India’s Resort to Coercive Diplomacy (Excerpts)

The Indian government swiftly grasped the implications of the events of September 11 and immediately joined the U.S.-led global coalition against terrorism. From New Delhi’s point of view, the Taliban’s indirect complicity in the attacks, and Pakistan’s support for the Taliban, provided the best opportunity and hope that the United States would finally declare Pakistan a terrorist state. Assuming that Pakistan would find it difficult to withdraw support from the Taliban, the Indian government, in a seismic policy shift, offered unprecedented logistical and intelligence support for any U.S. operations in Afghanistan. The Indian leadership also tried to persuade the United States to form a coalition of democracies under a U.N. mandate to wage war against global terrorism.

However, India’s initial attempt to isolate Pakistan failed. Pakistan abandoned the Taliban and joined Washington in its campaign against global terrorism. The Musharraf regime also agreed to provide logistical and intelligence support for U.S. operations against the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. No other country could substitute for Pakistan’s help in this regard. Furthermore, after September 11^th, the Bush administration’s top policy goals in South Asia became regime change in Afghanistan, and the political and economic stabilization of Pakistan. Another goal was to ensure that Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal did not fall into the hands of fundamentalist Islamic groups. For these reasons, Washington refrained from declaring Pakistan a terrorist state. 

The Bush administration also disregarded the Indian government’s advice to forge a global coalition of democracies and wage the Afghan campaign under a U.N. mandate. Instead, the United States decided to go it alone in Afghanistan and assemble a revolving coalition of partners. Under this new approach, the United States would invite groups of countries to join in its global campaign against terrorism in different regions at different times. Each partner’s commitment to the war against terrorism and degree of participation would be determined by a composite matrix of its own domestic, regional, and global interests. However, Washington would pursue its agenda independent of any restraints of its partners’ priorities.

Having failed to either isolate Pakistan or form a global coalition of democracies, India shifted the focus of its diplomacy toward insulating itself from the potential negative fallout of the U.S. military operations in Afghanistan. India stepped up pressure on the Bush administration by publicly demanding that the United States address the problem of Pakistani-sponsored cross-border terrorism. In private, the Vajpayee government also demanded assurance that Washington would not impose itself as a mediator in the Kashmir dispute or resume military aid to Pakistan on the scale of the aid package extended to Islamabad during the 1980s.

The United States agreed with the Vajpayee government’s argument that the problem of terrorism could not be tackled piecemeal. However, Bush administration emissaries made it plain to New Delhi that due to the exigencies of the Afghan campaign and necessity of shoring up the Musharraf regime, Indian complaints would be addressed during the latter phase of the campaign. Washington also quietly assured Indian leaders that there would be no quid pro quo with Pakistan on Kashmir. And finally, there would be no repeat of U.S. military aid for Pakistan on the scale of the 1980s. U.S. leaders emphasized that Pakistan’s problems were essentially social, political, and economic. Hence, the planned U.S. aid package would be aimed at ensuring long-term political and economic stability in Pakistan.

Pakistan’s emergence as a frontline state in the global campaign against terrorism caused enormous consternation in New Delhi. Several senior Indian government leaders publicly fulminated that the United States was out to pursue its own narrow agenda and that India would have to fight its battle against terrorism alone. There was also greater anger and disillusionment that Pakistan, which had helped the Taliban secure power, whose intelligence agencies had extensive contact with Al Qaeda were in cahoots with radical Islamic groups fighting Jihad against Indian forces in Kashmir, had emerged as a frontline state in the new global campaign against terror.

Indian leaders also drew another significant lesson from the events of September 11. They foresaw that one of the inevitable consequences of the terrorist attacks on the United States would be reduced political tolerance for non-state actors waging war against state actors, especially if the targeted state was a democracy. For the first time in decades, the line between violent self-determination movements and terrorism had become blurred. Hence, India could capitalize on the emerging international environment to frame Pakistan’s support for the Kashmir insurgency as support for a campaign of terror.

Two events provided the Indian government with an opportunity to act. The first was the October 1 suicide attack on the Srinagar State Assembly by the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), which left 40 people dead. In response t the attack, the Indian government stepped up artillery attacks on Pakistan military units across the LoC in Kashmir as a means of ratcheting up military pressure on Islamabad. Simultaneously, Indian political leaders launched a high-profile diplomatic campaign to highlight the role of Pakistani state agencies in sponsoring terrorist activities in India. Unable to ignore the evidence any longer, the Bush administration branded the attack on the Srinagar state assembly as an attack on democracy and froze the JeM’s financial assets in the United States.

  The second incident was on the Indian parliament in New Delhi on December 13, 2001. An outraged Indian government framed the assault as an attack on the heart of India’s system of governance and compared it to the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York. The attack on the Indian parliament elicited global condemnation and persuaded the Bush administration to ban the LeT and JeM. It also finally provided the Vajpayee government with an incident of sufficient magnitude to alter the terms of engagement with Pakistan and threaten Islamabad with the prospects of a limited conventional war.

In the weeks following the attack on the parliament, India demanded that Pakistan crackdown on Pakistan-based militant groups waging Jihad in India; that Pakistan end support for cross-border terrorism; and that Pakistan handover 20 individuals accused of committing terrorist crimes in India. To force Islamabad’s compliance, the Vajpayee government systematically took several steps to increase political pressure on Pakistan through diplomatic measures backed by the explicit threat of military force.

On the political front, India downgraded diplomatic relations by recalling its ambassador to Pakistan and cutting its consular strength in Islamabad by 50 per cent; similar restrictions were imposed on Pakistan’s consular staff in India. The Indian government declared that all road and rail links with Pakistan would be suspended from January 1, 2002; similarly all flights of Pakistani airlines through Indian airspace would be banned. As an extreme diplomatic measure, India also threatened to withdraw from the 1960 Indus Water Treaty that regulated the sharing of waters from the eastern and western rivers of the Indus basin. Simultaneously, the Indian cabinet ordered the largest military mobilization since the 1971 Indo-Pak war over East Pakistan. Not only were the Indian Army, Air Force, and Navy placed on high-alert, but military units were redeployed from the eastern and northern front to signal the seriousness of India’s resolve. Borders were mined and armoured strike formations deployed menacingly on Pakistan’s eastern borders.

 

Gaurav Kampani, Placing the Indo-Pakistani Standoff in Perspective,

Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute of International Studies

 

 

Our great fear — that Pakistan’s usefulness, indeed its essentiality, to the course America has chosen, bodes greater trouble for us — can ultimately be countered only by making America realise that it has greater stakes in cooperation with us. The alternative of opposing America — either because we think them wrong in morality or intention, like our un(re)constructed, frozen Cold Warriors, or because it seems the only way to preempt the greater troubles apprehended from Pakistan — is simply not there. Our only counter would have been to stultify Pakistan as the instrument of choice, and today’s India is not in a position to do that — precisely the lesson to be learnt by those responsible all these years for stunting India’s potential.

Many observers saw here a patience that would allow policy- makers time to work out the best options. Alternatives were there, more difficult in themselves but freer from the harmful side effects of the Pakistan option — and Delhi did indeed do its best to point all this out. But leaders have to lead; the pressures for reassuring the American people soon of their capability as well as safety had to grow; delay had obvious advantages for the terrorists, and the Pakistan route was obviously the most immediately convenient. In the event, Washington chose to go after Osama bin Laden as its immediate response, and to dethrone the Taliban as his protector. Both consummations are devoutly to be wished, and India, surely, is the first to want it to succeed if it can — and with all possible speed. Our problem, that the objectives will not only prove harder to reach in themselves but cause dangerous side effects, especially for India is as pressing as it is real, but there is not much to be done if howling and posturing are your only strengths.

Gen. Powell’s visit sought to emphasise these long-term possibilities. The danger is that it will all be soft soap as against harder collaboration with Pakistan. The support for an early Indo-Pakistan dialogue on Kashmir was far more in tune with Pakistan’s views — as against references, unwelcome and unhelpful to us, to the centrality of the issue, the wishes of the people, human rights, we did not even secure respect for the Line of Control. Even the invitation to the Prime Minister to Washington could prove part of the effort to keep us hoping and therefore not rocking the boat while the U.S.-Pakistan nexus develops. But the rhetoric of shared values is not empty; it is as much up to us as to America to make it real.

Pakistan is already working against that risk: providing help today, it promises more tomorrow by swiftly turning against the extremists it had nurtured and relied on, and presenting itself as ‘moderate Islam’ — and many Americans are buying that Gen. Musharraf might save us by being ousted, but we would still have to work harder than our present political shenanigans seem to permit to safeguard our nationhood. The basics of that nationhood is pluralism — symbolised most prominently by Kashmir — which Pakistan is bent on undermining — with even more destructive help from our own Neanderthals. Ultimately, what we have to ensure is that, right or wrong, Jammu and Kashmir remains part of India. To seek Washington’s explicit — however secret — commitment to that, which is essential if they really value our democratic progress, will add to the complexities of Washington’s juggling act but that is inherent in their choice, and must not deter us.

The next act depends partly on what happens on the ground, in Afghanistan and elsewhere, but for us above all on reinvigorating our unique nationhood, building up our economic and military capabilities — in short, managing our affairs purposefully. That ultimately is the only way to undertake the infinitely difficult task of dealing with the immediate challenges arising from Pakistan’s restored usefulness to America, indeed, we have no other choice.

 

K. Shankar Bajpai, The Hindu, October 20, 2001 http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2001/10/20/stories/05202523.htm

 

India has to Achieve

‘Objectives’: Envoy

 

Indian Deputy High Commissioner Sudhir Vyas refused to rule out war against Pakistan, saying, “India has some objectives which have to be achieved.” Various options were open to India and a ‘final decision’ would be taken as the situation evolved, he told Dawn at the Wagah checkpoint on his arrival from New Delhi.

“No one wants war. But Pakistan must take action against the groups which, apparently, have been involved in violence and attack on Indian parliament,” he said. Mr. Vyas is in charge of the Indian High Commission in Islamabad after the withdrawal of HC Vijay Nambiar on December 21.

He said the seriousness and enormity of the attack on parliament had left a deep impression on India and its people. “The incident was seen as an attack on our sovereignty and in response, Pakistan must take steps against the groups involved in it,” he said in reply to the question whether India wanted to take a retaliatory action against Pakistan.

Asked to explain the term ‘objectives’ he had used the envoy said it was incumbent on Pakistan to take action against the groups ‘involved’ in violence in India. “The objectives, which India wants to achieve, will have to be achieved,” he reiterated.

When pointed out that Pakistan had already taken action against some Jihadi groups and wanted to go further if India provided any evidence of their involvement in the attack, the envoy described the action as a cosmetic one. “These are only media reports and we want credible measures.”

He parried a question why India was not responding to Pakistan’s offer for a joint investigation into the attack on parliament to find out who was really behind that. Asked what action Pakistan should take, Mr. Vyas said, “There is no need to give details as Pakistan government already knows it.”

 

Intikhab Hanif and Amjad Mahmood, Dawn Wire Service, December 27, 2001,

http://www.lib.virginia.edu/area- studies/SouthAsia/SAserials/Dawn/2001/dec2901.html

 

India Shuns Pakistan Talks Offer

 

New Delhi has shunned overtures from Pakistan to hold peace talks, saying its neighbour must do more to stop militants. With the shadow of war looming larger, India’s Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee brushed aside an offer from Pakistan’s President Gen. Pervez Musharraf to meet at a regional summit.

Musharraf had said Friday he was willing to meet with Vajpayee during a summit of South Asian nations in Nepal next week. But Vajpayee said on Saturday India will not deal with Pakistan until it stops supporting cross-border terrorism. Speaking at an executive committee meeting of his ruling Hindu-nationalist BJP party, Vajpayee said he wants more international pressure placed on Pakistan to shut down terrorism. He said the international community must show the same resolve towards Pakistan as it did towards Afghanistan in wiping out terrorism.

India blames Islamic militants for the December 13 attack on parliament that left 14 people dead. India claims Pakistan backs those militants, who seek independence for the disputed region of Kashmir.

Since the attack, witnesses have described a military buildup on both sides of the countries’ shared border, leading the international community to urge restraint and a reduction in the level of tension. Vajpayee said he would meet leaders of opposition parties Sunday to discuss the heated situation with Pakistan. He said his BJP party endorses all the measures the Indian government has taken so far, including a ban on Pakistani airliners entering its airspace and cuts in the size of the Pakistani diplomatic delegation in India. Pakistan imposed similar measures shortly after India acted Friday.

Vajpayee also criticized Pakistan’s motives for fighting terrorism along its western border with Afghanistan, saying Musharraf only joined the international coalition against terror so it could gain support for taking over Kashmir. Pakistani diplomatic sources complained India was embarking on dangerous brinkmanship at a time when Islamabad is committed to the allied effort to stop terrorism along its western border with Afghanistan, where thousands of Pakistani troops are deployed. On its eastern border with India, Pakistan has deployed the largest number of troops in years.

In New Delhi, Nirupama Rao, a foreign ministry spokeswoman, said India would examine reports of arrests in Pakistan of 50 suspected Islamic militants and terrorists — whose alleged patronage by Islamabad has brought the two nations close to war. Responding to U.S. President George W. Bush’s praise of Musharraf for the reported arrests, Rao told The Associated Press, “We will need to make our own assessment of the substance and nature of Pakistan’s actions.”

As the neighbours massed troops and traded tit-for-tat sanctions, President Bush said the United States was working hard to restore calm and prevent a fourth war between the South Asian countries. India’s government said Friday it will grant Musharraf an exception to its ban on Pakistani airliners entering its air space, allowing Pakistan’s president to fly over India en route to the Nepal summit next week.

Pakistan International Airlines, meanwhile, said it will suspend five routes, use Chinese air space for other routes and shut down its offices in India because of that country’s action. India also extended until January 5 the time it had given half of Pakistan’s diplomatic corps in New Delhi to leave the country. India announced the sanctions Thursday, originally ordering the diplomats out within 48 hours.

In a statement released in Moscow Friday, foreign ministers from the Group of Eight leading industrial nations called for the two countries to resume political dialogue and urged Pakistan to crack down on terrorist groups operating from within its borders. The call for dialogue was echoed by the Organization of the Islamic Conference, which also issued a statement urging restraint.

“Resorting to arms and to the use of force will never resolve the problems, but would rather further aggravate hostility... and lead to human, economic and social tragedies of colossal dimension,” OIC Secretary General Abdelwahed Belkeziz said. Vajpayee is facing elections in India’s biggest state and three others in February and is under intense pressure from his own party and many ordinary Indians to take tough action. The United States fears a conflict between Indian and Pakistan will hamper its war against terrorism, including its hunt for Osama bin Laden, blamed for masterminding the September 11 attacks on the United States.

 

CNN, December 30, 2001,

http://asia.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/asiapcf/south/12/29/india.pakistan.talks/?related

 

Tempers Tempered

 

Yeh ladai ab aar-paar ki ladai hai (This will be a fight to the finish) — Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, after the attack on Parliament on December 13.

Given the aggressive posturing of the BJP vis-à-vis Pakistan, the perception was that the December 13 attack on Parliament would evoke a furious response from the BJP government. The early indications were that New Delhi had no option but to act. Public statements by senior NDA ministers like home minister L.K. Advani all seemed to point to this. Many BJP MPs were even seeing war clouds on the horizon.

In fact the day after the strike, the government demanded that Pakistan take action against the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammad. Foreign secretary Chokila Iyer summoned Pakistan high commissioner Jehangir Qazi and gave him an earful. But by the end of the fortnight, it appeared that the government’s initial emotional response had been tempered by pleas for caution from the international community and to some extent the Opposition.

But Vajpayee turned tack. “There can be no hasty decision in choosing between war and peace. We must be patient and take a comprehensive view of all options,” a cool and collected prime minister told Parliament on December 19. Even Advani had tempered his ‘we will get them at whatever cost’ posturing.

The hawks in and outside government were brought up short when word got around that immediate strikes across the LoC would not yield dividends because the targets — the terrorist training camps in PoK — had moved away, perhaps towards the Afghanistan border. A diplomatic offensive would have to be the first option, as minister of state for external affairs Omar Abdullah spelt out in Parliament.

CPI(M) leader Somnath Chatterjee says U.S. pressure moderated the government’s stand, rather than any political or strategic considerations. “There is talk of consultations, but no value is given to the views of the Opposition which had been advocating moderation from the beginning. If the government has realised that it cannot precipitate a confrontation, it must be on the advice of their friend, George Bush.”

Congress leaders, however, believe that a belated realisation of strategic and diplomatic compulsions prompted the government to sound a note of caution. According to them, it became clear that there could be no question of an open conflict. Notes Congress MP Kapil Sibal: “The decisive battle the PM mentioned isn’t possible in this day and age. The potential dangers are horrendous.”

