IDSA COMMENT

For an Indo-Pak strategic dialogue forum

Ali Ahmed

http://www.idsa.in/strategiccomments/ForanIndoPakstrategicdialogueforum_AliAhmed_040809

August 4, 2009

India is taking its time to reopen the dialogue process with Pakistan that has been suspended since 26/11. The meeting between Indian Prime Minister, Mr. Manmohan Singh and Pakistan’s President, Mr. Asif Ali Zardari, on the sidelines of the SCO meeting in Yekaterinburg in June had opened up possibilities of resumption. However, the joint statement following the one-on-one session between the two prime ministers at Sharm-el-Sheikh ran into rough weather. Consequently, India has reiterated the linkage between progress on terror dismantlement and the peace process, holding up proceedings till Pakistan convinces India of its anti-terror credentials. At the minimum, this would be by proceeding against those responsible for the Mumbai attacks.

India and Pakistan have diverse approaches to the peace process. In Indian understanding the peace process is an incentive for Pakistani actions against terror, whereby its actions would translate into gains made through the peace process on issues of concern that include Kashmir. On the other hand, Pakistan’s reliance on terror as a strategic tool speaks of its using terror to keep India engaged, fearful that there would be no incentive for India to stay at the table and deliver if Pakistan were to withdraw its only means of pressure. This not only indicates a trust deficit, but talks are yet another domain of strategic interplay between the two states substituting for conflict.

While a meaningful peace process is useful between any two adversaries, the two states being nuclear powers makes strategic engagement all the more necessary. With the looming threat of terrorism, a future crisis cannot be ruled out. In case of another terrorist strike, the Indian leadership may find itself politically compelled to resort to military means in response. Conflict, albeit in the form of a limited war, is not inconceivable in such a circumstance. Given that Pakistan subscribes to a nuclear first strike policy to deter an Indian conventional attack, it would be in the interest of both states to see the nuclear issue recede to the background.

Even if India’s response to a future terrorist strike is of a finite kind at the lower end of the escalatory spectrum, such as in the form of surgical strikes, it needs to shape the environment in advance. A preexisting dialogue forum with Pakistan would help create and retain the space to apply the required combat power. This may require sharing concerns, intent and compulsions with Pakistan through a strategic dialogue not only before hand but also during crises and even conflicts. Through dialogue, India needs to temper the possibility of a Pakistani conventional and nuclear escalation by clearly communicating to Pakistan that Indian intentions are limited. For Pakistan the benefit is in gaining a direct insight into India military limits. Absent a dialogue mechanism, it would otherwise have access to these through ‘tacit bargaining’ - the limitations of which in terms of misperception are fairly straight forward.

Therefore a strategic dialogue is necessary between India and Pakistan as an adjunct to the peace process. This way there would be an official and standing channel other than the peace process. These would principally cater to alleviating nuclear apprehensions of both states. The Cold War experience is instructive, as scholars are characterizing the India-Pakistan rivalry as a ‘cold war’. During the latter period of the Cold War, there existed a Standing Consultative Commission between the two superpowers which ensured that Berlin and Cuba like crises did not recur and helped develop a mechanism for cooperation through negotiation and monitoring.

The mechanism for such a strategic dialogue does not currently exist in South Asia. The closest forum is the dialogue on Confidence Building Measures mandated by the 1999 Memorandum of Understanding signed at Lahore. The two sides have conducted five rounds so far since 2004. There has been a back channel between the two states that has been functional prior to Lahore. It was active both during the Kargil conflict and Operation Parakram. It reportedly had considerable success during the Musharraf era, particularly in discussing his ‘out of the box’ initiatives.

However, notwithstanding these existing mechanisms, the initiative recommended here requires going beyond CBMs to security building. Ideally the two states should institute a standing mechanism with full time officials nominated from both national security systems. Ideas on this score are already available in thinking on Nuclear Risk Reduction Centres. These would not be suspended, but instead become active in a crisis.

While enabling crisis management and limitation in conflict, such a dialogue, once in place, could also serve a more ambitious purpose. Presently, talks on issues in the composite dialogue tackle symptoms and not ‘root causes’. Therefore incentivising Pakistani participation is vitally important. It bears noting that over the years terrorism has proven to be a strategy of diminishing marginal utility for Pakistan. India has been able to sustain the sub-conventional pressure through organizational innovations, such as the Rashtriya Rifles. India has also acquired an offensive strategic orientation, best evident from its Cold Start doctrine. With India’s tolerance threshold having worn thin due to repeated terrorist attacks, New Delhi may have to resort to coercive action bordering on compellence; irrespective of the American presence and interest in the Af-Pak region that has so far stayed India’s hand. In case of a US exit in the indeterminate future, it would be in Pakistan’s interest to have an insight into and handle over Indian intent and action.

While the dialogue in the short term could bring this home to Pakistan, over the long term Pakistani threat perceptions could be addressed. Since the military determines the national security agenda in Pakistan, directly engaging its core concerns could bring about a shared understanding on security issues. This would permit movement on other issues presently blocked in the composite dialogue.

A candidate item for the immediate agenda is confidence building over the safety of Pakistani nuclear assets. Concerns have been raised of a heightened Taliban threat to nuclear assets and over fear of a Taliban take over of the state. This has in turn provoked fears of an external take over of Pakistan’s nuclear assets. Indian fears with regard to the former and Pakistani apprehensions with regard to the latter can be aired in such a forum. Not having any means to raise such concerns leads to heightened insecurity.

