10-09-2003, 06:10 PM
SPEAKING FREELY
A grand strategy for South Asia
By Syed A Ahsani
[url="http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EJ10Df02.html"]http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EJ10Df02.html[/url]
Syed A Ahsani is a former Pakistani ambassador
Speaking Freely is an Asia Times Online feature that allows guest writers to have their say. Please click here if you are interested in contributing.
The strategic location of the great powers - Russia, China and India, and now the United States in neighboring Afghanistan - has made Pakistan a frontline state in the US "war against terrorism". Perhaps India seems reluctantly reconciled, and is prepared for entente with Pakistan. Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's offer of talks without preconditions is a pointer in that direction. The present time is propitious in developing a viable strategy to ensure Pakistan's future stability, and its role in South and Central Asia.
India and Pakistan have both decisively sided with the US in its war against terrorism, offering military and intelligence support that was vital in routing the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. In return, Washington has showered Delhi and Islamabad with military, economic and diplomatic quid pro quos to a degree that was inconceivable prior to September 11. The result has been a break in the severe relational pattern whereby improved US ties with one of the two countries came at the expense of ties with the other. Remarkably, since the onset of the war on terror, Washington's relations with both India and Pakistan have improved simultaneously.
But this time, better US relations with the sub-continent have come at the expense of increased tensions between the two nuclear states. Holding greater leverage on the region than ever before, the US would need to ensure that the generous amount of funds and equipment it is pouring into India and Pakistan is used for regional stabilization rather than for further arms buildup aimed against each other.
Since September 11, Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf has been persistently supportive of the US, despite the equally persistent menaces to his rule from radical anti-American segments of society. In addition to abandoning its five-year-old support for the Taliban regime literally overnight, Islamabad has stood at the forefront of the US coalition by providing a range of assistance, including the use of military bases, to US operations against its former friends in Afghanistan. It has allowed the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to take part in raids against al-Qaeda members who have escaped to Pakistan, leading to the capture of hundreds of suspects, including one of Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants. Succumbing to much American pressure, Musharraf is now permitting US troops to help conduct raids in Pakistan's isolated tribal regions where people are long known for their affinity to the Taliban.
Musharraf also sacked several high-ranking generals for their possible extremist Islamic tendencies soon after the launching of an anti-terror campaign last fall. In December, he swiftly banned two organizations believed to be responsible for carrying out the deadly attack on the Indian parliament earlier that month, to the pleasant surprise of India and the US. Pakistani authorities have arrested about 2,000 extremists and shut down hundreds of their offices.
US President George W Bush has heaped praise on Musharraf through generous rhetoric and material rewards of hitherto unforeseen proportions. Just weeks after the September 11 attacks, Bush removed all sanctions imposed on Pakistan since 1990, including those that took effect after Pakistan and India tested nuclear weapons in 1998. US economic assistance to Pakistan this fiscal year (FY) totals US$600 million, and another $250 million is in line for the next FY. This amount does not include the $220 million Bush offered Islamabad to cover costs incurred in aiding Operation Enduring Freedom. Washington has also promised to reduce tariff barriers against Pakistani textile exports to the US and Europe, as well as write off $1 billion in bilateral debt.
The CIA and the FBI are currently providing training and equipment to Pakistani police and agents as part of their efforts to hunt down al-Qaeda remnants. The US Justice Department, for its part, has allocated $73 million to boost Pakistan's border security. The program will provide all-terrain vehicles, Apache helicopters and radio communication equipment, in addition to training for provincial and tribal police and army troops.
Though the US has not restored full military-to-military ties with Pakistan, US Secretary of State Colin Powell told Musharraf last October that Washington is willing to discuss the issue, and also look into arms sales. Washington has already sold military equipment to recondition Pakistan's store of old American weapons systems.
US efforts to bolster economic and military ties with India predate September 11, but the war on terrorism catalyzed the process, providing justifications for removing obstacles that had hindered deeper bilateral cooperation. As with Pakistan, the US removed most economic and military sanctions imposed on India after the 1998 nuclear tit-for-tat. Quickly taking advantage of new possibilities, the Bush administration endorsed the sale of 20 military items in February, including Firefinder artillery-locating radar systems long sought by India in what marked the first US defense deal with India in more than a decade. Additionally, confirming early announcements that US military cooperation with India would reach "unprecedented" levels, the United States and India this month engaged in their first joint military exercises since 1962.
