Urdunama: Indian Misadventure

The Daily Ausaf has been fairly regular in the recent past in drawing attention to what it calls an “Indian conspiracy” in Pakistan and the need for Pakistan to counter it.  This theme, though not unusual in Pakistan’s vernacular press, has appeared more frequently recently than hitherto.  One wonders if there is more mischief at hand than meets the eye.

Below is the December 11 editorial from Daily Ausaf:

Interior Minister Rehman Malik has said that proof of India’s involvement in terrorism in Pakistan has been presented to the Foreign Affairs ministry so that the ministry may raise this issue in all international fora.  Malik said, “We have ample proof of India’s involvement in terrorist activities inside Pakistan”.

Weapons confiscated from four trucks in Bara had Indian markings.  He said his ministry was responsible for accumulating evidence, which is then passed on to the concerned institutions and ministries.

After 9/11, India has benefited greatly from America’s opportunistic wars. But what sort of peculiar logic is this, where Pakistan is forced to make the most sacrifices, while India reaps the most benefits.  This situation points to our weakness where our past leaders made policies only to satiate their own power.  Pakistan continued to sink as a result of this, and India fully exploited this situation.

On one end, India tried to sabotage the movement for Kashmiri independence, and on the other, it has created a situation of virtual anarchy in Pakistan by sending in terrorists through Afghanistan, in its quest for “Akhand Bharat.”

Despite this situation, the US not only  forgot Pakistan’s sacrifices in its war, but also tried to use India as an effective counter-weight to our ally, China.  This Indo-US friendship also includes the civil nuclear agreement between the two countries. As a result of the US’s friendship, India’s attitude is getting increasingly bellicose.  And India has been trying to avoid any further dialog with Pakistan on the Kashmir issue.

Even if firecracker bursts in India, their media blames Pakistan’s intellegence agencies, while on the other hand despite India’s support to terrorists in Pakistan, our leaders have been silent, and India has been making full use of our silence.

To promote its impure vision for an “Akhand Bharat”, India, via its agents, is trying to dismember and destroy Pakistan. It is also attempting a cultural invasion of our youth. Unfortunately, India’s cultural invasion of Pakistan is being helped by some of our own people.

Even Afghanistan’s external intelligence agency, RAMA, whose name sounds like “Ram”, was founded by India’s RAW.  India has increased its budget allocation for intelligence to facilitate RAW’s activities inside Pakistan.  India’s intentions are to encircle Pakistan — to that end it has established air bases in foreign countries.

With the ruse of helping reconstruct the airport in Jalalabad, India has deployed about 10,000 troops in Afghanistan, whose job is to support activities against Pakistan.  Therefore, India’s espionage and terrorism in sevaral parts of Pakistan — from Wana and Waziristan to Baluchistan — is irrefutable.

Our media has reported India’s hand in several terrorist activities in Pakistan — from the attack on the Manawa training center to the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team.  The question that needs to be asked is why India’s shameful and alarming acts haven’t been exposed to the world.

India’s politicians and media make it a point to sully Pakistan’s name, without proof, after every terrorist attack, but here, our politicians, despite beomg armed with concrete evidence of India’s terrorism in Pakistan, appear reluctant to present this to the world.

It is time to give India a befitting reply to its misadventures against Pakistan.

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Filed under: 9/11, Af-Pak, India, Pakistan, Terrorism, Urdunama, Afghanistan, akhand bharat, ausaf, baluchistan, bara, China, cricket, India, Kashmir, manawa, Pakistan, raw, RAWA, Rehman Malik, Sri Lanka, Terrorism, Urdunama, US, wana, waziristan

All I want for Christmas is Kashmir

Solving a 63 year old problem to solve an 8 year old problem is no solution

‘Tis the season of giving and Jeffrey Stern wants India and Pakistan to “give peace a chance” in Kashmir.  Jeffrey is the international engagement manager at the National Constitution Center and has apparently spent much of the last two years traveling around South Asia.

But his sojourn to South Asia has left him none the wiser on matters relating to the Kashmir issue.  Jeffrey presents the same tired, blitheringly idiotic arguments on Kashmir that many before him have presented.  There are two main themes in his article — first, he highlights what he calls “Wahhabism…sweeping through the valley..” and second, draws attention to the need to “resolve” Kashmir so that Pakistan can begin to be the “partner the US needs to confront al Qaeda and its allies..”

