Afghanistan and the Regional Geopolitics

A win-win game or zero-sum affair?

STATE CRAFT BY HAPPYMON JACOB

THE TALIBAN were born in Pakistani refugee camps, educated in Pakistani madrasas and learnt their fighting skills from Mujaheddin Pushtuns based in Pakistan. Their families carried Pakistani identity cards”, wrote one of the leading experts on the Taliban and Afghanistan, Ahmed Rashid, in his celebrated book Taliban: The story of Afghan warlords. When the Frankenstein - the Taliban – came back to haunt the Pakistani state – its originator - in the recent past, Pakistan watchers began to believe that the Pakistani state will go all out against the remnant Taliban elements in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The Pakistani state did so, but in parts and half-heartedly, which has gone on to further embolden the Taliban elements in the region.

It is now widely perceived that while most of those who run the political establishment in Pakistan want to see that the ongoing talibanisation process does not take further roots in the state and society of Pakistan, many disgruntled elements in the Pakistani armed forces and the all-powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), apart from the Islamic radical parties in Pakistan, continue to support the Taliban so that they can exert complete control on Kabul and bring about a ‘true Islamic’ state in Pakistan.

The new regional geo-politics in Afghanistan has been played out by a number of global and regional parties – the United States, NATO, Iran, Pakistan and India. While the United States and the NATO seem to be increasingly disinterested in continuing their engagement with Afghanistan, India and Pakistan seem to be clearly furthering their strategic interests in the war-torn nation.

Pakistan’s strategic interests in Afghanistan and its aggressive policies there, which date back to the 1970s, stem from both strategic necessity and geo-political greed. One of the primary reasons for its pro-active and aggressive Afghan policies is the successive Afghan governments’ firm refusal to accept the Durand Line which currently separates the two countries as a settled issue. Afghan Prime Minister, Mohammad Harkim Khan, declared as early as in 1947: “If an independent Pushtunistan cannot be set up, the frontier province should join Afghanistan. Our neighbour (Pakistan) will realise that our country with its population and trade, needs (an opening) to the sea”. Since then the Afghan irredentist tendency has only grown in intensity: various Afghan leaders such as President Nur Muhammad Taraki, Prime Minister Daud Khan, the Taliban leadership and now Hamid Karzai have all refused to accept the Durand Line as a settled issue.

Second is the issue of an independent Pushtunistan which many Afghan political leaders have fanned to the disquiet of the Pakistani leadership. When put together, Pushtun nationalism and Afghan irredentist tendencies have enough in them to give sleepless nights to Pakistan. Thirdly, many Pakistani strategic thinkers such as Pakistani General Aslam Beg have emphasized the need for Pakistan to have a strategic depth in Afghanistan. The question of strategic depth needs to be seen in the context of Pakistan’s access to energy-rich Central Asia.

Yet another Pakistani concern regarding Afghanistan is the latter’s traditionally close friendship with the former’s arch rival – India. The Indo-Afghan friendship had almost always flourished but for a brief interregnum during the Mujahideen war and the Taliban rule. The present Afghan leadership under Hamid Karzai has been proactively trying to enhance Afghan engagement with India which India is only glad to extend. India sees very tangible strategic results from a close relationship with Kabul: India is building parts of a highway from Chabahar (in Iran) through Afghanistan to Tajikistan (Chabahar-kabul-Kunduz-Badakhshan) which will enable India to have a transport corridor to the otherwise inaccessible Central Asian region. India’s goodwill in Kabul is a result of a variety of Indian initiatives: its liberal development aid to Kabul (as the fifth largest donor, it has already pledged more than $750 million to build roads, train teachers and bureaucrats, and putting in place the necessary infrastructure for the country), the large number of Indians (around 4,000) working in various developmental projects in Afghanistan, immediate steps towards reconstruction after the ouster of the Taliban in 2001 (helped reopen the Indira Gandhi Children’s Hospital in Kabul, sent medical missions to assist in humanitarian work, donated Airbuses to enable Ariana airlines to resume operations and started plying hundreds of city buses in Afghan cities for public transit facilities), and the traditional ties it has had with the war-torn state.

Hamid KArzai has visited India six times ever since 2001 and the recent visit of Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak to visit the headquarters of the army’s 15th corps in Srinagar J&K to see counter-insurgency operations raised quite a few eyebrows in Islamabad. More importantly, Pakistan thinks India fans insurgencies within Pakistan from its bases in Afghanistan.

