Paper no. 1197	22. 12. 2004
SOUTH ASIA’S STRATEGIC INCOMPATIBILITIES: An Analysis by Dr. Subhash Kapila Introductory Observations: South Asia at various times has been termed by the United States and Western Countries as a “conflict prone region”, as a "nuclear flash point”, “Kashmir as a nuclear flash point” and as a “politically unstable region”. The rest of the world dittoes this viewpoint as a matter of habit used as they are to accept the formulations of the major powers.  Regrettably India gets lumped together with Pakistan’s strategic delinquencies and American permissiveness of the same, as one of the major culprits impeding peace in South Asia. Not only is it a travesty of truth and strategic realities, it also betrays the vested strategic interests of the United States and China primarily, which desire to draw a veil on the strategic incompatibilities in South Asia, in which both USA and China have extensively contributed.  Equally regrettable is when prominent members of India’s strategic community for reasons not apparent, also assume American positions/ stances on South Asian strategic issues to the effect that India as the larger state should make concessions to Pakistan, or that India should not become paranoid about United States military alliance and arms supplies to Pakistan or that it is in India’s interests to keep General Musharraf in power and offer him concessions as the Americans desire. Such formulations and advocacy of such formulations betray a lack of grasp of the strategic incompatibilities that prevail in South Asia primarily between Pakistan and India. It also betrays a lack of penetrative insight or closing ones eyes to the strategic incompatibilities generated in South Asia by the two prominent external intrusive powers namely United States and China.  This paper attempts to highlight these facets in a bid to promote a truer picture of the strategic realities in South Asia whose conflictual overtones are not of India’s making.  Pakistan’s Strategic Incompatibilities With India:  Pakistan’s strategic incompatibilities with India are of Pakistan’s own creation. It has been led by the United States and China to believe in an obsessive strategic illusion that Pakistan is India’s strategic equal in South Asia. It is this illusion which still persists in the Pakistan Army and its Generals, that even after their defeats in four wars (1947, 1965, 1971,1999)  the refuse to admit that they are not India’s strategic equal, nuclear weapons not withstanding.  Further, Pakistan’s following political incompatibilities with India fuel Pakistan’s strategic incompatibilities with India: Pakistan was conceived and born in religious hatred as a nation. This hatred was primarily directed against the Hindus. Pakistan did not emerge as a homeland for Indian Muslims as millions of Indian Muslims elected to stay back in India rather than opt for Pakistan The partition of India was bloody leading to the total expulsion of the Hindu and Sikh population from the areas which now constitute the Pakistan state. Islamic Jehad is the battle cry for Pakistan’s over a decade old proxy war against India in Jammu and Kashmir and India’s North East. Pakistan’s implacable hatred of India has led it to become a failed state. The Kashmir issue was only a convenient excuse for Pakistan to continue its conflicts with India. As General Musharraf himself once said that even if Kashmir is solved, there will be many more Kashmirs which India will have to face.  The United States and China, India’s liberal establishment, India’s peaceniks and India’s starry-eyed media conveniently ignore that peace with Pakistan is well-nigh impossible. They refuse to see the realities of Pakistan, but focus on the promotion of their own personal interests.  To bring “strategic realism” in the picture, this author would like to enlist the conclusions on Pakistan by the respected Pakistani journalist Khaled Ahamad, who besides being earlier in the Pakistan Foreign Service has also been a founder member of Track II Neemrana Dialogue. His most significant observations on Pakistan in his writings have been: “Pakistan is falling, because it is a warrior state and is not supposed to last. It is wedded to the ideal of war in which its ideological rulers accept the possibility of annihilation (shahadat) as a consequence of righteous war.” “Pakistan's ideology invests the state with the passion of war. There is no normal functioning of the strategic mind in Pakistan.” “ The Army in Pakistan owed its status (paramountcy) to confrontation with India. It developed a vested interest in this confrontation and “guaranteed” the anti-Indian nature of Pakistani politics” “Pakistani nationalism has been described by certain writers as being akin to nationalism in the Balkans. Its textbook version is based on an anti-West and anti-Hindu interpretation of Indian history.” “Pakistan has walked into a blind alley because of its compulsion to adopt a hawkish foreign policy totally out of sync with its growing weaknesses. “It (Pakistan) has now in the sad position to predict that talks with India over Kashmir would be non-productive and in consequence of this failure of talks, the risk of nuclear war in South Asia becomes real” “ This is the response of a state breaking from within but desperately relying on its “nuclear status” to scare the world into delivering Kashmir to it.” Pakistan will continue to be strategically incompatible with India if it persists to exist in the mould outlined above. Changes if any can only be brought about by the United States and China and by a massive political mobilization of the Pakistani masses themselves.  Concluding on Pakistan, Khaled Ahamad’s sobering thoughts again need to be quoted and these are: “Pakistan is sad nation today because it is compelled to experience reality being created by other powerful states in their own interests.” “It is a depressed nation unwilling to accept reality because it was not trained to look at it inductively.” It is the United States and China which for their own interests that are shielding and blanking out Pakistan’s face-to-face with strategic realities. This is strategically incompatible with India’s national security interests.  United States-India Strategic Partnership Strategically Incompatible With a United States-Pakistan Military Alliance in South Asia: In the last few weeks, when India has cautioned the United States not to supply advanced combat aircraft and other weapons systems to Pakistan, the United States and its apologists in India have taken the plea to what amounts to saying that a US-Pakistan military alliance (which includes advanced weapons sales) is strategically compatible with the building up of a US-India strategic partnership. This is not so as the basic parameters of a strategic partnership stand undermined.  