Although the US has taken these swift moves under the rubric of aiding a key ally in the anti-terrorism campaign, Washington understands that the enticements are also needed to appease Delhi, which sees warming US-Pakistan ties with deep unease. For Vajpayee, the biggest terrorist threat continues to be what he claims are Pakistani-backed rebels in Kashmir. Thus, he could perceive Pakistan's rise in economic and military strength through US support as a threat, particularly to a settlement of the Kashmir dispute.
On the other hand, Delhi is aware that it stands to benefit from any improvement in US-Pakistan relations, since it would ultimately help bring stability to the region. For instance, under significant American pressure, Musharraf outwardly distanced himself from Pakistan's "freedom fighters" in Kashmir, banning five Islamic militant organizations in addition to promising closer scrutiny of mosques and madrassas (Islamic religious schools).
With the prospect of a more economically-stable Pakistan and with US recognition that Kashmir is inextricably linked to anti-terrorism in South Asia, India has so far demonstrated a degree of tolerance for the shifting power balances on the subcontinent.
If the anti-terrorism campaign has increased the prospect for a stable sub-continent, it has also increased actual tensions due to the escalation of violence in Kashmir. After the December 13 suicide attack on the Indian parliament last year that killed 14 people, both sides amassed their troops and weapons along the common border in what became the biggest military buildup since 1971. Pakistan called on India to withdraw its troops, but India refused to budge until Pakistan took further steps to crack down on Islamic militants India holds responsible for the attack. Only after apparent US intervention did the two sides back off.
The difficulty of settling the half-century Kashmir dispute can be seen in the fact that even if Pakistan halted directly aiding Kashmiri insurgents against India, as Musharraf claims he has, Kashmir will always occupy the heart of Pakistani national identity. As Musharraf stated in his much extolled (even by India) speech in January, "Kashmir runs in our blood ... We will continue to extend our moral, political and diplomatic support to Kashmiris." Islamabad is calling on the international community led by the US to mediate the dispute - an idea long rejected by India. Settlement today is nowhere closer than it was two decades ago when the two countries last went to war; but today, both are equipped with nuclear weapons. Musharraf has reiterated that he will always keep the nuclear option to ensure the survival of Pakistan.
With the unequivocal shift in US policy focus, Washington has, among other things, abandoned sanctions that had epitomized its commitment to weapons of mass destruction reduction and bestowed a gamut of rewards on a state that had been on Washington's wait list for states sponsoring terrorism. These actions made perfect sense while the world was caught in the anti-terrorism momentum. A key question is whether, once the dust has settled, the world will realize that in defeating terrorists the US had trained and equipped two nuclear states with an unceasing history of hostility toward each other.
That, of course, is the bleaker scenario. Once the dust has settled both Pakistan and India could in fact be Asian economic powerhouses, with reliable leaderships engaged in dialogue over Kashmir and exercising maximum nuclear restraint. That Washington will continue to provide economic/military inducements to both Islamabad and Delhi to maintain their support against terrorism is a foregone conclusion. What remains a vital option, therefore, is for the US - as embroiled as it is in fighting terror - to resuscitate former policy priorities toward the Indian sub-continent, namely, reaching a settlement for the Kashmir conflict and using diplomacy to rein in all possible drifts toward a nuclear crisis. The persistent problems of Kashmir and nuclear weapons cannot be overshadowed by the "war against terror" and, increasingly, they are becoming one and the same problem.
The US can therefore help avert a future crisis by complementing its new economic and military magnanimity toward South Asia with a demonstrated intolerance of Pakistani support for insurgents in Kashmir and subsequent Indian retaliation through military means. As far as possible, the international community needs to help the two sides start a process of negotiation on the Kashmir dispute, if not overtly mediate the dialogue. On the nuclear issue, it is imperative that the US urge both sides to implement concrete confidence-building measures as discussed at the 1999 Lahore summit and work toward the "credible minimum deterrent" status envisioned by both sides. These recommendations are neither new nor novel, but they should be reinstated on the sub-continent with renewed exigency.
Finally, efforts toward dialogue and conflict settlements need to come from the Indian and Pakistani leaderships themselves. They are no longer on opposite sides of the Cold War schism, but on the same side of the anti-terror war, which Musharraf has taken resolute and politically risky steps to support. Further evidence of Pakistan's detachment from Kashmiri insurgents - a task far more difficult for Musharraf than his resolute detachment from the Taliban - will greatly reassure Washington and Delhi.
