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COVER
STORY: DIPLOMATIC OFFENSIVE
Powell And Patience
It is India's moment to make Kashmir a vital part
of the war against terrorism
By Prabhu Chawla with Shishir Gupta
The host was not
in his famed poetic mood when he welcomed his distinguished guest from
Washington at South Block on October 17. US Secretary of State Colin Powell,
fresh from his greatly productive rendezvous with the General in Pakistan,
was winding up his subcontinental mission. There he was, face-to-face
with the leader of nationalist India, whose sense of terrorist horror
was not born on September 11. For the newly terror-scarred American, the
job at hand was to stop an Indian version of Operation Enduring Freedom
across the India-Pakistan border.
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NO LAUGHING MATTER: (From left) Powell with Vajpayee and
Jaswant
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For, India has been at the receiving end of enduring
terror, sponsored by its troublesome neighbour for the past 15 years.
The tragedy of Kashmir may not be as dramatic or as camera-friendly as
New York's World Trade Center on September 11. But it continues to be
renewed in bloodier methods. Still, October 1 in Srinagar, when an Islamic
suicide squad bombed its way into the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly complex
killing 40 Indians, was not even seen as a distant blip of September 11
on the international radar. For India, living and dealing with its own
private Taliban has always been a lonely pursuit.
Amid the media celebration of the American war
on terrorism-of which the current translation is Afghanistan-the national
mood was a sort of enough-is-enough. And October 1 was a catalyst; Washington
sensed the worst at what the earlier US administration called one of the
world's dangerous flashpoints. The White House reading was: the hawks
in the Bharatiya Janata Party (the so-called Hindu nationalist party in
international media parlance) may drive the moderate Atal Bihari Vajpayee
(the so-called human face of Hindu nationalism) to a bloody adventure
across the border. Such a scenario-India at war with Pakistan, America's
most useful ally at the moment-will totally upset the Big War on Global
Terrorism, currently waged on the mountains of Afghanistan.
The post-October 1 Delhi was not an embodiment
of patience. Immediately after the Jaish-e-Mohammed attack on the assembly
complex, the prime minister wrote a letter of "anguish" to US
President George W. Bush: "There has been understandable anger in
the country at this wanton act of violence. Ironically, it comes only
a day after the president of Pakistan announced on television that Pakistan
has no terrorist groups operating from its territory ... Incidents of
this kind raise questions for our security which, as a democratically
elected leader of India, I have to address in our supreme national interest.
Pakistan must understand that there is a limit to the patience of the
people of India." For Washington, this missive from the subcontinent
was a warning: India cannot afford to be a Mahatma of nonviolence to Pakistani
President Pervez Musharraf.
Bush had to take it seriously. He called back
Vajpayee and shared his sorrow and anger. As temperature in Lutyen's Delhi
rose, concerned statesmen flew in with a bucketful of cold water diplomacy.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Bush's partner in war, was the first
to arrive and genuinely shared Indian sentiments. The definition of terrorism,
he agreed, would be incomplete without the trauma of Kashmir. And the
UK had already banned 21 terrorist organisations, including the Jaish-e-Mohammed,
the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen which are active in Kashmir.
Then arrived General Powell himself, the Gulf War veteran whose doctrine
of limited war with optimum international consensus has already won the
day in post-September 11 Washington. He dropped a diplomatic bomb to neutralise
the host: an invitation to Vajpayee to visit the White House. A rare gesture
indeed, complete with a Rose Garden appearance with the Bushes and a luncheon
with the Washington elite. What's more, even the date has been fixed:
November 9. Vajpayee happens to be the first leader who is not directly
involved in the war to be invited to Washington after September 11.
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