For Vajpayee, a firm-but-cautious approach began to make political sense after the Opposition put the ball firmly in his court. While it would back the PM, the Opposition said, the ultimate decision would be that of the government alone. The Congress consciously adopted the role of a ‘constructive opposition.’

This represented a changed stance from that of December 13. At the CWC meeting that day, Sonia Gandhi had decided to go for the government’s jugular. Usually, she listens to all shades of opinion and lets a consensus evolve, but on that day she was quite vocal and insisted the party put the government on the mat. Cheered on by CWC member Kamal Nath, she ignored advice from Congress veterans that the party adopt a moderate approach and stress solidarity with the government rather than reproach it for security lapses.

At the CPP meeting the next day, Sibal suggested that this was wrong but was reportedly snubbed. But later, with the BJP piping down on its war plank and Vajpayee looking for support from the Opposition, the tide turned. Even Sonia realised that it was necessary to present a united front and leave it to the government.

The change in gears yielded immediate dividends, with Sonia’s understated speech drawing kudos across the board. It also ensured that if the government blundered, the blame would be laid directly at the PM’s door and no charge of an uncooperative opposition could be made. As had happened during Kargil.

 

Bhavdeep Kang, Outlook India, December 31, 2001, http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?sid=3&fodname=20011231&fname=Cover+Story    

 

 

 

Vajpayee — Converting the Drums of War into Shots of War?

 

The terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament building on December 13 last, to say the least, was a despicable and dastardly act. What was the aim and purpose behind this senseless attack would remain a mystery till someone involved in its planning or execution is apprehended. However, the emotions this attack generated amongst the Indian Government leaders and the general public was nothing short of mass war hysteria. The government and the people, both already over-wrought with paranoia caused by the unabated decade long freedom struggle of the brave Kashmiri people, Kargil fiasco, India’s abiding dream of getting Pakistan declared a state harbouring terrorists and a desire to draw world’s attention away from the festering Kashmir problem, the authorities virtually declared, even before the fire-fight was over, that the terrorists belonged to Jaish-e-Muhammad and Lashkar-e-Taiba.

The Prime Minister Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee said, “India’s response to terrorism would be unveiled across many fronts.” Adding, India would portray Pakistan as a breeding ground for terrorism to the “global coalition to fight against terrorism.” The Defence Minister, Mr. George Fernandes directly held Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence responsible for the attack on Parliament. The Union Finance Minister said that fear of economic difficulties would not deter the Government from taking “any action, if it is essential.” Mr. Advani set India’s priorities in his usual bellicose, cliché-driven, sabre-rattling fashion by fulminating against the political genesis of Pakistan as a theocratic state and questioning the two-nation theory that gave birth to Pakistan. The Indian Cabinet resolved that India would liquidate terrorists whoever they are, wherever they are.

If the purport of terrorist action was not clear, the motives behind Indian moves could not be hidden. Cleverly worded statements by senior Indian government leaders and specially prepared programmes by India’s electronic media, so emotionally charged the general public that they had no option left but to call for hot pursuit of terrorist phantoms and to strike at the so-called terrorist bases in Azad Kashmir. By creating this charged atmosphere, India hoped to brow beat Pakistan, which had committed a large number of its troops on its long Western border to stop infiltration by fleeing Al-Qaeda and foreign elements of Taliban forces, into agreeing to unreasonable Indian demands. Failing that, India wanted to ensure that the U.S. and other countries declare Pakistan a terrorist state or a state harbouring terrorists. But Pakistan and more mercifully the rest of the world too did not fall prey to Indian wiles and refused to oblige India. However, it was heartening   that most Indian English language editorials and many readers’ letters drew attention towards the need of a carefully considered response to terrorism rather than an emotionally charged military response. Whether the Indian government would pay heed to this advice is still to be seen.

Another report stated that the terrorist group was in fact heading for Delhi Airport when for some reason they changed their minds and headed for the parliament instead. The scale of confusion amongst the Indian authorities was such that no one remembers who called the Army to take over security of the Parliament buildings and of some VIP residences. The Army authorities obliged not knowing who had asked or invited them to take over.

While the Indian government beats its head against the proverbial wall, to get Pakistan declared “a supporter of terrorism in the eyes of the world,” the real perpetuators of the crime might in fact be the Indian intelligence agency RAW itself. It is reputed to have master minded the massacres of Sikh villagers and of Hindu yatrees in Kashmir, and of hi-jacking the Indian Airline’s aircraft to Afghanistan, as well as, being involved in the recent hi-jacking drama in India that misfired. Most bomb explosions and firing incidents in Pakistan are also attributed to this nefarious organisation. However, it is important that the ideological and nationalistic fervour of RAW personnel be never underestimated. It was my own experience to see the Head of RAW for Western Europe during the early seventies, let his son commit suicide rather than, for reasons of dharam, let him marry a French girl. The RAW Head enjoyed an under cover appointment dealing with UNESCO in Paris at that time.

Another possibility could be that this act of 13th December was carried out by a cadre of Al-Qaeda. After all, ever since Taliban emerged as a force in Afghanistan, India has been backing the Northern Alliance (NA) against the former, with all kinds of support, including military. Even earlier, India was the sole democratic country of the world to support Communist Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Later, with the emergence of Taliban and Al-Qaeda, India built a large modern hospital just across the Northern border of Afghanistan, which served as a conduit of military training and supplies to Northern Alliance and even before 11th March, acted as the hiding place for NA helicopters attacking Taliban and Al-Qaeda forces. In March this year, under a pact with the Northern Alliance (NA) and in association with four other countries, the Indians started training NA military personnel in a big way, Furthermore, India has encouraged important Northern Alliance’s leaders to keep their families resident in New Delhi, where they rest even today. All these factors could be used as sufficient justification for Al-Qaeda cum Taliban elements to organise attacks on targets in India.

In fact, according to Indian press reports, “Maharashtra had alerted the Central Government on a possible attack using aircraft a la the attack on the World Trade Centre, on the Parliament House — more than a month ago — based on the information culled from the lengthy interrogation of suspected Al-Qaeda operative, Mohammad Afroz Abdul Razack, by the Mumbai police. Not only did the Deputy Chief Minister, Mr. Chagan Bhujbal, inform the Union Home Minister, Mr. L.K. Advani, about the potential threat but the Centre was also involved in the questioning. Speaking to The Hindu today (13 December), Mr. Bhujbal said — what was a threat, has happened. Only the modus operandi seems to have changed.”

There is also the possibility that to avenge what has happened in Afghanistan, Al-Qaeda/Taliban decided to carry out this act of sheer terrorism in New Delhi to heighten tension and hostility between Pakistan and India to a level that could lead to an outbreak of hostilities between the two.  Even if active hostilities were avoided, it would have drawn away a large number of Pakistani troops from the West to the East, thus thinning out troop concentration along the Afghan border and leaving gaps through which the Al- Qaeda cadre could withdraw into Pakistan’s frontier region.

Under the circumstances, and to prevent all that has been described above, President Musharraf has remained unruffled and responded to Indian rhetoric and provocation in a dignified manner as befits a seasoned statesman. It is surprising that Mr. Vajpayee is afraid to accept General Musharraf’s offer of either sharing information with the Government of Pakistan, or, having a joint investigation on this act of terrorism, which he and all Pakistanis have vehemently condemned. He has further promised to take proper action against any Pakistani guilty party. One wonders why then Mr. Vajpayee is prevaricating? Does he really want to convert the drums of war into shots of war? One hopes not and prays that better sense would prevail before it gets too late. It is needless to point out that the consequences of any future war between the two nuclear neighbours could not be pleasant for either country.

 

Vice Adm. (Retd.) Iqbal F. Quadir, Defence Journal, January 2002,

http://www.defencejournal.com/2002/january/vajpayee.htm

 

India, Pakistan Easing Standoff

 

India and Pakistan exchanged information about each other’s nuclear facilities today, continuing an annual cooperative practice even as both nations have severed transportation links, limited diplomatic contacts and deployed tens of thousands of troops along their shared border.

The exchange of the lists, which include the exact location of their nuclear installations, is the latest sign of an easing of a tense standoff between the two countries, which both tested nuclear weapons in 1998.

They have been trading the lists since 1992 under an agreement that they will refrain from attacking each other’s nuclear facilities in the event of a war. Both have said there is no chance that their current dispute will escalate into nuclear war.

On Monday, in a move that India called ‘a step forward,’ Pakistan announced that it had arrested more than two dozen Islamic militants, including the leader of a guerrilla group, Lashkar-i-Taiba, that India has blamed for an attack December 13 on its Parliament complex. Last week, Pakistani authorities detained almost 50 militants, among them the leader of another group, Jaish-i-Muhammad, which allegedly orchestrated the Parliament attack.

Today, there were indications that Pakistan’s crackdown was continuing. A Jaish official said that more than a dozen of its activists had been detained in the southern province of Sindh.

But a spokesman for Pakistan’s foreign ministry said today that authorities would not take action against 20 alleged terrorists that India wants extradited until India provides evidence against them.

In his New Year address today, India’s prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, said that his country was willing to extend a ‘hand of alliance’ to Pakistan if it continues to rein in militants who have carried out terrorist attacks in India. “Take effective steps to stop cross-border terrorism and you will find India willing to walk more than half the distance to work closely with Pakistan to resolve, through dialogue, any issue,” he said in comments directed at Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

Although Indian officials dismissed the possibility of a face-to-face meeting between Vajpayee and Musharraf at a summit of regional leaders in Nepal later this week, the officials said no decision had been made about whether the Indian and Pakistani foreign ministers would meet.

Pakistan has urged India to agree to a meeting, but Indian officials had maintained that Pakistan must clamp down on its militant groups first for a meeting to be productive. With Pakistan taking steps in that direction, political analysts in New Delhi said that a meeting by the foreign ministers now appears increasingly likely.

After the attack on Parliament, Indian leaders said they were considering ordering military strikes against Pakistan, which they accuse of arming and training the militants. India’s decision to dispatch troops and ballistic-missile batteries to its border led to a similar mobilization in Pakistan.

India and Pakistan also have reduced the sizes of each other’s diplomatic missions and have halted cross-border passenger rail, bus and air travel. With many people unable to get seats on the packed last trains and airplanes out of India on Monday, India today said it would allow two Pakistan International Airlines flights to carry Pakistanis out of New Delhi and the southern port city of Bombay this week.

Despite that and other political gestures, Indian and Pakistani troops exchanged heavy gunfire today along the Line of Control that partitions the disputed Kashmir region, officials said. Indian police blamed militants for attacks that killed six civilians and two soldiers in Kashmir today.

 

Rajiv Chandrasekaran, The Washington Post, January 2, 2002,

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A49361-2002Jan1?html

 

Upping the Ante

 

Despite the rhetoric about a possible military response that emanated from the corridors of power in New Delhi, war clouds seemed distant as the New Year dawned. But the tough diplomatic measures New Delhi took against Islamabad following the terrorist attack on Parliament House have heightened tensions significantly. India’s decision in the last week of December to impose new sanctions against Pakistan has virtually added a new dimension to the crisis.

The Indian government started raising the diplomatic stakes with a decision in the third week of December to recall its High Commissioner in Islamabad. Such an action was not taken prior to the 1971 war with Pakistan. Despite requests from countries such as the United States and China asking for restraint on both sides, India went ahead and imposed tougher measures against Pakistan. The Pakistan government has been asking for evidence of its involvement in the December 13 attack on Parliament House. The Government of India has shown the ‘evidence’ to the U.S. and a few other countries, but New Delhi is of the view that media reports would suffice for Islamabad.

The new measures included a reduction in the staff at the High Commission in Pakistan by half and a ban on Pakistani civilian flights from overflying India. In a reciprocal action, Pakistan banned the entry of Indian flights into its air space. Earlier the government announced that it was stopping the Delhi-Lahore bus service and the ‘Samjhauta’ train service between the two countries. These two services were popular with the poor in both the countries. The banning of overflights is likely to have a more serious impact on India as Indian commercial air traffic stands to lose more.

These measures were taken after a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS). The government had stated that it was not satisfied with the action taken by the Pakistan government against militant organisations such as the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) and the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM). The measures taken by Islamabad included the banning of the two organisations and the purported arrest of Maulana Masood Azhar, head of the JeM.

External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh said in the last week of December that these measures were ‘inadequate.’ There have been reports that the two banned organisations had adequate warning about the impending action and had changed their signboards and shifted their financial assets to secret holdings. Jaswant Singh said that terrorism had to be eradicated fully and that it should not be justified on any grounds or under any name. He described the situation along the western border as tense and said that India was prepared to deal with any eventuality. He, however, described the measures taken by the Indian government as ‘minimal’; he expressed the hope that Pakistan would take urgent steps to curb the activities of the terrorists.

Before the new measures were taken, in a show of belligerence, Defence Minister George Fernandes spoke about ‘missiles being positioned’ along the border. India’s Defence Ministry described the Indian troop movements along the border as a response to large-scale Pakistani troop movements.

The U.S. seems to have made it abundantly clear to New Delhi that it does not want any serious military diversion for the Pakistani Army at this juncture. The focus of the Pakistani and American military is on Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan as on the hunt for Osama bin Laden and the remnants of the Al Qaeda.

The Pakistan side claims that all its moves have been of a defensive nature, in response to the Indian military build-up. Indian defence officials allege that Pakistan had moved forward its Hatf-1 and Hatf-11 missiles. Pakistan has, however, denied that it has repositioned its missiles. The talk of missiles being repositioned near the border has alarmed the international community. There is suspicion that both countries have armed at least some of their missiles with nuclear warheads.

The Indian Army has decided to cancel the annual Army Day Parade on January 15. This is meant to be a signal to Pakistan that every soldier is being mobilised for possible action. New Delhi has frozen the hotline between the Directors-General of Military Operations (DGMOs) of the two countries.

There are signs that the Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies are beating the drums of war in order to whip up jingoism, keeping in mind the Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh. In Meerut, the BJP mobilised its supporters to cheer the Army units moving to the front. The local administration was utilised to truck in the crowds. Several opposition parties allege that the BJP is trying to whip up war hysteria, hoping that the surge in patriotic fervour would help it at the polls.

Top Central Ministers and bureaucrats have added their bit too. Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha has said that the Indian economy was strong enough to absorb the cost of a war. Some bureaucrats in his Ministry have gone to the extent of saying that a war could actually help the economy. Home Minister L.K. Advani, speaking on the Raising Day function of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) on December 28, said that India was committed to winning the war against terrorism. “We want to win this on our own. If the world supports us, it is good. If not, we will not bother.”

Among the major political parties, only the Left parties have openly criticised the moves of the BJP-led government against Pakistan. They had hoped that the government would take the opposition into confidence before taking important decisions. The Left parties have characterised many of the recent actions of the government, starting from the recall of the High Commissioner in Islamabad, as inopportune. They have warned that hastily implemented moves would only push India into a diplomatic corner.

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), in a statement, said that the Indian government should place all the evidence it has against the perpetrators of the December 13 attack before the United Nations and the international community. This would provide the necessary backing to the demand that organisations like the Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Toiba, which operated from Pakistan, be proceeded against, it said. The Pakistan President will then be called to act on his statement that if evidence is produced, action will be taken against those responsible, the statement said.

International sympathy was with New Delhi immediately after the attack on Parliament House. But the talk of ‘hot pursuit’ across the borders by top Indian government functionaries and BJP leaders has alarmed the international community. Given the volatile history of the Indian subcontinent, there are fears that any ‘hot pursuit’ could end up in a full-blown war. The fact that both countries are nuclear powers has made the situation even more alarming. Influential Western newspapers have already started speculating about a conventional war between India and Pakistan escalating into a nuclear confrontation.

Many analysts fear that the full-scale military mobilisation and the tough rhetoric may make it difficult for the Indian government to make diplomatic concessions and start serious negotiations. The U.S. administration, which appeared sympathetic to Indian concerns immediately after the December 13 attack, now seems to have tilted yet again in Pakistan’s favour. President George W. Bush told the media on December 28 that President Pervez Musharraf was doing his bit to crack down on terrorism and that therefore New Delhi and Islamabad should resume their dialogue at the earliest. He said his administration was trying to stop the “escalation of force by India and Pakistan.”

U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on the same day that American troops were stationed in Pakistan and they should not come in harm’s way. In a message obviously directed at New Delhi, he said that Pakistani forces had not been redeployed from the Afghanistan border in spite of the rising tensions. He said that Pakistani forces were doing a fine job, policing the border with Afghanistan. American troops are said to have virtually taken over the Pakistani military base in Jacobabad. For all practical purposes, the two countries are now firm military allies, as they were until the late 1980s. During the 1971 war, India at least had a defence treaty with the former Soviet Union to fall back on.

