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BOOK REVIEW
India and
Pakistan: The ever-ever antagonism
By Sreeram Chaulia
A Review of J.N. Dixit's
India-Pakistan in
War & Peace
 I
once witnessed a pitched debate between former Indian foreign secretary
J N Dixit, alias "Mani", and peace activist Praful Bidwai on the pros
and cons of India going nuclear in May 1998. Bidwai argued emotionally
and rhetorically against India "losing its soul in Pokhran" (in a
theatrical style which has now been popularized by novelist Arundhati
Roy), as Dixit proceeded to professionally and dispassionately adumbrate
the security requirements and milieu in Asia that necessitated the
Indian nuclear tests.
I came out with the distinct impression that whether one agreed or not
with Dixit's defense of "Smiling Buddha II" - as the nuclear device is
popularly called - the man was a walking, talking encyclopedia who could
rattle off facts and incidents at will and at apposite moments on any
subject pertaining to South Asian politics and foreign relations.
A prolific writer and speaker since retirement from the Indian foreign
service, Dixit has come up with this volume covering the entire breadth
of India-Pakistan animosity, adding another feather to his plume as the
one foreign secretary who never went out of vogue, long after
superannuation.
If anyone still has doubts whether Mani Dixit is a one-man think tank,
this anecdotal and racy survey of the "ever-ever" enmity between India
and Pakistan, to borrow a phrase from author Francis Fukuyama, is the
clincher. In depth of knowledge and foresight, India-Pakistan in War
& Peace pleases, endears and also fills crucial gaps in
understanding of recent and not-so-recent events of sub-continental
history.
Present backwards
Dixit has chosen an anticlockwise narrative, beginning with the IC-814
plane hijacking and the Kargil war (May-July 1999), and then returning
to the historical developments of India-Pakistan tussles from
independence in 1947. A "gradual, logical and chronological approach
would diminish the sense of urgency with which India should assess and
react to Pakistani antagonism, which goes beyond territorial disputes or
strategic worries". (p 19)
The author, a member of India's National Security Advisory Board,
presents behind-the-scenes information about the involvement of
Pakistani authorities in the Indian Airlines hijacking of December 1999.
In Kathmandu, as a prelude, senior Pakistani diplomats and
Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) officials went to the Tribhuvan
airport departure lounge and "had some last minute discussions with the
leader of the hijacking group".
Refueling of the hijacked plane en route to Kandahar in Afghanistan was
done at Lahore, with Pakistani military officers present at the air
traffic control tower. After the Taliban gave safe passage to the
terrorists released by India in exchange for civilians in the plane,
they proceeded with fanfare to Pakistan. Maulana Masood Azhar's
triumphant march throughout his home province had the blessings of local
Pakistani government authorities. Pakistani officials were present at
Bahawalpur, where Azhar swore to raise an armed cadre of half a million
people to continue the jihad against India. What worries Dixit most is
that "the common people of Pakistan did not react to the hijacking in a
manner influenced by humanitarian considerations". (p 33) They felt it
was "incidental" and part of the general support that the ISI gave to
terrorist cadre.
The Kargil war must be seen as a continuation of the unalterable
objective of the Pakistani power structure: forcibly wresting Kashmir
from India. Dixit's evaluation is that the single most important factor
propelling Kargil was the personality of warmongering army chief,
General Pervez Musharraf. "He believed that a sustained campaign of
subversion and military intrusion would result in Pakistan achieving its
objective of annexing Kashmir," and staunchly defended jihad as a
"tolerant concept embodying commitment to Islam". (p 38). Like specious
defenses of innocence in the IC-814 episode, Pakistan's claim that
Kargil did not involve regular troops but only mujahideen was disproved
by the fact that "irregulars, barring foreign mercenaries, were used as
porters and logistical support personnel by the Pakistan army". (p 51)
Every foreign government, including Pakistan's ally China, acknowledged
that the Line of Control that divides Kashmir had been violated by
Pakistan as a unilateral provocative act and that Pakistani infantry
troops were directly involved in the aggression.
Again, disappointingly for those who imagine that people-to-people
relations are the panacea for the India-Pakistan conflict, Pakistani
public opinion (except in Pakistan-administered Kashmir) swallowed
government propaganda during Kargil that the misadventure was "launched
substantially by Kashmiri militants". (p 75) The lesson for India from
Kargil and IC-814, according to Dixit, is that bilateral dialogue at any
level should not be undertaken with any excessive expectation and should
not be predicated on the sincerity of Pakistan.
