Pattern of US actions vis-a-vis India and Pakistan

The second prong comprises their facilitation behind the scenes to bring them to the negotiating table. The formulation for a desirable outcome from the talks is "normalization" of ties. From the brink of war to normal good neighbourliness, if achieved, would earn due credit for America. There is no doubt what made Mr. AB Vajpayee extend a hand of friendship to Pakistan in 2003 from which ensued the January 6, 2004 joint statement: it was US urging. Since then US advice remains that the two should go on jaw-jawing rather than resuming sabre rattling, the US should be thanked for this role too.

But gratitude for these should not mean either not examining the big picture of what the US is after and what role it is likely to assign to the two nuclear powers of South Asia, or what precise effects will flow from its specific actions. Along the way, the two governments should consciously fix specific goals vis-a-vis each other that should be their own. Indians should have an unambiguous Pakistan policy. So should Pakistan have a long-term India policy, other than somehow taking control of Kashmir Valley and a few other parts of J and K state. Despite the natural urgency of disputes, there must be a prior goal beyond those disputes.

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Pattern of American actions vis-a-vis India and Pakistan will naturally be related to main American purposes. Chief purpose of American policies can only be the promotion of what it defines as its interests qua the sole superpower in economic and international fields. War on Terror is a subsidiary goal to keeping America Number One militarily and economically. Promotion of democracy, human rights observance, regime changes, drive against atomic weapons proliferation, preservation of Atlantic Alliance and NATO et al subordinate to that primary aim. The unbeatable power of America is to be used to promote America's economic interests as the world's largest debtor and a country that has to somehow sustain its deficits in trade and on current account. In Asia it is clearly a quest for big time domination, including of course, the containment of China and Russia.

The US has already won great victories insofar as South Asia is concerned. Pakistan and India fell over each other in supporting America's War on Terror just after 9/11. America is using four (only?) bases in Pakistan and had the offer of any amount of cooperation from India. Pakistan is supposedly proud of being made a Major Non-NATO Ally of the US. India is happy with the status of a Major Strategic Partner of the US. The US is drawing both to its bosom by offering to sell its top of the line military hardware: Any number of multi-role fighters that India fancies, dual use technologies, civilian reactors and of course transfer of military technology including for fighters and probably also the anti-missile missile-making. For Pakistan, the securely hooked fish, there are to be 25 F-16 fighters with implied promise of more, and the endearing adjectives, though it has added that it wishes to see full democracy working in a sustainable way. Seen in this light, the American promise of remaining permanently engaged with Pakistan can turn out to be as reassuring to the Musharraf government as it can be threatening.

Americans have hit the bull's eye in both India and Pakistan. Their governments are ga ga over the American munificence. Islamabad's happiness with the prospect of buying as many F-16s as they can scrounge the money for is palpable. The two states are now more firmly yoked to the US chariot. No one seems to have stopped to think what impact will it have on the Indo-Pak relations. New Delhi has already let it be known that F-16s to Pakistan will endanger India's security. This protest is more pro forma than a serious development in terms of its possible impact on Indo-American ties; it will virtually have no impact on them. But what will happen to Indo-Pak ties? That must be assessed. But more on that later.

There had better be a reality check amidst the euphoria of people-to-people contacts that the two bureaucracies are micro-managing; except for a few concessions by India on the visa regime, the latter remains as cumbersome and restrictive as ever. The main Composite Dialogue has failed twice, but, Americans be praised, it remains scheduled for a third try. Meantime, what is happening is an intense arms race in atomic weaponry. What is the evidence? Why over 21 missile tests during recent years? Why do they test a missile? It is done to adapt it to a new shape or dimension of the nuclear payload or weapon. It shows the nuclear weapons are being improved and the number increased. Why conclude that nuclear weapons (and probably vehicles) are being increased? Simple. Outdated ones, and their vehicles, are not being thrown on a dump heap; they are merely set aside for possible use in some situations.

Make no mistake. Nuclear weapons (and missiles) races are a fact of life; the arsenals on both sides are increasing by the day. Now, there is a second fact of life adumbrated first by French President Charles de Gaulle: once a stage is reached in nuclear arms races of rough equivalence between cold warring states, they become incapable of conducting their politics through "other means." Willy nilly they have to resume a second series of arms race in conventional arms so that inter-state politics can notionally be carried on by the credible threat of using notionally safer force. Look at the Indian reaction to Pakistan getting F-16s and look at the unease in Pakistan officialdom about India getting so much more to get far ahead. These are familiar cold war reactions.

Let's be clear-eyed. The current euphoria is not based on hard realities -- or even clearly-defined policies. Here the two countries remain engaged in talks that are still about talks. There is far too much of clever tactics and adroit articulation. Neither establishment is ready to make any serious concession of substantial nature; their attachment to maximalist stances stays unchanged. People-to-people contacts are being permitted and remain firmly under control of the two bureaucracies who do not believe that peace process, qua process, should be allowed to naturally evolve and grow.

Unless the obstructive power of the two bureaucracies is sharply reduced, hopes for a true rapprochement between Indian and Pakistani peoples, with the states being dragged along, can not materialize. Unless the vague formulation of normal ties is replaced with reconciliation -- fully owned by both sides -- as the objective, the two countries will go on moving in circles. There is also the question of anchoring this reconciliation in a wider people's reconciliation of South Asia. That would be tantamount in spirit to recreating a civilisational Historical India. Without these aims and clear-headed effort, there will be no progress.

MB Naqvi is a leading columist in Pakistan.