Nuclear weapons have brought about a protracted conflict, with nuclear states in a conflict dyad cooperating only on non-controversial issues. In the India-Pakistan case, even in less controversial issues, where the broad contours of an understanding are already in place such as on Siachen and Sir Creek, the two states are unable to bring issues to a closure. Without the ballast of success from lower order issues, the controversial issue of Kashmir will remain, and so would potential for terrorist disruption of relations.

Counter-intuitively, the current juncture is apt for such an initiative. ‘Blowback’ from their Taliban adventure has in some measure sensitized the Pakistani Army to the need to keep India quiescent, at least temporarily. India’s growing preparedness from learning from earlier crises, increasing military budgets and a more proactive mindset have surely not been lost on General Headquarters in Rawalpindi. The new US posture of holding Pakistan more accountable should give uniformed decision makers a pause. The civilian government in Islamabad is not averse to greater engagement with India since this helps expand its space with respect to the military in Pakistan’s internal politics.

The nuclear overhang necessitates additional measures of engagement between the two states that go beyond CBMs. This needs to be de-linked from the peace process. Instituting a strategic dialogue mechanism that with time and experience could be vested with an increasingly ambitious agenda is necessary. This is in kee

India-Pakistan: Unlocking the Status Quo

by ALI AHMED

http://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article3274.html

MAINSTREAM, VOL L, NO 9, FEBRUARY 18, 2012

India is watching with bated breath as Pakistan attempts to ‘normalise’ its civil-military relations. For India there is considerable benefit in the outcome going a certain way. It looks forward to a dividend in the outbreak of democratic peace. Resolving Kashmir amicably would be a positive fallout. The incentives towards this end, of expanding trade ties, have been on offer for long. The Lahore peace initiative was a fore-runner. Whether Pakistan bites is not for India to determine, it is an internal matter of Pakistan. India sees its problem as one of managing the interim.

Its choice has been to engage Pakistan. This accounts for the second round of talks getting underway since 26/11, with the joint working group on nuclear confidence building measures having met at Islamabad in late December. The process is good because not talking is worse. Also talks provide a buffer in case of crisis. They can be broken off as ‘protest’, an additional step away from a military tryst.

This is enough when apprehensions of such an eventuality are somewhat remote, as is at present. Measures taken by both since 26/11 have dampened the chances of an untoward incident. These include India’s defensive measures set to culminate in the forming of the National Counter Terrorism Centre. Pakistan, for its part, is readying to dispatch a judicial team to Mumbai to follow up on the terror investigations this month.

The two sides believe that engagement and deterrence are enough. Through periodic military exercises, such as the recently concluded Exercise Sudarshan Shakti, India hopes to dissuade Pakistan’s ‘strategic assets’. India’s military moves, earlier termed ‘Cold Start’, stand refurbished as its ‘Proactive Strategy’. On Army Day, the Chief said: ‘A lot has changed since the days of Operation Parakram. If we did something in 15 days then, we can do it in seven days now. After two years, we may be able to do it in three days.’

Pakistan, in rebound, has apparently worked towards a military response strategy termed ‘early strategic offensive’. In effect, on ‘Incident Day’ (‘I’ Day), or the next terror atrocity, the two sides could end up not only by racing to their own defences, but also to the other’s defences. Though the centenary of ‘the war to end all wars’ falls soon in 2014, the ‘Guns of August’ are seemingly in replay. With instability in Pakistan set to continue till the Obama-set magic date in 2014 for denouement in AfPak, an ‘I’ Day cannot be ruled out. While catering for the crisis by creating buffers is good, seriously tackling the reason to fear crisis would be better.

Their four rounds of ‘composite dialogue’ since 2004 made no headway. These were unleavened by the reported ‘progress’ made in the ‘backchannel’. The mark of four years was removed in one sweep by 26/11. The first round of talks since was merely to restart the process. The second round is underway with positive atmospherics in particular from the trade and commerce front. Their recent talks over NCBMs in Islamabad are sufficient to keep alarmists at bay. The two sides are agreed to disagree without being disagreeable about it. Both are set to be internally oriented for the next two years and cannot therefore afford to postpone reckoning.

India will continue without a credible interlocutor. In India’s case the political scene does not permit the government much play. The tussle in Pakistan is unlikely to yield the interlocutor of its choice, in a civilian eclipse of the military.

Understandably, unwilling to engage with the Pakistani military and unable to do so directly since a civilian government exists, India is in a ‘wait-and-watch’ mode. Waiting till 2014 may prove too long.

Even if a direct conventional contest is not India’s default option, a limited military reaction to terror provocation, such as by stand-off firepower, is on the cards. While there is no call for Pakistan’s military to over-react, the military, under pressure since OBL’s departure, may use it for internal political positioning. In effect, there is potential to upturn strategic rationality on both sides.

Yet in the light of the seemingly receded possibility of a crisis, the measures in place appear efficacious. Since neither wants such a diversion, the two states are batting on the same side. Should they not, then be fashioning a better innings?

•

THIS can be done by getting rid of strategic blinkers in the first place. Firstly, believing that mere engagement is enough is self-delusive. Second, engagement has to be meaningful and result oriented. Last, since the Pakistan Army calls the shots in Pakistan and will continue to do so into the next regime there, a way to engage with the military must be found.

This means that even as the second round eventuates into resumption of the ‘composite dialogue’, a strategic dialogue needs to be in place between the two national security establishments. This way the Pakistan Army will be engaged. This will help unlock the status quo. Such a dialogue will also defuse apprehensions of another crisis and, should an unfortunate ‘Incident’ occur, help in cornering the perpetrators decisively.