Wellsprings of hatred
While there are theories that Muslim separatism and antipathy to "Hindu
India" dated back to medieval times or to the anointment of Aurangzeb as
Mughal emperor instead of Dara Shikoh, Dixit thinks that the half
century from 1803, when Muslim political power crumbled before the
British onslaught, was the cementing factor in raising anxiety among
undivided India's Muslim intellectuals. The operational styles of both
Tilak and Gandhi, not to mention British policies, crystallized
suspicions about the Hindu majority in the psyche of Indian Muslims.
Partition and its attendant horrors were "seeds of communal antagonism,
sown over the previous 50 to 90 years, which were sprouting through the
ground as poisonous saplings". (p 108) The moment Pakistan's founding
father Muhammad Ali Jinnah complained of receiving a "moth-eaten and
truncated Pakistan" in 1947, the seeds of hostility based in religion
took on territorial identity. General Akbar Khan, who led the Afridi
invasion of Jammu and Kashmir in 1947, laid down the golden rule that
has caused untold bloodshed for 55 years: "The accession of Kashmir to
Pakistan was not simply a matter of desirability but an absolute
necessity for Pakistan's separate existence." (p 114)
Existing contradictions were compounded from 1958 by a "major
ideological chasm" with India's commitment to democracy and Pakistan's
transformation into a military-bureaucratic authoritarian state. Field
Marshall Ayub Khan's era (1958-1965) was characterized by ups and downs
in bilateral relations, with a few positive elements like the Indus
Waters Treaty and proposals for a mutual defense pact, but a steep
escalation in Pakistani war plans over Kashmir.
Then foreign minister (later president) Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's basic
hypothesis that the Kashmiri people would rise in support of guerrillas
and the Pakistan army in the 1965 war fell flat as locals supplied
steady information about infiltration routes and hiding places to the
Indian army. Pakistan's usage of code names such as "Operation
Gibraltar" (in memory of the Arab invasion of Gibraltar in AD 711) and
"appeals to the collective historical and assertive Islamic memory of a
conquest nearly [a] thousand years earlier" did not shake the basic
secular fabric of India in 1965, although Chinese ultimatums and
diplomatic pressure prevented a decisive result in the war.
Interestingly, again, though Indian premier Lal Bahadur Shastri made
strategic concessions of Haji Pir, Kargil and Uri-Poonch at the
Tashkent, it was Pakistani public opinion which was inflamed, led by
Bhutto slamming the peace agreement as a "surrender and a betrayal".
The rearrangement of Pakistan
Bhutto's jingoism and communal anti-Indian mentality were unmatched even
in the hard core of Pakistan's armed forces. His top secret memorandum
to Ayub Khan after the 1965 debacle advocated revenge by not just
acquiring Kashmir by force, but also by the dismemberment of India in
its eastern extremities with Chinese assistance. As the Bangladesh
movement picked up momentum, he accused the Awami League of Mujibur
Rehman to be a "pro-Hindu organization that was going to affect the
Islamic identity of Pakistan". (p 172) The 10 million refugees who fled
genocide and reached India were labelled "rebels", "secessionist
miscreants" and "majority Hindus".
An interesting sidelight of the 1971 war that led to the birth of
Bangladesh was that when Henry Kissinger and high-level American
missives warning India not to take military action for Bangladesh did
not convince Indira Gandhi, the US ambassador to Delhi threatened
stoppage of economic assistance to India. Mrs Gandhi, without batting an
eyelid, suggested "immediate closure of the USAID mission office in
Delhi". Another lesser known incident before the December war was that
during the visit of famous foreign dignitaries to the Bangladeshi camps
in West Bengal, French author Andre Malraux was so moved that he wrote
about his desire to mount an Indian army tank and wage war against the
military oppressors of Pakistan. Dixit also recounts the delightful
episode of Mrs Gandhi chiding General Manekshaw for drinking during
military briefings, to which he replied, "Madam, the brand name of the
whisky is Black Dog, which [President] Yahya Khan drinks. I am quite
sure that I shall overdrink him and outfight him. Please do not get
angry." (p 210) One of the Pakistani myths broken in 1971 was that
"India as a pacifist and soft state dominated by the Hindu ethos could
not match Pakistan's martial traditions". (p 223)
At Simla, Bhutto pleaded with Mrs Gandhi not to publicly disclose his
commitment to convert the LoC into a de jure border over three to five
years, but quickly reneged on the oral promise by starting a covert
nuclear program in 1972 and embarking on a grand strategic Islamic
alliance to counter India's influence and stature in Asian, West Asian
and Gulf politics. Most ominously, "Bhutto was accurate in this
perception about Mujib's subconscious Islamic inclinations and innate
reservations about India." (p 231) While crowds jostled around Bhutto's
car on his first state visit to independent Bangladesh, shouting "Bhutto
Zindabad" and "Pakistan-Bangladesh friendship Zindabad", Dixit, who was
the Indian High Commissioner, was harassed and booed with anti-India
slogans. The Islamization and anti-India postures of Bangladesh reached
full crescent with Ziaur Rehman's military coup and have not ceased ever
since.
