President Zia-ul-Haq of Pakistan is a very shrewd individual and/or he is very ably assisted. He has secured substantial US military cum-economic assistance without alienating the Soviet Union too much. He has allowed some amount of arms to reach the Afghan Mojahedin but within a limit which the Soviets apparently find tolerable. Indeed, he is sure that the Babrak Karmal set-up in Kabul will, with Soviet support or even under Soviet pressure, recognise the Durand line which no Afghan government has ever accepted. He has persuaded the Saudis to cough out the money he needs to buy F-16s from the United States without incurring Iran’s ire. I frankly cannot fathom his intention towards India. I am not even sure that if he is, indeed, well disposed towards India, he can make such a policy stick. And what happens after he is no longer Pakistan’s President.
This should be as much a matter of concern for you in the United States as it is for us in India. The United States has a stake in seeing to it that Pakistan develops co-operation with India. This has always been the case. It is especially so in the context of the Soviet presence in Afghanistan, the turbulence and uncertainty in Iran and the unpredictability of developments in the Gulf region as a whole.
We on our part too have an interest in Pakistan’s pro-US orientation, provided it gives Washington genuine influence in Islamabad. Whatever our relationship with the Soviet Union, it cannot be in our interest that Pakistan develops cordial ties with Moscow. But do Washington and New Delhi have the capacity to influence Pakistan’s long-term policies sufficiently? Apparently Washington has more confidence in its ability to do so than New Delhi. I for one share New Delhi’s scepticism.
Reactive Policies
I have been asked by my American friends whether I am not alarmed by the Soviet presence in Afghanistan. Quite frankly I am not able to make up my mind either on why the Soviets have behaved the way they have, or what advantages they expected to flow from their presence there, or whether their calculations have come out right or gone wrong. Broadly, I have taken the view that Soviet policies in Asia have been reactive, intended mainly to contain western, specially US initiatives and moves and that the Soviet Union suffers from too many handicaps to be able to seize the initiative. But the uncertainty in Iran in particular and the Gulf generally has made it difficult for me to be sure that the Soviet posture in that part of the world is going to remain defensive forever, though I am unable to see how it can turn the situation in the Gulf to its advantage without risking a confrontation with the United States which it has been the consistent Soviet policy since the Cuban crisis in 1962 to avoid. I am also not able to figure out how the Soviet presence in Afghanistan increases its ability to take advantage of troubles in Iran or elsewhere.
As for Pakistan, my view is that the Soviet Union would go to great lengths to befriend it rather than seek to break it up. I do not believe that the Soviets are going to unleash the Baluch guerrillas in Afghanistan. Indeed, in my view, there is an inherent conflict of interest between Baluch nationalism and the Soviet Union. Even otherwise I do not believe that the Baluch people are as well placed as the Bangladeshis were to assert their independence. Pakistan faces, in my opinion, a far more serious problem in the shape of the Afghan refugees and I do not quite see how it is going to tackle it.
US Preoccupations
In view of developments in Lebanon since the Israeli attack on June 6 and the consequent greater immediate US involvement in the region, I am not sure whether it is still America’s policy to raise for the Soviets the cost of their presence in Afghanistan to a level when it seriously hurts them. On the contrary, it seems to me that Afghanistan has moved to the back burner for all concerned major parties – America, China and Pakistan. But that apart, I have little doubt that the Soviets are there to stay. This raises the question whether it significantly modifies Pakistan’s strategic position and promises to compel it to revise its defence priorities. I do not think it is possible to answer this question at this stage. I just do not know how things will shape.
It follows that in my view Mrs. Gandhi should examine the prospect of improved Indo-Pakistan relations outside the context of the development in Afghanistan. Since Pakistan has defined its raison d’etre in anti-Indian terms and has held that we Indians are not reconciled to its existence, she would also be well advised to leave the initiative for improved ties to Islamabad. Let it decide what kind of cooperation, if any, it wants to develop with India.
There has been a lot of speculation in India that the military regime in Pakistan is unpopular, that not only the ethnic minorities such as the Sindhis, Baluch and Pathans but also large segments of the Punjabi population are alienated from it, that the continuation of the martial law and the imposition from above of the harsh Shariat laws have greatly angered the intelligentsia and made it more favourably disposed towards India than ever before. I for one would not wish to join this speculation. Let the Pakistanis manage their affairs as best they can.
The US policy makers are brave people capable of making quick decisions. So in their wisdom they have decided to cast Pakistan in the role of a front-line state in their conflict with the Soviet Union. They have apparently convinced themselves that Pakistan will help them raise the cost of the “occupation” of Afghanistan for the Soviet Union, that a strong Pakistan will offset the “loss” of Iran as a US surrogate in south-west Asia and that if the crunch comes, Pakistani troops, well trained and well armed, will be available for ensuring the survival of the present Saudi regime. We do not know what other roles the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department and the CIA have assigned to Pakistan. It is their business.
I do not wish to sound harsh. But it does seem to me that many of you Americans, when in power, tend to treat other countries as if they are culturally-neutral power units whom you could persuade, cajole or buy, into playing a certain role which you think is in your interest. Perhaps you cannot help thinking in that way in view of your own background as a melting pot of various nations, and races, and acting in that way in view of your worldwide commitments and the nature of the challenge you think you have been facing. Our background is different, though we too have had to cope with the problem of integrating diverse peoples and faiths into our body politic. And we have no external commitments which oblige us to treat other people as pawns on the chessboard of power politics. So our approach is different. And it is our considered judgement that Pakistan is neither capable of nor interested in playing the roles your administration has assigned it in its calculations.
Parallel Relations
From what I have said, it follows that in my assessment there is little possibility of an America-India-Pakistan trilateral relationship developing. In fact, we are back to the ‘fifties when the United States maintained parallel relations with India and Pakistan and sought to keep a balance between them.
I am in no position to say whether the US-Pakistan relationship in the ‘eighties is going to be as stable as it was from 1954 when Washington decided to extend military aid to Pakistan to 1965 when it ended that aid in view of the Indo-Pakistan war. And I do not wish to speculate on the subject. But I would make one point. Pakistan now sees itself much more a part of the Muslim world than it has done ever before. The fundamentalist-revivalist upsurge is not particularly strong in that country but the pan-Islamic sentiment is. So the attitude of other Muslim countries, peoples and movements towards you is likely to influence considerably Pakistan’s relations with you.
In India’s case also, some differences are obvious. US aid, bilateral as well as multilateral, figured prominently in Indo-US relations in the ‘sixties. Now that phase is over, thanks to your own economic difficulties, your aid weariness, your low priority for India and President Reagan’s general approach. This means that unless there is a substantial flow of private US investment into India, of which I for one do not see much possibility, the relations between you and us are likely to remain thin in substance and perhaps even in rhetoric.
(To Be Concluded)
This is the text of the second part of the talk at a seminar organised by the Columbia University, New York, on November 15
The Times of India, 2 December 1982