The core problem is in the Pakistan Army being the power-centre in Pakistan. The current crisis in Pakistan suggests that the reform of internal politics in Pakistan will take time. The interim remains fraught with uncertainties. Pakistan is not in a position to handle the aftermath of crisis and conflict. India too cannot afford a diversion from its economic trajectory. Therefore, there is a possibility of strategic convergence with Pakistan on crisis avoidance, its management and conflict prevention.

These would require mechanisms to be in place, as India has forged with China in the form of the joint coordination and consultation mechanism arrived at between the two special representatives in their fifteenth meeting recently. Such a mechanism needs being in place with Pakistan too. The current lull in Kashmir can prove shortlived and may not outlast the onset of this summer. Therefore, more concrete steps need to be taken rather than an MEA led ‘business-as-usual’ approach.

What would such a dialogue mechanism do? It must be tasked to match the strategic perspectives of the two sides. The threat perceptions of the two can be discussed. It can then over time bring about doctrinal balancing by enabling each side to step back from their respective offensive stance. While Pakistan is on the offensive in the subconventional level through proxy war, India is so on the conventional level in its response strategy variously called ‘Cold Start’ and ‘proactive strategy’. Both are offensive at the nuclear level. While Pakistan does not follow the No-First-Use principle, India intends to ‘finish’ Pakistan through nuclear retaliation.

There is a case for matching these postures since they are interlinked and cumulatively endanger peace in the subcontinent. For instance, proxy war can provoke India’s conventional response. The Pakistani reaction could be in the form of nuclear first use through the vehicle of tactical nuclear weapons, such as the Nasr. India, for its part may then be forced to make good on its promise of annihilation. This would be catastrophic for Pakistan, but also certainly in its environmental and socio-political consequence for India.

Once the standing dialogue mechanism is in place to discuss strategic doctrines, it can be useful in crisis for forestalling crisis instability and conflict escalation. Strategic dialogues are in place with friends as the US as also with perceived adversaries as China. Surely they are more needed with Pakistan; not only for prevention but also cure.

The author is a Research Fellow, Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, New Delhi

India-Pakistan: Advocating Accommodation

MAINSTREAM, VOL L, NO 16, APRIL 7, 2012

by ALI AHMED

http://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article3380.html

What to make of Pakistan is up to its 180 million citizens. However, what they make of Pakistan is consequential to its neighbours. Therefore, if India wants Pakistan to go along a certain direction, then it must go down the route ‘with’ Pakistan.

India wants the dividend of a democratic peace, which means getting Pakistan to take the right choices away from extremism and military dominance. India has not succeeded so far. This owes to the internal political complexion of Pakistan as a military dominant state. For its institutional self-interest, it chooses to see only India’s stick in India’s ‘carrot-and-stick’ policy.

Therefore, if India’s policy is to be effective, it needs to get the military and the Establishment on board. This may seem somewhat counter-intuitive since India’s policy aim is to arrive at a democratic dividend by networking the democratic forces and commercial classes.

So how can we engage with the military? If India wants Pakistan to cease being revisionist, then it must cease being status quoist. The end point of the 2004-07 window of interaction by the NDA and UPA governments is the start point we have. But first, anticipating criticism that the idea may invoke, a survey of India’s strategic culture is done to show that this proposal is not outlandish. Some have it that India does not have a strategic culture. India does not understand power and its uses and does not know how to create and employ power. Given this, India is disinclined to view force as an instrument of policy. It consequently has a predisposition for accommodation. This is taken as the ‘weakness’ that incentivises the security challenges India faces, both internally and externally. The prescription in this under-standing is for India is to create the sinews of power, acquire the hardware for its exercise and the software in terms of policy, doctrine and strategy. The resulting felicity with employment of power and the instrumental use of force is both necessary for India’s rise and the best indicator of such rise.

This critique of India’s engagement with power needs to be contested. India has not been found wanting in the use of force. Right at Independence, India employed its military speedily in response to a call from the Maharaja of Kashmir in 1947. It used coercive action in Junagarh. It resorted to police action to integrate Hyderabad. It threw out the Portuguese from Goa. It adopted a forward policy against China. It opened up the Punjab front in the 1965 War. It dissected Pakistan in 1971. It sent its troops for peace enforcement action to Sri Lanka. On the internal security front, it has militarily tackled insurgencies in Punjab, North-East and Kashmir. In terms of creating power capabilities, it is poised to gain a nuclear triad by the mid-decade.

This proves that India has used force with resolve. It is true that such use of force has also witnessed the exercise of restraint. The instances of restraint, usually cited as signs of weakness, necessarily form an equally long list. The list would include stopping short of Muzaffarabad in 1948. This had the very sensible intent of stopping along an ethno-linguistic divide over which negotiations for a trade-off could well have taken place. At the end of the 1965 War, yet again India created the conditions for a long-term settlement of the Kashmir issue by demonstrating its goodwill by returning Haji Pir. In the 1971 War it did not take the war into West Pakistan and returned the prisoners of war as it was duty-bound to do under the Geneva Conventions. The idea that these PWs could have been held hostage to Pakistani concessions is untenable. It did not overstay its invitation in Sri Lanka. It has been a reluctant nuclear power, but not one neglectful of nuclear and missile delivery technology that has proceeded apace under considerable inter-national pressure. It has used military means to beat back the militant challenge internally but has been circumspect in using force, for instance, by avoiding the use of the Air Force and area weapons.

Restraint cannot be taken as weakness, but of sensible strategy that takes into account vulnerabilities, limitations, unintended consequences and relative strengths. India’s exercise of power has rightly been with ‘resolve and restraint’. This background has been necessary to show India’s approach to force. Against this backdrop the approach to Pakistan can be better located.