Zia to Musharraf: The deepening cleavage
General Zia ul-Haq planned a thorough refashioning of India-Pakistan
relations in a manner whereby compromises made by Pakistan since 1971
could be reversed. From 1979-1980, Pakistan established connections with
extremist Sikhs in Punjab for fomenting the Khalistan movement against
India, adroitly using Sikh pilgrimages to Pakistan for recruiting top
level commanders (some of whom are state guests to this day, cocking a
snook at the Indian government's "20 most wanted" demand). Zia had a
two-track policy from 1981 onwards, "An apparent peace offensive, while
encouraging covert moves to erode India's unity, influence and
strength." (p 248) Concurrent with the total Islamization of Pakistani
society, Zia appointed himself a spokesman for Indian Muslims, claiming
"my heart bled for them when they are victimized". Dixit's riposte to
establishment claims from Islamabad that India was engaging in
"uncivilized behavior" against minorities is that "this criterion should
be suitably applied to Muslim rulers, beginning from Mahmud Ghaznavi to
Aurangzeb and latter-day rulers of Pakistan". (p 254)
Operation Brasstacks (1987), the nearest the two sides had come to war
since 1971, was a classic example of the heightened mistrust between
India and Pakistan that emerged out of Zia's machinations. Pakistani
nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan's "revelation" to Kuldip Nayar in
March 1987 that Pakistan possessed the atomic bomb was an orchestrated
attempt at coercive diplomacy by Zia, further warning India that
Pakistan was going the nuclear route to change the dynamics of the
Kashmir contest. Zia also used nukes to develop South Asian allies,
telling them that Pakistan's nuclear weapons capacity served the purpose
not only of its own security but also to save the smaller neighbors from
Indian hegemony.
Benazir Bhutto took Rajiv Gandhi's apolitical past and genuine desire to
improve relations for weaknesses and hoped that she could get him to
compromise on the Kashmir issue in December 1988. When Rajiv firmly
stood by India's interests, Benazir upped the ante in clandestine
activities, which coincided with and whetted the 1989 tumult inside
Indian Kashmir. Benazir's highly militant and aggressive postures on
Kashmir led to speculation about a new war in 1990, which was the first
instance of American diplomatic mediation through the Gates mission of
what could have been a nuclear confrontation.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif sent positive signals to India assuring that
Benazir-style bravado would give way to "change in the ground situation"
(read cessation of armed support to mujahideen). But whether civilian or
military, no Pakistani ruler was able to extricate Islamabad from its
religio-communal compulsions regarding Kashmir. Dixit says that
"regardless of their political affiliations, Pakistani leaders remain
prisoners of an all-embracing anti-Indianness". (p 282) The
ill-treatment of diplomat Rajesh Mittal in 1992 also showed how
Pakistani public opinion accepted official media portrayals of Indian
lies and conspiracies to be behind acts of wanton violence and violation
of international law. So vehement is the public opinion angle to
anti-India policies, that Dixit recounts Pakistani Foreign Secretary
Shamshad Ahmad "reminding" Nawaz Sharif in 1997 before Indian premier
Inder Kumar Gujral that a proposed gas pipeline from Turkmenistan
through Pakistan to India "could not be undertaken as there would be
opposition from Pakistani public opinion unless the Kashmir problem was
resolved first". (p 301)
From 1992-93, Pakistan's rhetoric on Kashmir shifted from
"self-determination" to "violations of human rights by Indian security
forces", allegations which were effectively rebutted at various world
forums by Dixit and his successor foreign secretaries. Islamic terrorism
emanating from Pakistan was successfully presented by Indian governments
in the 1990s as the core problem, not human rights. In the late 1990s,
the Gujral Doctrine of magnanimity did not yield any quid pro quo from
Pakistan, leading Dixit to comment that "the doctrine was not rooted in
reality". Even Atal Bihari Vajpayee's much-heralded visit to Lahore in
February 1999 was bound to fail, as no sooner had he visited the
Minar-i-Pakistan, Islam-pasand parties washed its entire platform in a
public ceremony "to purify it from the malign impact of the visit of an
infidel prime minister of the enemy country". (p 304) Uncontrolled
Islamization and Talibanization of Pakistan were the strongest anchors
backing the Kargil invasion which followed.