While both Pakistan’s and India’s engagement in Afghanistan is to gain the much-needed diplomatic and strategic leverage in that strategically important location, Pakistan, unlike India, has been trying to influence the developments by sheer muscle power rather than soft power and deft diplomatic skills which the Afghans have come to strongly resent. While this has brought New Delhi and Kabul closer, this has not been to the liking of Islamabad which is now trying its best to spoil that.

Last week’s attack on the Indian Mission in Kabul was not the first of its kind – allegedly sponsored by ISI – against Indian engagement in Afghanistan. In 2007, the Indian Border Roads Organization reportedly came under 30 rocket attacks while it was constructing the 124-mile stretch of road across Nimroz Province.

Pakistan’s concerns, strategically speaking, are understandable: It does not afford to have enemies on both sides and be sandwiched between them. It has to preempt any such moves by India and Afghanistan. However, the Pakistani strategy in preempting that is only making its own position in Kabul more and more vulnerable. Pakistan needs to rethink its strategy in Afghanistan, and India and Afghanistan together could persuade Pakistan to get together for a tri-lateral regional initiative at countering extremism in the region and rebuilding Afghanistan making the geo-strategic game in Afghanistan a win-win one rather than a zero-sum one.

Source: Greater Kashmir, JULY 16, 2008 , URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/full_story.asp?Date=16_7_2008&ItemID=3&cat=11

Political chaos in J&K

Political chaos in J&K

By HAPPYMON JACOB

During the course of the last three weeks, many significant developments have taken place in Jammu and Kashmir and many of these will have long-lasting implications for the ongoing peace efforts in and on Kashmir. The Congress government in the state has resigned leading to the possibility of President’s rule in the state for the fourth time in the state’s history, seven people have so far died in the protests that rocked the valley in the past few weeks, the ruling coalition in the state - Congress and the People’s Democratic Party - has parted ways and the state continues to be in turmoil.

However, the most unwelcome result of all the political developments in the state is indeed the unprecedented communal polarisation that the state is witnessing today: there are threats of an economic blockade of Kashmir by some Hindu fundamentalist parties in Jammu and this has prompted many Kashmiris to ask Pakistan for help with essential commodities. There are also reports of communal clashes from many parts of the state.

It all started when the state government decided to allot 200 Kanals of forest land to Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB), which led to the 10-day agitation in the Kashmir Valley spearheaded by the secessionist leaders such as Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yaseen Malik. Under pressure from widespread protests, the state government revoked the land grant order, which gave rise to protests in Jammu.

Kashmir, by all accounts, was limping back to normalcy in the last couple of years. Why then has this otherwise relatively minor act of land transfer and the controversy surrounding it, which, of course, could have been pre-empted by some deft handling by the government, taken the state by storm? What explains this sudden change of public mood on the streets of Srinagar? Why is peace in Kashmir so fragile?

A post-facto analysis of the situation in Kashmir proves one thing beyond any doubts: peace in Kashmir is too fragile to be taken for granted. Normalcy in Kashmir, to a great extent, did manage to veil the discontent, uneasiness and disapproval of the people at a lot of things that were happening in and on Kashmir. It is this pent-up anger and uneasiness that was vented out on the streets of Srinagar during the past few weeks.

T here are a number of underlying causes behind what is happening now and they call for some serious introspection on the part of the state and central governments.

Many analysts around the country tend to believe that the anger on the streets of Kashmir is essentially communal in nature and the Kashmiri dissidents who led these protests and a large number of common Kashmiris who participated in them are indulging in anti-Hindu politics.

The truth is far from that. While the immediate cause of these protests may be linked to the land transfer itself, there are other not-so-apparent and more substantive causes behind this. The recent spell of protests is the result of a series of fundamentally flawed policies in and on Jammu and Kashmir by the governments in Srinagar and New Delhi.

First of all, despite all their promises to the state of Jammu and Kashmir, what have the governments in Srinagar and New Delhi done to resolve the Kashmir issue to the satisfaction of the people of the state? Almost nothing. The Prime Minister’s round table conferences and the reports that were produced subsequently by various working groups have been neatly archived and forgotten about, as usual. The reports and the contents were indeed very encouraging and one had hoped that the governments would act on them helping, thereby, improve the situation in the state.

