U.S. Backing Wrong Horse in Pakistan

For decades, the U.S. strategy in Pakistan has been a fraught bargain: fund a powerful military to maintain a veneer of stability in a nuclear-armed nation, often at the expense of its democratic soul. That fragile bargain has now shattered, and Washington is perilously close to being on the wrong side of history.

A damning, 100-page report from the Commonwealth Observer Group—largely ignored by Pakistan’s government and given scant attention by the international community—provides irrefutable evidence that the February 2024 election was systematically rigged to sideline the country’s most popular political force, Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

The report’s conclusions are not mere allegations from a losing party; they are the meticulously documented findings of eminent international judges and election experts. They reveal a blueprint of democratic subversion that continues to fuel a deep and dangerous political crisis today.

The Blueprint of a Stolen Election

The Commonwealth report methodically details how state institutions were weaponized to create a “pre-election period that significantly impacted the level playing field.”

The two most consequential actions were judicial. First, the Supreme Court miraculously reversed a lifetime ban on politicians holding office, a move that Madiha Afzal of the Brookings Institution noted was designed to ensure “the scales had been tipped heavily” in favor of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the military’s preferred candidate.

Second, and most cripplingly, the Election Commission, with the Supreme Court’s blessing, stripped PTI of its iconic cricket bat election symbol. As Reuters reported, this was done “on technical grounds,” but the effect was catastrophic. PTI’s candidates were forced to run as independents, invisible on ballots to a population with significant illiteracy, and were legally barred from claiming their share of reserved seats.

The Commonwealth judges this with devastating diplomatic clarity: “While the reason for this decision had a basis in law, the negative consequences… appeared vastly disproportionate to the offence.”

On election day, the manipulation continued. Mobile networks were shut down nationwide, a move condemned by UN rapporteurs as contrary to international law. A voter in Lahore told the BBC, “Voters should be facilitated instead of having to face such hurdles… The shutdown made it impossible to book taxis or coordinate with family.” The blackout also conveniently caused the digital results transmission system to fail, opening the door for manual tampering.

Election watchdogs like the Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) reported that “election agents were not allowed to observe result tabulations in about half of the constituencies,” and documented “major discrepancies” between votes counted at polling stations and the results later declared.

Why This Should Alarm America

This is not just a story about a stolen election; it is about the active dismantling of a political outlet for millions of Pakistanis, particularly the youth. PILDAT’s Youth Report had presciently warned that if young people stay away from voting, “their opinion and pleas are ignored… a scenario that enhances their vulnerability to undemocratic and radical ideologies.”

Instead, in 2024, young voters turned out in record numbers, only to see their votes invalidated by what they perceive as a corrupt system. The U.S. must ask: what happens when the largest cohort in a nation of 240 million people loses faith not just in its government, but in the very concept of democracy?

The resulting government is a weak, illegitimate coalition of parties that, as Brookings Analysis stated, “will function as a junior partner to the military.” This is a government that has already handed “unprecedented power to the army.” America is now tethered to a regime with minimal popular support, whose primary constituency is the military brass, not the Pakistani people.

This internal decay has external consequences. The recent fiery exchange of nuclear rhetoric with India is a desperate diversion by a weak state. Randhir Jaiswal of the Indian Foreign Ministry called it Pakistan’s “stock-in-trade,” while Pakistan’s Foreign Office robotically asserted its “discipline and restraint.” This sabre-rattling is a classic tactic of a regime under internal pressure, and it risks spiraling into a conflict that would draw in the entire world.

The Root of the Crisis: A Failure of Foundation

The political crisis is a symptom of a deeper, more terrifying disease: the catastrophic failure of the state to educate its people. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Pakistan’s founder, declared education “a matter of life and death for our nation.” Decades later, as The Friday Times recently reported, Pakistan is ranked 125th out of 130 nations in education.

This has created a vacuum where critical thinking dies. As Carl Sagan observed, “You find kindergarteners full of deep questions… By 12th grade, they’ve become incurious. Something terrible has happened.” That “something terrible” is a system that produces citizens easier to manipulate and more susceptible to extremism—a direct threat to global security.

A Call for a Radical Rethink of U.S. Policy

The United States can no longer afford its shortsighted policy of prioritizing a “stable” military partnership over a stable, democratic Pakistan. That policy has created the very monster it sought to control: an unstable, nuclear-armed nation where the military is the only winner and the people are disenfranchised.

The path forward requires a fundamental shift. The U.S. must:

1. Loudly and publicly endorse the findings of the Commonwealth and other observer reports, making it clear that it stands with the Pakistani people, not any single general.
2. Condition all military aid on verifiable steps toward democratic restoration, including an independent investigation into the election irregularities and the intimidation of judges.
3. Massively pivot its investment from military hardware to the foundations of civil society: education, civic programs, and independent media.

Supporting an illegitimate, military-backed government might provide the appearance of a reliable partner in the short term, but the long-term outcome will be further radicalization and instability.

The Commonwealth report is the canary in the coal mine. It is a detailed, credible warning that the center cannot hold. The United States must decide if it will continue to prop up the forces breaking Pakistan apart, or if it will finally stand with the millions of Pakistanis demanding a democratic future. The wrong choice will have consequences far beyond Pakistan’s borders.