US predominance is unlikely to fade away

The US spent more than $607 billion on defence in 2008 according to SIPRI statistics and this constitutes 41% of global expenditure on defence. This far exceeds what the next nine countries spent during the same year. The Chinese spent $85 billion, the Russians $59 billion and the Indians $30 billion.

The Brazilians, the fourth member of the newly founded BRIC, spent even less. There are others who calculate that the US spends far more than this in its endeavour to maintain global primacy. America maintains about 750 military and intelligence bases world-wide and its intelligence budget exceeds India’s defence expenditure. Consider also the reach of the US Navy and Air Force and we have a clear idea of the extent of the difference between US forces and the rest of the world. The fact that the US ability to influence events in its favour is not commensurate with its expenditure and reach is ultimately immaterial since the power to deconstruct remains overwhelming.

It is for good reason therefore that the BRIC combine will remain, for the foreseeable future, a body that will concentrate on global economic, financial and climate issues while trying to build an increasingly multi-polar world order. All of them seek a bigger role in the management of the financial global order and are not prepared to pay for their own encirclement by allowing the US to overspend in dollars. Barring the Brazilians, the others have concerns in how the Great Game would play out in the 21st century.

American attempts to seek a role in Central Asia and the Caucasus worries the Russians, Indians fret about US military assistance to Pakistan and the Chinese remain concerned about US involvement in west Pacific and Taiwan. These are the geo-political drivers. The instrumentalities are going to be economic and financial and not military with China, for instance, willing to trade with Argentina and Brazil in renminbi. Sceptics argue that once multi-polarity is achieved the grouping will wither away under its bilateral contradictions and ambitions.

It is too early to predict as the US predominance is not likely to fade away soon but change is inevitable and BRIC will continue to hold for the time ahead.

Source : Economic Times , 19th June 2009

India can’t simply wait for America to deliver on Pak

In 1999, Hafiz Mohammed Saeed, mentor of the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba and Jamat-ut-Dawa, had announced in one of his numerous sermons that have been allowed to continue unchecked: “Today I announce the breakup of India, Insha Allah. We will not rest until the whole of India is dissolved into Pakistan.” Nearly 10 years later, in October 2008, Saeed ranted: “India understands only the language of jihad, which cannot be suppressed. In fact with some support, jihad can break up India like the former USSR.” For decades this man has poured pure vitriol on India under the benign eye of his benefactors and today he walks free in Lahore.

It has never been adequately understood in India that the Pakistan Army will never give up its perception of India as a threat, seek to avenge 1971 and use Hafiz Saeed and his hordes as an important weapon for this. Saeed has been an enduring favourite of the Pakistan security establishment and could not have been allowed to remain in any kind of custody for too long. The Pakistan Army cannot afford to have peace with India because should peace break out, then the primacy of the Pakistan Army will be lost. Its extensive business empire, valued at $38 billion, will be in serious jeopardy. The jihadis will become jobless and threaten Pakistan even more than they do today. It should not, therefore, surprise anyone that Saeed was released.

Pakistanis once again showed an impeccable sense of timing and disdain. They had just “won” the Swat battle, launched with great fanfare and huge hidden costs just ahead of President Asif Ali Zardari’s visit to Washington. A grateful West, desperate for some success story, then burst into adulatory gestures and found new reasons to ply their ally with even more funds. Saeed’s release was lost in the din of this praise. Besides, the release happily coincided with the visit to Pakistan by Richard Holbrooke, who dismissed the release as an “internal matter” of the Pakistanis. This has been a favourite escape route, used by many previous administrations whenever they wanted to cover up Pakistani transgressions.

In contrast, India’s sense of timing has been appalling. One day after Saeed’s release amid the usual round of angry reactions and soundbites, reports started circulating that India was about to resume the long-suspended dialogue with Pakistan. Everyone knew that pressure by the United States on India had abated only temporarily and that it would resume soon after the elections. It was also generally understood that the dialogue would be resumed after Pakistan had given India some satisfaction on issues relating to terrorism. One does not know who worked out this brilliant spin for the resumption, but it reflects poorly on our sense of timing and tactical wisdom. To say that we are not under anyone’s pressure and yet say the dialogue will resume prior to Hillary Clinton’s visit, so that she does not pressure us, only means we have wilted even before the heat has been turned on. The other reason put forward — that this would hopefully enable Pakistan to rein in its jihadis and prevent another Mumbai-type attack — can only be called supplication by a would-be major power to a failing state.

A few days prior to these events, The Nation of Lahore, in an editorial on May 29, referred to a report on “secret talks” between India and Pakistan which “could get underway in the near future in an attempt to resolve the Kashmir dispute.” It went on to add: “In public statements in response to Islamabad’s calls for resumption of talks, the Indian leadership continues to insist on the precondition of punishment for the Mumbai ‘culprits’ and destruction of the ‘terrorist infrastructure’. But it seems that covert pressure from outside is working, and New Delhi has decided to initiate secret diplomacy with the aim of resolving the dispute.” So was our leak a clumsy coverup for another leak?

New Delhi’s subsequent reaffirmation that there would be no dialogue till the preconditions were met is a relief, but there is also more than a hint of a flip-flop. It shows inconsistency where hope is confused with reality and tactics are mistaken for policy. But there is another dialogue which must be conducted in all seriousness and sincerity. This is a dialogue with all those Kashmiris who voted the Omar Abdullah government into power. They have shown faith in the system, and their trust must be upheld. Those who advocated a boycott of the elections and those who receive instructions from across the Line of Control are irrelevant because their “mother country” is in a shambles, unable to protect its own Muslims. Pakistan has thrown everything at us, including the Americans, but it has not worked.

For some time, during the last administration in Washington, there was a sense of exultation in New Delhi that we had at last managed to get India and Pakistan “de-hyphenated” in American eyes, a lot of it credited to our newfound “status” as an emerging major power. We felt vindicated that the US too was getting apprehensive at the direction Pakistan was taking, and that at last the US would now read the situation as we did and act on the lines we thought they should. Unfortunately none of this happened. We failed to fully appreciate just how dependent the US had become on Pakistan as the linchpin of its war on terror in the region. The reality, of course, is that the US exerts influence in different ways in the two countries. It keeps reassuring Pakistan that India is not a threat to it, and so it could safely move its troops to the western border. At the same time it keeps arming it with weapons that can only be used against India — a fact that the Pentagon appears to be slowly acknowledging. At the same time it keeps nudging India to give Pakistan confidence on Kashmir so that it can fight a little better on the western front.

Let us, not, therefore depend on the US to deliver on Pakistan unless we show much greater determination and will ourselves. We have concentrated far too much and too long on verbosity, when reciprocity should have been the keyword. When Hillary Clinton arrives, we need to tell her that we will resume the dialogue with Pakistan in our own time, when our security concerns have been met, not just US security interests. We need to assert that if another Mumbai-type attack takes place, when US state department advisories claim is possible, then it would be politically unacceptable in India to respond only with a diplomatic response. In such an event, we expect the US and the West to warn Islamabad in no uncertain terms that India’s reaction would be justifiably harsh. In fact, it may be wiser to send messages to Pakistan in advance, advising restraint. The onus of preventing another war lies with Pakistan, not with India. Good relations with the US is important for us and also for Americans (though in their present state of confusion they might not think so); but this cannot be at the cost of India’s security. Kashmir is not on offer, and India is not willing to be the sacrificial lamb.

Source : Asian Age 8th June 2009