Concerned about Musharraf's commitment to fight terrorism, the US is watching the Islamists in Pakistan. Ironically, to defeat former premiers Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto's parties, Musharraf encouraged Islamists, which have now become a pain the neck, demanding the repeal of the Legal Framework Order (LFO)that introduced constitutional amendments.
It was on his prompting that the Election Commission equated the degrees of religious schools with college degrees, resulting in the electoral triumph of Islamists, although this issue is being tested in the courts.
It is always intriguing to America whether Islamists and government are two sides of the same coin. Hence an annual review for aid commitment to Pakistan. It seems US involvement in Kashmir talks stems from the goals of the neo-conservatives now in power in the White House of securing Central Asia's oil resources, for which transit routes through Pakistan and Afghanistan are sine qua non. The US has for the first time become engaged in Kashmir settlement to fulfill the neo-conservative/chicken hawk agenda: To control oil in Iraq, and Central Asia; remove the Saudi monarchy and redraw the map of the "Meddle" East, nay, West Asia and build a bloc against China. The bombing and occupation of Afghanistan was the first step, the invasion of Iraq the second.
Thus, US bases have been built in the Central Asian states, which are keen to develop their economies with US help without antagonizing Russia and China. Concerned over insurgency in Chechnya and Sinking respectively, both are supporting the US "war on terrorism". Reminiscent of Lord Curzon's Great Game in the 19th century, the US is re-enacting the Second Great Game in Central Asia.
Pakistan is the closest outlet for Central Asia by sea - Karachi being only 450 miles as the crow flies - making Pakistan of pivotal geostrategic importance - to the bitter chagrin of India. Pakistan should, therefore, play its cards astutely. If it goes the Taliban way, Pakistan will risk meeting the same fate; being next door to Great Powers can be a double-edged sword.
Considering the security concerns against terrorism, the US and Pakistan are on the same side. The US ought to seriously consider broadening the scope of the US-India strategic partnership by including Pakistan in it. Such a suggestion is based on the rationale that a weak Pakistan may look for other avenues to enhance its security, Besides, it is better for a nuclear Pakistan to be part and parcel of a US-led strategic cooperation than belong to one of which North Korea is a party.
If Pakistan becomes part of the US-India strategic cooperation, both India and Pakistan will find ample reason to resolve the Kashmir dispute; the US may also support expanded strategic cooperation to enhance the domestic security of both South Asian nations' command and control, foreclosing potential for nuclear war. As a nameless US official observed, Pakistan "worries us the most because it's the only nuclear power in danger of falling into the wrong hands", and also because it has become a major source of proliferation.
Vajpayee's recent visit to China indicated that old disputes can be resolved through statesmanship and their talks have led to a major improvement in relations, following a landmark agreement over the status of Tibet. India has now formally recognized that the area known as the Tibetan autonomous region is part of the People's Republic of China. China also agreed to start border trade through the northeast Indian state of Sikkim - a move that is seen as an acceptance by Beijing of India's claim over the territory.
If history is any guide to determine international relations, ties between France and Germany, Italy and Austria, Italy and Yugoslavia and finally Brazil - their neighbors are worth scrutiny. These counties resolved their disputes on Alsace-Lorriane, the Tyrol, Trieste and Brazil's borders with Paraguay, Bolivia, Equador, Columbia and Venezuela. Will South Asian governments, non-government agencies and scholars undertake a serious study of these disputes once considered unresolvable? Their settlement resulted in peace between these countries for at last half a century or more, whereas the Kashmir dispute may become intractable, like the Palestine-Israel problem, as Musharraf has warned.
The post-Cold War era demands a new alignment and reorientation in regional and global frameworks. Taking advantage, India is getting closer to the US and China; apart from maintaining its old alliance with Russia. Russia and the US favor India for their self-interests as a counterweight against China; China wants India as a counterweight against the US.
If Pakistan follows the old policy - if India goes East, Pakistan will go West - and continues support of cross-border infiltration, it will not only loose US support, but also Russia and China's favor.
Pakistan's viable option is to maintain its current stand against terrorism in tandem with the US, but at the same time mend its fences with India on the one hand, and on the other act as a bridge, as in the 1970s, between the US and China. This will herald an era of peace, security and stability, instead of strife, conflict and global war.
The key to peace and security in South Asia an is agreement on "a just new world economic order". A "multipolar world: and "technology transfer". It is imperative to substitute Bush's doctrine of unipolar/ imperial US with John Quincey Adam's "Community of Principle" and Franklin Roosevelt's Doctrine envisioning the establishment of the United Nations. This concept could well usher in a grand strategy for a just and moral global order, heralding peace, justice and economic development on the planet Earth.