The change of guard in Srinagar in November 2005, when the People’s Democratic Party’s (PDP) Mufti Mohammad Sayyed was replaced by Congress party’s Ghulam Nabi Azad as the state’s Chief Minister, in retrospect, was a serious mistake committed by the Congress party: it suddenly brought to a grinding halt all the good work that the Mufti government was doing in the state even to the extent of being accused of as pro-militants by some. More importantly, the incoming political leadership lacked the political will and vision to implement the suggestions from the various working group reports. Even as PDP’s ‘healing touch’ was dismissed as mere rhetoric, it did have a great deal of symbolic effect. Therefore, one might say that the Mufti government would have organised the round tables better and diligently worked towards implementing the suggestions from the working groups.

Secondly, it is now apparent that the government was sleeping through the various phases of peace in Kashmir ignoring the daily demands and pleas from dissidents, activists, mainstream politicians and analysts to engage the state and the problems therein more proactively.

Not only that there was unprecedented willingness from the part of the dissidents and various sections of Kashmiris in looking for a solution to the state’s problems but more importantly many of these suggestions to conflict resolution were concrete and should have been taken into serious consideration. The governments’ dismissive attitude towards such gestures and proposals has brought about the prevailing situation of political disconnect between the people and the state in Jammu and Kashmir.

Giving the current spate of protests in Kashmir a religious colour is being simplistic and counter-productive. It is time we learnt to read the signs of political frustration of the people and act on them before it is too late. That said, it is necessary also to point out that the argument that the transfer of land to SASB is part of a well-thought out Indian conspiracy to settle non-local Hindus in the valley in order to turn Muslims to a minority in the state is far from the reality. It is also interesting to note the Pakistani reaction to the political developments in Kashmir.

Despite repeated pleas from the Kashmiri separatist leadership to get involved in the ongoing political turmoil in the state, Pakistani government is maintaining a studied silence on the issue and is seemingly unwilling to make loud statements about it.

Source: Sakaal Times, July 10, 2008.

New spell of violence

Kabul burns, Kashmir burns too

STATE CRAFT BY HAPPYMON JACOB

Violence seems to be returning to the troubled and unstable region stretching from Kashmir to Kabul. The region is riddled by daily incidents of bomb blasts, clashes between security forces and militias (ranging from Hizbul Mujahidin to the resurgent Taliban) and killings of scores of non-combatants. While Afghanistan has almost always been in turmoil ever since the US takeover of that country in 2001, the ongoing peace process between India and Pakistan and the ‘stable‘ leadership of Pervez Musharraf had apparently been successful in controlling the spate of violent incidents in other parts of the region. Monday’s Indian embassy bombing in Kabul killing the Indian Counselor and the Military Attaché among many others, increasing levels of violence in almost all cities of Pakistan and the unrest in Kashmir (incomparable though they are) shows that there are much deeper and graver problems that we are faced with which require more than cosmetic treatment. Why is it that the four year old Indo-Pak peace process and the six year old Afghan reconstruction efforts don’t seem to be able to stabilize the region?

In seeking an answer for this important question, I do not intend to go into the history of the conflicts or the geopolitical dynamics in the region. Looking back at history and finding those responsible for in order to attach responsibility and blame would do no good. To say that the most significant contemporary reason for this spate of violence is the levels of political instability in the region would perhaps be begging the question. However, political instability, lack of strong leadership with popular support and an absence of political will, one could argue, have been contributing to the current spell of violence in the region.

Pakistan: who is in charge?

Pakistan, indeed, is at the centre of this violence-hit region stretching from Kashmir to Kabul. And so the severe political instability in that country seems to be responsible, to a great extent, for the increasing incidents of violence in the region. To say so is no Pakistan bashing, but, in fact, merely echoing what many responsible analysts in Pakistan are repeatedly saying today. When Gen. (retd.) Pervez Musharraf was in charge in Islamabad, there was in existence a political authority that was capable and willing to take on the perpetrators of violence in the region and talk to the leaders in the neighboring countries. One did hope that Pakistan’s not-so-smooth transition to democracy could bring peace into the region: today it so looks that it was a pipedream. While the political class in Pakistan is fighting among themselves, the Army and the ISI seem to be having different geopolitical designs vis-à-vis both India and Afghanistan. The man who had taken the peace process this far, Musharraff, seems not just powerless to do anything about it, but is counting his days as President. This has sent a message to the extremists in the country: make use of the prevailing political instability and strike at will. Various Pakistani provinces are simmering with discontent: NWFP, despite the election of Awami National Party (ANP), is still out of reach and riddled with violence. There are daily bomb blasts in Pakistani cities and Baloch rebels continue to resist the Punjabi rule: Nawab Khair Baksh Marri, the head of the largest Baloch tribe, the Marris, recently said in an interview “I can co-exist with a pig but not with a Punjabi”.