Today, though there is widespread support for India as a victim of terrorism, there are very few takers for India’s recipe for a military solution to the problem of terrorism. Even Russia has called for a speedy resumption of dialogue between New Delhi and Islamabad to defuse the spiralling tensions. It was at Russia’s initiative that the Group of Eight Foreign Ministers issued a statement condemning the attack on Parliament House. The G-8 called on Pakistan to crack down on the terrorist outfits operating from its soil.

The G-8 Foreign Ministers at the same time voiced ‘serious concern’ over the build-up of tension between India and Pakistan and expressed the hope that the two countries would “avoid escalation, resume political dialogue in the spirit of the Lahore Declaration, and join their efforts in combating the global threat of terrorism.” There have been calls from important capitals almost on a daily basis to the Indian External Affairs Minister counselling restraint and resumption of dialogue. But it will be difficult for New Delhi now to tone down the rhetoric suddenly.

However, all doors have not been shut. There are strong indications that Jaswant Singh and Pakistan Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar will meet on the sidelines during the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) summit in Kathmandu in the first week of January. Musharraf has repeatedly emphasised that he wants to talk to Prime Minister Vajpayee during the summit.

On December 29, the Indian government formally rejected Musharraf’s offer. Foreign Ministry sources said that though India was always for a dialogue with Pakistan, talks would be possible only after Pakistan “creates a climate conducive to acting meaningfully against terrorism.” President Bush, whom both the BJP-led government and Musharraf seem to be willing to accept as an arbiter, has said that he may talk personally to Vajpayee and Musharraf to help in deescalating the tension.

Meanwhile, New Delhi continues to talk tough. It has ignored Bush’s suggestion that India carefully assess the steps taken by the Pakistani government after December 13. Bush had said that Musharraf had taken strong action by arresting more than a hundred hardcore terrorists. The Indian Foreign Ministry spokesperson said that India would make an ‘independent assessment’ of the reports and then decide on its future course of action.

 

John Cherian, Frontline, Volume 19 - Issue 1, January 5-18, 2002,

http://www.flonnet.com/fl1901/19010170.htm 

 

The Dogs of War (Excerpts)

 

The prospect of war menaces India and Pakistan as thousands of troops, missiles, tanks and heavy artillery are deployed on the border, and as the rhetoric of mutual hostility is ratcheted up with each passing day. The military build-up is vastly larger than the preparations before and during the Kargil war. Greater too is the use of devious political argument and varied forms of pretence and deception. This last category includes the show of injured innocence by the leaders of the two countries.

Thus, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee told a Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha rally on December 25 that India ‘does not war’; war is being ‘thrust’ upon it. Home Minister L.K. Advani took the same line. But their government is daily cranking up its belligerent anti-Pakistan rhetoric. On December 27, it upped the ante for the second time in a week by taking tough diplomatic measures against Pakistan. There are signs that India has arbitrarily broadened its agenda and now wants Pakistan to take ‘effective’ action against all terrorist groups, not just against the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammed. It has rejected Pakistan’s December 26-27 moves, including the detention of 30 militants, as ‘cosmetic’ and insincere.

The Vajpayee government has also contemptuously dismissed the suggestion that it should share with Pakistan the evidence of the LeT’s and the JeM’s culpability for December 13. At the same time, it charges Pakistan with failure to discharge its ‘responsibility’. It says Pakistan is not doing ‘enough’ to fight terrorism, but does not say what constitutes ‘enough’. It increasingly appears unreasonable. This unreasonableness goes back to September 11 and even earlier. It bears recalling that India was peeved when President Bush first demanded that Musharraf join the so-called ‘international coalition’ against terrorism, or face the consequences. India protested against Pakistan’s inclusion and proposed that a ‘Concert of Democracies’, excluding Pakistan, should be the right agency to fight terrorism.

According to highly placed sources in the defence services, the Vajpayee government had made, well before September 11, a plan to launch punitive attacks against Pakistan across the Line of Control. The ‘October 20 Plan’ was inspired as much by the Bharatiya Janata Party’s communal antipathy towards Pakistan as by its desire to “teach Islamabad a lesson” for fomenting terrorism in Kashmir. September 11 put paid to this scheme. Other aggressive plans were also made under Vajpayee, as part of its ‘pro-active’ Kashmir policy.

The Vajpayee government is now planning just such a misadventure under Right-wing pressure related to Uttar Pradesh politics. Many political commentators have long suspected this. Now there is strong evidence. On December 20, Vajpayee was grilled for two hours by Rajnath Singh at a meeting attended by top-ranking leaders of the BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh including L.K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Jana Krishnamurthy and Kushabhau Thakre. (The Telegraph and The Asian Age, December 22) They reportedly told him that all of Rajnath Singh’s Hindutva work in Uttar Pradesh would be wiped out unless India launches military strikes to show that it is not a ‘soft state’. War may be the BJP’s sole vote-winning device after it has lost all its trump cards. If the BJP loses Uttar Pradesh, the ramshackle National Democratic Alliance could itself come tumbling down.

Given its visceral hostility towards Pakistan and aggressive past plans, the Vajpayee government is being sanctimoniously hypocritical in claiming that it “does not war.” In reality, it is making all the belligerent moves. It is painting itself into a corner as it takes a tougher and tougher line, from which it will find it hard to climb down. The logic of this position is, simply put, war.

Nothing could be more undesirable in strategic, social, political and economic terms, or more unproductive as regards India’s stated objective of countering terrorism, than war. To demand that a military attack on Pakistan, however limited in range, must be averted at all costs is neither to minimise the gravity of what happened on December 13, nor ignore Islamabad’s overall complicity in terrorist activities, especially in Kashmir. Rather, the rationale of the argument is that India’s diplomatic options are broader and worthy of trial. It is India’s duty to explore and develop them fully.

The top brass of India’s armed forces is opposed to the use of military force in today’s circumstances. It has repeatedly expressed this reluctance in the Cabinet Committee on Security and even in public statements. This is also the mood among a majority of retired Generals and Admirals who have publicly commented on the issue, including V.P. Malik, L. Ramdas, V.N. Sharma, Shankar Roychowdhury, V.R. Raghavan and Afsir Karim. The restraint they advocate contrasts sharply with our political leaders’ sabre-rattling.

In fact, we may be witnessing the first disconnect since independence in perceptions between the country’s political and military leaders. Even when Sam Maneckshaw offered to quit over pressure to attack East Pakistan prematurely in early 1971, he disagreed with Indira Gandhi over the timing, not the basic military strategy.

The services chiefs reportedly believe that attacks on Pakistani territory will yield poor results while carrying high risks. Our forces lack accurate information on the location of such few ‘training camps’ as remain after most were shifted deep into Pakistan. (Most Kashmir militants do not undergo rigorous training which needs elaborate and permanent facilities, as opposed to temporary parade/drill grounds and firing ranges). Given the information constraints, high-altitude air strikes will be largely ineffective. Low-flying planes will be vulnerable to ground fire. Most suspect camps are beyond the range of heavy artillery.

That leaves the options of ‘pro-active’ ground attacks and ‘hot pursuit.’ These are fraught with high casualties. ‘Hot pursuit’ over land, as distant from the sea, is legally problematic unless it is subsumed under self-defence. Any ground-troops operation is likely to escalate. Today there can be no ‘limited war’ or swift ‘surgical’ strikes between India and Pakistan. Given their relative strategic parity, any military confrontation will last several weeks. This might mean opening up many fronts, on some of which India is vulnerable.

An Indian attack will certainly trigger Pakistani retaliatory strikes. Musharraf cannot afford to be seen cowed down by India. After the Taliban’s defeat, and the collapse of Islamabad’s quarter-century-old Afghanistan policy (including its reversal by him), he has no option but to hit back hard. Already he is facing flak from the religious Right for ‘selling out’ to the Americans and losing the ‘strategic depth’ supposedly offered by Afghanistan.

A protracted war will all but destroy Pakistan’s fragile economy. India’s own economy will be set back by many years. Besides, there is a likelihood that the war will escalate into a nuclear conflagration. Any use of nuclear weapons is totally, absolutely, unacceptable — irrespective of the circumstances. Even the threats of use must be defused. Nuclear wars cannot be won. They are suicidal and genocidal for all concerned. They must never be fought.

We must pause and ask what New Delhi will achieve even if, short of a nuclear holocaust, it ‘wins’ the war — leading to Musharraf’s fall (or assassination), a general collapse of Pakistan’s state, and its disintegration along ethnic lines. A failed state collapsing on one’s borders is disastrous enough — as Pakistan has discovered in respect of Afghanistan. A nuclear power disintegrating would be catastrophic for India.

We must acknowledge that our military options against Pakistan are limited, fraught with grave danger, or ineffectual. Instead of discouraging terrorism, they will, at minimum, encourage extremist, irresponsible conduct on the part of an embittered neighbour. Tragically, India’s rulers are contemplating such a course. Their motivation is profoundly irrational and vengeful. It is to teach Islamabad a U.S.-style or Israeli-style ‘lesson’. But Pakistan is not Gaza. And India’s ability militarily to bend Musharraf to its dictates is limited.

More important, Indian leaders know that Musharraf probably did not order the attack on Parliament House. He would have to be insane to do so when he is under watch or attack, both externally and internally. On the one hand, he is under close, probably intrusive, American scrutiny, and under pressure to deliver on his premise to act against terrorists. On the other hand, he is targeted by religious extremists. His Interior Minister’s brother was recently killed by them. They describe him as a ‘traitor’ and a ‘sell-out’. In all probability, December 13 was an amateurish operation by a group acting independently of Musharraf.

Vajpayee capitulated to Right-wing pressure when he took harsh diplomatic measures against Pakistan on December 21 and 27. He is now under even greater pressure to ratchet up hostility till war becomes likely, even inevitable. Besides cancelling Pakistan’s most-favoured-nation trade status, the government is considering abrogating the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty, an act that could lead to starving Pakistan of much-needed water.

Such measures will erode India’s diplomatic leverage, and inflict heavy punishment upon Pakistan, thus breeding more resentment — without encouraging moderate, reasonable conduct on its part. They will also weaken secular Pakistani opinion which stands for moderation. Abrogating something like the Indus Treaty would be tantamount to laying economic siege to a country, which is impermissible under international law. (India once almost invited stiff Security Council sanctions for choking off the flow of the Ganga to Bangladesh.) The Treaty pertains to the Indus Basin (26 million hectares), the largest irrigated area of any one-river system in the world. It comprises the eastern rivers, the Sutlej, the Beas and the Ravi, and the western Indus, Jhelum and Chenab. The Treaty basically allots the waters of the eastern rivers to India and most of the flows of the western rivers to Pakistan. Much of Pakistan’s agriculture is critically dependent on these flows. Killing the Treaty will cause it irreversible damage.

There is a sane, rational, cool-headed, low-risk alternative to such destructive measures. India should take the December 13 terrorist issue to the wider world, in particular to the Security Council on the basis of solid evidence. It should invoke Security Council Resolution 1373, mandating all states to take effective action against terrorism — on pain of sanctions. This will generate the right kind of pressure on Musharraf to take verifiable measures, including the arrest of extremist leaders, a clampdown on their facilities and assets, and destruction of their ISI links.

This course has the merit of winning – and retaining – the support of the international community on a transparent multilateral basis and of impelling Musharraf to fight a menace for which Pakistan has paid heavily. This will also help New Delhi build upon today’s favourable situation in Kashmir. The Taliban’s defeat has had a huge impact on the Valley. This creates a big opening to revitalise the political process and get the All-Parties Hurriyat Conference to participate in the next Assembly elections. War will close that opening. Good diplomacy will expand it and create conditions in which terrorism gets thoroughly discredited and foreign militants get isolated.

However, as a precondition, the government must abandon its military-adventurist approach. The Left has been pushing for this change. Now Centrist parties such as the Congress(I), Samajwadi, Bahujan Samaj and the NDA’s ‘secular’ components must join in. They must not lend uncritical, unconditional support to the government’s ‘anti-terrorist’ fight. Such life-and-death issues are too precious to be left to any one group, especially the sectarian-communal BJP-RSS.

 

Praful Bidwai, Frontline, Volume 19 - Issue 1, January 5 - 18, 2002,

http://www.flonnet.com/fl1901/19010190.htm

 

War or Peace — India’s Quandary?

 

Seize the moment and cash opportunities. This was the strategy a la mode throughout modern history, a period lasting three centuries led by Western Europe. When the powerful indulged, it was termed ‘realism’. If the weak did likewise, it became ‘not selling oneself cheap’. Many under-developed countries after their independence adopted the latter as their policy to safeguard national interests and for development.

Today, ‘realism’ or ‘not selling oneself cheap’ was called  ‘pragmatism’. In it there existed not room for morality. In fact, those who sought after morality were dubbed as unrealistic, backward, obscurantist or at the least ‘the weak’. India adopted this pragmatism as her favoured policy immediately after independence. Pakistan, Hyderabad, Kashmir and India’s other neighbours, all suffered in different degrees as a consequence of this subterfuge.

Yet, despite Indian lack of sincerity and morality, and injuries done to Pakistan, we cannot wish India away. Fate has decreed her to be our neighbour and both have to learn to live as good neighbours. Better understanding could lead to beneficial vistas of co-operation for both in which India would be the gainer. Through Pakistan, India would be able to economically and easily access expanding markets in the vast Central Asian Region, West Asia, Western China, Russia and Europe, and in return obtain from there vitally needed oil, gas and other inputs for her expanding economy. But the Indian leadership is too blinded by the glitter of higher ambitions. It wants India to become the regional power in South and Central Asia before going on to become a super power.

India knows very well that half a century of confrontation has produced little good for either country. Both have suffered greatly with Pakistan getting divided by Indian perfidy and India in the bargain losing her half a century old ‘Western aided race’ to develop faster than China. A legacy of a dream of Pandit Nehru to show to the world that democracy could produce faster results than Communism. This idea was bought by the West and then supported to the hilt. But consequences of continued confrontation with Pakistan resulted in India lagging at least a decade behind China. Diversion of resources towards massing troops on Pakistan’s border these days would enlarge this gap even more. India’s anticipated 6 per cent GDP growth this year was already on the way down for other reasons to 5 per cent and would surely fall further as a consequence of her present confrontation with Pakistan. This compared to China’s GDP growth of 7.8 per cent during 2001 and 8 per cent for 2000. China’s per-capita GDP at US$ 855 in the year 2000 was similarly almost double that of India’s. 

With Pakistan and India now nuclear weapon states, the stakes of confrontation have become higher; not only for the region but for the rest of the world too. The latter’s concern was truly reflected in the manner it reacted to India’s threatening posture against Pakistan. All countries that matter immediately despatched their leaders to cool down India. Others telephoned and counselled bilateral talks. Further, it is not generally known that when an Indian Corps Commander moved his Armoured forces too close to Pakistan, United States immediately moved some of her naval forces closer to Kutch. Their redeployment had an immediate sobering effect on New Delhi. Even the concerned Corps Commander was removed, reportedly under pressure from the United States of America.

It is now clear that so long Pakistan remains a partner of United States in its fight against terrorism and her future involvement in this region, the U.S. would not let Pakistan’s security be jeopardised. But partnership with the powerful has obligations difficult to avoid. Their details should not be left in a void. Nor should we sell ourselves cheap as was done in the past for mere military left overs or, luxuries for some and free trips abroad for those of the government. Pakistan must get something substantially strategic and political in nature. In addition, transfer of knowledge and technology in the civilian sectors must receive high priority. For a nuclear weapon state Pakistan was way behind the rest of the modern world in economic development and without importing knowledge we would continue to fall further behind at an increasing rate.

Reverting to India, she firmly believed in the dictum of the stronger and was not willing to accept two swords in the same scabbard. What sort of relationship could then be fashioned out with her? God willing, Pakistan government or the masses would never accept anything less than equality. Under these circumstances, with India unwilling to give up her hegemonic ambitions, peace with her without outside influence would only be possible if Pakistan remained strong enough; economically, politically and militarily; such that it cannot be blackmailed again in the manner India was trying presently.

War or peace, therefore, was the choice that only India can make. She could either lay the seeds of a war that in the end could efface all civilization from the Indus to the Gangetic Delta or, she could start respecting Pakistan’s genuine concerns and other people’s rights.  She would also have to swallow the bitter pill (her own determination) of equality with her neighbours. Further, it would be a lot easier if India did not allow herself to be misled onto a wrong path by visions of greatness fuelled from outside. A path that only led to confrontation with her two nuclear neighbours and would generate instability in the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific regions. Finally, let India put into practice the Five Principles of Bandung that India called Panjshila, and which the Chinese and Indian Prime Ministers talked of last month in India.