A grand strategy for South Asia
By Syed A Ahsani
[url="http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EJ10Df02.html"]http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EJ10Df02.html[/url]
Syed A Ahsani is a former Pakistani ambassador
Speaking Freely is an Asia Times Online feature that allows guest writers to have their say. Please click here if you are interested in contributing.
The strategic location of the great powers - Russia, China and India, and now the United States in neighboring Afghanistan - has made Pakistan a frontline state in the US "war against terrorism". Perhaps India seems reluctantly reconciled, and is prepared for entente with Pakistan. Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's offer of talks without preconditions is a pointer in that direction. The present time is propitious in developing a viable strategy to ensure Pakistan's future stability, and its role in South and Central Asia.
India and Pakistan have both decisively sided with the US in its war against terrorism, offering military and intelligence support that was vital in routing the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. In return, Washington has showered Delhi and Islamabad with military, economic and diplomatic quid pro quos to a degree that was inconceivable prior to September 11. The result has been a break in the severe relational pattern whereby improved US ties with one of the two countries came at the expense of ties with the other. Remarkably, since the onset of the war on terror, Washington's relations with both India and Pakistan have improved simultaneously.
But this time, better US relations with the sub-continent have come at the expense of increased tensions between the two nuclear states. Holding greater leverage on the region than ever before, the US would need to ensure that the generous amount of funds and equipment it is pouring into India and Pakistan is used for regional stabilization rather than for further arms buildup aimed against each other.
Since September 11, Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf has been persistently supportive of the US, despite the equally persistent menaces to his rule from radical anti-American segments of society. In addition to abandoning its five-year-old support for the Taliban regime literally overnight, Islamabad has stood at the forefront of the US coalition by providing a range of assistance, including the use of military bases, to US operations against its former friends in Afghanistan. It has allowed the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to take part in raids against al-Qaeda members who have escaped to Pakistan, leading to the capture of hundreds of suspects, including one of Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants. Succumbing to much American pressure, Musharraf is now permitting US troops to help conduct raids in Pakistan's isolated tribal regions where people are long known for their affinity to the Taliban.
Musharraf also sacked several high-ranking generals for their possible extremist Islamic tendencies soon after the launching of an anti-terror campaign last fall. In December, he swiftly banned two organizations believed to be responsible for carrying out the deadly attack on the Indian parliament earlier that month, to the pleasant surprise of India and the US. Pakistani authorities have arrested about 2,000 extremists and shut down hundreds of their offices.
US President George W Bush has heaped praise on Musharraf through generous rhetoric and material rewards of hitherto unforeseen proportions. Just weeks after the September 11 attacks, Bush removed all sanctions imposed on Pakistan since 1990, including those that took effect after Pakistan and India tested nuclear weapons in 1998. US economic assistance to Pakistan this fiscal year (FY) totals US$600 million, and another $250 million is in line for the next FY. This amount does not include the $220 million Bush offered Islamabad to cover costs incurred in aiding Operation Enduring Freedom. Washington has also promised to reduce tariff barriers against Pakistani textile exports to the US and Europe, as well as write off $1 billion in bilateral debt.
The CIA and the FBI are currently providing training and equipment to Pakistani police and agents as part of their efforts to hunt down al-Qaeda remnants. The US Justice Department, for its part, has allocated $73 million to boost Pakistan's border security. The program will provide all-terrain vehicles, Apache helicopters and radio communication equipment, in addition to training for provincial and tribal police and army troops.
Though the US has not restored full military-to-military ties with Pakistan, US Secretary of State Colin Powell told Musharraf last October that Washington is willing to discuss the issue, and also look into arms sales. Washington has already sold military equipment to recondition Pakistan's store of old American weapons systems.
US efforts to bolster economic and military ties with India predate September 11, but the war on terrorism catalyzed the process, providing justifications for removing obstacles that had hindered deeper bilateral cooperation. As with Pakistan, the US removed most economic and military sanctions imposed on India after the 1998 nuclear tit-for-tat. Quickly taking advantage of new possibilities, the Bush administration endorsed the sale of 20 military items in February, including Firefinder artillery-locating radar systems long sought by India in what marked the first US defense deal with India in more than a decade. Additionally, confirming early announcements that US military cooperation with India would reach "unprecedented" levels, the United States and India this month engaged in their first joint military exercises since 1962.
