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India-US Relations Blog, US Elections 2012

India and the US: The partnership that could define our age

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The US Presidential Election is right around the corner, and it is not surprising that the interest within India and amongst the Indian expats living in the U.S. and also right around the globe has seen a drastic upswing. This interest is expected to reach a crescendo by the time we get to the crucial final stages and everyone from school children to political bigwigs in India are following the race to the White House with doting eyes, and the curiosity and anxiety around being palpable indeed. The Indian media has given the election coverage its due space, voice, time, and ink, and has done a commendable job covering it thus far.

This heightened sense of anticipation comes as no surprise to many of the analysts who have often elucidated that the strength of this flourishing partnership between these two great countries is not just driven by political convenience and economic sense, but by popular consensus of its people, fuelled by a firm conviction that they share a common geopolitical destiny.

Many opinion-makers, along with other social and political commentators, have already christened the Indo-US partnership as one of the, if not, the partnership that will shape the world around us for years to come, with Democracy proving to be the mortar that binds it strongly together, seamlessly.

Although the result of the Presidential Election will be crucial as it will be the fulcrum around which all the policies and programs will be implemented with the result one way or the other having serious repercussions on how things will shape out for many, including us; the fact remains that be it Obama or Romney that ultimately prevail, it is not expected to dramatically impact the relation with India. The basic rationale behind this premonition is the fact that the fundamental reasoning and the practical logic behind the Indo-US friendship far outweigh the narrow sighted political concerns or compulsions that might sway things towards the negative and the deplorable.

Despite reports coming out of the U.S. relating to outsourcing and the recent statement on the investment climate and economic reforms in India, often hyped by the media covering the campaign, the grapevine in India suggests that no one is losing sleep over the issue and the popular sentiment in India is largely pragmatic as a strong America is considered best for India – and that outsourcing was always about making things efficient and ultimately better, wasn’t it? At least India still believes so, despite what the naysayers might say.

Obama is by and large still highly regarded in India and his visit to India is remembered fondly even today. However, in contrast, Mitt Romney remains a relative unknown in India, although his name has been associated with India; which unfortunately for him hasn’t been all that positive to say the least. Nevertheless, he does enjoy the backing of someone whose name many Indians might recognize – Bobby Jindal, Louisiana’s Indian-American governor who lambasted Obama in a tirade and labeled him the most incompetent president since Jimmy Carter. Having said that, the question still remains, does that speak to the majority of the Indian-American or for those having links with India? Probably not! But the jury is still out and many in India favor Romney to topple Obama with the majority expecting a close race too close to call just yet.

No matter what rhetoric gets thrown around, which is to be expected during the peak of campaign season, the underlying prognosis still leaves room for a guarded sense of optimism and excitement for the relationship’s future. This talks volumes to the speed at which the Indo-US relationship has developed, which has naturally attracted a lot of attention from nations with their own prejudices, biases, concerns, stake or involvement in this partnership.

India and U.S are seen as natural allies and have common values and ultimate goal, and the popular analogy used to describe the two has been that of a rising elephant and a slumbering giant, with both expected to thrive in the long-term, and more importantly, seen to be better off together. Both are all set to be key architects of change, not only for their own citizens, but for million and billions the world over who are counting on their leadership.

The partnership assumes even more significance under the economic environment that we live in today – a case in point being, “Dr. Doom”, the Economist Nouriel Roubini reiterating his predication for a, ‘perfect storm,’ among many others, and the world looking to the United States, the European Union, along with prominent countries like India and China, for a way through or over the dark clouds that loom on the horizon – too menacingly for comfort.

In India the United States has a partner it can rely on through the thick and thin, and the upcoming U.S. elections will be a significant milestone in a journey that although has many travails strewn across the anvil of time, but promises destined prosperity for both countries, its people, and the world therein. Although this partnership has had a checkered time thus far, I won’t be sullied for saying that the best is yet to come from the two greatest democracies on Earth.

