Musharraf's speech: a lurch to the brink
Subodh Atal,
May 28, 2002
Also appeared in
tehelka.com
Every Indian as well as all concerned people in the rest of the civilized word
awaited Gen. Musharraf's May 27 speech with bated breath, much more so than
his January 12 speech. Even the most diehard nationalist Hindu perhaps hoped
that the General would offer some compromise, something that the Indian
leadership could take back to its people as a rationale for deescalating.
After all, we have all been told that the results of a nuclear war would be
disastrous, with deaths in the millions and destruction of an unprecedented
scale, and Pakistan has made all kinds of noises about its nuclear and
ballistic missile prowess. There was public pressure from around the world on
the General. US President George Bush, Russia's Vladimir Putin and France's
Jacques Chirac had pointedly asked Musharraf to see to it that terrorism
export into India would end, not just with words but in deed.
There was even speculation in the international media that Musharraf would
announce some visible steps, such as tightening the laws that allowed the
quick release of Pakistani terrorists after their much-ballyhooed arrests, or
sending some of the most wanted terrorists on India's list to a neutral
country. The untimely missile tests in the last few days had added to the
tensions, and the consensus was that they had also added to the world's
distrust of Pakistan's sense of responsibility. Musharraf was expected to
allay some of those concerns.
Thus what came out of the General's mouth was a complete shock. His
statements were full of belligerence. He made no new concessions and harped
back to "bold steps" he had taken and India's non-response to them.
He absolved Pakistan of all responsibility for terrorism in Kashmir, declaring
that there was no infiltration. He made no references to the dozens of
terrorist bases that are active in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir. With this
tone, he wasn't just goading India on towards the brink; he was slapping his
chief benefactor, the US, in the face. After all, Bush and Powell's specific
demand of ending terrorism export from Pakistan had been in the headlines the
last few days.
Combined with the world-defying missile tests, his belligerent speech
provides a chilling window into the thinking of Musharraf and his coterie of
generals raised on a diet of jehad. Rather than take the tough, but not
impossible, steps of dismantling the terrorist infrastructure created by the
Pakistani army and the ISI, the generals would push the subcontinent into the
specter of nuclear war. For them, the deaths of millions, and perhaps
destruction of their own country is an acceptable cost of their duty to spread
their religion unobstructed into Kashmir and beyond.
With his harping on perceived mistreatment of minorities in India, he
crossed the boundaries of common sense, unless his aim was to anger the
already seething Indians. Would India ask what happened to the minorities in
Pakistan, why are almost no Hindus left there? Why are Christians in Pakistan
falsely accused of blasphemy and sentenced to death? Why are minority Shias
regularly targeted in Pakistan? Should India start providing moral, diplomatic
and political support to the Sindhi freedom movement to parallel the euphemism
under which Pakistan supports a terrorist insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir?
On careful analysis, his entire speech was an open challenge to India and
the rest of the world. The general and his military commanders have long
concluded that they can continue the proxy war using Islamic militants against
India, without any chance of punishment. This time, they are gambling that the
temperature has been raised so much, and that India has dithered so long, that
the rest of the world, led by the US, will intervene either before a war
starts, or soon after. Perhaps they believe that if a conflict starts, the US
and Russia will force the two nations to the negotiating table, and pressure
India to offer part of Kashmir in order to appease the Pakistanis.
International intervention in Kashmir after all has been Pakistan's goal for
decades.
It is a big gamble, and it may be based upon the months-long fawning of the
Americans over Musharraf as a "courageous ally" in the
"anti-terror" war. This unbecoming flattery had clearly gotten to
his head and convinced him to re-energize the terrorist incursions into
Kashmir. It is impossible that the Pakistani military leadership is unaware of
the catastrophic risks of such a dangerous set of assumptions. But in their
fundamentalist zeal, they are no less than the September 11 hijackers, who
thought nothing of going down in flames and taking thousands with them. The
Pakistani generals have put in place a new model of a rogue state for the 21st
century: one that will use nuclear blackmail to support international
terrorism and dare its opponents to join it in touching off a nuclear
conflagration.