Afghanistan: a failing state?

There is no political stability in Afghanistan either – Karzai is not even able to control what happens in capital Kabul let alone rid the country of violence. The confused western strategies in Afghanistan and political anarchy in Pakistan explain, to a great extent, the persistence of violence in Afghanistan. Monday’s Indian embassy bombing needs to be seen in this context. I do not dismiss the claim about Pakistani involvement in this attack (because of the uneasiness that many sections of the Pakistani state has about the Indian influence in Afghanistan), but the Pakistani leadership could easily be unaware of what happened: let us face it, the use of violence in and by Pakistan is no more a state monopoly! Because many factors such as the absence of centralized political control, drug running militias, resurgent Taliban, Pakistan’s involvement in Afghanistan are responsible for the prevailing situation in Afghanistan, one variable alone cannot explain the state of affairs in that country.

Kashmir: Return of the 1990s?

Until a few months ago, no one would have imagined that the relative peace and stability that had returned to the violence-hit Jammu and Kashmir state would soon start disappearing. Today, apart from the disconnect that there exists between the people and the government, there is also an uncomfortable uneasiness between the various religious communities in the state. No leading politician of the state has till date tried to bring the communities together and create the conditions for peace; they are busy politicking in view of the impending state assembly elections in the state. Political instability and lack of credible and visionary political leadership are, again, giving rise to a condition that is conducive for violence and discontentment in the state.

While many in the Pakistani establishment might want to see an end to its misadventure in Kashmir, those promoting violence in Kashmir from Pakistan continue to do so because there are such deep divisions among the ruling elite in Pakistan on Kashmir today. While “one Pakistan” talks the language peace and genuinely wants to have peace with India, the “other Pakistan” does not want to have peace with India and works towards undermining the peace process. The good news is that the peace process seems to be retaining the ability and momentum to survive the sustained attacks from those who want to derail it; the bad news is that even though the governments in the region seems to be wanting to control violence in the region, they don’t seem to be able to do so.

(Happymon Jacob is Assistant Professor, Department of Strategic and Regional Studies, University of Jammu)

Source: Greater Kashmir, JULY 09, 2008. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/full_story.asp?Date=9_7_2008&ItemID=13&cat=11

Why is peace in Kashmir so fragile?

The week-long protests by Kashmiris against the transfer of 800 kanals of forest land to Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) by the state government has proved true what many refused to understand for a long time: peace in Kashmir is too fragile to be taken for granted. Normalcy in Kashmir, one would have to say, managed to veil the discontent, uneasiness and disapproval of people at whatever was happening in and on Kashmir. It is this pent-up anger and uneasiness that is being vented out on the streets of Srinagar as I write these lines. Even as we hope for the speedy return of normalcy to the turbulent valley, we need to ask ourselves certain important questions: why is peace is Kashmir so fragile? Why has this otherwise relatively minor act of land transfer and the controversy surrounding it, which of course could have been pre-empted by some deft handling by the government, suddenly gone out of control? What factors have brought Kashmir to this state of affairs?

There are a number of obvious causes behind what is happening now and they call for some serious introspection on our part. Many analysts around the country tend to believe that the anger on the streets of Kashmir is communal in nature and the Kashmiri dissidents such as Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Sajad Lone and Yaseen Malik and a large number of common Kashmiris are indulging in anti-Hindu politics. The truth, as I see it, is far from that. The current spell of protests, in fact, is the result of a series of fundamentally flawed policies in and on Jammu and Kashmir by the governments in Srinagar and New Delhi. There may indeed be some elements among the protesters too who would like to give it a communal color, but that is certainly not its key feature.