Divining India’s strategy, in the absence of any document that states the strategy, makes the attempt equivalent of the output of the seven blind men examining an elephant. However, India’s grand strategy for Pakistan can be said to be one for over-awing Islamabad by developing a power asymmetry whereby Pakistan is forced to throw in the towel. This owes to India’s self-image as the regional power, entirely understandable in the light of its size, economy, military capability, political contrast, future potential etc.

A tough line with respect to Pakistan has been in evidence all along. It has become progressively more pronounced since the eclipse of Nehruvia-nism by the Indira doctrine and later by the assertive turn to strategic culture prompted by India’s cultural nationalist movement. Even in Nehru’s time, India was never overly accommo-dative. At Independence, India had to be pressured by the Mahatma’s last fast to hand over some financial dues to the fledgling Pakistan. It has been firmly status quoist over the bone of contention, Kashmir. The Swaran Singh-Bhutto talks were towards buying time under Western pressure as India rearmed in the wake of 1962. At Tashkent, the sweetner of return of Haji Pir was to sell the status quo. It is quite evident that the 1971 War was a watershed in regional power equations. Yet, the explosion at Pokhran I soon thereafter was coyly advertised as a peaceful nuclear explosion. By the mid-eighties, prompted by the Indira doctrine, India had upped its defence budget to thrice that of Pakistan. Pakistan’s featuring as a ‘frontline’ state was of course a ready reason. India aimed for a blue water navy, created a missile programme, came within a screw driver turn of nuclear weapons and practised diplomatic coer-cion in Exercise Brasstacks. The nineties witnessed culmination of mechanisation in the third strike corps, one more than Pakistan. At the end of the decade, India’s nuclearisation owed also to the hope of smoking out Pakistan, to call its bluff. Of the last decade it can be said that the steady opening up of asymmetry has precedence in the ending of the Cold War. In other words, India has not been found wanting in exercising the ‘stick’. Therefore, for Pakistan to only look at the business end of India’s stick is unexceptio-nable.

•

YET in keeping with India’s strategic culture of ‘resolve and restraint’, India has episodically tried reaching out sincerely alongside. This has originated in the goodwill, sometimes reciprocated from across the border, of protagonists who were politically unable to follow through on their intentions on both sides: Nehru, Rajiv Gandhi, Gujral, Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh on the Indian side and the Bhuttos, Nawaz Sharif and Musharraf on the other. None of these leaders has been able to create the political conditions for a settlement.

Insofar as the carrot—in the form of CBMs, economics, people-to-people contacts, cultural opening etc.—forms part of India’s grand strategy, it has been interpreted as a ‘bear hug’ by the security establishment in Pakistan. If India’s strategy of engagement were to succeed it would enable India more leverages and at the cost of the Pakistan military and anti-India political forma-tions. The Pakistani reciprocation under-stand-ably has been of ‘moat building’.

India for its part has not found this off-putting since it helps avert any possibility of accommo-dation and compromise that India is also loath to do. It justifies India’s game of positive and negative leverages, with no end-point in sight. India is a power indulging in power politics. This is not illegitimate. After all, Pakistan has been proac-tively at it. But the upshot has been an ineffective ‘carrot-and-stick’ strategy.

The ‘carrot’ designed to increase the space for democratic forces, popular goodwill and comm-ercial interests, has been denied by the military that congenitally sees only the ‘stick’. Pakistan’s deft external balancing and less admirable internal balancing through leveraging extremism, has India stumped. That the Pakistani military has been the stumbling block to an outbreak of democratic peace in the subcontinent is a long-standing reality. India’s policy has not taken its reaction, based on relative power logic and its institutional interests into account. The best explanation for such a blind spot seems to be that the Pakistani Army being rational will see the obvious asym-metry and throw in the towel. This time round India expects to be able to prevail since New Delhi has been gaining ground: economically, militarily and diplomatically and politically. Recent reports, which suggest Islamabad is giving up on Kashmir, can only make India believe that the strategy works.

India’s policy carries risks since, firstly, it is reliant on a deterrence and, secondly, the more successful the strategy, the greater the asymmetry. In case of a Pakistan on brink of collapse, such a strategy has a point of diminishing marginal returns. India’s credibility as a regional power depends on how it guides the region out of the after-effects of the Afghan Wars. Over-awing Pakistan is only one strategy option. Instead an alternative strategy is called for. If the future is to be a break from the past, India must turn to accommodation.

The critique of strategic culture that India is overly accommodative already helps deny accommodation, being designed to push Indian policies to more muscular, pro-active and offensive directions. It is to compel the state, fearful of being charged with being ‘soft’ on defence, to over-compensate in a certain direction. India must instead seek to engage Pakistan meaningfully on outstanding issues, as indeed it is pledged to. This will enable Pakistan to disengage from its ‘strategic assets’, the terrorists it has employed in a proxy war. Pakistan, with some-thing to carry back on the question of Kashmir, can then dismantle the terror infrastructure that India has been insisting on all along.

The position so far is that India will talk once terror is dismantled. There is a certain sequencing in this. However, the trust deficit does not permit Pakistan to throw away its lever, howsoever illegitimate. So there needs to be a simultaneity in India talking concessions and Pakistan behaving itself better. This was the case in the 2004-07 window. We need to begin afresh and India’s public must be conditioned to this by proactive political action.

The criticism of this idea would be that it is to give in to terror and proxy war. The point is that the strategy of not talking under the threat of a gun to the temple has not worked adequately well. Persisting in the hope that India’s better economic indices of late will enable it to manage the relation-ship with resolving the underlying problems is self-delusion.

