Despite Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee’s far from elegant denial, it is clear beyond doubt that the pro-Moscow communist coup in Afghanistan figured prominently in his recent talks with the Shah of Iran in Teheran. The Shah must now be a very different person from the one the world has known if he is not alarmed over what has happened in Kabul, especially in view of the mess the Pakistanis have made of their affairs.
Since he returned to the throne with the well-advertised help of the CIA some 25 years ago, he has lived in dread of being surrounded by pro-Soviet regimes. This has turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. And since the break-up of Pakistan in 1971, he has been haunted by the fear of that country disintegrating still further. This, too, has ceased to be inconceivable.
As it happens, another of the Shah’s nightmares is threatening to materialise, though it hasn’t yet – the coming together of the intelligentsia whom he dubs as Marxists and anarchists and the Shia mullahs. Both are opposed to his highly repressive SAVAK-dominated regime.
Cooperation
In the circumstances it would have been truly remarkable if he was to seek urgent meetings first with the Indian minister for external affairs and then with the prime minister – Mr Desai will be stopping over in Teheran on June 5 on his way to the United States – only to discuss how best to promote economic co-operation between the two countries and the region as a whole.
The surprise, if any, is that the Shah should have thought it worth his while to explore the possibility of enlisting India’s support in his scheme of combating communism and containing the Soviet Union in this part of the world. For, not long ago he used to be quite content with an assurance on New Delhi’s part that it would do nothing to promote the dismemberment of what is left of Pakistan.
This by itself should have caused Mr Vajpayee some concern. He should have woken up to the fact that India’s policy under him has come to be so represented that the Shah feels emboldened to elicit this country’s co-operation in whatever anti-Soviet and anti-communist arrangement he is able to devise with the support of the United States and other Western powers. But instead of seeking to dispel the misunderstanding, he lost no time in accepting the Shah’s “invitation” – some knowledgeable persons insist on calling it a summons – and rushing to Teheran.
Leaving that aside, it is necessary to recognise that events are moving rapidly in Asia and Africa and the old responses acquired in altogether different circumstances may not suffice to cope with them. The coup in Afghanistan might be an autonomous development. The Russians themselves might not see it as part of their new, powerful thrust in Africa and Asia. But it cannot be denied that it has taken place in that context. Irrespective of the intentions of its architects, it is a landmark and has to be treated as such.
It is reasonably safe to assume that whatever his personal predisposition Mr Desai, too, will shy away from any move to involve this country, however indirectly, in any anti-Soviet scheme. But this is essentially a passive approach which is not likely either to protect India’s long-term interests or ward off pressures from the United States which has convinced itself, rightly or wrongly, that it can push the Janata government in the direction it desires. New Delhi must try and fashion a more positive response which is in keeping with its status, potentialities and interests. This will call for a great deal of daring on New Delhi’s part and it may not even get off the ground. But the risk is worth taking because there is no other way to ensure the stability and security of the region. Without such an effort by India it is bound to blow up.
To begin with, it is necessary to make two points. First, if the Shah and General Zia-ul-Haq indeed want India’s co-operation, they must be willing to initiate the process of national reconciliation within their own countries in order to stabilise the situation there. To be precise, the Shah should liberalise his regime genuinely to permit the intelligentsia a measure of freedom so that they at least do not feel compelled to make common cause with the mullahs and the General should release Mr Bhutto’s supporters and let it be known that he is not hell-bent on making the Supreme Court confirm the sentence of death on the former prime minister. Only liberal regimes in Teheran and Islamabad can win the necessary popular support. The SAVAK cannot produce stability in Iran nor the soldiers in Pakistan.
Influence
Secondly, Mr Desai must make an earnest effort to persuade the West, particularly the United States, to recognise that an increase in the Soviet influence in the region is an inevitable, even if a belated, outcome of the policy they have pursued and that if the area is to be stabilised, it must be neutralised. It is, for example, ridiculous for anyone to expect the Russians to exercise restraint in Afghanistan if the United States is to pour more and more sophisticated weapons and military personnel into Iran and Saudi Arabia. India can hope to be listened to in Moscow only if it is willing to speak equally frankly to the United States and the latter, too, is prepared to leave the area alone to sort out its enormous problems as best it can.
The West has by and large managed to secure its interests pretty well for the last three decades. Indeed, it will not be much of an exaggeration to say that its prosperity in the post-war period has been built largely by a reckless exploitation of the oil resources of the Persian Gulf. And it may well calculate that the leverage that the coup in Afghanistan and the unrest in Iran and Pakistan have provided or may provide the Kremlin is too weak for it to bother seriously about. Indeed, the chances are that this is going to be the Western response and the rulers in Iran and Pakistan will welcome it because they do not wish to think in terms of sharing power with the people.
In that case, there is precious little this country will be able to do at this stage. But it does not follow that it should withdraw into its shell. It cannot and need not make common cause with the Russians and their supporters and engage in an empty denunciation of the West and its allies in the name of anti-colonialism and so on. New Delhi cannot oblige them any more than it obliges the Americans. It must go on pressing its viewpoint that it is necessary to neutralise the region from great power rivalries.
The great power stakes in Africa are by themselves big since the continent is immensely rich in mineral resources which elsewhere are rapidly getting depleted. But the struggle for ascendancy there has acquired a new and far more dangerous dimension because it has got linked with the one in West Asia. Saudi Arabia’s rulers, for example, are jittery that, with Soviet and Cuban assistance, Ethiopia might succeed in suppressing the secessionists in Eritrea and in planting the red flag on the Red Sea. The rebellion in Chad is similarly a matter of concern for Sudan and other pro-Western Arab regimes.
Prospect
The prospect of the Cubans – and behind them the Russians – moving into Rhodesia and in course of time into South Africa is already haunting some people in the West. They will do all in their power to stop this onward march. President Carter’s recent statements and the French intervention in Zaire in defence of President Mobutu’s despicable regime can leave little room for doubt on this score.
All in all, the conflict in Africa is going to be a prolonged and bloody affair and India would do well to keep out of it. Mr Vajpayee may think that his statement calling for the withdrawal of foreign troops was unexceptionable. But it was not. He might not have had the Cubans alone in mind. But that is how it has been widely interpreted.
It has been reported that Mr Callaghan in London and Mr Carter in Washington will raise the question of the Soviet-Cuban role in Africa in their talks with Mr Desai during his forthcoming trips. In the light of the desperate statements which have been coming out of Washington, these reports can be taken at their face value. This makes it virtually obligatory for Mr Desai to make it abundantly clear that India is not anxious to relapse into the old habit of reading lectures to others in respect of developments in far-away lands and that the problems in Africa are in any case too complicated to be discussed in cold war terms. Even Mr Callaghan has found it discreet to dissociate himself from America’s wholly simplistic view of developments in Zaire.
If India has to play a worthwhile role in securing the neutralisation of the area along the Indian Ocean, it has to begin nearer home. If it fails there, as is only too likely, it had better be content with minding its own affairs for the time being.
The Times of India, 3 June 1978