First of all, despite all their promises to the state of Jammu and Kashmir, what have the governments in Srinagar and New Delhi done to resolve the Kashmir issue to the satisfaction of the people of the state? Almost nothing. The Prime Minister’s Round Table Conferences and the reports which were produced subsequently by various Working Groups have been neatly archived and forgotten about, as usual. The reports and the contents were indeed very encouraging and one had hoped that the governments would act on them helping, thereby, improve the situation in the state. The change of guard in Srinagar in November 2005, in retrospect, was a grave mistake by the Congress party: it suddenly brought to a grinding halt all the good work that Mufti government was doing in the state even to the extent of being accused of as pro-militants by some. More importantly, the incoming political leadership lacked the political will and vision to implement the suggestions from the various Working Group reports. Even as People’s Democratic Party’s (PDP) ‘healing touch‘ was dismissed as mere rhetoric, it did have a great deal of symbolic effect. Therefore, one might say that the Mufti government would have organized the Round Tables better and worked towards implementing the suggestions from the Working Groups. More importantly, nothing substantial has been done to return the houses, schools and orchards to Kashmiris which the armed forces have been keeping with themselves for many years, despite assurances from the Central government in this regard.

Secondly, it is now apparent that the government was sleeping through the various phases of peace in Kashmir ignoring the daily demands and pleas from dissidents, activists, mainstream politicians and analysts to engage the state and the problems therein more proactively. Not only that there was willingness from the part of the dissidents and various sections of Kashmiris in looking for a solution to the state’s problems but more importantly many of these suggestions to conflict resolution were concrete and should have been taken into serious consideration. The governments’ dismissive attitude towards such gestures and proposals has now brought about this situation.

Bureaucracy in India, unfortunately, has a tendency to be insensitive towards the people and this is a widely recognized fact, be it in Kashmir or Bihar. Officers especially those belonging to India’s higher bureaucracy behave as if the country is still under colonial rule and this becomes more pronounced when it comes to Kashmir. When dealing with Kashmir the usual arrogance of the Indian bureaucracy combines with suspicion and a mere law and order approach to understanding issues and concerns. This is precisely what was evident from the acts and utterances of the bureaucrat who was in charge of the Shrine Board. The bureaucrats need to understand that they are servants of the public and that people are not their subjects. If they refuse to learn this fundamental truth of democracy, they will continue to land their political masters in situations such as the one we are witnessing in Kashmir today.

Finally, the present crisis was also precipitated by a feeling among the people and dissident leaders that the peace process was going nowhere. Political crises in Pakistan one after the other, disenchanted dissident leadership in Kashmir, and vision-less Kashmir policies by New Delhi all disillusioned the people of the state and they have now grabbed an opportunity that came their way to vent their feelings. Giving the current spate of protests in Kashmir a religious colour and discarding it is being simplistic and counter-productive. Its time we learnt to read the signs of political frustration and act on them before it is too late.

That said, it is necessary also to point out that the argument that the transfer of land to SASB is part of a well-thought out Indian conspiracy to settle non-local Hindus in the valley in order to turn Muslims to a minority in the state is far from the reality.

(Happymon Jacob is Assistant Professor at the Department of Strategic and Regional Studies, University of Jammu, J&K.)

Source: Greater Kashmir, July 2, 2008. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/full_story.asp?Date=2_7_2008&ItemID=3&cat=11

Hurriyat’s Unification Move

What next? Here lies the question of curiosity
STATECRAFT BY HAPPYMON JACOB

The luncheon meeting between the moderate leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and the hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani that took place last week is likely to provide the necessary impetus for the much-awaited unification of the All Party Hurriyat Conference. This crucial meeting comes after Mirwaiz recently called upon Ali Shah Geelani, Yasin Malik and Sajad Gani Lone from the martyrs’ graveyard to join hands to unify the Hurriyat conference that has remained a divided house ever since Geelani accused Bilal Lone of “proxy participation” in the 2002 Assembly polls and subsequently formed his own faction of the Hurriyat. Indeed, the break up had come much earlier: Shabir Shah was expelled from the Hurriyat 1998 when he had met the then American Ambassador to India Frank Wisner without taking the Hurriyat Executive into confidence. Later Yaseen Malik also left the group.