 

Iqbal F. Quadir, Defence Journal, February 2002, http://www.defencejournal.com/2002/february/peace.htm

 

Bully, Know Thyself

 

Let’s take Kashmir. Isn’t it common sense that what has remained unsolvable bilaterally for 50 years requires a third party mediator? It’s a matter of India’s pride to keep mediators out, but pride doesn’t stand in the way when they rush to the Americans for help. After all, it was President Clinton who forced the Pakistani troops to retreat from Kargil. And look at the way Indian home and defence ministers rush for talks to Washington. Indians want third party mediation when it suits them, which is to end cross-border terrorism — meaning pressure Pakistan — but don’t want it when it involves sitting down to solve the Kashmir problem: meaning don’t want to be pressured themselves. When it comes to finding a solution, Kashmir suddenly becomes a shuddh Brahmin of an issue that the world cannot touch. It’s an internal matter. End of discussion. Everybody out. Aren’t these double standards? Besides, nobody now talks about the cross-border terrorism that India spawned — training and arming the LTTE and the other Tamil militant groups to operate in Sri Lanka. And America, that mother-nation of double standards, sure plays ball with India. They publicly rule out third party mediation even as they are in the midst of mediating to cool down tensions between the two angry neighbours.

And then there is this fracas over whether Kashmir is the core issue. That seems obvious to everyone in the world, but not to the Indians. Wonder how many Indians know what the Sir Creek dispute is all about. Or, how many other issues there are that send the two countries ballistic at regular intervals. In Pakistan, Colin Powell agrees Kashmir is the ‘central’ issue. Then he tight-ropes to New Delhi and toes India’s line to say dialogue should be comprehensive. When Americans tour South Asia, they always go to Pakistan first and then to India, where whatever little they’ve said in Pakistan’s favour is quickly torpedoed. And that being the final comment, rules out a Pakistani comeback. Surely Pakistanis must want the Americans to henceforth reverse the order.

Musharraf made important announcements — banning JeM and LeT, freezing their accounts, arresting leaders. Announcements that even Colin Powell pointedly described as ‘actions’ taken by Pakistan. But India announced implacably they’d wait for these announcements to translate into action. Fair enough. But India had also said, for every one step Pakistan takes, India would take two. After all, the first step is an announcement. By their own promise, India should have made two announcements. Instead, India quibbles about the size of the step, that Pakistan should take a long stride while India takes two small steps that may not equal a stride! To ordinary Pakistanis, this only reaffirms the impression that India is a giant trickster.

Adding to all these frustrations is the real fear Pakistanis experience when war clouds gather on the border. After all, India is militarily more powerful. It is much bigger. We take our bigness for granted. It is no big deal. But it matters a great deal to the smaller neighbour. Just seeing India’s size on the map is intimidating. This is the reason why Pakistan is obsessed with India and India obsessed with itself. An India on red alert is a fearsome spectre in the eyes of the Pakistanis.

From prime ministers down, Pakistanis have been critical of the ISI control freaks and their dangerous games. If an ISI link is indeed established, then the Calcutta attack only suggests that the ISI has lost control of the jehadis they trained and armed, exactly the way India lost control of the LTTE. The last thing the ISI would want is a terrorist strike aimed at America when the FBI chief is in India. But the jehadi-underworld axis have their own agenda. India is in a mood to punish Pakistan. What if India retaliates after the next terrorist attack? The ISI, mafia dons and jehadis won’t suffer. Pakistani citizens will. You see why their blood pressure is rising?

As if all this fear and frustration isn’t enough, Pakistanis have to put up with India’s patronising attitude. It’s typical of Indian double standards that they are so hyper-sensitive and take offence at any American patronising, lecturing or interference vis-à-vis them, while being blissfully unaware of their own pomposity and condescension when talking about Pakistan. His baritone voice dripping with sarcasm, Jaswant Singh says: “It’s not as if they (the 20 wanted terrorists in Pakistan) are hiding in caves. There are, alas, no caves in Karachi to hide.” Would you blame a Pakistani if he retorted: “Alas, there are no caves in Delhi for you to chase your temple-constructing sants into.”

Anita Pratap, Outlook India, February 4, 2002,

 http://www.outlookindia.com/    

Bargaining in Crisis

 

Following the December 13 attack on the Indian Parliament, the Indian Government quickly mobilised its troops and, if reports are to be believed, even deployed its missiles. India placed a charter of demands on Pakistan – prominent being the extraditing of India’s 20 most wanted terrorists and the closing of terrorist training camps inside Pakistan. Calls then came from the ruling party to cross the LoC. With India driving a bargain that cross border terrorism be stopped, 20 of India’s most wanted criminals be handed over or else the military build-up would continue, an escalation of the crisis was inescapable. 

Stephen Maxwell and Robert Jervis argue that a refusal to back down in a crisis exposes a government to the risk that the other will also refuse to back down; hence the one willing to accept the greater risk will prevail. Both governments thus have a choice between accepting the demand of the other, which leads to an automatic de-escalation of the crisis and a certainty in its outcome, or accepting an uncertain outcome (back channel diplomacy, international pressure to de-escalate-the crisis, which may or may not work) leading to a military conflict ensuing from the demands not being met. Glenn Snyder has also theoretically gamed the choice of outcomes that a country might decide to accept in bargaining. He contends that the main component of each country’s strength in this type of situation is ‘critical risk’, that is the risk of the other side standing firm, leaving the initiator of the crisis with the choice of either standing firm or accepting the demands of the other side. This is the risk that a government should be willing to accept as the consequence of standing firm. There remains a choice with the bargainer of comparing his critical risk with an estimated probability — the probability that the other side also stands firm whatever the consequences. An escalation at this juncture would leave no room for a face saving solution to the bargainer.

Based on this framework the following scenarios emerge if one speculates on the possible outcomes of the present Indo-Pak standoff. 

 

• Pakistan decides that if it complies with any of India’s demands of stopping cross-border terrorism and handing over India’s 20 most wanted criminals, it stands to lose out with its domestic constituency, and concludes that India is unlikely to attack given (a) international pressure, and (b) India’s established norm of not crossing the LoC; in that case one outcome is certain. The standoff remains for a time, but international pressure slowly ensures that India withdraws its troops in a phased manner from their battle positions to peacetime locations. 
• Another outcome could be that the standoff continues for a while, and Pakistan does hand over some of the people named in the 20 most wanted list (perhaps beginning with the Punjab militants), and a process of de-escalation is initiated. 

·         A third outcome could be no compliance, no bargaining, no punishment – the U.S. ensures that the standoff ends peacefully. In either case, Indian demands, even if met, would only be partially met. Pakistan realises that it can get away after testing India’s patience at a threshold that is substantially higher than before.  Where does this leave India? After the present standoff, India would realise that a military build-up and making demands does not work. Since this threshold did not work, India would have to raise the threshold in the next crisis to just short of an armed conflict.

 

In the present crisis, it is unlikely that India will either launch an all out military attack or target the terrorist training camps. It is also unlikely that Pakistan will comply with all of Indian demands – at best there could be a limited compliance. The next time around India would have to exercise better judgement about the probability of various pay-offs including Pakistan’s refusal to comply, and India’s ability to execute a threatened course of action. 

 

Arpit Rajain, Article No: 695, February 7, 2002,

http://www.ipcs.org/issues/newarticles/695-ip-arpit.html

 

A Question of Confidence

 

Although the war clouds over the subcontinent have receded, the armies of India and Pakistan are still in position along the border. Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf recently characterised the continued deployment of Indian troops as “brinkmanship at its most dangerous.” Speaking in Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (POK) on the occasion of ‘Kashmir Day’ in early February, he said the Indian side had not reciprocated to the Pakistani efforts at rapprochement. He accused India of adopting a ‘very cynical’ attitude even after he launched a crackdown on the Pakistan-based militant groups blamed by India for terrorist activities on its soil.

In January, Musharraf offered to hold talks for a phased withdrawal of troops in order to defuse the tension. New Delhi rejected the offer, saying that meaningful talks could only be held after Pakistan curbed cross-border terrorism and took action on ‘the list of 20.’ Musharraf called upon ‘influential countries’ to prevail upon India as bilateralism had failed to ease its confrontational posture. At the same time, he also reiterated the Pakistani position that the Kashmiri struggle was legitimate and the groups fighting in the State had the backing of the Pakistani people.

The General’s strong defence of the groups engaged in the freedom struggle in Kashmir evoked strong reactions in Delhi. The External Affairs Ministry spokesperson said that Pakistan was reverting to ‘yesterday’s clichés’. The official stated that the President’s observations on Kashmir amounted to interference in the internal affairs of India. A statement issued by the Foreign Office said that Musharraf had turned the clock back by restating “time-worn and untenable positions on terrorism.” Indian officials say that his undue focus on the Kashmiri struggle has made them doubt his bona fides and his pledge on curbing terrorism. However, there are reports that despite the tough tenor of Musharraf’s speech, Islamabad had started cracking down on militant groups.

Musharraf’s speech came in handy for Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee during his election campaign. Addressing a rally in Punjab, he said that Pakistan would not be able to get hold of Kashmir by observing ‘Kashmir Day’. He stressed that India wanted to resolve the Kashmir issue peacefully but insisted that it was up to Pakistan to foster a congenial atmosphere for talks. Vajpayee reiterated the government’s stand that the troops would stay deployed as long as Pakistan continued to sponsor cross-border terrorism.

India’s seeming reluctance to resume the dialogue process and start de-escalation along the border is viewed with a degree of concern by the international community, with the notable exception of Russia. Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov were in New Delhi in early February. Ivanov concurred with India’s assessment of the situation in the subcontinent. In a joint statement issued after talks between Ivanov and External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh, both sides condemned the “continued acts of cross-border terrorism against India.” It said that “these activities from Pakistan and the territory controlled by it, must cease completely.” Referring to Musharraf’s assertions that concrete steps have been taken by him to curb terrorism, the statement said that such claims “can only be judged by the concrete action Pakistan takes on the ground.” Both sides called for an end to the “continued terrorist violence in Jammu and Kashmir as also in other parts of India.” They also called for “sustained and irreversible steps” so that an environment conducive to the resumption of dialogue between India and Pakistan can be created.

The statement added that the two countries should negotiate bilaterally in accordance with the Simla Agreement. It recommended that future talks between India and Pakistan should be based on the composite dialogue revolving round the eight points agreed upon at Lahore in 1999. Ilya Klebanov told mediapersons in New Delhi that his country agreed with the Indian demand that Pakistan do something on the ground to display its sincerity.

Washington, on the other hand, apparently wants New Delhi to take steps to de-escalate the military situation. George Tenet, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), testified before an open session of the U.S. Senate’s Intelligence Committee in February, that once India and Pakistan launched a conventional war it could escalate into a nuclear confrontation.

The West has now found it convenient to raise the nuclear bogey to pressure New Delhi to withdraw its troops. Pressure from Washington may have been one reason why New Delhi and Moscow chose to downplay stories about the proposed sale of nuclear-powered Russian submarines to the Indian Navy. The Russian media had reported that negotiations were at an advanced stage with India for the sale or leasing of two nuclear submarines. It is an open secret that India is keen on acquiring nuclear-powered submarines to give its nuclear deterrence capability more credibility. However, Defence Minister George Fernandes denied that the Navy planned to purchase such submarines.

The international community is generally of the opinion that Pakistan is trying to curb the infiltration of terrorists into Kashmir. India seems to have signalled to the West that it would wait until the snows melt in March/April to come to a definite conclusion about the level of infiltration.

Western diplomats feel that both New Delhi and Islamabad, by conducting their diplomacy in public, are undermining the chances for any meaningful concessions. “The big bang theory will not work,” said a diplomat, referring to summits such as the one held in Agra in 2001. They feel that a feasible way out of the long standing logjam is to turn the de facto LoC into a de jure border, with a “minor compromise in geography,” citing the Anglo-Irish agreement as an illustration. New Delhi, however, insists that there is no change in its position on the status of Jammu and Kashmir.

 

John Cherian, Frontline, Volume 19 - Issue 4, February 16 - March 1, 2002, http://www.flonnet.com/fl1904/19040240.htm

 

India Rules Out Pakistan Talks

 

India has ruled out any resumption of talks with Pakistan until it is convinced that its nuclear rival has stopped supporting attacks by Islamic militants on Indian targets. President K. R. Narayanan, in a strongly worded address to parliament on Monday, vowed to maintain the current mass mobilisation of troops on the border with Pakistan. He also promised firm action against separatist militants in Indian-administered Kashmir, but said the government would talk to any group that laid down its arms.

The tough policy statement was delivered to the first session of the Indian parliament since it was attacked by gunmen two months ago. India has accused Pakistani intelligence of backing the attack. Islamabad denied any involvement, but the incident triggered a massive military build-up by both sides along their common border.

India and Pakistan have fought two wars over Kashmir, where Islamic militants have been waging a bloody insurgency against Indian rule since 1989. President Nayaranan strongly reiterated India’s view that the militants were terrorists and not freedom fighters, as they are viewed by many in Pakistan. “We keep hearing calls for a resumption of dialogue with Pakistan. Terrorism and dialogue cannot go together,” he was quoted as saying. He said the 13 December attack on parliament, in which the gunmen and nine policemen died, was another attempt by Pakistan to destabilise India by sponsoring militants. “It strengthened our resolve to deal decisively and conclusively with this challenge,” he said.

Since the attack, almost a million troops have been deployed along the border by the two countries in a tense and dangerous standoff. Pakistan has cracked down on militant groups inside its own borders, but has so far refused Indian demands to hand over those suspected by Delhi of masterminding the attack. There have been widespread calls internationally for the two sides to scale down their military confrontation, given fears that the current brinkmanship could spark a nuclear conflict.

But President Narayanan stood firm. “My government has made it absolutely clear that India is determined to end cross-border terrorism by all the means at our command,” he said. “The necessary level of military strength and preparedness will be maintained to deter any aggression.” He said India would not withdraw troops until it was convinced Pakistan had stopped militants from crossing the Line of Control, which divides the disputed territory of Kashmir.

The opening of the parliamentary session, which will discuss the country’s forthcoming budget, followed a disastrous showing for the ruling BJP in four state elections.

The party’s poor performance in Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayees’s home state Uttar Pradesh has caused particular embarrassment. But analysts say the election results do not pose any immediate threat to the coalition government.

BBC, February 25, 2002,

 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/1839826.stm

 

Prudence Demands India

not Stretching the Rope too Far

 

It is heartening that the official Indian attitude towards the crisis in Indo-Pak relations has encountered serious criticism in many quarters. President Musharaff’s words need to be taken at their face value, and the righteous indignation caused by the provocative terrorist attack against the Indian Parliament cannot be forgotten. But a sense of proportion is required for managing tensions. The official reaction is adamantine. To demand a response from Pakistan commensurate with Indian demands is unrealistic.

Crisis situations and armed belligerence can easily get out of control; the classic illustration being the Sarajevo crisis leading to the First World War. Austrian intransigence in not modifying the terms of its ultimatum to Serbia led inexorably to other nations entering the fray. India should avoid indiscreet bravado. Insisting on Pakistan demonstrating its reining in of terrorist groups is tough enough; but not moving towards even limited disengagement of forces is irresponsible.

The situation on both sides has now led to diplomatic taunting that augurs ill for dialogue. Islamabad is now drawing up a list of Indian terrorists, past and present, in retaliation against India’s demands on its own terrorist list which is an ominous sign.

Prime Minister Vajpayee’s combative speech reverting back to India’s sovereign rights over Pak-occupied Kashmir may have been an election gimmick, though it was also indicative of the further hardening of attitudes. Coercive diplomacy, it should be remembered, can easily become corrosive diplomacy.

There is the other hazard of Indian policy becoming a foil to Israel’s. Prime Minister Sharon’s relentless pursuit of military solution to terrorism without any negotiations with Arafat cannot serve as a good precedent. Besides the U.S. endorsement of Israel’s reckless adventurism may not extend to India.

India’s confidence lies in the U.S.’s understanding of its hard posture given President Bush’s rhetoric of eradicating terrorism, regardless of the time it would take. Thus there is a near convergence in U.S., Israeli and Indian crisis management. The question is whether the U.S. would support India’s insistence on Pakistan demonstrating good faith. This is very unlikely. 

It is in the sub-continent’s interests that this armed standoff between its two big states be relaxed. Whatever the justification for India refusing to begin disengagement earlier, why load the crisis with the rather worn-out thesis of Pakistan locating its occupation of the part of Kashmir the only basis for negotiations. The Indian Prime Minister has further added that nothing less than that could constitute the agenda for talks. 

