In a rare moment of brutal honesty, Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Asif stood before his nation’s parliament and spoke the words many had thought but few dared say: America used Pakistan, then tossed it aside like trash, according to NDTV.
His admission cuts deep. Speaking to the National Assembly, Asif didn’t mince words about his country’s turbulent relationship with Washington, a partnership forged in the fires of Cold War politics and the chaos following 9/11. “Pakistan was treated worse than a piece of toilet paper,” he declared, “used for a purpose and then thrown away.”
The minister’s confession goes beyond diplomatic niceties. He pointed fingers at Pakistan’s own military dictators, Zia-ul-Haq and Pervez Musharraf, accusing them of dragging the nation into Afghanistan’s wars not for Islam, as citizens were told, but to please a superpower. Young Pakistanis were sent to fight under the banner of jihad, a framing Asif now calls “misleading and deeply damaging.”
The price? Staggering. While America eventually packed up and left Afghanistan, Pakistan remains trapped in the aftermath grappling with homegrown terrorism, radicalization, and economic wounds that may never heal. “The losses we suffered can never be compensated,” Asif said, his voice heavy with regret.
But perhaps most troubling is his claim that Pakistan’s entire education system was reshaped to justify these wars, embedding ideological changes that persist today. The terrorism plaguing Pakistan now, he admitted, is simply blowback from mistakes made by dictators chasing American approval.
It’s a sobering reckoning. In acknowledging these “irreversible” mistakes, Asif has done what few politicians dare; told his people an uncomfortable truth about their nation’s choices and the devastating consequences that followed.
The question now is whether Pakistan can learn from this painful history or remain haunted by it.
