Open wars have become unfashionable, like wearing hats. Sure, there are some of those crazy or old-fashioned people who like to wear a hat or wage a war openly now and then. But on the whole, open wars have become passé.
But who wants an open war? Not Pakistan, which has in the past wars at best managed to save Lahore from India and at its worst, lost Bangladesh. It knows it can’t beat India openly. So Kashmir insurgency, 26/11 and Kargil war are a natural progression for Indophobic Pakistan army. After all, experience is the greatest teacher and Afghanistan experience did teach them the power of useful idiots, with a dash of religious fundamentalism and a sprinkling of propaganda combined.
We don’t need to burden our army for teaching Pakistani government a lesson. Let us go for the kind Pakistan is favoring so much: proxy, information and intelligence wars. For that, we require disgruntled Pakistani people, media and RAW respectively. There are plenty of disgruntled Pakistani people, as there are disgruntled people in almost every other country except North Korea, with real and imaginary grievances against the Punjabi-dominated Army which controls the country, from backstage or openly. We also have a lot of media persons in our country without journalistic integrity but with decent journalistic skills, who will be happy to aid their country in lieu of some consideration. It would be a nice change for them to focus on actual (and sometimes fictional) human rights violations in Pakistan instead of Deepika Padukone’s cleavage. And it’s not like the people in India are going to suffer neglect since media rarely covers actual issues nowadays. And as for RAW, it is high time it gets its fair share of action. Its personnel must feel very marginalized when they compare themselves with their Pakistani counterparts.
If India has Kashmir, Pakistan has Baluchistan (an independent nation invaded by Pakistan army), Gilgit-Baltistan (Shia dominated) and NWFP (closer to Afghanistan than Punjabi-dominated Pakistan). Pakistan already accuses us of being the hand behind all the terrorist attacks. So, it’s not like the mindset of an average India-hating person is going to change there. The support to the separatists and dissidents should be discrete and minimal, for example raising the issue at international level, welcoming the dissidents or propaganda dissemination, and not the kind that bites us back. We have already started down that path under Modi, but much more needs to be done and can be done.
We can make Baluchistan as famous as Palestine or at least Kurdistan. Obviously, we shouldn’t supply arms, since we’re not the USA which supplies arms to people with very questionable credentials and the unlikelihood of long-term loyalty. And no Indian citizen should need to die for this proxy war. Additionally, Iran is not going to like it since part of what was Balochistan lies in it. But we can make it a humanitarian issue with exaggerated, emotional and dramatic headings like “Cultural genocide of Baloch people” or “The silent holocaust in Balochistan”, and some generous funding to intellectuals and human rights initiative. I eagerly await Baluchistan, a graphic novel. The best thing? It’s a legitimate issue, just like Bangladesh although the scale is very dissimilar. China may have certain objections though, due to its strategic interest in Gwadar port. But, it does not have a locus standi to object. Baloch people’s right to self-determination and their voice on this subject trumps any other point or so should be our official retort.
Then, let us turn to NWFP and FATA. We need to stand by Afghanistan and Pashtun nationalists in their demand for one great Pashtunistan. We need to expose the brutalities of the Pakistani army in the tribal areas. These brutalities are unfortunate and usually unintended collateral damage concurred during operations to flush out Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan and other militants but we can overlook this fact, just like Pakistan media forgets while mentioning human rights violations in the militancy-plagued Kashmir.
Then in our third front against Pakistan, we can push Iran, a Shia-majority nation, in solidarity with the Shias in Gilgit-Baltistan and other areas. Iran has emerged as a major player in international politics, a force to be reckoned with and our champion of Shias around the globe. Gilgit-Baltistan is riddled with sectarian conflict between Shias and Sunnis since 1980s, inflamed by “peaceful lessons to local population” as well as terrorist attacks on Shias. Surely Iran should hold its neighbor accountable for such despicable treatment of its minorities. It can be a key ally in countering Pakistan if we only put in the efforts. We can be friends economically, militarily (reminding Iran that Pakistan is militarily closer to Iran’s arch-rival Saudi Arabia), culturally (their is a mutual cultural tradition and any fan of Urdu poetry should definitely thank Iran for providing the inspiration) and politically.
As for China, the all-weather friend of Pakistan which shields and supports it on the international stage, there are two ways to handle it: soft path and hard path. In the first path, we would need to recognize that the rivalry between us need not be military. Most Chinese don’t see us as a military threat and the Chinese establishment does not suffer from an advanced case of Indophobia and paranoia which would wash all our efforts to reach mutual understanding down the drain. We can have a ‘quid pro quo’ policy for Tibet and Kashmir. For that to work, we would need to stop supporting Dalai Lama. We wish China to respect our integrity. We should do the same for them. Tibet is China’s business like Kashmir is ours. Dalai Lama is no Hafiz Saeed, but if China fails to make a distinction, there isn’t much we can do. China needs to stop shielding Pakistan’s terrorists, but we need to give them an incentive to do so. China has the power to convince Pakistan to get their terrorists under control (evident by Pakistani government trying to shut down anti-China terrorist camps). Perhaps some other common ground can be found, and although China won’t be best friends with us, their reason to support can be diluted. This dilution might prove sufficient for our proxy wars on Pakistan’s sovereignty to succeed. But, we can’t say for sure, how much reprieve we may get from China’s belligerence against India by removing the Tibetian thorn.
For the second path, that I personally favor, we enter into an alliance with China’s rivals in East and South-East Asia, especially Japan. Japan can be to us what China is to Pakistan: a multi-faceted ally and a big investor. We can issue cheesy statements on our friendships. Japan and China have a bloody history and tempestuous rivalry that makes Indo-Pak bickering look cute by comparison. China will have to think twice before messing around. The list of countries that China have antagonized is much longer. Many countries in South-East Asia are exasperated by China’s assertion of dominance. While China cooks “patriotic fish”, we will go for Vietnamese Pho and Filipino sisig. And as China’s star rises and America’s sets, USA will be over the moon if we decide to partner with them to keep China in check. In my opinion, America’s war on terror will eventually be passé and its Cold War against China would be a good excuse to kindle the Senate’s generosity.
Again all this should be done to Pakistan only if it continues to support anti-Indian activities in Kashmir and elsewhere. I have no wish to see Pakistan disintegrate, no more than I wish to see India disintegrate. Our support to anti-Pakistan forces should not be the cornerstone of our foreign policy but a tit-for-tat. It should be made clear to Pakistan that in the event it reforms its approach of doing business with us, the support to “freedom fighters” will be withdrawn. I hope Pakistan will come around to its senses and before mourning the death of militants in Kashmir, it would mourn the death of children in its own country at the hand of the Pakistani army and 100% home-grown militants. Peace be upon those who wish for peace to be upon us.