Although the US has taken these swift moves under the rubric of aiding a key ally in the anti-terrorism campaign, Washington understands that the enticements are also needed to appease Delhi, which sees warming US-Pakistan ties with deep unease. For Vajpayee, the biggest terrorist threat continues to be what he claims are Pakistani-backed rebels in Kashmir. Thus, he could perceive Pakistan's rise in economic and military strength through US support as a threat, particularly to a settlement of the Kashmir dispute.
On the other hand, Delhi is aware that it stands to benefit from any improvement in US-Pakistan relations, since it would ultimately help bring stability to the region. For instance, under significant American pressure, Musharraf outwardly distanced himself from Pakistan's "freedom fighters" in Kashmir, banning five Islamic militant organizations in addition to promising closer scrutiny of mosques and madrassas (Islamic religious schools).
With the prospect of a more economically-stable Pakistan and with US recognition that Kashmir is inextricably linked to anti-terrorism in South Asia, India has so far demonstrated a degree of tolerance for the shifting power balances on the subcontinent.
If the anti-terrorism campaign has increased the prospect for a stable sub-continent, it has also increased actual tensions due to the escalation of violence in Kashmir. After the December 13 suicide attack on the Indian parliament last year that killed 14 people, both sides amassed their troops and weapons along the common border in what became the biggest military buildup since 1971. Pakistan called on India to withdraw its troops, but India refused to budge until Pakistan took further steps to crack down on Islamic militants India holds responsible for the attack. Only after apparent US intervention did the two sides back off.
The difficulty of settling the half-century Kashmir dispute can be seen in the fact that even if Pakistan halted directly aiding Kashmiri insurgents against India, as Musharraf claims he has, Kashmir will always occupy the heart of Pakistani national identity. As Musharraf stated in his much extolled (even by India) speech in January, "Kashmir runs in our blood ... We will continue to extend our moral, political and diplomatic support to Kashmiris." Islamabad is calling on the international community led by the US to mediate the dispute - an idea long rejected by India. Settlement today is nowhere closer than it was two decades ago when the two countries last went to war; but today, both are equipped with nuclear weapons. Musharraf has reiterated that he will always keep the nuclear option to ensure the survival of Pakistan.
With the unequivocal shift in US policy focus, Washington has, among other things, abandoned sanctions that had epitomized its commitment to weapons of mass destruction reduction and bestowed a gamut of rewards on a state that had been on Washington's wait list for states sponsoring terrorism. These actions made perfect sense while the world was caught in the anti-terrorism momentum. A key question is whether, once the dust has settled, the world will realize that in defeating terrorists the US had trained and equipped two nuclear states with an unceasing history of hostility toward each other.
That, of course, is the bleaker scenario. Once the dust has settled both Pakistan and India could in fact be Asian economic powerhouses, with reliable leaderships engaged in dialogue over Kashmir and exercising maximum nuclear restraint. That Washington will continue to provide economic/military inducements to both Islamabad and Delhi to maintain their support against terrorism is a foregone conclusion. What remains a vital option, therefore, is for the US - as embroiled as it is in fighting terror - to resuscitate former policy priorities toward the Indian sub-continent, namely, reaching a settlement for the Kashmir conflict and using diplomacy to rein in all possible drifts toward a nuclear crisis. The persistent problems of Kashmir and nuclear weapons cannot be overshadowed by the "war against terror" and, increasingly, they are becoming one and the same problem.
The US can therefore help avert a future crisis by complementing its new economic and military magnanimity toward South Asia with a demonstrated intolerance of Pakistani support for insurgents in Kashmir and subsequent Indian retaliation through military means. As far as possible, the international community needs to help the two sides start a process of negotiation on the Kashmir dispute, if not overtly mediate the dialogue. On the nuclear issue, it is imperative that the US urge both sides to implement concrete confidence-building measures as discussed at the 1999 Lahore summit and work toward the "credible minimum deterrent" status envisioned by both sides. These recommendations are neither new nor novel, but they should be reinstated on the sub-continent with renewed exigency.
Finally, efforts toward dialogue and conflict settlements need to come from the Indian and Pakistani leaderships themselves. They are no longer on opposite sides of the Cold War schism, but on the same side of the anti-terror war, which Musharraf has taken resolute and politically risky steps to support. Further evidence of Pakistan's detachment from Kashmiri insurgents - a task far more difficult for Musharraf than his resolute detachment from the Taliban - will greatly reassure Washington and Delhi.
Concerned about Musharraf's commitment to fight terrorism, the US is watching the Islamists in Pakistan. Ironically, to defeat former premiers Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto's parties, Musharraf encouraged Islamists, which have now become a pain the neck, demanding the repeal of the Legal Framework Order (LFO)that introduced constitutional amendments.