Defence And Strategic Affairs Blog

Glimmers of Hope in Pakistan

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Pakistan’s prospects careen from bad to worse, but there is still some possibility that it might one day evolve in a more liberal and moderate direction

 

Events over the last few weeks have amply demonstrated the growing decrepitude of the Pakistani state, providing fresh justification for its perennial ranking at the top of the world’s failed-state indices.  Yet out of the gathering gloom, several flickers of light can be detected.

First, though, there can be no doubt about the country’s cloudy prospects.  The massive energy crisis, which has resulted in prolonged black-outs, has crippled the already weak industrial base.  With the national government defaulting last month on its loan guarantees to power producers, some experts warn that the energy crunch is more of a threat to stability than is terrorism.

The economic crisis has also careened from bad to worse.  Last week, Finance Minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh disclosed that the economy grew only 3.7 percent in the July 2011-June 2012 fiscal year, undershooting the government’s 4.2-percent target.  Shaikh’s budget proposal to parliament the following day was widely criticized as perpetuating the status quo.  Its presentation was also a riotous affair, with loud heckles emanating from the opposition benches and shuffles breaking out between parliamentarians.

The country is running wide budget and trade deficits, exacerbated by the marked decline in U.S. financial assistance over the past year.  Inflation is at an 11-percent rate, investment is at the lowest level in decades, and the Pakistani rupee is trading at record lows.  The Wall Street Journal last week quoted the head of the central bank, Yaseen Anwar, as saying that Islamabad may soon have to turn again to the International Monetary Fund even though repayment of a prior $4-billion IMF loan is likely to test the national exchequer in the months ahead.  Anwar’s lament – “There are many serious challenges.  I have a rough job here” – neatly encapsulated Pakistan’s situation.

The rise of religious extremism has continued unabated, including the escalation of violence throughout the country against the minority Shia community by the Pakistan Taliban and Sunni militant groups.  Two weeks ago, Human Rights Watch took Pakistani authorities to task for failing to protect the small Ahmadi sect that is regarded as heretical by many Muslims, a theme that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also repeated when she released the State Department’s annual human rights report.  The use of the notorious blasphemy laws against Christian minorities is another source of national disgrace.

Yet against this darkening horizon, a few glimmers of hope appear that are worthy of note.  The current issue of OPEN magazine, an Indian weekly, carries an article about how the privately-owned television channels that have proliferated over the past decade have become forums challenging hard-line anti-India policies, government malfeasance and societal extremism.  It reports:

A new breeze is blowing over Pakistan—most Indians are unaware of this because they cannot watch Pakistani TV channels—and it may well be a sign of the road Pakistan might go down in future. It augurs well for both countries.

 

Pakistan’s new media—actually old, but in its new incarnation—comes down really hard on Pakistan’s new and old rulers, including the military, for encouraging distortions in its new history books and spending time, effort and money on preparing for a future conflict with India rather than concentrating on building a better and more prosperous Pakistan.

 

It draws inspiration from India’s economic growth over the past decade or two. Its praise and admiration for India is almost embarrassing. It advocates free flow of trade between India and Pakistan. Just a few years ago, these thoughts would have been regarded as anti-Pakistani and deeply subversive. But Pakistan’s media is now free. It is on a roll and it is angry and rebellious.

On a related note, a new Gallup Pakistan poll finds that a strong majority approves of the deepening trade ties that are driving improved relations between India and Pakistan.

Encouragingly, too, the state-run Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation has asked All India Radio for a copy of its recording of the address Muhammed Ali Jinnah made to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on the eve of the country’s founding.  In it, Jinnah, the leading figure in the Pakistan national movement, articulated the secular ideals he hoped would animate the new state, including the equal treatment of religious minorities:

You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed – that has nothing to do with the business of the State.

Pakistani officials have done much since Jinnah’s death a year after the country’s creation to mask his liberal views and decidedly un-Islamic ways, including censoring his remarks before the Constituent Assembly.  So, the audio copy of his address is not just of historical interest.  Similarly, the pilgrimage that President Asif Ali Zardari – a minority Shia like Jinnah – recently undertook to the tomb of a 12th-century Sufi saint located in India contained a good measure of political symbolism.  Sufism is a mystical and largely tolerant variant of Islam practiced by many Pakistanis and is in stark contrast to the austere faith professed by the Taliban.