General Musharraf's statements as late as January 2002 that Pakistan
would not accept any solution of Kashmir based on the LoC and his
repeated warnings that Pakistan will use "all means available" (ie
nuclear) in a conventional war have taken the story of India-Pakistan
squabbles into familiar territory of mistrust and tension. Daredevil
attacks on the Jammu & Kashmir assembly, the Red Fort and Indian
parliament and countless acts of terrorist infiltration and violence in
Indian Kashmir have added to the sting of mutual bitterness.
Psychological hurdles to normalization
Towards the conclusion, Dixit identifies a series of Pakistani traits
that refuse to live amicably with India. First, "artificially nurtured
memories of Muslim superiority and a subconscious desire to rectify the
unfair arrangements of partition". Second, a certain envy Pakistanis
would not acknowledge openly about the failure of their civil society to
solidify democratic and tolerant traditions in comparison to an India
where khakis and bayonets follow popularly elected representatives.
Third, assumption by Pakistan of the role of protector and overseer of
the welfare of Indian Muslims, who in the words of Maulana Azad, could
be exploited from forces across the border owing to their
"socio-political schizophrenia" since partition. Fourth, avenging the
military defeat of 1971, which is a formal objective declared in the
official oath-taking ceremony of every Pakistani officer-cadet when he
graduates. Fifth, irrational faith in the "profound capacity for
commitment to jihad amongst the momin", as was publicly declared by
Foreign Minister Gauhar Ayub Khan at a press conference in Delhi. Sixth,
confidence that Pakistan's nuclear weapons program is an instrumentality
to further geopolitical objectives in Kashmir. Seventh, widespread
belief in the Pakistani establishment and media circles that India is
getting exhausted in Kashmir and would not be able to hold on to it for
long (a presumption of Musharraf in Kargil). Eighth, and most
significantly, "the unarticulated ambition and hope that if India broke
up, Pakistan will emerge as the strongest and most powerful political
entity in South Asia". (p 392)
For all the Vajpayee government's "bold and dramatic" initiatives since
1998 to break the log jam with Pakistan (the latest Agra Summit of 2001,
incidentally, was L K Advani's brainchild, according to Dixit), unless
there is an alteration of the above eight fault lines, no permanent
peace can be expected. Unless there is a "fundamental transformation of
the power structure in Pakistan, not only in terms of its military
components but also of the social background and political inclinations
of the plutocratic and feudal leadership" (p 437), the "ever-ever"
antagonism will persist.
Mani Dixit's tome is decidedly an Indian version of the causes, symptoms
and course of India-Pakistan fencing, but the fact that he was in the
thick of diplomatic wrangles and peace initiatives since the 1970s, and
the illuminating anecdotes and personal impressions he packs into this
book will make it a primary reference guide for students of South Asian
history and politics. For one, if Indian politicians understood as much
as Dixit about Pakistan, there may be hope for more realistic and
problem-solving policies.
India-Pakistan in War & Peace, by J N Dixit, Routledge
Publishers, London, 2002. ISBN 0-415-30472-5. Price US$27.50, 501 pages.
[Sreeram
Sundar Chaulia studied History at St.Stephen’s College, Delhi, and took
a Second BA in Modern History at University College, Oxford. He
researched the BJP’s foreign policy at the London School of Economics
and is currently analyzing the impact of conflict on Afghan refugees at
the Maxwell School of Citizenship, Syracuse, NY.] |
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