Q. In your last book, “Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military,” you wrote about the ties between Islamist movements and Pakistan’s U.S.-backed military and intelligence. To what extent is religious extremism in Pakistan an American creation?

The Americans inadvertently expanded religious extremism in Pakistan. But if you go back in history, Pakistan was already involved in supporting religious extremism in Afghanistan when the Americans launched their massive aid program for Afghan mujahedeen after the Soviet invasion in 1979. Religious extremist groups have been in Pakistan since 1947. And some of them have been embraced by the state as a means of nation-building.