The meeting has reportedly emphasized the following issues: self-determination as the bottom-line of the Hurriyat’s struggle; support for Mian Qayoom committee which will coordinate the movement against Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) land transfer; no external proposals or road-maps would be acceptable for the resolution of the Kashmir issue; and set up a special committee comprising three members from each faction to work out a mechanism towards forging unity. The text of the agreement to meet, the meeting itself and the outcome of the meeting seems to be perfectly timed and neatly phrased.

A reading of the subtext, however, would make it clear that the unification move and its steam from here on are not so easy to sustain. There are far too many internal contradictions in this unification move of the two Hurriyat factions and ex-members of the Hurriyat. Consider the following. Mirwaiz Umar Farooq has been an important moderate voice of the valley whereas Ali Shah Geelani has no such illusions of moderation. A close reading of Mirwaiz’s statements at various points of time would make it clear that he is more pro-Kashmir than anti-India, willing to talk to and reason with New Delhi, and is flexible about what self-determination entails. ‘The United States of Kashmir’ proposal, the resolution formula put forward by Mirwaiz, does not seek complete independence of Kashmir from India. He also does not regularly invoke the United Nations Resolutions even though the 1993 Hurriyat constitution is committed to it. In other words, Mirwaiz is willing to make adjustments and see reason in talking to New Delhi. What about Ali Shah Geelani? Geelani has made it clear that resolution to the Kashmir problem lies in complete independence and nothing short of that. He rejects the need to have talks with New Delhi. This leaves us with the question: can the two leaders put up with each other’s stances and ideologies? Or will one succumb to the other’s views? Who among them is willing to be flexible and what does it mean for Kashmir, Kashmiris and the peace process between the two countries and New Delhi and Srinagar?

What about Sajad Lone? Reports suggest that talks are being held between the moderate and reasonable People’s Conference Leader and the Mirwaiz faction of the Hurriyat Conference. Will Sajad Lone be comfortable with Geelani’s hard-line views at a point in time when the former’s Achievable Nationhood has been acclaimed to be one of the finest and workable proposals to resolve the Kashmir issue? The participation of Muhammad Yasin Malik, yet another Kashmir leader respected both in India and Pakistan, in this unification move also does not look likely under the present circumstances. What about the Jamaat-e-Islami and Dukhtaran-e-Millat’s Asiya Andrabi? Will they also be part of a grand coalition that seems to be in the making? While a consensus among the Kashmiri leadership and a concerted effort by them is welcome, any ‘unity’ that destroys the moderate space in Kashmir would not be a welcome development in the longer run.

While the unification move could mean going away from its moderate agenda as far as the Mirwaiz-led Hurriyat is concerned, it certainly means that New Delhi has lost another opportunity to bring peace in Jammu and Kashmir. Indian government has been a mere passive spectator during the past few years that can easily be considered as the most important period for India-Pakistan relations that witnessed positive gestures from the Kashmiri leadership in Srinagar and Pakistan, and a popular urge for normalcy and peace in the region. There were a number of opportunities for New Delhi to resolve the conflict using of the relative calm and positive peace in Srinagar and between the two countries. Going by what is happening in Kashmir now, one may have to say that New Delhi has let the opportunity to make peace in Kashmir pass by. The unification move born out of frustration – caused by the compulsive inaction by New Delhi – could also be seen as a forerunner of the changing nature of politics in Islamabad and Srinagar. One only hopes that the time for peacemaking is not yet over, though that may easily (and unfortunately) be the case.

Source: June 25, 2008, Greater Kashmir; URL: http://greaterkashmir.com/full_story.asp?Date=25_6_2008&ItemID=3&cat=11)

India’s Obama Dilemma

What if Barack Obama is the next US President

STATECRAFT BY HAPPYMON JACOB

The charismatic and eloquent African-American, Senator Barack Obama, is likely to become the President of the most powerful state in the world. This is something to be watched with great interest, not just because he would the first black man to become the US president (if he does), but more so because he carries an important message for the world which today is deeply divided on the basis of religion, race, colour and ethnicity.

