Author: Josy Joseph
Publication: DNA India
Date: August 31, 2009
URL: http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_somebody-in-the-state-dept-is-bent-on-arming-pakistan_1286497
Islamabad's illegal modification of Harpoon
missiles for attack against land targets in India is symbolic of Pakistan
military's obsession with India. But Indian military sources say, the worse
is the continuing American military assistance to Pakistan in the name of
terrorism that in reality is arming its military for a conventional war against
India.
"It is a matter of finer nuance (if Harpoon has been modified). But what
we are worried about, and what we have been repeatedly telling the Americans,
is that all the systems they have been supplying to Pakistan after 9/11 has
nothing to do with terrorism. They are all arms meant for a conventional scenario
(against India)," says a senior army general.
A recently retired military chief says the
US military leadership "understands what we [India] say, but it is at
the state department that someone is bent upon arming Pakistan".
Former navy chief Admiral Arun Prakash said none of the weapons that the US
has given Pakistan -- surveillance radars, P3C aircraft and F-16 fighters
-- has any specific counter-terrorism role. Historically "these weapons
have been used against India", not terrorists, he said.
Admiral Prakash says the Harpoon is not of
much significance in military terms. "Even if they [Harpoons] are modified
for land attacks, they don't have much range and cannot take heavy payloads.
The bigger worry for us has been the Babur missiles supplied by the Chinese
that can carry heavier payloads and have a significant range," says Admiral
Prakash.
The NYT, too, quotes a defence expert as saying
that Pakistan doesn't have to modify Harpoons and it already has better land-attack
missiles. Calling the US accusation "incorrect", an official from
Islamabad said that the missile tested was prepared by Pakistan, the report
said.
A senior Indian army officer said that India's
worry is not so much the old Harpoon missiles, but the "array of new
generation US systems that have provided Pakistani military a huge leap in
their capabilities".
That includes a new generation of Harpoon
missiles, given after 9/11 when the US revived military assistance to Pakistan
that had been stalled because of various sanctions in the 1990s.
Among the systems that the US military has
received in the name of terrorism are armed maritime surveillance aircraft,
new generation missiles, new F-16 fighters, 155 mm artillery guns, C-130 Hercules
transport aircraft and attack helicopters, among others. "Tell me, which
one of it is a counter-terrorism weapon, other than the helicopters, probably?"
asks a senior air force officer.
Another officer said there is a possibility
that the US is deliberately using terrorism as an excuse to arm Pakistan to
check India's military strength.