During his field trip to Kashmir, Jeffrey based his understanding of the conflict and of the people’s aspirations by speaking with “former militants” and separatists, most prominently Maulala Shaukat Shah of the Jamiat-e-Ahl-e-Hadees. Most in India will remember Shah as central to the uproar on the Amarnath Shrine Board last year.  By any measure, the Jamiat plays a prominent role in Kashmir, which has a support base of 1.5 million followers and is patron to 600 mosques and 150 schools.

But by focusing almost entirely on the Jamiat, Jeffrey has either intentionally excluded other actors in what is a complex and sensitive issue, or has been entirely blindsided by them. Although the situation in J&K remains fluid, developments are afoot outside the realm of the Jamiat that could fundamentally alter the dynamics of the issue.

Quietly, Manmohan Singh’s government has proceeded with back-channel talks with moderate members of the Hurriyat, with Mirwaiz Umar Farooq clearly emerging as the international face of the Hurriyat contingent for talks.

These talks come at an advantageous time  for India.  Despite an increase in ceasefire violations by Pakistan, terrorism in J&K is at a five year low.  The insurgency is not what it once was. The people of Kashmir defied separatists’ calls and militants’ threats to vote in the state elections in December 2008 (Voter turnout was 62%, with 55% in Kashmir Valley. Contrast this against the 42% voter turnout in Mumbai, in the country’s first general elections post-26/11).  India today, is able to dedicate political and economic bandwidth on the Kashmir issue.

Manmohan Singh’s government is in the process of implementing a series of confidence building measures to signal its intent at quiet diplomacy. Chief among these include amendments to the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSP) and withdrawal of some para-military forces from the state, with gradual transfer of responsibilities to state police.

But importantly, significant progress on talks with separatists and consequent reorganization of Centre-J&K relations are happening at a time when Pakistan is mired in conflict and is unable to dedicate sufficient bandwidth to stall or retard such progress.  If and when the time does come for an Indo-Pak “settlement” on the Kashmir issue, Pakistan may not find itself in a very advantageous bargaining position.

There is clearly more at work in Kashmir than Jeffrey knows about or wants you to believe.  His second issue dealt with resolving Kashmir to allow Pakistan to focus on al Qaeda. Readers of The Filter Coffee will know how poorly conceived this idea is. Kashmir is only a symptom of the myriad complexes the Pakistani state suffers from vis-a-vis India, which kinder folks attribute to the postpartum trauma of Partition.

Jeffrey writes:

Broadening [the definition of mutual US-Pak trust] will mean a holistic approach to Pakistan, acknowledging that Taliban militancy on the border with Afghanistan is not Pakistan’s most pressing concern even if it is the United States’. It will mean acknowledging Pakistan’s grievances with India.

Redefining the relationship will mean moving towards a workable resolution to Kashmir. Only then can Pakistan begin to be the partner the U.S. needs to confront al Qaeda and its allies, buttress Western efforts in Afghanistan, and to keep Kashmir itself from exploding.

In other words, Jeffrey wants Obama to solve a 63 year old problem as quickly as possible so that he can spend  the next two years trying to solve an 8 year old problem. Jeffrey’s ideas on resolving Kashmir confront the same cul-de-sac as other such prescriptions — there is no mention of just how Obama or anyone else can go about “resolving” Kashmir.

Mercifully, for every Jeffrey Stern there are the Lisa Curtises and Stephen Cohens who try to keep insanity at bay. The United States would do well not to muck around in Kashmir. Despite being impoverished and politically and economically stunted for decades after independence, India managed to stave off international pressure on entering into disadvantageous compromises on Kashmir or readjusting its borders along the LoC with Pakistan.

Today, given its economic and political leverage in the world, India acquiescing to such a compromise is even more unlikely. The United States will need to very carefully consider the negative repercussions of  any overt involvement in the dispute on the future of the Indo-US strategic partnership.