On a political note that deserves some cheer, Yusuf Raza Gilani last week became the longest serving civilian prime minister in Pakistan’s tumultuous history and, against all odds, the present government seems likely to serve out its allotted term – another first in the country’s dismal record of civil-military relations.  It’s also managed to claw back some authority in the national security arena that previously was the sole province of the men in khaki.  Of course, Gilani’s government is highly dysfunctional and unpopular, but its unexpected longevity nonetheless is a sign of Pakistan’s on-going democratization.

A final point concerns the growing number of leading voices calling for greater public scrutiny of defense expenditures, which consume about a quarter of the wobbly national budget.  Nawaz Sharif, a former prime minister who now heads the main opposition party, has in the past called for a reduction of military spending.  Now Imran Khan, a rising political star, has joined the chorus.  General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the powerful army chief, also recently acknowledged the need for greater balance in defense and development spending.

All these gleams of light, however tentative and faint, indicate that there still remains some hope that Pakistan might one day evolve in the liberal and moderate direction that Jinnah posited at the outset.  The lesson for New Delhi is to continue searching out areas of engagement with those Pakistanis eager for more normalized relations.  For Washington, justifiably frustrated by the double game Islamabad is playing in Afghanistan and the anti-Americanism coursing through Pakistani politics, it is important to continue helping build up the country’s increasingly influential civil society and supporting the often messy democratization process.  There may be long stretches when such efforts appear in vain but they may end up making a good bit of difference.

This commentary was originally posted on Chanakya’s Notebook.  I invite you to follow me on Twitter.

Defence And Strategic Affairs Blog

Stand by democracy in Pakistan, Mrs. Clinton!

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If the U.S. is floundering in a region hosting some of the world’s most dangerous religious extremists, a leading cause is the tribe of “South-Asia experts” nestling comfortably in think tanks, government agencies, and university departments across the U.S. Almost all of them have been apologists for the Pakistan army, as even a cursory reading of their published works during the previous three decades would testify. For years, these analysts and scholars have fed off the disinformation abundant in the ISI trough. Even after 9/11, when the BJP-led government then ruling New Delhi offered Washington an alliance against Wahabbi terror, these “experts” ensured that the offer got spurned, and that once again, the Pakistan army was entrusted with the job of guarding the chicken coop. Unfortunately for U.S. interests, the Clintons’ share with the Bushes’ and the Cheneys’  enormous faith in the “South-Asia” experts who evolved from the crucible of the Cold War, when India leant towards the USSR while the Pakistan army was an alliance partner, albeit on its own terms.

 What those in charge of the formulation of policy towards Pakistan have consistently failed to factor in is the contradiction between a stable Pakistan and a strong military.”South-Asia” experts in the U.S. have been voluble in their claim that it is the military that is imparting stability to Pakistan, and have been dismissive of the few who have pointed out that the reverse is the case. That instability in Pakistan is caused by the bloated power of the military, principally the army, which controls domestic and foreign policy within Pakistan to the same degree as the junta in Myanmar did before the last election.

It is the irredentist adventurism of the Pakistan military and its nurturing of terrorism as a strategy of war that has combined with its Wahabbi outlook and its huge demands on the economy to steadily bring Pakistan to the edge of collapse. Although the “experts” favored by successive U.S. administrations may not be aware of this, the reality is that the Pakistan army is involved in a host of criminal activities, including the transport and refining of narcotics, counterfeiting of currency, and the training of extremist groups. Sadly, all this has been facilitated by the U.S. policy of (effectively) unconditional support for the Pakistan army.

