Which country poses a serious threat because of its established links with international terrorism, proven weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programme, and close ties with other dictatorships in WMD-related matters? To an Indian, the answer may be obvious: Pakistan, bristling with dangerous extremists inside and outside its armed forces and engaged in covert WMD cooperation with the communist regimes in Beijing and Pyongyang.
But to President George W. Bush and several of his advisors, the answer is Iraq, a starving, humbled country reeling under oppressive international sanctions for 11 years whose WMD projects were dismantled methodically by UN inspectors over several years before they were expelled for refusing to acknowledge their mission was over. In the current din in the US over whether to wage war on Iraq or find other ways to change the regime there, an undeclared Bush policy is emerging - demand democracy in enemy states and oil friendly dictatorships.
Bush is right that Saddam Hussein, a leader who gassed members of his Kurdish minority, symbolises evil, and that his downfall, by whatever means, is essential to resolve the humanitarian crisis confronting Iraqis and bring their nation back into the international mainstream. If Iraq is reintegrated with the world, it would send oil prices tumbling down, and India would directly benefit.
But Bush is wrong in seeking to impose a unilateral solution to the Iraq problem. In doing so, he is in danger of pointlessly stoking anti-US sentiment when America's unprecedented primacy in the world calls for responsible leadership and prudence. The more justifications Bush puts forward for war with Iraq, the more he exposes the contradictions in his foreign policy.
While offering few firm facts in support of his claims on Iraq, Bush continues to turn a blind eye to and even wink at inconvenient facts about Pakistan. Even as Bush was threatening war on Iraq for democracy's sake, General Pervez Musharraf, not content with the sham referendum he held over his self-declared presidency, proclaimed 29 constitutional amendments in one stroke to crown himself virtually the Emperor of Pakistan.
More interesting is the way Bush reacted to this constitutional assault by someone who, true to his training, likes to execute everything in commando style. Bush began by heaping praise on Musharraf for being 'still tight with us on the war against terror' and, after stating disingenuously that he would 'continue to work with our friends and allies to promote democracy', ended without a word in criticism.
If democracy is good (and necessary) for Iraqis, why isn't it so for Pakistanis? If the US really wants regional peace and stability, it cannot forget that every Pakistani military ruler has waged war with India and that the only occasions when the two neighbours have come close to peace have been during the short periods of democratic rule in Islamabad. Yet no ruler in the world has benefited more from 9/11 than the man who presides over the nation that is the main sanctuary of Al-Qaeda, the Taliban and Kashmiri terrorists.
Bush espouses a doctrine of preemptive war that flies in the face of the principle of inviolability of states enshrined in the Treaty of Westphalia. He justifies his doctrine on the plea that the 350-year-old convention must give way to the new WMD reality. As he put it at West Point in June, the WMD factor precludes the luxury of waiting for an attack and America must be 'ready for preemptive action when necessary to defend our liberty'.
While many in America worry about Iraq or some terrorists acquiring weapons of mass destruction, the reality for India is that Pakistan has State-supported terrorists and nuclear weapons controlled by Islamist generals. When the Pakistani dictatorship openly employs nuclear terror to shield its export of terror, shouldn't the right of preemptive war come into effect automatically? Yet when Pakistan again employed nuclear blackmail this summer, the Bush administration, rather than working with New Delhi to immobilise such blackmail, targeted India economically through a hitherto untried sanctions tool -- travel advisory.
The Bush team wants to practise a policy of preemptive war to protect US interests, but when it comes to India it applies a different standard by trying to actively dissuade New Delhi from striking preemptively or even in reprisal to major State-sponsored terrorist attacks. Henry Kissinger contends speciously that there is now 'an imperative for preemptive action' by the US against Iraq. If there was a convincing imperative for military action by a democracy, it was the audacious attempt by five Pakistani gunmen last December 13 to wipe out India's elected leadership.
But what did Bush and his folks advise India then? Restraint. And how have they sought to thwart the possibility of Indian action ever since? By extracting two anti-terrorism pledges from Musharraf in less than six months that he has not honoured, and by supplying him more than $ 175 million worth of military equipment, including badly-needed replacement parts to get the Pakistani F-16 fleet back in full service again.
If anything, Washington has validated Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee's public admission that he erred in not seizing the moment after December 13 to launch action - not preemptive but retaliatory. The Indian Air Force was ready (and capable) on December 14 to surgically inflict punitive blows on the Pakistani terror infrastructure and its guardians, with escalation to ground war precluded by the absence of mobilisation of the rival armies. But the air force waited in vain for the political green light.
After all, India's history is one of lost opportunities.
In the nearly 11 months since the terrorist attack on the Jammu and Kashmir legislature, counter-terrorism has emerged as a useful political instrument for the US to do what it had always aspired for - to advance its interests by being an intermediary between India and Pakistan. With each side pleading its case with every visiting US official, America finds itself playing its desired role as arbiter, soother and calmer. No longer New Delhi demurs when US officials halt in Islamabad before or after visiting New Delhi. In contrast, India kicked up a diplomatic storm to try and stop Bill Clinton from stopping even for a few hours in Pakistan on his subcontinental tour as president.
While carving out a role for itself in managing the India-Pakistan conflict and relationship, including the Kashmir issue, Washington has sought to keep both New Delhi and Islamabad happy with carefully crafted statements that regional analysts vie to interpret as support to their country's official position. But the latest subcontinental tours of Colin Powell and Richard Armitage have served as a reminder that there are limits to such a balancing act and that these visits are yielding diminishing returns. A key goal of the US diplomatic intervention - 'Bring about a situation where there can be a dialogue' - looks more distant. Given the rising level of cross-border terrorism and the self-enthronement of Musharraf after his belligerent independence day speech, the dangers of a declared Indo-Pakistan war are likely to come a full circle by this winter.
The more powers Musharraf has usurped,
the more unpopular at home and the more dependent on his army he has become.
That in turn makes it more likely he will ratchet up hostilities with India.
India has to guard against the risk that Musharraf, not wanting to be seen
as an emperor without clothes, may employ in commando style the doctrine
of preemption of his new-found chief patron.