This inflexible posture of the Prime Minister suggests paradoxically that the issue of Pak-occupied Kashmir is negotiable. So far the Government of India has not conceded this point, but it is commonly recognized that the bottom line for any comprise on the Kashmir issue would be the internationalisation of the Line of Control, perhaps with necessary adjustments to make it more defensible.

If this is correct, the motives for his recent statements could be two-fold viz., taking a strident stand to assuage the BJP’s rightist elements, and keeping the door ajar for Pakistan to negotiate on India’s demands.

India needs to move beyond its apparent intransigence towards a positive approach to Pakistan. Of course, the present opportunity to force Pakistan to concede its role in the terrorist campaign on Indian soil should be exploited. President Musharraf’s admission of the need for Pakistan to acquire a clean and progressive image is an acknowledgement of that country’s dirty hands. Prudence on India’s past now requires a less bellicose disposition. 

 

Prof. R.V.R. Chandrasekhara Rao, Article No: 715, April 10, 2002,

http://www.ipcs.org/issues/700/715-ip-rao.html

 

 

 

 

India’s Rising Anger

 

India’s decision to expel the Pakistani High Commissioner reflects a growing sense of frustration felt by ministers in Delhi. To their considerable irritation, Pakistan has managed to position itself as one of America’s key allies in the war on terrorism.

But India believes that, for all President Pervez Musharraf’s speeches denouncing terrorism, the Pakistan army is still supporting the insurgency against Indian security forces in Kashmir.

 In January Mr. Musharraf banned two of the Pakistan-based militant groups fighting in Kashmir, Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed. But India says that, in reality, both organisations have been allowed to resurrect themselves.

India has blamed Pakistani-based militants for the most recent attack in Kashmir, in which at least 30 people were killed when three men opened fire on an Indian army base at Kaluchak near the winter capital Jammu. When U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christina Rocca visited Delhi last week her Indian hosts insisted that Pakistan was a sponsor of cross-border terrorism in Kashmir.

And they urged Washington to put pressure on Pakistan to end its support for such militant activity. While Ms Rocca did unambiguously condemn the Kaluchak attack, her visit did not produce the kind of statements India was hoping for.

State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said that while ending the infiltration of militants into Kashmir was “an important concern,” the issue should be seen in the context or reducing tensions more generally and starting a dialogue between India and Pakistan. Indian ministers have made no secret of their disappointment with the American stance.

The deteriorating diplomatic relations between India and Pakistan reflect recent military developments. For several months now the two countries have had hundreds of thousands of troops deployed on their common border. And in Kashmir itself there have been heavy exchanges of artillery fire across the line of control.

In recent weeks Indian officials have threatened limited military strikes across the line of control in Kashmir. They say they want to destroy the militant training camps in Pakistani-held territory.

Given the strength of the rhetoric coming out of Delhi, the expulsion of the High Commissioner on May 18 is a relatively mild measure. India’s External Affairs Minister, Jaswant Singh, said the move would maintain parity since India withdrew its High Commissioner from Islamabad after the December 13 attack on the Indian parliament.

The question for the months ahead is whether India will continue to employ such diplomatic measures or whether it will decide to launch some kind of military action.

 

BBC, Owen Bennett-Jones, May 23, 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/1995540.stm

 

Pressure on U.S. to Broker Peace

 

If the crisis in the Middle East has distracted Washington from focusing fully on its military operations against the Taliban and the al-Qaeda, the brewing showdown in South Asia could well unravel its entire war against terrorism. This is Washington’s prime concern as it scrambles to prevent India and Pakistan from going to war.

The possibility of the two nuclear-armed neighbours going to war has increased sharply following last week’s terrorist attack at Jammu, where at least 34 persons, many of them family members of army personnel, were killed. India blames Pakistan for the attack. Delhi is pointing to the sharp surge in terrorist incidents in the Kashmir Valley as evidence that there has been no change in Islamabad’s policy of supporting terrorist attacks in India, notwithstanding President General Pervez Musharraf’s statements distancing himself from religious extremism and terrorism. Indian Intelligence reports indicate that infiltrations into India from across the border have risen in recent months.

Although the Bush administration has repeatedly and publicly praised Musharraf’s action against terrorism, U.S. officials admit in private that Delhi is right — Musharraf has failed to match his words with concrete action against terrorists, especially with regard to Kashmir.

In fact, there have been reports that the Pentagon is not happy with Pakistan’s half-hearted support to American forces hunting down the al-Qaeda and Taliban fugitives either, especially in its tribal region. South Asia watchers in the U.S. concede that New Delhi’s anger and impatience with Pakistan is understandable. Where the U.S. differs with India is the way the latter should respond to Pakistan. Washington has been counselling restraint. It is firmly opposed to India launching military strikes on Pakistan, however limited.

More than a million Indian and Pakistani soldiers stand in an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation along the border. In December, when the troop deployment began following the attack on the Indian parliament, allegedly by a Pakistan-backed terrorist group, there were fears that India would resort to military strikes against Pakistan and that this could lead to an all-out war. Such fears have multiplied manifold this time around as India’s patience with Pakistan is clearly running out. The U.S. clearly recognizes that.

The possibility of war between India and Pakistan injects new uncertainties into American strategy in the war against terrorism. In fact, even the current high-level deployment of troops by both countries is perceived as hindering Washington’s military operations against the al-Qaeda. The U.S. has been pressuring Pakistan to commit more of its troops for deployment along the highly porous Afghanistan-Pakistan border to prevent Taliban and al-Qaeda fugitives from escaping into Pakistan. Musharraf has expressed his inability to do so, blaming the pressure of Indian deployment along the India-Pakistan border.

Over the past five months, Washington has been requesting India not to take military action against Pakistan, as that would jeopardize its operations in Afghanistan. India, while holding back so far on military strikes against Pakistan, has flatly rejected dialogue or a withdrawal of its troops from the border. Its stock reply to American diplomats has been: Get Pakistan to stop infiltration of terrorists into Kashmir first.

“We believe that the U.S. has not done enough to prevent Pakistan from persisting with its adventurist policy [of backing terrorism in India]. In the circumstances, it is difficult for India to continue to listen to American requests for restraint,” an official in the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) told Asia Times Online.

Indeed, that India’s patience has virtually run out not only with Pakistan but also with U.S. hectoring has been evident for some weeks now. India responded coolly to Washington’s dispatch of Assistant Secretary of State Christina Rocca to the subcontinent — a mission that was aimed at nudging India and Pakistan to the negotiating table. The general feeling in India was that if the U.S. wanted the tension defused it needed only to tighten the screws on Islamabad. “Its call on Delhi to exercise restraint is absurd,” the MEA official said.

In fact, signalling Delhi’s irritation with Washington’s appeasement of Musharraf even as he continued to push terrorists into India, Rocca was politely refused meetings with Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes and National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra. Rocca’s visit to India was therefore a non-starter even before she set foot on Indian soil. The terrorist attack at Jammu, which took place while she was in New Delhi, simply dealt the final blow to a mission.

In a bid to mollify a furious New Delhi, the U.S. government used some strong words to condemn the terrorist act at Jammu. However, while it described the attack as ‘terrible and outrageous’ and clarified that terrorism against India was ‘unacceptable,’ there was silence with regard to Pakistan’s role in fostering cross-border terrorism. Rocca, in fact, drew a distinction between the war against terrorism and the India-Pakistan standoff. “It’s a very complicated issue. It is not black and white,” she said.

The Indian government is under tremendous domestic pressure to give Islamabad a ‘fitting reply’ and to teach it a lesson ‘once and for all’ for its continuing support to terrorism in Kashmir. There is a growing demand for launching military strikes, with or without American help.

“Delhi’s dilemma, however, is that it does not really want to defy world opinion, especially the U.S. The government does not have the stomach for military strikes,” says an Indian Intelligence official angrily. “It does not want to fritter away the huge gains it has made in building a new strategic equation with Washington.” Military-to-military cooperation between the two countries is growing. In fact, a joint military exercise involving commandos of the two countries is going on at present near Agra. Two more exercises of this kind — one in India and another in Alaska — are scheduled for later this year.

There is also the nuclear issue. New Delhi might plan for a limited strike, but what should prevent Islamabad from pressing the nuclear button? Musharraf has said that he would use the nuclear weapon if attacked by India.

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage is scheduled to travel to South Asia in the first week of June. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld will follow him. In a Washington-datelined report, the Times of India’s Chidanand Rajghatta writes, “by spacing out the visits citing scheduling difficulties, the Bush administration appears to be buying time to work on Pakistan while letting Islamabad stew in the pressure New Delhi is exerting. It would also suggest Washington does not believe a war is imminent despite the build-up of both arms and rhetoric.”

A report in the weekly newsmagazine India Today says that the U.S. is likely to get tough with the Pakistanis. It quotes a senior American official as saying that the U.S. will tell Musharraf “to shape up or we will pull the plug.” The article says that the U.S. “is planning to deliver the same kind of ultimatum it gave him after September 11.”

With war clouds looming over the subcontinent, the U.S. has been generous with its assurances to India that it will get Musharraf to crack down on terrorism. But as in the case of Musharraf’s verbal pledges with regard to terrorism, the final test of Washington’s credibility in India’s eyes will be whether it matches its words with concrete action on the ground.

Sudha Ramachandran, Asia Times, May 24, 2002,

http://www.atimes.com/ind-pak/DE24Df04.html

 

As the Standoff Continues

 

Test-firing of ballistic missiles by India or Pakistan cannot be seen in isolation from the unfortunate race for building up arsenals of weapons of mass destruction in which these internally unstable and economically backward countries of the subcontinent have allowed themselves to be trapped.

Other redeeming feature is that a large number of people in the two countries do not regard nuclearisation of South Asia as a blessing. In fact, large groups of lawyers, doctors, writers, artists and journalists in the two countries remain strongly committed to the objective of disarmament and denmmitted to the objective of disarmament and denuclearisation.

In January 2002, on the eve of the SAARC summit in Kathmandu, a representative gathering of senior media personnel from the SAARC nations expressed “alarm at the prospect of inter-state conflicts leading to wars, including nuclear wars, which could cause a tremendous loss of life, devastation of environment, destruction of precious resources and enormous misery to peoples.”

The on-going military standoff between India and Pakistan with the forces of the two countries massed along their common border has created serious apprehensions of an armed showdown. Any such conflict would inflict incalculable devastation in both countries because, unlike 1965 or 1971, both India and Pakistan are now in possession of nuclear weapons. A recent study conducted by U.S. and Asian researchers at American’s Princeton University estimated that at least three million people would be killed if “even a limited nuclear war broke out between Pakistan and India.” The destruction to property, industrial and economic infrastructure would also be colossal.

The prospect of nuclear conflict in the subcontinent began with India testing nuclear device in May 1974. However, 24 years later, in May 1998, it went overtly nuclear and conducted a series of nuclear tests.

With a Hindu communalist BJP government in power in New Delhi, the flaunting of its nuclear capability by India’s ruling establishment was only to be expected. More so with super-hawkish home minister, Lal Krishna Advani, setting the pace for an arrogant display of power.

On May 18, while Pakistan was still weighing the advantages and risks involved in responding to India’s nuclear tests, Advani warned Pakistan that with the Indian tests the geo-strategic situation in the subcontinent had undergone a ‘decisive’ change particularly in regard to ‘finding a solution to the Kashmir problem.’ The Indian defence minister, George Fernandes, also threatened ‘hot pursuit’ of ‘Pakistan-backed terrorists’ operating in Indian held Kashmir into Azad Kashmir.

Two Indian scholars, Praful Bidwai and Achin Vinaik, known for their commitment to non-proliferation, have recorded the May 1998 scenario saying that Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan’s prime minister at the time, “showed a distinct reluctance to test... to seize high moral ground and overcome some of the stigma deriving from his support to Islamic extremist groups such as the Taliban.” However, he could not with and for too long the increasing pressure from the jingoists on the home front, especially when his close aides expressed the view that in the event of non-testing the troops’ morale would be affected.

According to Bidwai and Vinaik Nawaz Sharif even resisted offer of a five-billion dollar U.S. package in economic and military aid offered as an incentive not to test ultimately decided to go for nuclear tests of his own and ‘get even with India.’ This was only to be expected in the peculiar context of the subcontinent where a tit-for-tat propensity has long been the defining characteristic of the military equation between two of its major countries.

Against the backdrop of the on-going military standoff on its eastern border, there has been a growing concern in Pakistan about its security, particularly since the middle of December when India, accusing Pakistan of masterminding an attack on its parliament house in New Delhi, ordered the massing of forces on this country’s eastern border. There was also an alarming escalation in cross-border shelling.

The other day, Mr. Vajpayee told Indian forces confronting Pakistan across the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir that “the time has come for a decisive battle.” For his part, President Pervez Musharraf has made it clear that Pakistan is not seeking a war with India but if one is foisted on it, it is capable of meeting any threat to its security.

The frightening prospect of yet another India-Pakistan war has prompted the world powers to express deep concern primarily because both India and Pakistan now happen to be nuclear powers. The U.S. ambassador in Islamabad confirmed last week that the U.S. was deeply disturbed over the heightening tensions between India and Pakistan and was working with both countries for de-escalation and for an end to the five-month-old military standoff.

Earlier, the U.S. assistant secretary of state, Christina Rocca, visited New Delhi and Islamabad to assess the situation and advise restraint on both sides. However, some later developments, including the forced recall of Pakistan’s high commissioner in New Delhi, made it plain that nothing concrete came out of Ms Rocca’s visit. Moreover, the pitch of her trip was marred by the killing of more than 30 people at an army camp in Jammu allegedly by infiltrators from Pakistan.

The U.S. has since decided to send a higher-level envoy on a peace mission to India and Pakistan in early June. The British foreign secretary, Mr. Jack Straw, is also due to visit Islamabad and New Delhi on similar mission. Many other world powers, including China and Japan, have also urged Pakistan and India for de-escalation of tensions and for the resumption of a peace dialogue.

The chances of peace and normality between and Pakistan are not likely to improve as there is the tendency on the part of the western powers to go along with the Indian contention that ‘cross-border terrorism’ is the only problem in occupied Kashmir — without taking into account the basic cause of unrest and violence in the held territory. There is indeed little attempt on the part of the world leaders to address the core issue — the Kashmir dispute — as the actual reason for between India and Pakistan.

However, perhaps as a result of some behind-the-scenes pressure by the U.S., India has of late somewhat softened its war-like posture. It has decided “to give Pakistan another two months to crack down on extremists before considering military action.”

What may make a tangible contribution towards the easing of tensions in the subcontinent is our invitation extended by Russian president Vladimir Putin to India and Pakistan for ‘negotiations’ in Kazakhstan next month.

The format for the proposed dialogue is not clear but, as India interprets Putin’s invitation, the likelihood is that President Putin will hold separate talks with Mr. Vajpayee and General Pervez Musharraf. India’s response to Mr. Putin’s suggestion has been somewhat guarded. Its foreign office spokesperson, Narupama Roy, has merely said that New Delhi’s understanding was that President Putin would meet the two leaders separately.

Meanwhile, the report about the idea of a ‘civic dialogue’ in an open forum convened by the Association for Communal Harmony in Asia (ACHA) and the institute for Asian Studies of Portland state University suggests a possible format for the ‘search for a solution’ of the Kashmir issue.

The discussions in the open forum were stated to be intensive and open. It developed the draft of a comprehensive agreement based on the idea of creation of five autonomous regions in Kashmir — Azad Kashmir, Northern Territories, Jammu, (Indian occupied) Kashmir and Ladakh — each to be governed by representatives elected by its permanent residents.

Foreign affairs will be conducted by India or Pakistan for the region under their respective control. The regions would be required to create a joint governing council of Jammu and Kashmir within two years to regulate inter-regional a fairs. The council would be required to come up with a detailed plan for the settlement of all Jammu and Kashmir-related matters within five years. Until the final resolution of the matter, the LoC would be treated as the international border between India and Pakistan.

In a broad sense, the draft agreement comes close to what would have been the shape of things if the plan for region-wise plebiscites proposed by Sir Owen Dixon of the U.N. Commission for India and Pakistan (UNCIP) in 1950 had been implemented. However, today’s Kashmir may prove to be too complex for the proposed solution. Yet it deserves to be studied and its practicability in the given configuration of things objectively examined.