Another criticism could be that the suggestion of accommodation reeks of India being forced to talk with Pakistan holding a gun to its own head. Yes, the region cannot want that gun going off.

The author is an Assistant Professor, Nelson Mandela Centre for Peace and Conflict Resolution, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi.

India-Pakistan Dialogue: The Way Forward

by Ali Ahmed

February 22, 2010

http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2010/02/22/india-pakistan-dialogue-the-way-forward/

A terrorist bombing of a bakery in Pune resulting in 14 dead greeted the announcement that the foreign secretaries of India and Pakistan are to meet at New Delhi on 25 February 2010. Though the attack is evidence that both the states are on the same side, they have diverging expectations from the talks. India intends keeping the focus on terror so as to enable it to arrive at a decision whether Pakistan has been responsive enough to its concerns for it resume the stalled composite dialogue. Pakistan for its part would push for the resumption so as to outflank its extremists, led by Maulana Hafeez Saeed, who have called for Kashmir to be declared as the ‘core issue’. The differing agendas indicate that even as the composite dialogue may resume in the wake of the meeting, expectation of a meaningful outcome any time soon in any of its eight subparts would be belied.

The earlier five rounds of dialogue since 2004 did not see any see any issue being wrapped up, even though at least two were reported to have been ripe for disposing off: Siachen and Sir Creek. Progress instead had been recorded on the ‘back channel’ as long as General Musharraf’s credibility lasted. That the dialogue process was derailed by 26/11 was therefore not grieved over by either side. India then did not need to concede on any point, even as it gained an additional pressure point in its Cold War with Pakistan. The Pakistan Army, embroiled internally, could do without the dialogue during its phase of relative weakness. The only party affected was the civil side of government in Pakistan that could have used any success in talks to create greater space for itself.

The current move owes in some measure to stabilisation of the AfPak front in renewed US push for closure of the campaign through a military and civilian ‘surge’ combined with politically reaching out to amenable sections of the Taliban. Pakistan, having India marginalised in the London and Ankara conferences, is confident of preserving ‘strategic depth’ by brokering a deal between the US and the Taliban. India, not wanting to appear a spoiler, has pragmatically aligned itself with the Obama initiative. It would appear that both states await the outcome, outline of which will possibly be discernible by mid year.

The Indian initiative, for which the ground was prepared prior in a flurry of Track II activity over the turn of the year, has been expected for some time. The law of diminishing marginal utility had caught up with the policy of pressurising Pakistan to act against handlers involved in the 26/11 attack. Pakistan obliged partially, but has been patently unable to meet India’s expansive condition that action also is taken against leaders as Hafeez Saeed. The set back to Dr. Manmohan Singh’s policy of reaching out received in wake of Sharm es Sheikh was by now well behind. There has been a changeover in the National Security Adviser, making a change of gears possible. India also would like to expand the constituencies in favour of reconciliation in Pakistan by engaging with all secular-democratic sections. This would enable them to make gains against the space occupied by the military and the extremists internally in Pakistan. This, being a long term strategy, is unlikely to result in any worthwhile movement. Therefore, any initiative would be with Pakistan and its Army.

The Pakistani Army requires reconciling with India’s growing power. It has attempted to under cut this unsuccessfully by its proxy war, earlier in Punjab and Kashmir, and over the course of last decade in Indian hinterland. Not only has India faced down the challenge when it was most vulnerable in the Nineties, but its economic and military indices and internal security measures imply that it would be able to do so better over the coming decade. The lesson is obvious that intelligence and military means have been tried and found to be failures. Besides, the policy has proved dangerous. Not only has the threat of military conflict with a nuclear backdrop loomed large, but extremists have proven over the last year to be grave threat to the state. There is advantage for the Army in changing tack. The question is: ‘Will it?’

Presently, both the Pakistani state and the Army are reliant on American largesse. The controversy in wake of the Kerry-Lugar bill over mention of civilian-military balance in Pakistan indicates where power lies. The disarray in the civilian camp, in particular the warring between the executive and judiciary, does not help any. Over the long term, Pakistan hopes to rely on a China wanting to tie down India as a South Asian power. Therefore, the Army would be able to continue as the premier organisation in Pakistan. National security, supposedly threatened by rising India power, would act as rationale for it to continue cornering a disproportionate share of externally enhanced national resources. Therefore, there is no fear of the Army’s institutional interests suffering. That its earlier methods have proven counter productive serves as incentive for it to change tack. Therefore, it can afford to countenance reciprocating Indian overtures without adverse affect to its self interest.

An Army permitted opening up to Indian advances can enhance its image among those profiting from the initiative. An expanding economic resource cake would enable a proportionately larger military share, even while making other sectors less envious. Extremists would be progressively marginalised by expanding commercial classes and democratic spaces. The pace of the opening up, dictated by the Army, would keep it central to the exercise. It would thus be able to extract concessions from India as incentive for good behaviour. This would be particularly useful for Pakistan’s position on river waters and Kashmir, since adversarial relations are unlikely to get Pakistan anywhere.

To get the Pakistani Army round to this perspective would require consistent and enlightened orchestration of diplomacy, political discourse and public information by India beginning end February.

India-Pakistan Dialogue: Going Beyond Thimpu
http://www.ipcs.org/article/india/india-pakistan-dialogue-going-beyond-thimpu-3107.html

Another opportunity for traction on the India-Pakistan front in the form of the just concluded SAARC summit appears to have been lost. The two states are to have the foreign ministers, aided by their foreign secretaries, review current straits in terms of mutual confidence. Presumably, India will await the outcome of the Home Minister’s visit to Islamabad for the SAARC meet in June. He would best be able to gauge progress in Pakistan’s sincerity against terrorism.