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Filed under: Af-Pak, Al Qaeda, America, Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, India, Kashmir, Line of Control, Pakistan, World, Al Qaeda, amarnath shrine board, asfp, hurriyat, jamait-e-ahl-e-hadees, jammu, jeffrey stern, Kashmir, Manmohan Singh, maulana shaukat shah, mirwaiz umar farooq, Pakistan, wahhabism

Manmohan’s US trip

India must aggressively pursue to protect interests and stake in Afghanistan’s future

Manmohan Singh’s visit to the US coincides with Thanksgiving week and the first anniversary of 26/11.  During the Prime Minister’s visit, the debilitating security situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan will be on the agenda.  It is on this issue that some incredibly silly, wantonly naive advice is being shoved the US President’s way.

Two broad themes on India’s place in the regional security discourse seem to periodically appear, which can be summarized thus.  Firstly,  Pakistan feels threatened by the presence of a larger adversary at its eastern border. The main thorn in Indo-Pak relations is Kashmir. Therefore, solve Kashmir and receive a grateful Pakistan’s full commitment on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

Second, Pakistan feels “strategically encircled” by India’s presence in Afghanistan.  An increase in Indian involvement would inflame Pakistan’s apprehensions vis-a-vis India. Therefore, in the interest of Pakistan’s sensitivities, an expansion of Indian involvement in Afghanistan must not be encouraged (or must at least be brushed aside).

Both these themes do an excellent job in confusing symptom (the “Kashmir” issue, and “strategic depth”) with root cause (Pakistan’s pathological neuralgia with India).  It is another issue of course that those advocating the “resolve Kashmir” approach haven’t ever come close to articulating how this feat is to be accomplished by Washington.

It is no secret that there is disconnect between the UPA and the Obama administration on the way forward in Afghanistan.  There are two aspects to this disconnect — one, th UPA administration has been blind to US’s plans in the region (and consequences to India’s interests), and two, the Obama Administration has been unable to present a coherent, consistent vision for Afghanistan, mired as it is with internal squabbling.

But Obama, who ran on a canvas promising to withdraw troops from Afghanistan is under pressure to act, if only to placate his fellow Democrats and voters.  The Obama administration sees greater regional involvement as a solution that would allow for a phased US withdrawal.   Hence Richard Holbrooke’s  recent diplomatic sojourns to China and Russia.

The role that India will play in this “regional approach” will perhaps become more apparent after the Prime Minister’s visit to Washington. Rightly, as the preeminent power in the region, India’s involvement is not only “beneficial”, but imperative.

But the status of “regional power” is not achieved through birth-right.  It must be  earned, and if India believes itself to be the preeminent regional power, it must start acting like one. Unquestionably, this involves taking tough decisions not only on what India would “prefer to do” in Afghanistan, but what it must do to safeguard its interests.

Thus far, India has stayed away from overt involvement in shaping the politics in Afghanistan, choosing instead engage in the (noble) pursuits of building schools and roads and training the Afghan police force.  “Soft power”, Shashi Tharoor calls it.  But soft power is credible only as long as someone else is willing and able to do the dirty yard work.

What if that “someone else” leaves? Who will step in?

A power vacuum in Afghanistan with a weak, de-legitimized government in Kabul constantly being undermined by a reinforced and invigorated Taliban and affiliated networks presents a scenario for India where its overall influence in the country will diminish, relative to that of China and Pakistan.

Economic investments in Afghanistan (totaling over $1 billion), development of ties with the country’s civilian polity and strategic importance of Afghanistan to an energy-starved nation, make such a scenario unacceptable to India.

There is simply too much at stake for India not to be meaningfully involved in a regional approach to the Afghanistan problem.  Indeed, India’s contribution to such a regional solution must span across all realms, including security/law enforcement, political reconciliation and delivery of social services.  In this regard, offering a larger Indian contingent to train Afghanistan’s security forces, can be a small, but important first step.

US administrations will always have India doubters, just as they will their  share of Indophiles.  India’s goal within the construct of the “regional approach”  must be to aggressively defend its interests in the country, while playing a meaningful role in addressing the current crisis and defining the future of Afghanistan.

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Filed under: Af-Pak, Afghanistan, Barack Obama, China, Foreign Policy, India, Pakistan, Terrorism, World, Afghanistan, Barack Obama, China, India, kabul, Kashmir, Manmohan Singh, Pakistan, regional security, richard holbrooke, Russia