 

M. H. Askari, Dawn, May 29, 2002,

 http://www.dawn.com/2002/05/29/op.htm#2

 

 

 

Predicting a Fourth Pakistan-India War

 

A recent report conveyed that a statement emanating from Washington suggested the possibility of a fourth war between Pakistan and India. This analysis which tends to predict, came from none other than, George Tenet, Director CIA. What is quite clear that this knowledge is really not breaking news. It raises an important question, that why is there a visible absence of a role by the U.S. to act to remove such as a possibility, or the moving closer towards such a situation (even if a war does not break out). The super-power country itself admits that it is aware of a very dangerous situation and also expresses its ‘concern’ then why is there no action to prevent it. There is responsibility and not just concern the U.S. speaks of, for this part of South Asia when two nuclear strong nations get closer to a war, therefore, importantly again it is the message which should be able to be read, within context to this stated ‘U.S. concern’. It is time that an effort should be made to make the U.S. and those important role players, act with a responsibility to ensure in a positive aspect, a peaceful atmosphere for Pakistan and India. This would have to mean:-

 

• India should de-escalate its massive troops build on the border and LoC.
• A realistic approach to find the just solution to Indian held Kashmir. 

 

Just merely predicting a war, in wraps of concern and non-activity (as a world’s Policeman) does not help in changing the existing ground realities positively or averting in a just manner, the extreme dangers of war which cannot even afford being conventional because of the reality of the well-known nuclear equation. Therefore, a conventional posturing would certainly mean a step close to getting ‘nuclear.’ This dispels the notion of those who want to define war in order to achieve their own interests. This is because there is no definition for war, as it is associated with moving events, which influence it, as such it cannot go by ground-rules imposed by one side. It appears that if the existence of one side is threatened, there could be a reaction which could take a war to a dangerous limit. So this undermines the wisdom of ‘a limited war’ aura, being floated by the Indian side.

The U.S. and the west have done little in easing the four-month long tension, created by India, when it has an extensive troops build up, on the border and LoC with neighbouring Pakistan. With such a backdrop and India not being pursued to de-escalate, Mr. Tenet has stated, “If India were to conduct large scale offensive operations in Azad Kashmir, Pakistan might retaliate, with strikes of its own in the belief that nuclear deterrent might limit the scope of the counter attack.” “We are deeply concerned, however, that a conventional war once begun could escalate into nuclear confrontation.”

In a certain sense, the statement, does seem to be establishing a nexus between the present situation as it stands (i.e. India and Pakistan have amassed some 800,000 troops at their common borders) and the conflict in Kashmir, further mentioning the nuclear characteristic and the expression of concern, should logically mean, there is a lot of work to be done (positively) in this area. Since with massive troop deployment on the border and the flash point flashing unattended, it does not augur well. In a situation like this who could guarantee that miscalculating could not take place. And a miscalculation could also be a conventional war, as Mr. Tenet perceives. It was reportedly on April 2, that President General Musharraf expressed to an Indian newspaper, while referring to the present situation, between both countries as ‘extremely explosive.’ Further in the wide-ranging interview, the President did mention talk and friendship, but he did speak from a position of strength, making things quite clear. He mentioned Indians false claim of terrorism. Speaking on the face of an accusation of cross-border terrorism, he suggested a call for the deployment of a U.N. force to determine that India was falsely claiming the so-called cross-border terrorism.

But the position as it stands, is that India has not responded to create a peaceful atmosphere or de-escalate. This can be seen in the Indian defence minister’s statement (after President General Musharraf’s interview). Fernandes while touring the disputed borders with Pakistan (which new Delhi insists must be fully sealed from freedom fighters before it eases a military build-up) stated “India will not withdraw troops from its border because Pakistan intentions are not sincere. It continues to sponsor terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir.”

India is trying to create a 12/13 scenario: The immense troops build-up draws international attention the U.S. on April 11 has said that both countries should talk, (describing the dangers of it.) India’s attempt to play the ‘list of twenty’ card is extremely unsubstantive. Pakistan has made it quite clear that no one from Pakistan would be handed over to India. It is that India attempts to lay a trap, with a negative use of semantics, when it speaks of, cross-border terrorism. There is no border but LoC (Kashmir). There is a freedom movement in Held-Kashmir, which India wants to brush under the carpet, while buying time to create a false spectre of terrorism. Further is the implementation of a controversial draconian law POTA, concerning Kashmir. It finds India playing dangerously, when it prepares for farcical state elections (later this year) in Kashmir. It is going by a nuclear equation, in context to Pakistan and India, that puts forth the idea. That nuclear conflict is unconceivable, and something which is not to happen, therefore making it not possible to sum up things, because it has never taken place. So the ability of any side is an inexperienced issue. Therefore, best stated that ‘nuclear weapons are deterrence and their use is something which should even be considered’. In conformity with this premise it makes an analysis of nuclear capabilities of a lesser aspect.

The U.S. and the west should have positive concern for any conflict between Pakistan and India, as strategic analysts are of the opinion that it has the out of control characteristic. It is to quote a report by the Wall Street Journal; Pakistan has rejected Indian pleas for a ‘no first use’ pledge, countering it with demands that India make a no war pledge Pakistan is understood to reserve the right to use nuclear weapons, if the country’s survival is threatened, whether by conventional or nuclear attack.

The trigger would probably come if Indian troops reached Pakistan’s heartland, Pakistani strategists say, but just where the heartland is, nobody is saying, “Deterrence lies in ambiguity”. In light of this, the U.S. and the international community should have a proactive role for ensuring peace in this region.

 

Humera Niazi, Defence Journal, May 2002, http://www.defencejournal.com/2002/may/predicting.htm

 

A Way Out of the Impasse?

 

Two major factors — one can term them miscalculations — and a growing domestic compulsion for the Vajpayee government, can be seen to have been responsible for bringing Pakistan and India to the military standoff that prevails presently.

The first miscalculation was the Indian assumption that after 9/11 they could bring Kashmir into the terrorist ambit. This was clear in the manner in which the 13th December attack on the Indian parliament was played up (we still have no idea of the names and faces of the perpetrators of this act just as we never knew who actually carried out the December 1999 Indian Airlines hijacking). As India failed to get the right U.S. response, it kept upping the ante, including mobilizing of its forces along the border with Pakistan.

The situation got further compounded by the growing domestic challenge which confronted the Vajpayee government after the state elections in February 2002. The Gujarat massacre of the Muslims and the continuing support given to the Gujarat Chief Minister, Mr. Modi, by Vajpayee, as well as the subsequent rout of the BJP in the local Delhi elections, has placed the Vajpayee government in a beleaguered position domestically. So fuelling the external belligerency has been a natural way out, especially since there has been a continuing expectation that the U.S. would eventually pressurize Pakistan into all manner of unilateral compromises — with the fear of a nuclear war being played up by the many American Indophile analysts and bureaucrats.

This was the second miscalculation, both on the part of the Indians and the Americans. Having learnt the wrong lesson from Kargil, both saw the present situation as another opportunity to pressurize Pakistan into yielding to Indian demands.

Hence we have seen President Bush continue to call for action from Pakistan in terms of stopping ‘cross border terrorism’ — which recently has been altered to ‘infiltration across the line of control’ into Kashmir — with no demand being made at all on India to lower the military ante. Perhaps Pakistan’s willingness to go the extra mile in cooperating with the U.S. in its war in Afghanistan sent the wrong signals also, but primarily U.S. assumptions were based on the Kargil experience. But Pakistan also learnt from Kargil that unilateral submission to U.S. diktat vis-à-vis India is of no use within the context of Kashmir and dialogue with India.

But it seems that the U.S. has now begun to realize that unilateral pressure on Pakistan will not work, especially given the fact that despite all assertions by India and its backers, there is a struggle being waged by the Kashmiris themselves against Indian occupation. Perhaps that is why the U.S. has at least begun to apply indirect pressure on India by asking its citizens to leave India — which has led the U.N., Japan and EU states to do likewise.

 The impact of this on the Indian economy and its credibility can only be evaluated in the manner in which the Bombay Stock Exchange plummeted in the immediate aftermath of this announcement. Also, what is important is that, unlike in the case of Pakistan, the call for withdrawal of foreign nationals in the case of India was directly premised on the growing threat of war — perhaps even nuclear war. That is also the reason why India has failed to get its reserve stocks of palm oil from Malaysia — because no shipping company was prepared to go into Indian troubled waters!

Also, India has not offered any quid pro quo regarding Kashmir beyond the demand that Pakistan stop ‘cross-border terrorism.’ This continuing refrain on the part of the Indian leadership is beginning to become more and more of an irritant — especially given that Pakistan has maintained that it has already begun to take action in this regard. But more important on this front is the question ‘then what?’ which the international community needs to ask of India.

This is where India has nothing to offer in terms of resolution of the Kashmir issue. And the continuing refusal of dialogue with Pakistan — which General Musharraf has once again offered unconditionally in Almaty — is also beginning to draw more and more negative responses from the international community.

So what can be done to end the present standoff? To begin with, Pakistan has to be assertive on maintaining the distinction between terrorism and struggles for self-determination. While Pakistan has committed to fighting the latter, which includes ending the privatisation of ‘jihad’ by the extremist groups so that everyone obeys the laws of the land and no private military camps are in operation on Pakistani soil, it cannot withdraw diplomatic and political support for the Kashmiri struggle against Indian occupation. And it cannot afford to give such guarantees to the U.S. and Britain either.

In this context the international community has to accept the reality of the indigenous struggle of the Kashmiris, just as it did in the case of the East Timorese and has done in the case of the Palestinians.

So how can India be ‘satisfied’ on the issue of infiltration across the line of control? To begin with, India has to get over its absurd claim that it wants no third party mediation on Kashmir. It has accepted this mediation in principle by asking the international community to press Pakistan into stopping ‘cross-border terrorism,’ and discussing the issue with its allies. Here there are two proposals which should be put to India (and have been done in the past by Pakistan):

First, that international observers be placed along the LoC — and these can be from critical Indian allies like the U.S., Russia as well as Pakistan’s ally China. Obviously, the U.N. has become too ineffective to do much on this count, but military observers from the major players in the system can be effective.

Two, even more critical in this regard, the U.S. should be asked to provide a system of electronic surveillance along the LoC. In this connection, when Mr. Advani visited Washington in January of this year, (where, incidentally, he was treated like a PM-in-waiting) he was given a special briefing by the Cooperative Monitoring Center (CMC) of the Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico. The two and a half hour briefing was conducted in Washington. Of course, what India was interested in was transfer of technology but what the U.S. should offer is U.S. supervised surveillance.

Apart from this, India has to be made to realize that no problem can be resolved without dialogue — unless the military option is to be used. Therefore, it has to dialogue with Pakistan, even on devising confidence-building measures relating to Kashmir. These could include a withdrawal of Indian forces to their barracks in Occupied Kashmir simultaneously with a cessation of the military struggle by the Kashmiri freedom fighters — during the dialogue process, provided the Indians do not use dialogue as a pretext for bolstering their military resources in Occupied Kashmir. Within the framework of dialogue, Pakistan has already offered a flexible negotiating stance on Kashmir, including the seeking of new options beyond the traditional and stated positions of both sides.

Also, simultaneous to dialogue, India needs to improve the human rights situation in Occupied Kashmir and there should be moves for an all-encompassing intra-Kashmiri dialogue which can then be brought into the ambit of the Pakistan-India dialogue. This is the only way to move towards a lasting solution to the Kashmir issue.

Meanwhile, the U.S. needs to realize, despite its predilections, that unilateral pressure on Pakistan will only destabilize the region in the long term. All this will do is to pander to the extremist elements in Indian politics and this will only make the region highly unstable. Already, one has seen the effects of Indian extremism in the form of the Gujarat carnage.

Unfortunately, the BJP is a party with a commitment to Hindutva and all that that implies. As it loses ground domestically, it is seeking external means of reasserting itself within the domestic political fray. The U.S. should not allow itself to be used to this end. That will have a long-term negative impact on the sustainability of U.S. interests in this region. But even more important for us, allowing Indian extremism to flourish will only result in deepening the prevailing fissures that beset South Asia. As the present standoff shows, no one in South Asia can afford such a development.

 

Dr. Shireen M. Mazari, The News, June 5, 2002,

http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/jun2002-daily/05-06-2002/oped/o1.htm

 

Vajpayee Rejects Talks Offer

 

Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said on Tuesday that the “epicentre of terrorism and religious extremism” was close to India’s borders, and rejected an offer of talks with Pakistan. “Unfortunately, in recent times, the logic of conflict-resolution through dialogue has had a formidable enemy. Its name is terrorism, sustained by religious extremism. Its epicentre is in India’s neighbourhood,” Vajpayee said while speaking at the Conference on Interaction and Confidence-building Measures in Asia (CICA) here.

New Delhi has faced terrorism for the past two decades and India’s patience is running out, he added. Vajpayee again rejected Pakistan’s offer of talks until ‘cross-border terrorism’ in disputed Kashmir territory was ended.

“As far as India-Pakistan dialogue is concerned, it is India which has always taken the initiative,” Vajpayee said. “In the space of the last four years, I have gone to Lahore and invited President Musharraf to India.” “We have repeatedly said that we are willing to discuss all issues with Pakistan, including Jammu and Kashmir. But for that cross-border terrorism has to end.” Vajpayee also warned Pakistan against any loose talk about nuclear weapons.

“One of the important ground rules is that nuclear weapon states should not indulge in nuclear blackmail,” the Indian prime minister said, speaking in Hindi. “India has already adopted the doctrine of no first use. We believe the adoption of this by all nuclear weapons states would be an important confidence-building measure,” he said.

The Indian leader said past promises President Musharraf made to crack down on militants operating in Kashmir had not been fulfilled. “He publicly made two promises: one, that Pakistan’s soil would not be allowed to promote terrorism anywhere in the world, and two, no organization would be allowed to indulge in terrorism in the name of Kashmir. We have seen in the following months that cross-border infiltration has increased,” he said.

Dawn,  June 5, 2002,

 http://www.dawn.com/2002/06/05/top3.htm

S. Asia Paying Heavy Price for Standoff: President’s Address at Almaty

 

President General Pervez Musharraf said on Tuesday the people of South Asia were paying the price for what he termed India’s unwillingness to end the standoff over disputed Kashmir. “The people of South Asia continue to pay a very heavy price by the refusal of India to resolve the Kashmir dispute in accordance with the relevant U.N. resolutions and the wishes of the Kashmiri people,” Musharraf told the Conference on Interaction and Confidence-building Measures in Asia (CICA) here.

“For the past several months, tension along our borders with India and the Line of Control is high, stirring deep fears in South Asia and around the world over the real possibility of conflict,” the president said. “We do not want war. We will not initiate a war. But if war is imposed on us, we will defend ourselves with the utmost resolution and determination,” he said. “We have stated repeatedly that instead of accusations, threats and dangerous escalation, India should return to the path of dialogue and negotiations, which is the only sane option, especially in the dangerous environment of South Asia.”

In his address Musharraf said state oppression could lead to terrorism. “We cannot allow individual or group terrorism on any pretext. Similarly, we cannot condone for any reason the rapacious policies of certain states that forcibly occupy territories and deny freedom to peoples for decades on end,” he said. Global peace has remained hostage to the expansionist ambitions of such states and their ruthless campaigns to suppress, through brutal use of force, the legitimate struggles of people to gain their internationally recognized fundamental right to freedom and self-determination. Terrorism by states, apart from inflicting massive suffering on occupied people, spawns a spiral of violence and terrorism.

President Musharraf said, “denial of freedom, and the resulting desperation and humiliation, are the breeding grounds for extremism.” To eradicate terrorism, he said “we must address the root causes by eliminating injustice and honouring the commitments consecrated in the Charter principles.”

Global peace, he said, has remained “hostage to the expansionist ambitions of such states” and their ruthless campaigns to suppress, through brutal use of force, the legitimate struggles of peoples to gain their internationally recognized fundamental right to freedom and self-determination.

Pakistan notes with satisfaction, he said, that the Almaty Act to be adopted by the CICA summit had reaffirmed the core principles of the U.N. Charter, namely: respect for sovereign equality and territorial integrity of states; respect for the right of self-determination of peoples under occupation and colonial domination; peaceful settlement of disputes through dialogue and international intercession and mediation; and mutually beneficial cooperation.

General Musharraf said, “Our faith in the validity of these principles has been reinforced by the unfortunate history of South Asia.” President Musharraf said he travelled to Agra nearly a year ago in the hope of setting into motion a dialogue process to address Kashmir and all other outstanding issues with India. Regrettably, he said, the summit remained inconclusive.

The president said the end of the Cold War and the elimination of the danger of global annihilation, heightened prospects for global peace. Ten years later, he said ‘that optimism has been tempered by unfortunate events and trends. New threats and new prejudices darken the horizon,’ he warned.

In these circumstances, he said, interaction, dialogue and confidence-building have assumed greater urgency “for the revival of a fading promise. We must ask ourselves whether the present situation has been brought about because of a sudden eruption of violence and terrorism by misguided individuals and desperate groups that threaten to destabilize the international community. Or is there a deeper malaise and terrorism is a symptom of this malaise.” September 11 brought home to the world ‘the horror of terrorism and galvanized inter-national resolve to fight and eliminate this modern day scourge.’