Given that the internal power hierarchy in Pakistan is currently indistinct, India’s strategy is to ‘wait and watch.’ It had earlier invested in Nawaz Sharif and Musharraf, only to be disappointed. This time round it appears to be placing its bet on Gilani, seen as having the backing of the Army and being more credible than Zardari. The underside is that this policy is dependent on uncertain internal political dynamics in Pakistan.

However, the underlying structural factor indicates that the Army is the consequential political player and in charge of Pakistan’s India policy. This article offers an innovative idea for furthering the dialogue process by recommending that the Army, at the core of the Pakistani establishment, be strategically engaged with directly.

The joint statement in Islamabad that heralded the resumption of the dialogue: “Prime Minister Vajpayee said that in order to take forward and sustain the dialogue process, violence, hostility and terrorism must be prevented…President Musharraf assured Prime Minister Vajpayee that he will not permit territory under Pakistan’s control to be used to support terrorism in any form.”

India had promised dialogue, while Pakistan promised to discontinue terror to facilitate it. An element of similarity can be detected in the phrasing, particularly in the Pakistani position. The current Indian stand requires Pakistan to end terror, prior to meaningful dialogue being pursued.

The ‘pause’ in talks ever since 26/11 owes to Pakistan not keeping up its end of the bargain. Nevertheless, terror attacks’ having undefined linkages with the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) implies that terror amounts to Pakistani pressure for movement on the Kashmir issue. The trust deficit prevents Pakistan from rolling back the terror infrastructure to avoid losing its leverage. Getting Pakistan to oblige requires India assuring it of ‘meaningful’ talks.  

Prospects for dialogue are becoming brighter. Pakistan has begun to understand the limits of terror as an instrument against India and that the strategy has costs, such as India’s continuing reluctance to talk. The growing power asymmetry with India would over time make India indifferent to an adversarial Pakistan. Therefore, Pakistan is not averse to a change in its India strategy. This is best evidenced by the progress made during the Musharraf years, recounted earlier by AG Noorani in Frontline and recently by the Times of India.

For India, the benefits of dialogue are equally evident. The possibility of India being forced to respond militarily to a terror attack has loomed large. Since this could setback India’s economy, preventive measures are warranted. Expanding the constituency of peace in Pakistan, and thereby restricting the military political space, can only happen by engaging Pakistan. Lastly, India’s China strategy requires that its backyard be reordered. The ‘two front’ formulation is the ‘worst case’ scenario. This means Pakistan has to be brought round.  How can this be done?

The key player in Pakistan is its Army. A military dominated Pakistan can be expected to look only at the ‘stick’ end of India’s ‘carrot and stick’ policy. The Pakistani response can only be in the realist mode of power balancing. Pakistan’s Army is acutely conscious of the conventional imbalance. As a first step, diluting this perception of asymmetry can be done through a strategic dialogue.

The two routinely undertake strategic dialogue with friends, such as the one Pakistan had with the United States in February which was attended by its Army Chief. It is more important that the two adversarial nuclear powers also undertake such an approach. A strategic dialogue can help mitigate their mutual ‘security dilemma’.  This can be discussed in a standing strategic consultative mechanism to manage the South Asian ‘Cold War’, in line with the earlier Cold War model. Progress in strategic balancing can create the necessary ballast for resuming the composite dialogue and making it meaningful once resumed.

India is pledged to negotiations. How meaningful these could get depends on Pakistani responsiveness to its concerns. That is a function of the Army’s threat perception of India. Therefore, India needs to manage this alongside other concerns. A strategic dialogue can be a means to this end.  

India and Pakistan: Losing time
http://www.ipcs.org/article/indo-pak/india-and-pakistan-losing-time-3061.html

The offer of two dates to Pakistan for a meeting of Foreign Secretaries this February has come not a day too early. That the preceding muscle flexing by General Kayani in a power point presentation on the Pakistani Army’s world view to journalists was not allowed to delay this initiative indicates that the pendulum of India’s strategic elite has once again swung towards the liberal end. Keeping the dialogue running and resuming the composite dialogue, that continues to be ‘paused’, should now be a priority. Not doing so could materialize a scenario painted by former Army Chief, ‘Paddy’ Padmanabhan.

Padmanabhan would be just shy of Sundarji in any hypothetical intellectual ranking of India’s brass. Even if his book India Checkmates America 2017 (New Delhi: Manas, 2004) does not make this explicit, it bears recall that his paper as a Lieutenant Colonel figured in the famous Sundarji postal seminar at the College of Combat.

Mr Gates’ mention of India running thin on restraint, his depiction of the 2010 Lohri Day massacre in Bakshi stadium makes a compelling read. He writes, “Every Indian gun able to bear on Pakistani frontline defences in POK began firing on one target after another with maximum number of guns concentrated on each target in turn.” The IAF quietens retaliation and takes out all Pakistani planes scrambled. This brings the Pakistani DGMO to the ‘hotline’ begging India to stop. In the General’s verdict, “We punished Pakistan for her misdeeds…We acted with firmness, maturity and decisiveness.”

Nevertheless, the situation is allowed to drift and come 2017, Pakistan launches a conventional attack on India. Within a day, the General, perhaps anticipating ‘Cold Start’, has Indian pincers virtually surrounding Lahore and penetrating 80 km into Sind while the PAF is ‘nearly finished’. This sets the stage for the nuclear ‘backdrop’ to come to the foreground. At this stage the second front is opened by the collusive power. Within three days Pakistan has ‘comprehensively lost’. And the Mullahs are at the gates of the ‘ageing general’. Indians move in consultation with their enemy of an hour ago, the US. The extremist threat to Pakistan and its nuclear arsenal is taken as a common foe bringing them together. Indian paratroopers on landing fight alongside the Pakistani troops warding off the Jihadist coup.