The importance of Obama comes not from an argument of affirmative action or positive discrimination, but from the urgent need of the hour to provide a healing touch to the American people: blacks and whites, right and left, young and old. Indeed, the significance of the Obama phenomenon is not to be restricted to the Americans alone but to all societies where we still, unfortunately, have racial, caste, religious and gender discrimination. The importance of Obama comes from the fact that he is willing to address one of the most vexed problems in the American society – race. At a time in his presidential campaign when rumour emails have been circulating claiming that Obama is a ‘Muslim‘ and that he refuses to salute the American flag, and at a juncture when opposition politicians were gleefully using his former pastor Mr. Jeremiah Wright’s statement that the US is racist, against him, the statesman and visionary in Obama spoke up and said that the US has to come out of the “racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years”. He further said, touching the hearts of many an American: “The anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races”.

That said, the Indians seem to be uneasy of Barack Obama. The general feeling among foreign policy experts and US watchers in New Delhi is that he might end up as unfriendly towards India in his fervor to revive the Democratic agenda of liberal internationalism. New Delhi’s apprehension about Obama comes mostly due to the very close relationship it had with the Bush administration. Bush administration offered India membership in the nuclear club (through the backdoor though), made India one its key foreign policy priorities and stopped talking about the Kashmir issue. However, while the Indian government has been very close to the Bush administration (except perhaps when it invaded Iraq), the general Indian public has been clearly uneasy about the Bush policies. Like a large number of people in most parts of the world, Indian public also considered George Bush to be an insensitive administrator and a divider of communities and people.

New Delhi fears that an Obama administration could potentially go back on the nuclear deal with India or radically amend some of its provisions, ask India to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) like the previous Democratic administration had done, push the Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty (FMCT), and revive the Kashmir issue. Some Indian analysts have said that in order to gain Pakistani sincerity for the war on terror on the Afghan border, US could stop talking about Pakistani support for militancy in Kashmir. While Obama will not have the neo-conservative religious fervor in his interventionist stances, he may not rule out intervention as a possible American foreign policy strategy. On the other hand, his Republican opponent John McCain has promised to implement the Indo-US nuclear deal in its entirety. He is also unlikely to push the FMCT or the CTBT and is likely to continue the strategic partnership with India.

However, I wish to take a second look here at the Obama dilemma that we face in India. Obama’s election as the US President is significant and important for India for a variety of reasons. First of all, the Republicans are likely to follow the Bush policy of undermining the United Nations and international law. In other words, the unilateralism of the US hyperpower will only scale new heights under John McCain. No one wants the US do more Iraqs and make the already dangerous world more dangerous. Respect for the United Nations and international law is something that the world needs so badly. While the democratic liberal interventionism under Obama is likely to preach to the countries of the world how to govern, it is unlikely that an Obama administration will behave like Bush did in Iraq to impose its wishes. Democrats are likely to strengthen the hands of the UN. Secondly, I do not think that the Indo-US nuclear deal could have been the best thing that could have happened to India. We can do without the deal and can still continue our relationship with the United States. The US administrations had pressurized India to sign the CTBT even before (under Clinton administration), but despite not signing it India had maintained an excellent relationship with the US.

Thirdly, and perhaps more importantly, Obama will be able to send out a clear message that there is actually no civilizational conflict between Islam and the West (Obama doesn’t buy the argument that extremism in the name of Islam is what Islam teaches as a religion). Even as some Hindu fundamentalists in India would like to see a clash between Islam and the West, one needs to keep in mind that India will not only be a direct victim of such a clash, but more importantly this will have long-lasting implications for communal relations for a country which has the world’s second largest Muslim population. There may be some immediate and tactical gains from a McCain presidency but prudence lies in looking for strategic and lasting gains which an Obama presidency can offer.

While some sources of India’s Obama dilemma seem to be genuine, many of its fears seem to be misconceived or born out of a short-term approach to understanding and conceiving foreign and security policies of the country.
(Happymon Jacob is Assistant Professor at the Department of Strategic and Regional Studies, University of Jammu, J&K. Feedback at happymon@gmail.com).

Source: Greater Kashmir; June 18, 2008. URL: http://www.greaterkashmir.com/full_story.asp?Date=18_6_2008&ItemID=5&cat=11

The Northeast: India’s Achilles Heel

J&K hogs headlines, but here lies the real rub
STATE CRAFT BY HAPPYMON JACOB

The conflict in and on Kashmir tends to dominate the security discourse in India. Many Indians, Pakistanis, Kashmiris and people around the world tend to think that if Kashmir is resolved, then there will be no more issues in India (some even suggest that the Indian state doesn’t want to resolve the Kashmir issue so that it can continue to keep the Indian army engaged; an absurd argument at that). My recent visit to Manipur and Nagaland has dispelled this long-held conviction in me.

