Worse could be yet to come

Our weakest link is the disappearance of the beat policing system in the states

BANGALORE and Ahmedabad in July 2008 appear to be Jaipur May 2008 rewind, only upgraded, while Surat sends shivers down the national spine. The nation is going through its familiar “ whodunit” act. There are the usual accusations of intelligence failure, resolve to punish the guilty ( if they can be found that is), demands to reintroduce POTA or some such law, learned discourses on TV channels, calls for setting up yet another organisation and angry comparisons between the RAW and the ISI. Until the next terrorist act takes place when we will rewind this tape again.

Intelligence failure is a frequent and often justified point of criticism. In India, there is a lack of appreciation that intelligence agencies are the sword arms of the nation ( not the government) in the furtherance of its foreign security interests and the protection of the country. In normal times, when it is the best time for the agencies to be allowed to hone their skills, develop their sources and prepare for the future, they suffer from benign neglect. Posts remain unsanctioned, purchase of new equipment is postponed and upgrading is frowned upon, all because the powers- that- be assess that the threat has passed. Yet, when an incident takes place, intelligence agencies become the useful whipping boys with politicians and others ready to shift blame as they assess their political fortunes.

Any organisation is as strong as its weakest link. In India, the weakest link in the states is the disappearance of the beat constable system — the man who knew who or what was new on his beat and what was happening. It was this man who would generate, confirm or refute, new information. He used to be the lowest common denominator. Today, the police force is undermanned, undertrained, underpaid and overworked.

Urban ghettoes have become the preserve of mafia dons and are no- go areas for the constable in search of suspects. In the districts and rural areas, a perennial resource crunch of all kinds and political interference designed to keep the system weak, means the ability and urge to perform even the normal functions has been severely impaired.

Challenge

So while we may all talk of new specialised agencies, co- ordination between the state and the Centre and rapid communications, the real problem is that we are not equipped to execute all this. Any new agency will surely be formed by cannibalising existing agencies, take a few years to get organised after the existing organisations reluctantly give it some space and it will remain understaffed and under- equipped. These are problems that we are not prepared to address adequately.

Terrorism has changed face. The terrorist is now “ one of us” — he is the boy or girl next door who may even be the mastermind and a computer buff upgrading the nature of the attack. This can be tackled by having another boy or girl next door as the counter terrorist. There are many citizens who would be willing to offer information but an inadequate witness protection programme and the fear that they would get involved in never ending court cases, deters many from offering information that an intelligence agency or an investigation agency needs. Long drawn out trials frustrate the investigator, and provide the terrorist the hope that he would escape punishment. In that context a special law and special courts would help provided the other systemic corrections are made. The witness protection scheme has to be strengthened and speedy justice ensured for information to begin flowing. POTA alone will not do.

ISI

One of the other angry outbursts after a terrorist incident is to compare the R& AW with the ISI. The short answer to this is that if Indian media and politicians have built the reputation of the ISI, the Pak press and accusations by persons like former army Chief Gen Aslam Beg provide enough cause for the R& AW to feel satisfied with its achievements! However, the important thing to remember is that in Pakistan the defence budget is beyond any review by any civilian authority, including parliament. The ISI thus has unlimited access to funds; it can draw money from any bank including, the Askari Bank, owned by the Army.

If this is not enough, it has drug money to fall back upon and if that does not work, then there is largesse from the US. In India we have migratory bureaucrats with little or no understanding of intelligence functions who sit in judgement on agencies’ needs.

In Pakistan, the ISI is multifunctional, combining the role of the R& AW, IB, MI, and the CBI. Its National Accountability Bureau is controlled by the ISI and its favourite past time is to keep errant or dissident politicians and bureaucrats in check. Besides it can arrange disappearances, and worse.

Foreign policy control and domestic political skulduggery has been the domain of the ISI. This is what makes it the most powerful institution in the country. It started off as being answerable to the Army and was what the Army chief wanted it to be. The Indiafactor had always provided the Army with its reasons to run the country its own way. Unable to tackle India militarily, recourse to terrorism had become the other foreign policy option. It was cost effective and did not need the Army to die for the nation. That was the privilege of the Kashmiri or the Punjabi underclass. The execution of this policy option strengthened the Army’s special status in Pakistan as the only functioning system, which arrogated to itself huge corporate interests for its services to the nation, lowered its nuclear threshold against India and raised the banner of terrorism in the name of Islam so that any escalation by India would mean using the nuclear option in the name of the nation and Islam.

Desperation

As Pakistan’s options began to reduce with the rest of the world glowering at Pakistan’s rulers, the Army became more desperate to retain its primacy as the Protector of the Faith and Defender of the Realm without losing out on being America’s stalwart ally. Over time, the Army became increasingly dependent upon the ISI for its actions in Afghanistan and India and the ISI graduated from being a State within a State to being the State.

Come September 2001 and things began to spin out of control for the Pakistan Army and the ISI. It became more and more difficult for Pakistan to be seen as the provider of foot soldiers and support to the jehad in Kashmir. It was probably around this time that the ISI began to recruit Indians for its jehad and began to spread it to the rest of India. Growing American pressure to come clean has begun to take its toll in Pakistan even though the ISI continues its double game with the CIA in the NWFP. Anticipating increased American pressure, the ISI has begun shifting that pressure to India.

