BHARAT BHUSHAN - How US diplomacy put brakes on India-Pakistan escalation after 'surgical strikes'
US diplomacy
played a crucial role in ensuring that the tension between India and Pakistan
was not escalated further in the aftermath of India's 'surgical strikes'
against terrorists in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (PoK). When US National
security Advisor Susan Rice called Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval,
apparently she did not do so to support India's 'surgical strikes' against
Pakistan.
According to those in
the know, the US administration also reached out to Pakistan. The US message to both countries was the
same: do not escalate the conflict.
US diplomatic
intervention could be the reason why Prime Minister Narendra Modi is advising
people not to thump their chests. And it might also explain why Pakistan is
denying that any 'surgical strikes' by India took place. However, nothing
prevents the two sides to instead opt for a propaganda war which suits the
political class on both sides. According to informed
sources, Rice advised India against chest-thumping after striking some forward
locations of the Pakistan Army. India was counseled to be patient and not do
anything that might impact the outcome of the US Presidential election due on 8
November.
US CALCULATIONS
The US calculation was
that any escalation of India-Pakistan conflict would damage the foreign policy
legacy of President Barack Obama in his last days in office. Additionally, a
conflict between India and Pakistan would give a handle to the Republican
Challenger Donald Trump. He would use the escalating conflict between two
nuclear neighbours to berate the Obama administration. Rice apparently
condemned the cross-border terrorist strike at Uri. Until her call to the
Indian NSA, the US Secretary of State John Kerry had situated the Uri terrorist
strike in the context of the violence that had been going on in Kashmir for the
last two and half months and given call of ending all violence.
Thus, while Rice's
phone call represented a movement forward in recognising Pakistan's role in
promoting cross-border terrorism against India, her essential message to India
was to tone down the military rhetoric and not escalate the conflict. She apparently made it
clear that if the Democrats won the presidential election, then India could
expect the continuation of the current administration's policy towards Pakistan
and Islamabad's promotion of UN designated terrorist groups - that is, the
Haqqani network, the Jaish-e-Muhammad, Jamaat-ud-Dawa and Lashkar-e-Tayyeba.
However, if the Republicans won, she warned that then India would have to wait
for the new administration to take over in January and for the emergence of
Donald Trump's policy towards the region.
RICE'S MESSAGE TO
PAKISTAN
In the US
communication to Pakistan, Islamabad was reprimanded for not condemning the Uri
attack which had invited Indian retaliation. It might be recalled,
that Pakistan Prime Minister had justified the Uri attack to reporters in
London, while on his way back from attending the UN General Assembly meeting
in. New York. He had said, "The Uri attack can be the reaction of the
atrocities in Kashmir, as the close relatives and near and dear ones of those
killed and blinded over the last two months were hurt and outraged."
The Americans
apparently told Pakistan that despite the US advising it to condemn the Uri
attack, the Pakistani leadership had deliberately chosen to ignore it. US is
believed to have warned Pakistan against taking any military retaliation to
worsen the situation. This is what possibly
led to Pakistan going in the denial mode while India did nothing beyond hyping
the strikes on Pakistani forward positions as a series of major 'surgical
strikes'.
If Pakistan claims
that the exchange of fire was routine one on the LoC and no ingress by Indian
soldiers took place into territory under its control, there is little rationale
for it to escalate the issue militarily. Even if the Pakistan military might be
seething within, under US advice it is unlikely to do anything precipitate
immediately. The US advice is
perhaps one of the reasons why India is unlikely to release whatever evidence it
has of the military strikes. The ultra-nationalists in India can continue
celebrating India having crossed the Rubicon of strategic restraint to punish
Pakistan, while Pakistan can keep trying to debunk Indian claims.
CHURN IN ISLAMABAD
In Pakistan, it is
perhaps this marginalisation by the US which might have forced the
unprecedented exchange at a meeting reported by
Pakistan's leading newspaper, Dawn. It has reported on a recent
showdown between the Pakistani civil and military authorities on containing
terrorism. In the meeting between
the Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmad
Chaudhry, Chief of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Lt. Gen. Rizwan Akhtar and
Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, apparently, the ISI was told about the
international isolation of Pakistan and the need to act against terrorist
groups operating from Pakistan.
The message to the ISI
was apparently that "military-led intelligence agencies are not to
interfere if law enforcement acts against militant groups that are banned or
until now considered off-limits for civilian action." Significantly, the
news story in Dawn claims that Foreign Secretary Chaudhary in
his briefing to the gathering said that US-Pakistan "relations have
deteriorated and will likely further deteriorate." He told the meeting
that "the principal international demands are for action against Masood
Azhar and the Jaish-e-Muhmmad; Hafiz Saeed and the Lashkar-e-Taiba; and the
Haqqani network." On India, Chaudhry
reportedly said that the principle demands were the completion of the Pathankot
investigation and some visible action against Jaish-e-Muhammad.
Surprisingly, the
Pakistan Foreign Secretary also reported that China was also unhappy and wanted
a change of course by Pakistan. China apparently has also questioned the logic
of being asked to repeatedly block the designation of Masood Azhar as a terrorist
by the UN. However, the Pakistan
PMO has since denied the report.
Security experts familiar with Pakistan,
however, are reluctant to overplay the importance to this meeting. "Such
presentations have happened in the past also. What matters is what the Pakistan
Army does on the ground. The Pakistan Army needs these terrorists for bleeding
India in Kashmir and it needs to keep the Kashmir issue alive for its own
survival," one of them said. Another security expert said that while
Pakistan may not want the escalation of military tensions with India under US
advice, it was highly unlikely that it would act against the terrorist groups
it uses as its proxies in the region.
"General Raheel Sharif will not allow
action against the LeT, JeM, Hafiz Saeed or Masood Azhar in the run up to his
retirement in November. Only after his retirement would anything become
possible - that is, if at all such action is taken under international
pressure," he claimed.
