Yet again it seems that India is going to miss the wood for the trees. I am watching a vocal but to my mind, meaningless debate, on TV on whether we should free up some police personnel from guarding politicians and move them to guarding train stations.
What happened to the need to take action against Pakistan?
Any strategy novice will realise that the ISI has just executed a fantastically planned and timed operation.
The situation was slipping : the Kashmir election was proving a great success, with more than 60% voter turnout. The LeT was losing morale, and the Pak army was being forced by the US to fight against their kin in the Al Queda.
At one go, the tables have turned. India is seething, but a toothless PM is not in a position to respond. Elections are round the corner, and with the ruling party on the back foot, the willingness to go on the offensive is low. The typical response of the Indian leadership is to "put Pak on the mat" by offering proof to the US authorities of Pak's involvement and hope that the US will force Pak to take action. Unfortunately, it misses the point completely. The USA is NOT going to do anything for India, only what is in its own interest. They have only partially de-hyphenated India-Pak relations. Incident such as the mumbai attacks help to strengthen this hyphenation to the detriment of India. The US Secretary of States statements in her visit to India, and subsequently Pak, make this clear to any but the blind. Zardari threatened to pull troops from the Afghan border, and that was enough for the USA to stop its sabre rattling.
India is therefore left with some exhortations to act "responsibly". The Pak government is busily repeating the line that our beloved PM gave them - that Pak is also a victim of terrorism - and therefore cannot be blamed for the attack.
So what happens next - we act "responsibly", do nothing and wait for the next attack. Musharraf has gone so far as to suggest that India should be sympathetic towards Pakistan, should appreciate the problems of Pakistan!
So is there an alternate plan?
There are some key issues we need to understand:
1. A country like India with a long border and unfriendly/non-cooperative neighours cannot be converted into a fortress. The only way to defend its citizens is to ensure that the cost of attack is unacceptably high for its enemies. This means that ALL attacks MUST be met with overwhelming force as a response
2. Pakistan, in its current political form and geography, is not going to allow peace with India. As has been pointed out in one of the article I have earlier bookmarked, the economic power (70% of market cap) and the military power (the N-bomb) is in the control of the Pak army, NOT its civilian government. We cannot therefore deal with the Pak govt. as if they are driven by the same factors as a govt. in India. They are powerless to decide anything. The Army, on the other hand, derives its power from its unceasing animosity towards India.
3. The Indian government has to tune its foreign policy and its list of "friends" to suit its own needs, not that of others. If that means that some are upset, so be it.
Once these are accepted, the only clear path is to figure out a way to put pressure on Pakistan to clean up its act. This requires a two pronged approach.
1. Economic - India needs to impose an unacceptable economic cost on Pakistan of continuing its proxy war. Ideally, this can be in the form of UN sanctions. However, given the presence of China in the UN Security Council, such a resolution cannot be passed. The next alternative is to try and enforce and economic blockade by itself. An interesting suggestion made in an article I read on this subject, was that India should insist on all products carrying a notice that they werre being made by a company having associates operating in Pakistan, and then build Indian public opinion to boycott those goods. The idea was that this may force these companies to withdraw from Pakistan rather than give up the Indian market, and this would put enormous pressure on the Pak industry. I am not sure how much this would effect Pakistan, but it is definitely an interesting idea.
2. Military - here the options are few. The first would be to take out the terrorist camps through air strikes and commando operations. The next would be a bigger operation - barricade the sea route to the Pakistan ports, and involve Israel and US - the first to help with taking out the nuclear assets of the Pak army, and the latter to help with the intelligence. (Why should they help - we are solving their problem as well, and are supplying the foot soldiers. Otherwise, the nuclear deal with the US need not be activated i.e we do not buy their military hardware). The second step would be to move in physically, and divide the country into Baluchistan, NWFP and Punjab-Sindh. The exit option would be to dismantle the financing structures of the ISI and then allow elections etc.
If either of these seem to radical, then we should hunker down and prepare for the next bomb blast - because that is what we will get.
No comments:
Post a Comment