We may be in the midst of one such shift and more will most certainly follow.

Source : Mail Today , 1st August 2008

Is the Nuclear Deal really in the National interest

The never-ending soap about the nuclear deal looks bizarre and would be humorous were the matter not so serious

It is true that not many people have read the 123 Agreement, the Hyde Act or the US Atomic Energy Act of 1954. Fewer understand them. Yet amazingly, luminaries of the Samajwadi Party, having hidden their nuclear knowledge for years, attained enlightenment after a brief half-hour meeting with our former President. It was a convenient meeting at a convenient hour.

The SP says it will support the government but not join it, having learnt from the Left the exquisite art of wielding power without responsibility. Dissidents within the SP say they are opposed to their leadership but not opposed to the nuclear deal. The Akali Dal says they are a constituent of the NDA but will not vote against the government in deference to the Prime Minister. The SP has defined the national interest more specifically. They want certain ministers divested of their portfolios and would like to select their own man as the next director of the Central Bureau of Investigation, presumably to help in those cases involving the party hierarchy. Quite obviously, a case of personal party interests masquerading as the national interest.
We cannot solemnly declare that we will not share the details of the privileged IAEA Safeguards Agreement with the Left since they are not a part of the government, but then find that the agreement is already on the Internet for all to see. We cannot describe the deal as a national issue yet not talk to the main Opposition party, but prefer instead to have closed-door meetings in safe houses to woo the willing. We cannot say it is a national issue and then convert this into a Muslim, Sikh or a communal (read Hindu) issue or about Telangana. Where is the Indian in all this?

The never-ending soap about the nuclear deal looks bizarre and would be humorous were the matter not so serious. Since there is general cynicism in the conduct of statecraft, there can be an equally cynical interpretation of this elaborately-scripted charade. Both the Left and the Congress Party know they have to contest the forthcoming state elections in opposition to each other. They cannot make inflation and energy prices an issue for parting company because that is self-defeating. The other catchy national interest is the 123 Agreement, but this is more an excuse than a reason. As the opposition to the deal grew, so did the nightmare that the successors to the throne may be the "communal party". The alternative to this was for the Left to walk out once it was ensured that the SP and a motley crowd of parliamentarians would support the UPA in any vote of confidence. The nation would thus have been saved from the "communalists." There is no national interest in all this. It is only about several deals within a deal.

In the midst of all this high drama, some aspects of the Indo-US nuclear deal have been forgotten. For instance, why has all the pushing and shoving come from the United States if the deal is so much in India’s national interest? There has never been any satisfactory explanation from anyone — specially from the US, a country known to and able to act in its own perceived interest while pretending to be inspired by altruistic motives.

Many of us may have forgotten what Nicholas Burns had to say a few days after the Bush-Manmohan Singh nuclear agreement in July 2005. The gameplan was clear when he said that the 123 Agreement "brings India ... back into the non-proliferation mainstream in a way it was not before. And that is a tangible gain for India, as well as the US and the rest of the world." He had also said that "eventually 90 per cent of India’s nuclear reactors will come under safeguards." In other words, this is FMCT (Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty) through the back door, by reducing India’s capability to produce fissile material.

There are several other things that could go wrong or at least work out differently. For instance, India may be able to push through the agreement with the IAEA and the NSG but not leave enough time for the US Congress to ratify the 123 Agreement. This would leave India free to deal with the French and Russians for supply of material and construction of reactors. Surely the Americans, having taken all these steps, are not going to sit back and watch all lucrative deals go to others when the 123 was to be part of an effort to revive the languishing US nuclear industry. Coincidentally, the US Energy Act of 2005 was designed to revive the country’s nuclear industry and what better prospects than selling reactors to India and China, where the market could be worth $150 billion.

The deal exposes India to uranium supplies from a cartel notorious in the past to resort to price manipulations. In recent years, the price of uranium has risen six times above the usual average of about $25 per kg. With demand in India and China expected to rise, the price of uranium, already increasing at a rate higher than that of crude oil, will increase further.
Mr Burns had also said that American companies would be selling the "finest nuclear technology" to India. But latest reports indicate that American negotiators are wary of supplying high-end technologies to India despite claims by Indian protagonists, and would rather supply technologies that cannot be replicated. It is extremely doubtful that the Chinese will ever agree to an arrangement in the NSG which enables the transfer of state-of-the-art dual-use technology to India as this has strategic implications for China.

Spin masters would have us believe that the Chinese favour the deal. It is well known that the Chinese have opposed every international Indian move seeking a higher profile or role. There has been no progress on the Sino-Indian boundary question, despite our unequivocal surrender of Tibet, and there were 150 intrusions along the border last year — indicating that things are far from being normal. Whatever the Chinese may say publicly, they do not wish to see a rival in Asia. Their view of a multipolar world is quite different from ours. For them, multipolarity consists of two poles — themselves and the US — with lesser poles hovering around somewhere below, but with the US out of Asia. It is, therefore, puzzling to find that the Chinese actually support the 123 Agreement unless they have figured out that this would limit India’s strategic options in the future.

Recent comments by Strobe Talbott that the next US President — whether Democratic or Republican — may be harsher on India on CTBT and implement the deal only if India agrees to abide by this treaty, should be worrying. Is this another push and shove? Or just bluff and bluster?

Source : Asian Age , 16th July 2008