Though muted, the nuclear genie comes up twice in the book. Once in the discussion on how the good going in India’s ‘Cold Start’ raises possibility of a nuclear response, and second on the threat to Pakistani nuclear weapons from extremists taking over the state. The former does not materialize eventually in the book since the dictator, modelled on former President Musharraf, is taken as a realist. The latter sees the Americans mulling over taking over Pakistan’s nuclear assets while Indians save the Pakistani dictator and state. The aftermath of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan not having played out at the time of writing, the General painted a bright post-war future to his 48 hour long war. The danger is in reality usually being stranger than fiction.

The war ends on this note of Indian ‘magnanimity’. The crucial question is ‘Should it take a war?’ In his Epilogue, the General appears to think so writing, “We hope the blood letting of 70 long years has sated the appetite of the most jingoistic of our people.” The challenge for strategy is to avert the seeming necessity.

The strategy appears to be that in case this recurs, India could threaten realistically to replicate the response in the book. This along with US pressure would force Pakistan to finally act. Triggering off an internal conflict in Pakistan would make Pakistan’s establishment lean on India, as in the fictional scenario of India rescuing the beleaguered dictator. If successful, this would establish India as the central regional power. In case relations were to be resumed and this to recur, then to compensate for the internal political embarrassment, India may feel it necessary to act rather than merely threaten. In light of there being nothing to be gained by talking, since the Pakistani regime cannot deliver, India can afford to wait. With Kashmir on the mend through secret parlays with separatists, there is also no incentive to talk meaningfully even if talks are resumed.

Sensing that Obama’s December speech has given Pakistan room for manoeuvre it would likely manage its ‘two front’ problem by first seeing off developments on the western front. In this, rehabilitation of Taliban in a power sharing arrangement in Kabul would be aimed for. It expects the delicacy in NATO’s position to stay India’s hand. The terror attacks it had been subject to have ceased since the end of the Waziristan operations. No wonder Pakistan has indicated to visiting Mr Gates its unwillingness to undertake any further operations. Unlikely to end up a ‘failed state’ due to the Kerry-Lugar bailout, Pakistan will return.

Since coercion is not working and military means may prove counter-productive, India needs to move beyond the well worn realist paradigm for innovative approaches to Pakistan. Resuming the dialogue is not enough.

The ‘Pause’ in India-Pakistan Dialogue
http://www.ipcs.org/article/indo-pak/the-pause-in-india-pakistan-dialogue-2983.html

India-Pakistan relations are once again in a trough, perhaps this is fallout of the terror unleashed by the jihadis on 26/11. While cutting off of the dialogue can be seen as fallout of their action, persisting with the ‘pause’ has moved beyond mere ‘fallout’ to become ‘strategy’. Ostensibly it is a way to keep up the pressure on Pakistan to act against the handlers of these jihadis. By now, some forward movement could have been expected, particularly because of the need to avoid another 26/11. Why has this not happened?

What accounts for India persisting with the strategy of ‘pause’?

India is mindful that response to terror directed at India would require Indian pressure, separate and in addition to any pressure mounted by its friend and partner, the US. It is the success of such pressure that results in Pakistani complaints – exaggeration apart - about Indian action in Afghanistan and allegedly also in Baluchistan.

By withholding from talks, India is driving home its advantage. In case it succeeds in pushing Pakistan to deliver, then it achieves its aims. In case Pakistan takes some action, this can be taken as success of the pressure. In case Pakistani action results in an extremist backlash, then the reaction would force the Pakistani state to keep up the action, if not enlarge its scope. This is a situation not averse to some in India. Pakistan has taken limited, if reluctant, action. It has not done any more, lest the largely Punjabi jihadi groups combine with the Pashtun Taliban and destabilize Pakistan’s core areas. India may then, along with the international community, assist Pakistan and in doing so extract Pakistani compliance with Indian interests.

A possible outcome is Pakistan not delivering on Indian demands, particularly the prosecution of mastermind, Hafeez Sayeed. While this is likely, by demanding it, India is compelling Pakistan to at least go after the smaller fish. It would also serve to justify India’s stand that Pakistan is not doing enough. This would permit India to pursue its containment of Pakistan by intelligence means. ‘No talks’ implies that no politically difficult concessions need be made. India cannot be held to the Pakistani requirement in the Islamabad joint statement. There being no buffer of talks, India’s possible recourse to military means in response to another 26/11 would deter Pakistani state complicity. In case of another 26/11, the Indian state cannot be put on the defensive internally for having resumed talks prematurely. India does not need talks anymore for controlling the situation in Kashmir since it appears to have arrived at a position of strength there. More importantly, talks serve little purpose in light of the political schizophrenia in Pakistan. The ‘talks as strategy’ route was to propel forces in favour of peace in Pakistan within its polity. This has not happened. Lastly, India, looking for parity with China, would like to end the hyphenation with Pakistan that talks only serve to reinforce.

For its part, Army-controlled Pakistan is hoping to transit its period of potential instability without overly compromising on its political ends and strategic means, both in Kashmir and Afghanistan. In retrospect, would India’s strategy of ‘pause’ be seen as time lost?

