A report from the Indian campaign for the hearts and minds of some part of the US security establishment.
MUSHARRAF OR WORSE? saag.org
by B. Raman
"After me, the fundamentalist deluge in Pakistan."
That is the fear Gen. Pervez Musharraf, the military dictator of
Pakistan, has successfully planted in the minds of many
policy-makers and moulders of public opinion in the USA, by
skilfully projecting before them carefully cultivated images of
himself as an anti-terrorist warrior, who has taken upon himself,
at tremendous risk to himself and his political future, a
courageous fight against religious extremism and international
terrorism and by waving before them the spectre of Weapons of
Mass Destruction (WMD)-wielding terrorists assuming control of
Pakistan were he to be thwarted in his efforts to continue in
power by hook or by crook and were he to be pressurised to
totally give up his use of terrorism as a weapon to achieve
Pakistan's strategic objective of annexing Jammu & Kashmir.
That is the over-all impression in my mind after a short visit to
the US last week, the second since February, 2002.
I was reminded of another military dictator who held American
political and public opinion to ransom for years by creating in
them the fear of "after me, the Communist deluge". His name
was Gen. Pinochet. Apprehending a Communist take-over were
he to be discarded, the USA blindly supported his massacre of
democracy in the name of saving democracy from Communism.
Similarly, one could discern an anxiety to support Musharraf right
or wrong, lest undue pressure on him weaken his perceived (in
US eyes) contribution to the war against terrorism being waged
by the international coalition led by the US. The creator and the
creation of WMD-threatening terrorism in Afghanistan and
Pakistan continues to be supported in the name of thereby
saving the civilised world from religious terrorism.
The man, who contributed enthusiastically to the creation of
Pakistan's WMD-threatening Army of Islam in the 1980s under
the pretext of saving the Islamic world from Communism, is now
being supported in the hope that he is the only Pakistani who can
help the USA in getting rid of this pernicious Army, which has
taken its jehad right into the USA and has started dreaming of
the day when it could replicate Bosnia in the USA by successfully
waging a jehad for the creation of a "Muslim homeland" in the
USA through the surrogates of American Muslims recruited and
trained in the terrorist camps of Pakistan in increasing numbers.
However, the support to Musharraf, though still as strong as in
February, 2002, is no longer as blind as it was then. During my
discussions with my interlocutors in February, I had said: "You
are fighting the war against terrorism with your eyes half-closed.
You are afraid of opening your eyes fully, lest you start seeing
Musharraf for what he really is--the fomentor, the instigator and
the sponsor of terrorism in the name of freedom-struggle.
Unless and until you open your eyes fully, you will go nowhere in
your war against terrorism."
It was gratifying to see the eyes opening, but not yet fully and not
as rapidly as they should. There is now a greater convergence
of views between India and the USA on the real dimensions of
the military-sponsored terrorism radiating from the hub of
Pakistan. Before February, 2002, India's arguments that what
one is witnessing in Jammu & Kashmir is no longer Kashmiri
militancy, but pure and simple Pakistani Punjabi terrorism in the
name and under the guise of the Kashmiris fell on deaf ears.
Now, the ears are no longer as deaf as they were before. One is
heard---patiently, attentively and with much greater
understanding than before February. One could sense a
realisation, still hesitant, that Jammu & Kashmir is the victim and
not the cause of terrorism of the most brutal kind infecting the
world from Pakistan.
One is gratified by a willingness--- not yet whole-hearted--- to
admit in tete-a-tete discussions that the war against terrorism
cannot be decisively won unless and until the terrorist
infrastructure in Pakistani territory--whether directed against
India, the USA, Israel or the rest of the world-- is destroyed truly
and permanently and not in a make-believe manner as
Musharraf did after his televised address of January 12, 2002.
Unfortunately, however, this greater openness and receptivity to
India's case has not yet led to a realisation that in its charge
against terrorism, the USA is riding the wrong horse. Despite all
his deformities, Musharraf is still the best horse available. That
continues to be the prevailing wisdom in the USA.
How to end permanently the terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan by
working through Musharraf and not by discarding him? That is
the question often posed, whomsoever one met. The alternative
to Musharraf can or will be worse. That is the fear still influencing
opinion and decision-making in the US. Despite his
post-January 12 perfidy, there is still a readiness to see him as a
genuinely-reformed man who wants to put an end to terrorism in
Pakistani territory.
It is pointed out that Pakistan is not Afghanistan and that what the
US did in Afghanistan, it cannot in Pakistan. One has to find a
different way of dealing with the problem, it is said.
Arguments that there will be no end to terrorism without an end
to the pernicious role of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), that
no military dictator will voluntarily defang the ISI, that only a
genuinely-elected political leadership, free from the stranglehold
of the military-intelligence establishment and fully backed by the
US and the rest of the democratic world, can be expected to rid
Pakistan of this evil etc are heard, but not yet accepted.
The argument that if Pakistan has to be decontaminated of the
virus of terrorism, the Army has to go back to the barracks and
Musharraf sent on his long overdue superannuation does not
have many takers. Statistics to show that Pakistan-sponsored
terrorism goes up when the military is in power, that all the seven
hijackings against India were carried out by Pakistan-sheltered
terrorists when the Army was in power and that
democratically-elected political leaderships have co-operated
more genuinely with the rest of the world in dealing with
terrorism and narcotics smuggling than military leaderships are
noted, but without any discernible impact on the minds of many
interlocutors.
Despite this, India should keep up its efforts to make the USA
see the reality that is Pakistan and that is Musharraf. The brutal
murder of Daniel Pearl, the US journalist, the grenade attack in
an Islamabad church, the murder of 11 French experts and the
latest explosion outside the US Consulate in Karachi have
caused the incipient signs of an unease in the USA over
Pakistan and Musharraf.
At the same time, there is still considerable reluctance to come
to terms with reality. To make that happen should continue to be
the principal objective of Indian diplomacy.
(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India,
and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-Mail:
corde@vsnl.com ) |