It was on his prompting that the Election Commission equated the degrees of religious schools with college degrees, resulting in the electoral triumph of Islamists, although this issue is being tested in the courts.
It is always intriguing to America whether Islamists and government are two sides of the same coin. Hence an annual review for aid commitment to Pakistan. It seems US involvement in Kashmir talks stems from the goals of the neo-conservatives now in power in the White House of securing Central Asia's oil resources, for which transit routes through Pakistan and Afghanistan are sine qua non. The US has for the first time become engaged in Kashmir settlement to fulfill the neo-conservative/chicken hawk agenda: To control oil in Iraq, and Central Asia; remove the Saudi monarchy and redraw the map of the "Meddle" East, nay, West Asia and build a bloc against China. The bombing and occupation of Afghanistan was the first step, the invasion of Iraq the second.
Thus, US bases have been built in the Central Asian states, which are keen to develop their economies with US help without antagonizing Russia and China. Concerned over insurgency in Chechnya and Sinking respectively, both are supporting the US "war on terrorism". Reminiscent of Lord Curzon's Great Game in the 19th century, the US is re-enacting the Second Great Game in Central Asia.
Pakistan is the closest outlet for Central Asia by sea - Karachi being only 450 miles as the crow flies - making Pakistan of pivotal geostrategic importance - to the bitter chagrin of India. Pakistan should, therefore, play its cards astutely. If it goes the Taliban way, Pakistan will risk meeting the same fate; being next door to Great Powers can be a double-edged sword.
Considering the security concerns against terrorism, the US and Pakistan are on the same side. The US ought to seriously consider broadening the scope of the US-India strategic partnership by including Pakistan in it. Such a suggestion is based on the rationale that a weak Pakistan may look for other avenues to enhance its security, Besides, it is better for a nuclear Pakistan to be part and parcel of a US-led strategic cooperation than belong to one of which North Korea is a party.
If Pakistan becomes part of the US-India strategic cooperation, both India and Pakistan will find ample reason to resolve the Kashmir dispute; the US may also support expanded strategic cooperation to enhance the domestic security of both South Asian nations' command and control, foreclosing potential for nuclear war. As a nameless US official observed, Pakistan "worries us the most because it's the only nuclear power in danger of falling into the wrong hands", and also because it has become a major source of proliferation.
Vajpayee's recent visit to China indicated that old disputes can be resolved through statesmanship and their talks have led to a major improvement in relations, following a landmark agreement over the status of Tibet. India has now formally recognized that the area known as the Tibetan autonomous region is part of the People's Republic of China. China also agreed to start border trade through the northeast Indian state of Sikkim - a move that is seen as an acceptance by Beijing of India's claim over the territory.
If history is any guide to determine international relations, ties between France and Germany, Italy and Austria, Italy and Yugoslavia and finally Brazil - their neighbors are worth scrutiny. These counties resolved their disputes on Alsace-Lorriane, the Tyrol, Trieste and Brazil's borders with Paraguay, Bolivia, Equador, Columbia and Venezuela. Will South Asian governments, non-government agencies and scholars undertake a serious study of these disputes once considered unresolvable? Their settlement resulted in peace between these countries for at last half a century or more, whereas the Kashmir dispute may become intractable, like the Palestine-Israel problem, as Musharraf has warned.
The post-Cold War era demands a new alignment and reorientation in regional and global frameworks. Taking advantage, India is getting closer to the US and China; apart from maintaining its old alliance with Russia. Russia and the US favor India for their self-interests as a counterweight against China; China wants India as a counterweight against the US.
If Pakistan follows the old policy - if India goes East, Pakistan will go West - and continues support of cross-border infiltration, it will not only loose US support, but also Russia and China's favor.
Pakistan's viable option is to maintain its current stand against terrorism in tandem with the US, but at the same time mend its fences with India on the one hand, and on the other act as a bridge, as in the 1970s, between the US and China. This will herald an era of peace, security and stability, instead of strife, conflict and global war.
The key to peace and security in South Asia an is agreement on "a just new world economic order". A "multipolar world: and "technology transfer". It is imperative to substitute Bush's doctrine of unipolar/ imperial US with John Quincey Adam's "Community of Principle" and Franklin Roosevelt's Doctrine envisioning the establishment of the United Nations. This concept could well usher in a grand strategy for a just and moral global order, heralding peace, justice and economic development on the planet Earth.