Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, September 1999, pages 30-31

The Subcontinent

Kargil Crisis Recedes in Wake of Clinton-Sharif Meeting, But Menacing Kashmir Problem Remains Unsolved

By M.M. Ali

The State of Jammu and Kashmir does not belong to either India or Pakistan. This is a fact that many outside the subcontinent do not know, and some do not care to recognize. Anyone who is even remotely interested in resolving the menacing Kashmir dispute, however, needs to remember that in this case the devil is not in the details but in the basic underlying facts.

The issue is not Kargil or Daars, as it has been made out to be in recent weeks in the international media. It is the entire State of Jammu and Kashmir which is contested in a dispute that jeopardizes the peace of one of the most heavily populated regions of the world. Further, the organized international community needs to be reminded that it pledged through the United Nations in 1948 to let the 13 million people of Kashmir determine their own political future. It is a promise that has gone unredeemed for the past half-century.

The subcontinent has paid a heavy price in economic and human terms for this denial of the right of self-determination–a principle honored by great powers all over the world in the abstract, but repeatedly denied to all who are prepared to fight and die for it. The Kargil crisis, it must be recognized, is just the latest example of the willingness of Kashmiris to lay down their lives for their freedom.

Unfortunately, there is more hypocrisy than honesty in international relations. Depending on who is defining them, the groups that have revived the demand for an independent Kashmir are identified as mujahedeen, freedom fighters, intruders, infiltrators or mercenaries. Whatever they are called, they are people dying for their own independence, a cause with which Americans, only two centuries after their own similar struggle, should easily empathize. This is particularly so since, until it is resolved, the Kashmir dispute presents the world’s greatest threat, by far, of nuclear war. The half-century-old Kashmir dispute has proven, beyond a shadow of doubt, that time is no healer, as it has defied all manner of delaying tactics over the years.

New Delhi has been able to avoid a settlement only by deploying more than 700,000 army and paramilitary troops to “keep order” in the Indian-occupied two-thirds of Kashmir. Nor has any amount of counterfeit democracy reduced the demand for freedom in the state. India has arrested prominent Kashmiri leaders belonging to the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, a conglomerate of groups fighting for freedom, and India’s puppet Kashmiri chief minister, Farooq Abdullah, has accused his fellow Kashmiris living in the Kargil-Daars area of supporting alleged mercenary intruders. However, none of this theater or fakery has changed the mind-set of the local population, who have suffered deeply under severe repression. Their struggle for freedom continues unabated.

The Kargil Crisis

Pending final settlement of the Kashmir dispute, a temporary Line of Control (LOC), was set up some 27 years ago demarcating the Indian- and the Pakistani-controlled parts of the State of Jammu and Kashmir. Ever since, the LOC, which marks the front lines at the time a cease-fire was negotiated, has been monitored by a U.N. peacekeeping force, although the artificial boundary has been porous, especially during the short summer when snow and ice do not impede passage.

India accused Pakistan of aiding and abetting “intruders” who breached the LOC and occupied high ground on the Indian side, shooting down at the Indian troops trying to regain the lost territory. It is snow-clad and treacherous terrain and, by New Delhi’s own admission, the Indian army suffered major casualties.

Military skirmishes and exchanges of fire began in mid-May, with both sides making contradictory claims. The United States called only for a return to the status quo, and respect for the LOC. India quotes the Simla Agreement of 1972 wherein the two countries had agreed to “resolve” all issues, including the Kashmir dispute, through bilateral negotiations. And Pakistan, which acknowledges no control over the mujahedeen, has lost trust in bilateral talks and accuses India of “stalling” instead of negotiating sincerely to resolve the dispute. Pakistan wants third-party (preferably American) mediation. But the stalemate remains.

The mujahedeen succeeded in tying up a vastly larger Indian force. But even with the support of Pakistan it is not clear that they can win the war. Nor is it clear how long India can sustain the human and economic costs of maintaining positions in Kargil, especially in view of the impending snowfall that will begin in late September. Will Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee pay a political price in India’s September elections for the huge military strain in Kargil? Mujahedeen withdrew from Kargil and the Indian army has re-occupied its lost posts. Tensions have been defused for the time being.

