Author: Brahma Chellaney
Publication: The Hindustan Times
Date: September 20, 2001
Although US retaliatory strikes
appear unlikely to begin before October, jehadis are already on the run.
The thuggish Taliban's one-eyed chief, Mullah Mohammad Omar, his son-in-law,
Osama bin Laden, and their band of advisors and commanders are holed up
in mountain hideouts. Terrorist chieftains in countries as disparate as
Lebanon and Sudan have gone underground.
Even more striking has been the
sudden change in the behaviour of States providing aid and comfort to jehadis.
Pakistan, a major exporter of jehad, was quick to heed American warning
and agree to join the US-led jehad on jehadis, including those reared by
its Inter-Services Intelligence. The bankrolling States, Saudi Arabia and
the UAE, have turned tame.
Terrorism is the cowards' weapon,
as it involves sneakiness and obviates facing an enemy. Now that the enemy
has declared war, the terrorists and their sponsors are all pleading innocence
and condemning the airborne attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
How quickly the Taliban and Bin Laden uttered words of innocence! It took
only one public warning from President Bush for Pakistan to fall in line
behind Washington.
Imagine, that same Pakistan, so
afraid to face punishment, has been merrily exporting jehad to India, encouraged
by New Delhi's reluctance to impose retaliatory costs on it. India should
draw appropriate lessons from America's clearheaded, plain-speaking response
to the terrorist strikes. Contrast Bush's straight talking with the waffling
by Indian leaders in past crises. Bush means every word he says. Indians
say words they don't mean. For example, Prime Minister Vajpayee's post-Kargil
pledge of "zero tolerance" against terrorism was followed within months
by an unparalleled, ignoble surrender at Kandahar.
Now that Washington has declared
jehad on the jehadis, India should be supporting that campaign in every
way possible. But so accustomed India had become to turning the other cheek
that some in this country seem appalled that the United States should plan
reprisal strikes. The only defence against the sneaky, murderous terrorists
is offence aimed at smashing their cells, networks and safe havens. No
terrorist group can train and plan a major action, such as the Bombay bombings,
the Red Fort raid or the kamikaze-style strikes against the US, without
sanctuary provided by a State.
If India is to fully benefit from
the new developments, a political consensus at home is necessary. The opposition
needs to back the government as it aims to fashion a frontline role for
India in the new international coalition against terrorism. Because externally-sponsored
terrorism is its No. 1 national security threat, India should welcome both
the evolving new global consensus against terrorism and the prospect of
concrete and sustained international counteraction.
Indian politicians should learn
from the way Republicans and Democrats are standing united and speaking
in one voice in America's hour of crisis. In contrast, right through the
Kargil war, the Congress party kept hitting out at the government than
at Pakistan. Today, the party is speaking in different voices, with Sonia
Gandhi on CNN supporting complete Indian cooperation in the fight against
terrorism, but some of her colleagues questioning New Delhi's offer of
help to Washington.
National interests need to clearly
take precedence over political partisanship. After September 11, a new
world is emerging - harder, fiercer, less tolerant and more assertive.
In this emerging world, those States that waffle, sit on the fence, act
coy, or engage in debate, but not in action, are certain to lose out. India,
with its track record of being a loser in the old world, has no choice
but to brace up to the new challenges and opportunities.
As one of the world's major victims
of terrorism, India needs to be in the vanguard, not the margins, of the
new coalition against that scourge. That demands not a gloating, 'I-told-you-so'
response, but the readiness to fully support and participate in what is
likely to be a protracted international jehad on terrorism. In the first
phase of that warfare, the principal target clearly will be the Taliban.
There isn't a better way to crush the Taliban than to press its creator,
Pakistan, in this task as part of the dictum, "Set thieves to catch other
thieves."
Only by playing a lead role can
India ensure that the offensive's second phase targets the Pakistani terrorist
infrastructure as part of Bush's pledge to attack all the roots of terrorism.
It serves Indian interests that Pakistan is used initially to undermine
and oust the Taliban regime because such use will help foment fratricidal
bloodletting in the Islamist camp. There cannot be a better scenario than
open conflict among terrorists and other extremists.
Pakistan's fate, once again, is
in the hands of three 'A's - America, Army and Allah. Despite being 'China's
Israel', Pakistan is financially at America's mercy. Islamabad's demands
for economic aid and other goodies in return for its 'unstinted support'
reflect both its desire to drive a hard bargain and its compulsion to soften
its domestic opinion over its U-turn. Having meekly handed over to America
homegrown terrorists like Ramzi Yousef and Mir Amal Kansi in the past,
Pakistan has no qualms in joining the hunt for Bin Laden as his capture,
dead or alive, will endear it to Bush and eliminate an Arab figure seeking
to make the Taliban less dependent on Islamabad.
India cleverly has offset Pakistan's
bargaining capacity by providing unambiguous support to the US-led counteraction.
Such support will also help block the revival of the old US-Pak military
relationship. India does not have the strong ground presence in Afghanistan
that Pakistan has, and Ahmad Shah Masood's murder eliminates New Delhi's
last Afghan asset. But India can offer to US forces what Islamabad cannot:
a safe, secure base for military strikes on the Taliban, although through
the Pakistan air corridor. Because US troops will have to watch their backs
if stationed in Pakistan, teeming with renegade elements, America is likely
to base its special forces elsewhere and aboard navy ships and fly them
to Pakistan just before each series of cross-border raids.
Having denied Soviet forces access
to its military bases, India has fundamentally transformed its policy by
agreeing to allow America to use its ports and airfields and base unconventional
warfare troops on its territory. The swiftness, quality and extent of the
response has handed US forces a degree of strategic flexibility, undercut
Pakistani leverage, and placed India in the big league of the international
counter-terrorist coalition. As a full and vigorous member of that coalition,
India could participate in military strikes if a multinational force were
set up.
The extended US-led offensive, and
the Indian military and intelligence involvement in it, will enable India
to use the same logic and reasons as America to put the spotlight on terrorist
bases in Pakistan and go after them if Islamabad defiantly refused to shut
them down. A war on the Taliban, in any case, is a first step to weaken
Pakistan's terrorism-export capability by demolishing the Afghanistan-centred
strategic depth it has built against India. India will have to ensure that
the Taliban is not replaced by another ISI-backed clique in Kabul, as is
being now demanded by Pakistan.
The offensive will essentially seek
to complete the unfinished Afghan war. No sooner the Soviet tanks started
rolling out of Afghanistan than the Americans too pulled out without installing
their nominee in Kabul. The chaos and bloodshed that followed only helped
Pakistan to make Afghanistan its colony.
Completing the unfinished Afghan
war will not be easy. China, which signed a defence cooperation pact with
the Taliban as part of its two-faced approach to terrorism, is hoping that
America will damage its interests by getting mired in Afghanistan, Soviet-style.
But the US strategy will be to punish and crush the Taliban through intense
missile, aerial bombing and special forces strikes, not to occupy a land
known to be a graveyard for foreign troops.
The jehad on jehadis will extend
beyond Afghanistan. And it will go on for years. As Vajpayee stated, "The
world must join hands to overwhelm them militarily, to neutralise their
poison." For a change, New Delhi is acting with speed and statecraft to
advance national interests and add depth to its strategic engagement with
Washington.
The outcome of this war will determine
the long-term security of India, the US and other free societies.