Pakistan has now tasted ‘blow-back’ intimately. It is barely managing to roll back Islamists and would not want them to rise inordinately again. There are also internal forces in Pakistan, such as a growing middle class, the civil society and the media, which are not in favour of continued hostility with India. Some sections, especially the commercial class, instead may want to profit from engaging with an economically vibrant India. There is also an increasing pragmatism in the political class on the issue of Kashmir, as seen in statements by President Zardari and former President Musharraf from time to time. The fact is that anti-American and anti-Indian sentiments exist. Therefore, the regime cannot go overboard in meeting aims either of the West or of India. It would not do so at the risk of compromising Pakistan’s stability. Pakistan can be pushed only so far. It follows that strategic prudence requires that these limits be respected.

There is no escaping the fact that only talks can help tackle the outstanding issues between the two states. Just as the military action, Operation Parakram, lost its sting after a while, the ‘pause’ strategy too could do so. Therefore, India needs to change gears soon. ‘Pause’ is not an ‘end’ in itself, but an instrument of pressure. The pressure having succeeded to the extent it has, it is time to change gears. The opportune moment to resume talks seems to be the first anniversary of 26/11. It has been a year since the last terror incident outside of Kashmir. Perhaps an announcement may be made prior to the PM’s state visit to the US and as with the Islamabad meeting, the postponed SAARC summit of this year could witness a replay of Islamabad 2004.

Talks As Strategy
http://www.ipcs.org/article/india/talks-as-strategy-2935.html

India has engaged Pakistan through dialogue in the six rounds of talks in 1963-64, in the seven rounds of talks in 1990-1994, in initiating the Composite Dialogue process in 1997 and in five rounds since its resumption in 2004. The aim has been to expand the constituency of peace in Pakistan, not only through the talks in themselves, but also through the achievements of these talks, such as additional people to people contacts and trade. In keeping with theories in the field of peace studies and interdependence, progress on less controversial issues could impart the necessary momentum to tackle the more difficult issues.

The idea has been that an expanding stake in peace with India would undercut the stranglehold of the Pakistan Army over Pakistan’s security and Kashmir policy. Eventually, with internal power equations in Pakistan tending towards the peace-inclined constituency, the Army would be forced to downgrade its dependence, through the ISI, on terrorism as a ‘strategic tool’. Also, in the Musharraf years, it was felt that since he could carry the Army along, there was a possibility of arriving at a modus vivendi on Kashmir through the up front dialogue and the ‘back channel’. Thus these talks can be said to have served a purpose. The drawdown in terror incidents in Kashmir is evidence of this. However, the terror attack in Mumbai on 26/11 is also testimony to the distance that remains to be traversed.

The Mumbai attack brought out the third dimension in domestic political space in Pakistan, that of the jihadis. The autonomous tendency in this group cannot be discounted. Drawing sustenance and legitimacy from their anti-India activity, the jihadis can be expected to attempt to derail any progress towards peace. Being dependent on ISI largesse to an extent, they can also serve the Army’s interest in sabotaging peace. They are used largely to sensitize India to the need for movement on the issue of Kashmir, which is viewed as the ‘core’ issue by the Army. As noted in the aftermath of the Mumbai attack, they can serve to deflect pressure on the Army to do more against the Taliban.

Resuming the paused dialogue was inevitable. Internally, the ‘pause’ had proved useful in the return of the UPA to power at the Centre. Externally, Pakistan appeared to be taking credible action against the LeT, as conveyed in the dossier recounting these actions. There was a need to shore up the Zardari-Gilani administration against the Army. Lastly, the US was interested in stability so that their concerns in the Af-Pak region were met more purposefully by Pakistani army action against the Taliban. Thus, the initiative towards a resumption of talks of the Prime Minister at Yekaterinburg in his meeting with Zardari on the sidelines of the SCO summit, and thereafter furthering it in his meeting with Gilani at Sharm el-Sheikh, was timely. The Joint Statement at the latter meeting points to a ‘limited’ resumption, with foreign secretaries to meet as required and report back to the Foreign Ministers.

The statement of the PM in the Lok Sabha meant to lay at rest the controversy surrounding the Joint Statement, brings out India’s dual-pronged Pakistan strategy: shoring up the defence and security while engaging in talks. For the first time, the strategic dimension of the talks has been brought out. The need to follow this strategy is evidenced in the Indian Prime Minister’s words, “I believe that there is a large constituency for peace in both countries…We know this, but in the past there have been hurdles in a consistent pursuit of this path. As a result, the enemies of peace have flourished….In the interests of our people, and in the interest of peace and prosperity of South Asia, we must not let this happen.”

The adoption of talks as strategy implies persisting with dialogue despite hurdles, which are only to be expected. Since the disposition of the Pakistan Army cannot be changed militarily in light of the nuclear backdrop, dialogue has greater potential. Dialogue however, needs to meet a strategic end in order to be meaningful, especially with respect to issues that are relatively less difficulty. If used as a means to exhaust the Pakistani Army by having talks-for-talks sake, then India would continue to remain vulnerable to terror. Transferring the onus of stopping terror on Pakistan is a good tactic, but poor strategy in light of the current uncertainty surrounding Pakistan’s internal politics.

It is unfortunate that the controversy over resumption of the dialogue process has placed the Indian government on the defensive and stymied resumption of talks. While Pakistan will take action against the set of jihadis identified with the attacks, it can be expected to continue to hedge; witness its attitude to Hafeez Sayeed. The Islamabad Joint Declaration had linked ‘positive results’ to a drawdown in terror. Pakistan’s inaction on the issue of terror due to the absence of institutional mechanisms, exposes India to a recurrence of 26/11 and this is implied in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s words, “There are uncertainties on the horizon, and I cannot predict the future in dealing with neighbours, two nuclear powers.”