The basic parameters of the United States-India strategic partnership were defined/visualized/envisaged by the two nations as under: Strategic convergence of interests Shared democratic values of democracy and human rights War against terror of the 9/11 variety Prevention of WMD proliferation Strategic convergence of interests denotes mutually shared strategic perceptions, first, regionally and then globally. United States fails in the very first litmus test of a strategic partnership and that is regional strategic convergence of interests in South Asia.  India strongly believes that any over-militarisation of Pakistan generates the conflict potential of Pakistan, increases its propensity for military adventurism and impedes peace in South Asia. The United States ignoring India’s strategic sensitivities designates Pakistan as a Major Non-NATO Ally to facilitate the supply of advanced weaponry. All this on grounds of strategic expediency. As for the United States ignoring the return of democracy to Pakistan, the involvement of Pakistan in 9/11 and Global Islamic Jehad and WMD proliferation sanctioned by the Pakistani General, the less said the better of United States double standards.  As this author wrote in the last paper, how can India have a strategic partnership with USA, when it (United States) is not ready to share “regional convergences of interest in South Asia” itself. How can then India share convergences with USA globally. The connotations of all United States policy / attitudes / formulations / statements after 9/11 are: Pakistan is United States choice of a strategic ally in South Asia, notwithstanding all its strategic delinquencies which endangered US security.  India’s strategic sensitivities are inconsequential in United States strategies of expediency in South Asia. India has no choice but to lump it and make India’s national security interests subservient to US strategic priorities in South Asia. Therefore, if the above be the underlying premises, a US-India strategic partnership is strategically incompatible with a United States-Pakistan Military Alliance in South Asia i.e. within the region itself.  China-Pakistan Strategic Nexus Strategically Incompatible with Dynamic Build up of China-India Political Relationship: China and India have given a dynamic impetus to the build up of a vibrant economic relationship between the two countries. Two way trade is set to touch the $10 billion mark. China and India have, however, to think whether an economic relationship is enough. The rapidly changing strategic environment in West Asia, South Asia and East Asia all dictate that China and India also work towards a more dynamic political relationship which could greatly contribute to political stability in Asia’s strategic regions.  However, a politically dynamic China-India relationship can only emerge if China reviews its South Asia’s strategic policies as under: China must view South Asia now as a “region of opportunity” and not as a region where “ regional spoiler states” like Pakistan have to be built as counter-weights to India. China must re-asses the strategic utility of Pakistan in China’s grand strategy. China has to consider whether it accepts Pakistan’s promiscuous relationships with both USA and China. China has also to consider whether in its strategic calculus, a Sino-Pak strategic nexus is compatible with Pakistan's status as a "Major Non-NATO Ally" when NATO is creeping Eastwards into China's preferred sphere of influence. China has to accord strategic pre-eminence to India in South Asia and say so. Till the above review takes place in China’s grand strategy, a dynamic China-India political relationship is strategically incompatible for India.  Concluding Observations: Some of the readers in their feedback have maintained that India can demand its regional pre-eminence only by first building up its strategic strength and ridding its governance of corrupt and criminal politicians. This point is well taken and it would be recalled that this author has repeatedly in his papers has called for building India’s strategic assets like ICBMs, SLBMs, nuclear submarines and its Air Force combats squadrons. The other aspects of need for building India’s political will, will to use power, declaratory strategic policies and good governance stand reflected in this author's SAAG Paper No.1118 dated 16-09-2004 entitled “India’s National Security and Defense: Prescriptions.” It was an abridged reproduction of the concluding chapter of this author’s book: “ India’s Defense Policies and Strategic Thought: A Comparative Analysis.”  Building up national power is an evolutionary and on-going process. It needs to be recalled that the United States, China and others took strategic notice of India only after 1998 nuclear weapons test. It was the first defining moment in India’s post-Independence strategic history.  A second defining strategic moment is now called for and that is the ICBM and SLBM arsenal build-up. Once India achieves this, all the strategic incompatibilities analysed in this paper will evaporate and United States and China would be prompted to grudgingly grant India’s strategic pre-eminence in the region. It is time to shrug-off external pressures impeding the development of India's strategic assets stated above.  India must begin learning to air its strategic declarations forcefully, even while it evolves its strategic strengths. The United States did not have to be cautioned that it should not provide advanced weaponry to Pakistan. India should have made a firm strategic declaration that a “US –India Strategic Partnership” is incompatible with a "US-Pakistan Military Alliance" in South Asia and hence a strategic partnership with USA is not acceptable to India. Similarly, China too needs to be strategically declared to that a China-Pakistan strategic nexus needs a review, if China wishes to work with emerging major Asian powers. India has all the cards even while awaiting evolution of its strategic assets. It needs to play them adroitly. One of the  many being that India will not make military purchases from foreign countries which sell or provide arms to Pakistan. (The author is an International Relations and Strategic Affairs analyst. He is the Consultant, Strategic Affairs with South Asia Analysis Group. Email drsubhashkapila @yahoo.com)
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