Northeast India is to the rest of India what Africa is to the World – far away and forgotten. Both in the cases of Africa and the Northeast, mainlanders witness these peripheral regions sliding into underdevelopment, uncertainty and anarchy. Since nothing much can be done to save them, safeguard the status quo, they believe, so that things do not go out of control. While it may be comparing the incomparable, the message is loud and clear that parts of Northeast India is close to near total collapse – from the points of view of governance, law and order, and development - and still the government policies have not gone beyond mere ad hoc measures aimed at maintaining the status-quo. Even as the governability of the state and governance therein are severely damaged, the parties - the governments both at the Centre and in the states, local politicians, the many Underground Organisations and the narcotics mafia – all seem safe in their comfort zones. The governance and development in these two states have been severely affected by a host of problems: narcotics, insurgency, corruption, and HIV/AIDS. Manipur and Nagaland lie physically next to what is referred to as the “Golden Triangle” comprising Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and the Yunnan Province of China which is World’s most prominent source of illicit heroin and opium. Burmese heroin is transported to Manipur through the border zone of Moreh (an Indian town in Manipur) from the Burmese town Thamu. Alternatively, narcotics also transits through Nagaland. Transit of drugs through these states leads to a) increase in drug addiction (Manipur is estimated to have around has around 50,000 drug addicts), b) local officials make their share of the profit from drug trade and 3) separatists in the two states aid, run or permit drug trade in order to make quick money. Reports suggest that the NSCN (IM), a prominent militant group in the region, controls most of the ganja trade in Manipur and Nagaland. They make sure that the consignment reaches the Assam-Nagaland border. It is interesting to observe that sometimes clashes among various insurgent groups take place not due to any ideological or political reasons, but for the control of routes and areas known for narcotics trade. While on the one hand this means general breakdown of law and order, this also means increased instances of HIV/AIDS in these two states. With hardly any development in the form of industries or other enterprises in these states, drug trade is today a booming business in the Northeast. Along with drug abuse, alcoholism is also becoming a social problem in the northeast. Alcohol is widely available in every nook and corner of the two states despite the fact that both of them are officially declared “dry” states (some call them the “wettest dry” states of the country!).

Insurgency has become the mainstay of politics and all other aspects of life in the Northeast except perhaps in the case of Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram. Not a single day passes without an incident related to insurgency in either Nagaland or Manipur nor are the general population free from the dictates of the insurgents who claim to fight for their liberation. While on the one the one hand, there is functional cooperation among many of these organisations, there are also feuds among many of them. Some of them even maintain links with Pakistani Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) and Chinese intelligence agencies, and have bases in Mynamar, Bangladesh, Thailand and Bhutan. Manipur alone has around 15 active insurgent organizations. Over the years, the insurgents have managed to infiltrate into the governing systems of the two states. Locals say that the insurgents not only take a share of their salaries/income from them, they do so directly from the concerned government department. Government servants at all levels are forced to give ‘tax‘ to the underground organizations. The insurgents impose their wishes in the local elections, police recruitment and development initiatives. Local politicians take the help of the insurgents to win elections and the insurgents make sure that their sympathizers are recruited in to the police service. Most industrialists run away from the two states when the insurgents demand a monthly share from them. There is hardly any industry in the state, nor is the state of basic infrastructure like roads and electricity any good. While the government of India is pumping a lot of money into the two states, most of it goes into the pockets of the politicians or local bureaucrats (corruption is so rampant in the two states) and the insurgent groups ask for a “cut” in whatever is left. Hardly anything is left for the actual development of the region.

The government of India thinks that the situation is not yet out of control and that it is too complicated to get into to find a resolution to the issues there; the insurgent organisations have a free hand in the affairs of the two states, and the people are too tired of expecting anything better and so they unwillingly listen to the insurgent groups. The result is a parallel government in Nagaland and Manipur, something not even heard of even in places like Jammu and Kashmir. Jammu and Kashmir may have captured the headlines across the world, but the real Achilles Heel of India is the Northeast.

(Happymon Jacob is Assistant Professor Department of Strategic and Regional Studies, University of Jammu)