 This is not the occasion to recite a litany of the policy errors made by the Clinton administration in South Asia, except to point out to a grievous error of judgment made by the Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in 2009, when she secretly joined hands with the Chief of Army Staff Parvez Ashfaq Kayani in forcing the Zardari-Gilani civilian government in Pakistan to reinstate the dismissed Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Choudhury. At that time, this columnist had warned that this move would neuter the efforts of the Zardari-Gilani duo to establish civilian supremacy over the military. And unless this is done, there is zero prospect of a “stable” Pakistan. The military is the wild card in the pack that has ceaselessly fomented a jihadist mentality within Pakistan society, and has created conditions that have led to contempt for democracy within the establishment in that country.

 Secretary of State Clinton has not hidden her antipathy for the President of Pakistan, nor her backing of the Chief of Army Staff.

Perhaps the “South-Asia experts” she relies on for guidance have not told her that General Kayani comes from a fundamentalist background: one that is almost completely Wahabbi. Or that throughout his career he has been a votary of the Zia Doctrine of the unity of jihadis with the Pakistan army. In contrast, while President Zardari shares with Bill Clinton a propensity for making overtures towards seductive females, he comes from a Sufi background, one where there is zero space for religious extremism. Indeed, the ethos of the Zardari family is even more moderate than that of the Bhuttos, whose apparent lack of fundamentalist beliefs cloaks a vacuum in religious attitude that was filled by a pseudo-western lifestyle. The Zardaris are religious, but in the Sufi rather than the Tablighi tradition favored by Kayani

This being the case, Asif Ali Zardari has from the start shown his willingness to take on the Pakistan military and cleanse it of extremists and their sympathizers. Instead of assisting him in this task, the Obama administration drove a dagger into its heart by conniving at the re-instatement of Iftikhar Choudhury as Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) in 2009. While there has been a much effusive comment about the “corruption-fighting” credentials of the CJP, what the U.S. “South-Asia experts” have failed to mention is the fact that Choudhury has not a word to say against an institution that is among the most corrupt in South Asia, which is the Pakistan army. The generals, as also lower-level staff, wallow in graft, to be met by a Nelson’s eye from the Chief Justice, who is equally indulgent towards Mian Nawaz Sharif of the Pakistan Muslim League, whose family leapfrogged from poverty to plenty within a generation by use of methods that defy characterization as ethical or legal. The U.S.-facilitated re-instatement of Choudhury has turned out to be a disaster for democracy in Pakistan, because of the CJP’s obsession with ensuring the dismissal of the elected PPP-led civilian government in Pakistan. Once Kayani got his man in as Chief Justice, and forced through an extension to his tenure as COAS (again with help from Washington), he became even more open in implementing the policy that has been his signature tune since the time he took over as chief of the army.

 This is to do to NATO in Afghanistan what the Pakistan army did to the USSR during the 1980s, ensure defeat. It is no secret that China has entered the Great Game as a major player, or that Beijing is adopting the same strategy in Afghanistan that the U.S. followed two decades ago, which is to use the Pakistan army to ensure the defeat of rival militaries active in the Afghan theater. In 1998, this columnist first mentioned that China was more influential among the senior levels of the Pakistan military than the U.S. This and pointing out the Punjabi domination of the army earned him an effort from Pervez Musharraf to block him from writing in the Times of India. The Pakistan strongman complained to the former Times of India Editorial Director Dileep Padgaonkar about the unflattering comments (though accurate) being made about the Pakistan army and asked why “such writing was being tolerated by the newspaper”. Today, the most recent Kayani visit to Beijing, and his long meetings with Xi Jinping, Wen Jiabao, and other top Communist Party leaders have made clear that Beijing supports the brass in Pakistan in its struggle with the civilian establishment. After all, it is the Pakistan army that is expected to ensure that NATO leave Afghanistan in disgrace by 2014.

 This is the precise reason why President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton need to avoid repeating their 2009 mistake (of backing Kayani over Zardari), and instead support the civilian establishment in Pakistan. If President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani are given backing from the U.S. and the rest of NATO, they can resume the task that was aborted in 2009, which is to de-radicalize the Pakistan army and make it a professional force that would battle terror groups rather than nourish them.