Author: Tavleen Singh
Publication: India Today
Date: February 18, 2002
Introduction: America's war against
terrorism doesn't include India's battle against the scourge
America's South Asia policy since
September 11 has often left me bewildered. I have attributed this to my
inability to see the bigger picture from Delhi. So it came as something
of a shock when I saw it last week from New York and discovered that if
American foreign policy seems only puzzling from Delhi it seems surreal
when seen from New York. It was to attend the World Economic Forum's annual
meeting that I came to this city, which has seen the single worst act of
terrorism in history and because September 11 dominated the conference,
I was drawn to sessions that discussed issues related to it.
I found myself one afternoon in
one of the Waldorf Astoria's gilded halls amidst a group that was discussing
security and terrorism and among the panelists was Pakistan's Finance Minister
Shaukat Aziz. At some point in the discourse, a speaker announced that
the US needed to learn from countries that had been "victims" of terrorism,
like England and, believe it or not, Pakistan. Someone then announced that
Aziz would now tell us how terrorism could be fought. There were Indians
in the audience and a sort of collective gasp went up but nobody said anything
perhaps because there really is nothing to say. Clearly, in America's current
view of the world the "evil axis" does not and will not include Pakistan.
Our boys in the Ministry of External
Affairs have tried their best. Let us not blame them. They have pointed
out-not once but many times-to the American State Department that Pakistan
has been responsible not just for giving birth to the Taliban and equally
malevolent groups like the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammed, but
for nurturing those responsible for terrorism in the US. The Americans
already know this since they once sent a spy plane into Pakistan to bring
Ramzi Yusuf (the first bomber of the WTC) to justice. They also know Pakistan
is a military dictatorship and that the Pakistani Army cannot be absolved
of terrorist activity. But right now they just do not want to listen.
A decision appears to have been
taken in Washington that Pakistan is needed as an ally now just as much
as it was needed 20 years ago to trap the former Soviet Union in the quagmire
of Afghanistan. The US State Department appears not to be alone with this
view. The latest issue of Foreign Affairs, the world's most revered foreign
policy journal, has an article titled "Preserving Pakistan". The first
paragraph spells it out. "The survival of Pakistan in its existing form
is a vital US security interest, one that trumps all other American interests
in the country. A collapse of Pakistan-into internal anarchy or an Islamist
revolution-would cripple the global campaign against Islamist terrorism.
Strengthening the Pakistani state and cementing its cooperation with the
West have thus become immensely important to Washington."
So, what should India do? We know
that strengthening the Pakistani state-in terminal decline before September
11-will have a direct effect on India. The more money Pakistan gets the
more it will spend on training "freedom fighters" in Kashmir. Of late,
these freedom fighters have taken their fight outside the boundaries of
Kashmir right up to Parliament House and we have no means of talking to
Pakistan's General because all he wants to talk about is Kashmir. What
he means by talking about Kashmir is that India find some way of handing
it over to him. What should we do then?
Well, we may as well stop hoping
that America is going to help us by persuading Pervez Musharraf to become
more broadminded in his approach to dialogue. We need to also give up the
illusion that America's war against terrorism includes our own fight against
it. Our fight is one that we will have to continue fighting alone. But
while doing this we need to remember that there is a political dimension
to our Kashmir problem and that it has been a lmost forgotten in all this
talk of terrorism.
We must start dealing with it urgently
now. It is time Atal Bihari Vajpayee woke up to the reality that putting
K.C. Pant in charge of talking to militant groups in Kashmir does not constitute
a policy. In any case, choosing someone like Pant makes the idea of dialogue
seem non-serious.
We must then get on with reforming
the Indian economy at top speed. We must muster the political will to ensure
that India becomes at least as developed as Thailand in the next 10 years.
If the Indian economy booms, Pakistan's ability to continue being a terrorist
thorn in our side automatically diminishes. When we talk of speeding up
economic reforms these days, the finance minister gives us the glib answer
that he has done what he could and it is now for the states to do their
bit. This is not good enough and not entirely true. Meanwhile, let us forget
about the "evil axis" between America and Pakistan since we can do nothing
about it.
