Abstract
The United States (US) and Pakistan developed a relationship during the Musharraf era of simultaneous cooperation and coercion against each other. Pakistan helped both the US and the Taliban in their war in Afghanistan. The US aided and reimbursed Pakistan, but also violated its sovereignty on a sustained basis. Realism, Liberalism and prominent varieties of Constructivism do not explain this interaction. The explanation offered here is that each state had certain persistent concepts it applied repeatedly as new situations arose. The concepts are drawn empirically from the policy discourses of the two states after the Musharraf coup, the 9/11 attacks, and during the middle 2000s when Pakistan’s focus on Kashmir diminished but Taliban attacks in Afghanistan intensified. These concepts highlighted some aspects of these situations and occluded others. These descriptions of situations using these concepts formed episodes in situational narratives. The situational narratives do explain the observed interaction.
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