“Targeting of innocent people cannot be justified under any circumstances. We do and we must reject terrorism in all its forms and manifestations.” However, as we wage war on terrorism, there also is the need for introspection. “Violence in the world is not because of terrorism alone.”

Dawn, 5 June 2002,

http://www.dawn.com/2002/06/05/top1.htm

 

The India-Pakistan Standoff

 

A million and more Indian and Pakistani troops are facing one another across the Line of Control (LoC), the working boundary and the international border for the last five months. The possibility of a conflict erupting not by design, but by inadvertence or misperception or accident or leadership irrationality remains imminent. We had led ourselves to believe that war by design, which could acquire a nuclear dimension, was unlikely, appreciating the maturity imbuing the India-Pakistan leadership no less certainly than the leaders in the nuclear weapon states. Still, the Kaluchak massacre was obviously intended to provoke the Army and pressure India into taking precipitate action. This was followed by Abdul Gani Lone’s assassination leading to further escalation of tensions and strains between the two countries. An advertent and planned India-Pakistan war is no longer an improbability now.

How seriously the leaderships in India and Pakistan take this sabre-rattling is another matter, since rhetoric has been the hallmark of all bilateral interactions in the past; they are expressly designed anyway to assuage or mould domestic opinion. It would take a very careful ear to discern nuances in the timbre and quality of this public belligerence. Abdul Sattar, as Pakistan Foreign Minister, has conveyed to the U.N. Secretary-General that “the Indian leadership routinely blames Pakistan for every violent incident inside India and in Occupied Kashmir.” Mr. Sattar further believes that, “the BJP Government also wishes to deflect international attention from the ongoing massacre of the minority Muslim community in Gujarat as well as other domestic failings.”

This might be partly true, but does not explain the rationale underlying the deployment of troops along the border following the attack on Parliament last year, which occurred much before Gujarat exploded. Was this troop deployment necessary in view of their total inaction for the last five months? Their inability to stop the growing cross-border terrorism is evident. In retrospect, the audacious attack on Parliament required a police investigation, not military action. But it was not possible for the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, to ignore inflamed public sentiments and the high feelings in the Sangh Parivar, and weigh his options dispassionately before dispatching troops to the border. Domestic compulsions compelled spectacular action.

Domestic imperatives are also working in Pakistan. Pervez Musharraf had pledged in his January 11 national broadcast that “no organisation will be allowed to indulge in terrorism in the name of Kashmir... Anyone found involved in any terrorist act would be dealt with sternly.” Appropriate instructions had been issued to the Pakistani intelligence to cease assisting non-Kashmiri terrorist groups on the logic that this was in the interests of Pakistan’s internal security. But Gen. Musharraf has not been able to follow through on his promises, as he has little room for manoeuvre between taking on the terrorists entrenched in Pakistan and keeping him in power. Clearly, the jehadis are too deeply entrenched in the ruling elite, including the armed forces, and the politics of Pakistan for them to be suppressed. In consequence, the extremists arrested were released; action to freeze their bank accounts was almost farcical. More disconcertingly for India, some 2,500 to 3,000 battle-hardened Taliban and Al-Qaeda elements have found refuge in PoK and could be infiltrated into Kashmir.

Cognisant of this situation, India has laid out benchmarks for compliance by Pakistan. So far, however, its demands that Pakistan must end cross-border terrorism and deliver some 20 criminals wanted by it and resident in Pakistan have not been met. Cross-border terrorism continues unabated and the wanted persons remain free. So, India finds itself between a rock and a hard place, unable to withdraw its troops from the border and resume the bilateral dialogue process with Pakistan, which must include the vexed problem of Kashmir for reasons of face-saving. Nor can it keep its troops indefinitely on the border for no adequate reason, costs apart. Whenever the dialogue resumes, India could dust off its proposal to grapple with cross-border terrorism made obliquely during the negotiations on the Shimla Agreement to nominate a joint body “to establish ground rules and to supervise the effective observance of the Line of Peace (Control) and the rest of the border between the two countries.” Unfortunately, this clause was deleted on Z. A. Bhutto’s urgings. Undertaking joint patrolling of the border to check unauthorised movements has been pressed by India for several decades, but this has been resisted by Pakistan for obvious reasons.

Mr. Vajpayee has threatened Pakistan with ‘a decisive battle’; its Foreign Ministry has warned that “any misadventure by India will be met with full force. This would be a major miscalculation leading to grave consequences.” The unsubtle reference to nuclear weapons is too obvious to be missed. Pakistan’s missile tests have injected new strains into the India-Pakistan standoff at this critical juncture. Predictably, the test series has been explained away as being part of Pakistan’s research ad development related to its indigenous missile programme to maintain a minimum deterrent posture and ensure its security. For good measure, its official spokesman clarified that India was informed of these prospective tests and that they were “in no way related to the current situation existing between the two countries.”

This verisimilitude might have been faintly amusing had the missile tests not been timed with Pakistan’s Railway Minister, Javed Ashraf Qazi, a former ISI chief, mentioning that, “if it ever comes to the annihilation of Pakistan, then what is this damned nuclear option for, we will use it against the enemy.” He added that, “if Indians destroy most of us, we too will annihilate parts of the adversary.” Disconcertingly enough, this irrational logic also afflicts large constituencies in New Delhi’s political class, armed forces and the strategic chatterati. The clear and present danger is the unconcern in the ruling classes of India and Pakistan towards their nuclear capabilities that could overwhelm each other’s population and economy, and their disbelief that the present confrontation could lead to a conventional war and escalate into a nuclear conflict.

Some part of this insouciance is explicable because the hope lies at the back of their minds that the U.S. would, as before, achieve some kind of a compromise solution It is worth speculating whether the present crisis would have reached its current proportions if the comforting presence of the U.S. in its Good Samaritan/Peacemaker role had not been omnipresent in the background. The contours of a compromise solution to the present crisis, incidentally, are staring us in the face. It requires Pakistan to initiate more determined action to arrest the Taliban and Al-Qaeda elements holed up in PoK, proceed more credibly against the jehadi organisations in Pakistan and deliver some, if not all, of the 20 criminals wanted by India. For its part, India would need to assure the world that the coming elections in Kashmir would be conducted in a free and fair manner. Inviting foreign observers to monitor the elections could ensure this. A process of dialogue could also be initiated with the Jammu and Kashmir Government on the autonomy package suggested by it that had been summarily dismissed by the Central Government.

 

P. R. Chari, The Hindu, June 8, 2002,

http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2002/06/08/stories/2002060800511000.htm

 

Options to Reduce Tension

 

“If Pakistan decides it will not support infiltration, then both countries can work on a mechanism for joint patrolling.” — Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.

“The proposal is not new. Given the state of Pakistan-India relations, mechanisms for joint patrolling are unlikely to work.” — Pakistan’s Foreign Office spokesman.

At least half a dozen options have been presented from various sides to reduce Indo-Pak tension going on since December 13. Most of these options relate to the issue of violence in Kashmir which India calls cross border terrorism and Pakistan calls movement for self-determination by people under the occupation of the Indian military forces. The most recent proposal (which was contradicted by the Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes as not required) presented by the Indian prime minister in a news conference at Almaty calls for joint patrolling by the Indian and Pakistani side to make sure that no infiltration in support of Kashmiri militant groups was taking place. Pakistan has rejected that proposal describing it impractical because given the state of Indo-Pak relations its success cannot be ensured. In order to counter the Indian proposal Pakistan suggested neutral monitoring along the Line of Control so as to see that infiltration was not going on. India argues that such a mechanism cannot work “because the region (Kashmir) is mountainous terrain inaccessible and for a third country to come to verify the situation.” Behind the Indian refusal of neutral monitoring and Pakistan’s insistence of that option is the dynamics of political cleavage between India and Pakistan with each side a victim of egocentric approach and not interested in resolving the conflict through negotiations. Lately, there are reports that the United States and Britain are considering, much to the chagrin of New Delhi, a proposal for an international monitoring force for Kashmir.

Prior to Mr. Vajpayee’s proposal for joint monitory along the LoC, Pakistan had proposed a joint enquiry composed of Indian and Pakistani teams to examine New Delhi’s charges of Islamabad’s involvement in cross border terrorism. That suggestion was presented immediately after December 13 terrorist attack on the Indian parliament so as to dispel allegations put by New Delhi that Pakistan was behind such an attack and it should hand over 20 terrorists. Pakistan had also offered the deployment of international observers along the LoC so as to monitor the situation and act as a buffer between the two warring sides. As far as the international community is concerned, several proposals were presented to de-escalate tension between India and Pakistan. After his meeting with U.S. President George Bush, Russian President Vladimir Putin invited the Indian prime minister and Pakistani president to participate in a conference at Almaty. The United States, Britain, China, Iran and Bangladesh also suggested to both India and Pakistan to exercise restraint and de-escalate tension along the borders. The Bangladeshi foreign minister undertook a visit to Islamabad and New Delhi in the second week of June to diffuse tension between India and Pakistan. Similar requests and expressions were made by the U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan who appealed the two countries to pull out from the brink and resolve pending issues through a process of negotiations. However, between December 13 and June 5, India rejected most of the suggestions and proposals arguing that unless Pakistan stops cross border terrorism and hand over 20 suspects involved in various terrorist acts in India, it cannot demobilise troops deployed along the Western borders and start negotiations. It was only after the proposal was presented by the Indian Prime Minister on June 5 for joint patrolling along the disputed area of Jammu and Kashmir that one saw the Indian initiative to be rejected by Pakistan. Otherwise, prior to June 5, most of the proposals to reduce tension with India were presented by Pakistan but rejected by India. With these hard realities in mind, one doesn’t see any possibility of following a flexible approach by the either side resulting into the hardening of their positions. What is then the way out from the sustained impasse in Indo-Pak relations and how a situation could be created which could at least help resume the process of negotiations?

Because of three reasons, options to reduce tension between India and Pakistan are not resulting into any breakthrough. First, Pakistan’s insistence that the monitoring along the LoC should be done by international observers is unacceptable to India because such a step would mean the inclusion of third party in the Kashmir conflict. So far, India has tried its level best to discourage any external involvement in the Kashmir conflict, whereas, Pakistan is all for the international intervention because it firmly believes that the Indian proposal of joint patrolling will not work and the two countries cannot resolve the Kashmir conflict through bilateral means. Pakistan hopes that if the international community is involved in the Kashmir conflict then it will be a source of great support to the Kashmiri liberation movement. Whatever, Islamabad thinks about internationalising the Kashmir conflict, the fact is so far it has not been able to put any pressure on India agreeing to its proposal.

The two extreme positions taken by Islamabad and New Delhi on diffusing tension along the borders tend to worsen the standoff and sending wrong signals to the international community. Already, one can see the withdrawal of thousands of foreign nationals from both India and Pakistan causing severe economic losses to the two sides. Second, each side, i.e. India and Pakistan is a hostage to few individuals who have neither any consideration nor any regard for the people of their countries. More than Pakistan, the Indian people have become a hostage to a group of extremist leaders who are not reluctant to take one billion people of their country to a nuclear holocaust. Such an irresponsible approach expressed by the power circles of New Delhi is totally unbecoming of a democracy and a responsible country of South Asia. As far as Pakistan is concerned, it was wrong on the part of the government to go for missile test firing in an environment marred with war hysteria resulting into unnecessary provocation. Moreover, instead of promptly rejecting the Indian proposal of joint patrolling, Pakistan should have carefully studied the case and then submitted its response. This should have given the impression to the outside world that Pakistan was not following the Indian position of being inconsiderate to diffusing tension along the borders. But, as a result of refusal from Pakistan, India will get a chance to propagate that Islamabad by refusing to Prime Minister Vajpayee’s proposal was not interested in reining extremist elements sneaking into the Indian controlled parts of Jammu and Kashmir.

Finally, there is not adequate pressure on the part of saner elements in India and Pakistan on the hard line elements in New Delhi and Islamabad to exercise restraint. On the contrary, the hawkish group, particularly in India, has got a free hand in raising war hysteria and creating panic in South Asia. To a large extent, such people have succeeded in their objective because the Western countries have asked their nationals to withdraw from India and Pakistan. Except muted voices raised by some moderate elements in India and Pakistan, extremists are calling the shots. Such a situation is depressing particularly when the international community, despite the pressure exerted by the United States, Russia, Britain, Japan and the European Union, has reconciled to the possibility of a showdown between the two nuclear neighbours, i.e. India and Pakistan. But, those who will be wholly and solely affected as a result of nuclear holocaust are not coming forward so as to stop the madness and compel their government to show wisdom.

No side from India and Pakistan has in the recent past seriously suggested that the U.N. Security Council should immediately intervene and send peacekeeping force in order to disengage troops of the two countries and prevent the possibility of an all-out war. It is the responsibility of the U.N. Security Council to take prompt action in that direction so that the situation is diffused and South Asia is saved from predictable disaster. If the U.N. Security Council keeps mum over the prevailing crisis between India and Pakistan it will be held responsible for deliberately avoiding the disengagement of forces along the borders of the two countries.

Till the time the Indian leadership has an illusion that it can browbeat Pakistan through sustained military pressure, there is no likelihood of any breakthrough for de-escalation of tension in South Asia. Furthermore, the quasi-military government in Islamabad also needs to rethink its rhetoric on Kashmir, particularly the perception in Pakistan that Kashmiris would one day join their country. The only way one can see peace in South Asia is by abandoning the military option to resolve the Kashmir conflict. Let the people of Kashmir, who have suffered heavily as a result of more than a decade of violence, are given a break and the U.N. Security Council takes up the responsibility of administering Kashmir, both under the Indian and Pakistani controlled parts for a specific period of time followed by elections. Only then, proper conditions could be created for empowering the people of Jammu and Kashmir for deciding their own destiny, independent of Indian and Pakistani pressures.

 

Dr. Moonis Ahmar, The News, June 11, 2002,

http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/jun2002-daily/11-06-2002/oped/o5.htm

 

Vajpayee: Pakistan Pledges Helped

Avert War

No ‘Perceptible’ Tensions

 

Guarantees from Pakistan to curb cross border militancy, not pressure from the United States, helped avoid a war in South Asia, Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee told an Indian newspaper Monday.

In comments published in the Hindi-language Dainik Jagran newspaper, Vajpayee indicated that the chance of armed conflict with nuclear neighbour Pakistan had been ruled out by New Delhi after what had been a tense, six-month standoff.

“If Pakistan had not agreed to end infiltration, and America had not conveyed that guarantee to India, then war would not have been averted,” Vajpayee was quoted as saying. The comments — Vajpayee’s first detailed remarks on the crisis — come just days after U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld wrapped up a visit to India and Pakistan aimed at reducing heightened tensions between the two nuclear neighbours. Declaring ‘victory without war’ Vajpayee said, “the belief that India gave up the option of war under American pressure is totally wrong.”

The prime minister’s comments come after a bloody weekend in Kashmir — the disputed Himalayan region at the core of tensions between Pakistan and India — after at least 17 people where killed in attacks or shootouts with Islamic militants. India has blamed a series of militant attacks, including a dramatic raid on the Indian parliament in New Delhi last December, on Kashmiri separatist groups it says operate from Pakistani-controlled territory with backing from Islamabad.

Pakistan has rejected the charges, saying it only gives moral support to groups fighting what it calls a ‘liberation struggle’ for the Kashmiri people. The row has led to a dramatic increase in tensions between the two nuclear powers, between them deploying around a million troops along their shared border and the Line of Control.

Amid such a tense standoff, diplomats have expressed fears that another militant attack could spark a catastrophic war. But a pledge from Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf to halt cross border militancy drew conciliatory gestures from New Delhi.

India withdrew its naval forces from near Pakistani waters, opened up its airspace to Pakistani commercial aircraft and is taking steps to reinstall its High Commissioner in Islamabad. Speaking on Sunday, India’s Defense Minister George Fernandes said that there was no ‘perceivable’ tension along the Line of Control in Kashmir despite the high build up of military muscle. “We have already withdrawn our navy, lifted [the] ban on Pakistani overflights on Indian skies with an intention to defuse tension ... [We] hope Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf will realize all these aspects,” Fernandes said in a Press Trust of India report. “However, our jawans [soldiers] are always alert on duty to safeguard the borders,” the defence minister added.