Internal Realities

Atal Behari Vajpayee’s caretaker government (BJP) is faced with mid-term national elections in September, but he cannot afford to call for a delay in the voting because the opposition will interpret it as a departure from democratic procedure and a confession of political weakness. Pakistani Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif also rides a tiger and faces a difficult task. Pakistan’s economy is still heavily dependent on external assistance for survival. Therefore he cannot afford a costly, extended conventional war with India. He also faces the reality that his own powerful army will not be happy if he surrenders the upper (literally) hand that has been achieved in the heights of Kashmir. But the option of opening up alternative military fronts on the lengthy India-Pakistan border to take pressure off the combatants in Kashmir risks a nuclear war that no one wants. Ironically, as happened in the Soviet-U.S. Cold War, the nuclear capability on both sides has become a deterrent against the outbreak of a full-fledged war like the three that already have been fought in the second half of the 20th century between India and Pakistan. But if mutually assured nuclear destruction becomes the only bulwark for peace between the two governments, the next millenium will become a perilous one in the subcontinent.

Indian Media Blitz

The crisis began with physical evidence that close to 1,000 men equipped with heavy artillery had crossed over into the Kargil and Daars area on the Indian side of the LOC. The U.S. and others asked Pakistan to seek a withdrawal of the intruders and to respect the sanctity of the LOC.

Meanwhile India, although suffering militarily, took advantage of the favorable tilt in public opinion and launched a media blitz. It first played on American fears by charging that the men occupying Kargil and Daars were “terrorists” associated with Osama bin Laden and trained by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Then it charged that they were regular soldiers from Pakistan’s army. An expensive full-page advertisement in leading U.S. and European dailies called Pakistan’s military a “Rogue Army” and Indian emissaries were dispatched to major capitals of the world with the same kind of message. Prime Minister Vajpayee vowed to continue military operations until all the lost ground had been recovered. Pakistan provided its own version of events and disassociated itself from the actions of the mujahedeen.

This was the background to Pakistani Prime Minister Sharif’s urgent request for an emergency meeting with President Clinton in Washington on July 4th—a move that caught U.S. officials by surprise.

The joint U.S.-Pakistani communiqué issued after the talk said that Sharif agreed to ask the “intruders” to withdraw from the Indian side of the LOC. New Delhi described the statement as vindicating its version of events. But Islamabad interpreted it as drawing the United States into settling the dispute. This, too, would be a victory because internationalizing the Kashmir issue has been a long-term Pakistani objective.

Sharif had a similar meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair in London. Significantly, Pakistani Army Chief of Staff Gen. Parvez Musharraf said he would abide by any decision that Prime Minister Sharif took, an essential ingredient in any negotiation, since Pakistan’s army has deposed prime ministers in the past to settle internal crises.

Although right-wing religious groups and other hard-liners predictably opposed the Washington agreement and launched a national campaign to support the “freedom fighters” in Kargil, the meetings in Washington and London had a calming effect in both Islamabad and Delhi. A lead story in the July 12 Times of India read: “The directors-general of military operations (DGMO) of the two countries met on Sunday and agreed on the modalities of de-escalation, including sector-wide cessation of ground and air operations to facilitate the mujahedeen’s disengagement.” The language of the joint communiqué was very significant. It acknowledged that the men who had occupied the Kargil-Daars hilltops were not Pakistani soldiers, as India had alleged, but were mujahedeen, or Kashmiri freedom fighters. However, on July 18, the Indian army chief, Gen. V.P. Malik, still insisted on calling the intruders “Pakistan army regulars.”

Nawaz Sharif Addresses Nation

For his part, following his meetings in Washington and London, Prime Minister Sharif said in a televised broadcast to the nation on July 12 that he had requested the mujahedeen to withdraw from Kargil to avert the possibility of a nuclear war with India. He also implied that he was doing so because of President Clinton’s assurance that he would take a “personal interest” in resolving the Kashmir dispute.

Pakistan’s objective to internationalize the Kashmir dispute apparently has been met, and the Kargil episode very likely has re-ignited the fire of freedom inside the State of Jammu and Kashmir. But the voluntary withdrawal of the mujahedeen from their bunkers takes pressure off the Indian military, who were caught napping and paid a heavy cost in human lives. The withdrawal suits New Delhi because, when the snow starts falling, movements by either side in the area will become impassable regardless of what happens on the military front.

Pakistan will nag the Clinton administration in coming months to intervene and give some meaning to the India-Pakistan bilateral talks. India, concerned about the “personal interest” promise of Bill Clinton to the Pakistani prime minister, will seek to drag out the issue for another 18 months until Clinton’s term of office ends.

If the Indian diplomacy succeeds, that may launch another half-century of the arms standoff in the subcontinent that has diverted scarce resources from human resource development projects and the growth of democracy across the subcontinent. And this time the arms being brandished are capable of poisoning the entire planet.

Prof. M.M. Ali is a consultant and senior fellow with The Center for Planning & Policy Studies in the Washington, DC area.