Meanwhile, India has still ruled out dialogue with Pakistan until there is evidence of a cessation of separatist incursions in Indian controlled Kashmir. “Pakistan should first stop cross-border terrorism and dismantle terrorist infrastructure particularly in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir [POK]. Unless that is done, there is no point in having a dialogue,” Indian Home Minister L. K. Advani was quoted as saying by the Press Trust on Sunday. Advani added that there was no indication that there had been a reduction in cross-border infiltration. “Rather, even today, there are at least 70 terrorist training and sheltering camps operating in Pakistan and a bulk of them were in POK,” he said.

Referring to Musharaff’s May 26 address to the nation, when the Pakistani leader promised the insurgency crackdown, Advani said, “We want to see results at the grassroots level ... in checking export of terrorism to India.” “We will like to convey to the international community that despite his [Musharraf’s] declarations and statements, we cannot afford to relax our guard.”

 

CNN, June 17, 2002,

 http://asia.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/south/06/17/india.pakistan/

 

G-8 to Discuss Border Standoff

 

The current Pakistan-India crisis with particular reference to the resolution of core issue of Kashmir will be discussed at the Group of Eight summit scheduled to be held in Kananaskis, Canada, on June 27-28, a diplomatic source told Dawn.

The present military standoff between the two nations is a source of serious concern for the international community and the issue is expected to figure prominently in discussion at the G-8 Summit in Rockies resort of Canada, the source added. Japan, being the only country in the world which has experienced the nuclear holocaust, is expected to raise the issue of lingering tensions between Pakistan and India and the imminent danger of a nuclear conflict in the region, the source said.

Diplomatic community here seems convinced that President Musharraf has fulfilled its promise to check infiltration into occupied Kashmir, which too has been acknowledged by Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes in a recent statement.

However, the measures taken by Indian government to de-escalate the tension, including resumption of overflight facility, were being viewed as inadequate having no impact on the ground situation where a million troops are still massed on the borders.

The recent clash on the international borders and violation of Pakistan’s airspace by a spy plane are the incidents which caused serious alarm in the world capitals as the international community is convinced that any such incident could trigger an all-out war between the two countries.

“The threat of a nuclear war will remain there as long as the forces are at the borders,” the source said, adding that the situation could not be defused without withdrawal of troops to peace-time locations. A view is fast emerging among the major international players that more pressure should be exerted on India to bring it on negotiating table.

The adamant attitude of the Indian government towards holding talks on the Kashmir issue either on bilateral level or through third-party mediation has also made international community a bit wary, the source said. “It is quite illogical, India either has to accept bilateral talks or should accept third-party mediation,” the source added.

Indian refusal to accept international monitors at the Line of Control or deployment of U.N. observers was also not acceptable for the world community, he added. Referring to Almaty conference, he maintained, Pakistan had shown a flexible attitude and was open to all proposals aimed at resolving issues including Kashmir but the Indians had remained obstinate.

Dawn, June 22, 2002,

 http://www.dawn.com/2002/06/22/top3.htm

 

India’s ‘Coercive Diplomacy’ Flounders

 

When Mexico’s representative to the U.N. Security Council two weeks ago sought an informal meeting of the council to discuss the Kashmir issue, the Indian foreign ministry went into action to thwart any such meeting. It contacted the capitals of the all the 15 member-states of the council. Under immense pressure from Russia, in particular, Mexico backed out from convening such a meeting.

It is, of course, possible that the council may not have been able to take a categorical decision upholding the Kashmiris’ right to self-determination as laid down in previous resolutions, because of Russia’s veto and the British and the U.S. deference to India. But one thing is clear: India will no longer be able to argue that Kashmir is a bilateral issue. Indeed, the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, made that clear while echoing President Bush’s commitment that the U.S. would try to ‘inspire’ a solution to the Kashmir dispute.

When the tragic events of September 11 brought many nations together to fight international terrorism, India saw this as an opportunity to exploit the tragedy for its own objective of de-legitimising the freedom struggle of the Kashmiri people by equating it with terrorism. However, the exercise of ‘coercive diplomacy’ has proved to be a costly affair for India — economically, politically and strategically rather than a diplomatic victory.

Besides ‘internationalising’ Kashmir, India has ended up validating the doctrine of nuclear deterrence and eroded the repeated threats of a limited war espoused repeatedly by Indian leaders and generals in recent months.

When Pakistan’s ambassador to the United Nations, Munir Akram, refused to endorse India’s hollow commitment of ‘no first use’ of nuclear weapons at a recent press conference, the issue went on the front burner of the international community which made intense diplomatic efforts to avoid a war between the two countries where nuclear weapons could be conceivably used.

The possible threat of use of nuclear weapons prompted studies by Pentagon which warned that at any first strike more than 17 million people could die and another 12 million be impacted by the fallout. It prompted Mr. Bush to send Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to the region preceded by Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, who followed British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.

Indian columnist Anurag Sinha wrote in the Indian Express: “This is a classic deterrence theory.” Even the most hardcore foreign policymakers and military personnel have suggested that there is no cause worthy of a nuclear confrontation. The BJP’s presidential candidate A. P. J. Abdul Kalam admitted that addition of the nuclear dimension had diminished the chances of a war in South Asia.

To underscore the nuclear dimension and its impact, the U.S. ambassador to India said: “It is no doubt that the nuclear dimension accelerated our decision-making and did accelerate the departure of Americans from India, including from the U.S. government part of the American citizens there.”

But it cannot be overstated that the biggest cost of India’s standoff with Pakistan has been to the Indian economy. It resulted in reversal of foreign investment, crash of India’s stock exchanges, depressed businesses and decrease in exports. The compound economic impact of this standoff on India would easily mount to several billion dollars and consequently slow down India’s economic development and growth prospects for several years.

The primary objective of India’s macho posturing was to elevate the electoral prospects of the BJP in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections. However, if the recent provincial elections and by-elections are any barometer, the BJP’s electoral chances have not increased by the present coercive posture.

It is quite possible that India may revive its bluff in September to give cover to the elections in Kashmir or in the hope of again coercing Pakistan to abandon its principled stand on Kashmir. Such manoeuvring may once again push the region to the brink of war.

India’s claim that Pakistan has still not been able to stop cross-border terrorism is a ploy to keep the pressure on Pakistan. Since the intense diplomatic activity by the United States and the United Kingdom, the top diplomats there have noted that the cross-border activity has almost stopped.

Mr. Armitage said the other day that there were strong signs that alleged infiltrations from Pakistan into occupied Kashmir had decreased sharply in the last few weeks. But India continues to mass its forces on the borders, with no let-up in tensions. Given the fact that the ‘fighting season’ in South Asia begins in September, India’s hostile posture could trigger a conflict by design or by accident, which could have devastating effect for both.

 

Masood Haider, Dawn, June 29, 2002, http://www.dawn.com/2002/06/29/fea.htm#4

 

India’s Varied Threat to Pakistan

 

As India-Pakistan military tension increases and their armed forces confront each other on the borders, the deeper Indian intentions towards Pakistan become clear. Although becoming obvious is the manner in which India wants to undermine Pakistan politically and economically if it cannot engage it militarily and defeat it decisively on the military front. India wants to have far more powerful weapons than Pakistan, and in large numbers. They want to manufacture most of them or obtain them cheap from countries like Israel. And it is succeeding pretty well, as it is able to obtain sophisticated weapons in plenty from Russia and other republics of the former Soviet Union at very low prices. And it is able to prevail on some of those countries not to supply the same kind of arms to Pakistan.

India’s capacity to manufacture such weapons is also on the increase and as its Defence budget increases, its capacity for manufacturing is also on the rise. Compared to that Pakistan’s defence budget is small even at the enhanced 145 billion and is under pressure from the IMF to reduce it further to balance its budget or reduce budget deficits. The donors too have been exerting pressure on Pakistan to reduce its defence spending.

India has also been expanding its Blue Water navy in an effort to dominate the Indian Ocean and parts of the Pacific, making other countries in the region including Australian and Indonesia uneasy. It has acquired aircraft carriers as well as nuclear submarines in sizeable numbers. Economically India has been signing free trade treaties with other countries in the region like Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, while trying to isolate Pakistan and smuggling from India to the extent of a billion dollars has been hurting Pakistan’s economy previously. Such smuggling is bound to increase in the coming months and years.

Politically India has been trying to assist, encourage and promote disaffected groups in Sindh and Balochistan by sponsoring seminars abroad where speeches are made on how Pakistan had dropped its sub-nationalities of their rights and privileges, It has also been encouraging Muhajir elements campaigning against the Federal government or against Pakistan. It suits India to see Pakistan in the political boil.

While the bomb explosions in mosques, buses, railway stations and other places have been numerous we do not know how many of them were caused by Indians allegedly as a reprisal to the bomb explosions in Indian Occupied Kashmir. Too many of them are said to be of Indian origin but we are not too sure as our Police and intelligence agencies are not good at tracking down the culprits in most of the cases and suspension alone is not proof of the guilt of India.

We need a far more vigilant, vigorous and effective intelligence system to be able to investigate each case and establish the complicity of India in many of these explosions. And they include the explosions in the church in Bahawalpur earlier, in another church in the diplomatic enclave which killed several foreign nationals. And finally the suicide bombing in Karachi that killed twelve French Navy engineers.

It would be irrational to assume that those who were ready to go to war at any cost will hesitate to take to such explosions in Pakistan to prevent terrorist explosions in Indian Held Kashmir as they ruled them or to punish the perpetrators as they viewed them.

India has discovered after forty-two years a new tool to hurt Pakistan decisively. And that is scrapping the Indus Water treaty to deny the waters of the Indus System to Pakistan, make the crops fail and cause widespread famine in a land of one hundred and forty million people of whom thirty million are undernourished. India says it can scrap the treaty and then it says it won’t. The treaty signed under the auspices of the World Bank President Eugene Black is coming to be more like a Sword of Damocles hanging over us despite Indian assurances.

India realizes it is running grave political risks in trying to undo Pakistan. If Pakistan is undone, the hundred and forty million Muslims of Pakistan will join together with one hundred and forty million Muslims of India. Together they will be almost four hundred million of Pakistan or over one third of the population of the two countries put together. A minority that large cannot be held down by the eight hundred million Hindus of India who may like to treat them more like the manner the Hindus of Gujarat treat their Muslims.

In an election with the Hindu majority divided as between the Congress and the Hindu extremist BJP and its more vicious factions. The Muslims may have the swing vote and that is not what the Hindus would like and the Hindus cannot eliminate them. Such considerations barred India from absorbing Bangladesh with its preponderant Muslim population into India after the break-up of Pakistan in 1971. India has hence to learn to live with Indian Muslims and with Pakistan instead of blaming its neighbours for its failures and problems.

It has to seek peace with Pakistan however irksome it may regard that to be, reduce its military expenditure and spend more on its social sector particularly for poverty reduction when 45% of its people are living below the poverty in India. India owes a responsibility not only to its poor masses but also the impoverish people of the region as a whole. India’s great traditions as those said by Ashoka should be used for peace, prosperity and progress in the region not for negative pursuits and create scenes of horror.

 

Sultan Ahmed, Defence Journal, June 2002, http://www.defencejournal.com/2002/june/threat.htm

 

Ball in Pakistan’s Court

 

India has conveyed to Britain that the next steps in the current peace process with Pakistan must come from Islamabad, which should implement its promises of ending infiltration and disbanding the infrastructure of terrorism on its soil.

Summing up the two rounds of talks over the weekend with the British Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, India today said it would not make additional moves towards reduction of tensions until it saw more action on the ground from Pakistan. “We have told very clearly to the British Government that any further movement on the de-escalation front would depend on the Pakistan President, Pervez Musharraf, keeping his promise to end infiltration and cross-border terrorism,” the spokeswoman of the Foreign Office, Nirupama Rao, said today.

Mr. Straw had travelled to the subcontinent to restore political confidence between India and Pakistan and nudge them to keep the process moving forward. Islamabad is arguing that it has done what it could and New Delhi must respond by agreeing to talks on Kashmir. New Delhi on the other hand insists that dialogue could only follow a complete cessation of cross-border terrorism.

Britain apparently would like to see Gen. Musharraf take additional steps on cross-border terrorism and India respond by diplomatic and military de-escalation. Britain and the United States, which are brokering the current peace process between India and Pakistan, suggest that the appropriate sequence is to end terrorism, reduce military tensions and begin political dialogue.

The process is now stuck somewhere between the first and second stages. Britain does not expect an immediate resumption of full-blown dialogue between New Delhi and Islamabad. But it does believe that renewed diplomatic contacts at the ambassadorial level could help open channels of communication between the two sides.

Mr. Straw’s visit to New Delhi and Islamabad is being seen here as a probing mission to understand the positions of the two governments. The focus will now be on the U.S. Secretary of State, Colin Powell, who arrives here later this week. Mr. Powell will try and bridge what appear to be irreconcilable positions in New Delhi and Islamabad.

C. Raja Mohan, The Hindu, July 22, 2002,

http://www.meadev.nic.in/news/clippings/20020723/hin.htm

 

Coercive Diplomacy or

Nuclear Brinkmanship?

 

As the present crisis between India and Pakistan continues on a de-escalation trajectory, it is increasingly being asked whether the crisis was coercive diplomacy at its best or nuclear brinkmanship at its worst.

It is being opined that the outcome of the present Indo-Pak crisis was determined by India’s synergised policy of coercive diplomacy.  The attack on the Indian Parliament, followed by the attack on the Raghunath temple in Jammu, and the most recent attack on the Kaluchak army camp in Jammu, had increased the hardliners pitch demanding that the government take decisive action. India took a range of diplomatic steps: it reduced the High Commission staff by half, withdrew its High Commissioner in Islamabad, stopped over flight, and snapped rail and road links with Pakistan. Stepping up its diplomatic offensive against Pakistan after the Jammu massacre, India asked Islamabad to withdraw its High Commissioner in New Delhi, Ashraf Jehangir Qazi.  This effort was supplemented by constantly appealing to the western world and the U.S. in particular to step up their pressure on Pakistan.  India threatened to take military action but never initiated it, thereby testing the limits of coercive diplomacy — threatening to go to war but not actually doing so. The U.S. shuttle diplomacy managed to obtain an assurance from General Musharraf that infiltration had been ended, and permanently. That seemed sufficient for India to de-escalate.

The sounding of the war bugles, along with the persistent and well thought out crisis management and escalation control efforts, acquires a novel meaning in this context. If armed conflict was not initiated, it was because neither side was interested in escalating it to the ‘point of no return,’ and choosing to come out of the crisis with ‘something to show’ for it as opposed to ‘backing off.’ It appeared that the Pakistani decision-makers believed that thanks to their nuclear capability, India would not cross the international borders, a ‘norm’ that was set during the Kargil conflict. This is what some scholars imply when they say that the threat of war was effective in creating international pressure on Pakistan, but maintain that the execution of any such threat would be dangerous and could lead to a breakdown of deterrence.  There is a delicate balance between nuclear capability acting as a deterrent and it being the cause for breakdown of deterrence. The appropriate diplomatic response lies in adopting the stance of nuclear brinkmanship: threaten to cross the brink and hope your enemy gives in first. The risk that hostility between India and Pakistan may escalate was affirmed by several factors that ranged from the diplomatic to the politico-strategic. As the crisis de-escalates, Pakistan has claimed that deterrence has worked. 

For years Pakistan believed that it could bleed India in Kashmir. The May 1998 tests encouraged it further as it thought that stability at one level make sub-conventional conflict safer without the risk of escalation. Kargil demonstrated that Pakistan could be a reckless, adventurist, and risk-prone state, capable of behaving strategically and irrationally.  The possession of nuclear weapons has raised the threshold for Pakistan to take risks. But in the post-Parliament attack phase, India decided to play tough. Until very recently Pakistan thought it could manipulate the risks of a nuclear confrontation purely for political reasons and when India upped the ante it could cry nuclear wolf, attract global attention to the Kashmir ‘flashpoint’ and get away with it. This time New Delhi decided that relentless pressure and war talk with subtle threats could alter the outcome of the crisis in its favour. To be taken credibly India had to ensure that its threat of initiating an armed conflict was taken seriously. And since Pakistan had to appear to be doing something apart from troop mobilisation, a series of missile tests were conducted. The range of military options available to India from limited air strikes to special forces action to limited war to all out conventional war — all carried the risk of escalation. The outcome of an armed conflict, especially with missiles and aircrafts deployed, may not have been to either country’s liking as neither country has any escalation control mechanism in place. At the same time, each side was determined to convince the other that it was not blustering, by maintaining the threat of actual war. 

However ‘victorious’ either side may feel from the standoff, one thing is clear — an unresolved Kashmir issue carries the risk of another crisis.  The government should seriously consider the case for using monitoring technology and not maximalist preconditions in a unilateral mode of political bravado.  

 

Arpit Rajain, Article No: 796, July 15, 2002,

http://www.ipcs.org/issues/700/796-ndi-arpit.html