The most unfortunate aspect of the present state of Pakistan-India relations is the complete severing of contact between the Prime Ministers of the two countries the complete severing of contact between the Prime Ministers of the two countries—this makes the situation even more gloomy when seen in the light of expert opinion and past experience that see political contact at the highest level as the only way out of the potentially dangerous military crises.
Temperatures in Pakistan-India relations have risen to such a level in the recent months that nobody in fact is talking about defusing the politically and militarily tense situation.
The exchange of fire on the Line of Control (LoC) has become a norm and more disastrously a war of words is underway between the two capitals, giving rise to the experts’ assessments that atmospherics between Prime Minister, Imran Khan and Prime Minister, Narender Modi has touched the lowest ebb.
Adding fuel to the fire is the continuously deteriorating human rights situation in Indian Administered Kashmir.
Prime Minister, Imran Khan is directly accusing the ruling party of India and its prime minister for being the sole reason for deteriorating security situation in the region. The Indian Prime Minister has remained tight-lipped in reaction, however Indian media is no less venomous in its comments about Prime Minister, Imran Khan.
The possibility of any military tension arising in such a situation, which is already tense, seems extremely dangerous, as the absence of a direct political contact between the Prime Ministers of two countries will be felt in such a situation. Pakistani and Indian prime ministers in the past have maintained hotline telephonic contacts to defuse crises in the region.
In the past the political and military crises between the two countries were mostly defused when Foreign extra-regional powers like United States and other western countries intervened to reduce tensions. However most of the time it was through the channel of direct contact between two Prime Ministers that the foreign powers mediated between the two countries.
Right now the direct contact between Prime Ministers is missing and foreign powers are busy elsewhere. In such a situation the arrival of a fresh military crisis could be disastrous for the region.
In the past both the PPP and PMLN government in the post-Musharraf period had faced pressure from Washington, Moscow and Beijing to take steps to reduce tensions in the region and resume dialogue process with India. As a consequence the talks offer to New Delhi became a mantra with the successive governments in Islamabad.
However the Indian government had repeatedly turned down the talks offer in the wake of terror attacks in Mumbai in 2008 with the results that the military and political tensions between Islamabad and New Delhi continued to rise in this period.
The political contact continued even after the Mumbai terror attacks as prime ministers of two countries continue to meet on the sidelines of international and regional conferences. However Indian government severed political contacts as well in the wake of Uri Attack when an Indian military check post came under attack by militants on Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir.
Prime Ministers’ level contact between two countries have often led in the past to improved atmospherics and reduction of military and political tensions between the two countries.
Imran Khan’s government will be facing the same kind of pressure from their past and new friends in the international community. In the past Washington had continuously pressurized the PPP government to do something to resume dialogue process with India.
Similarly PMLN government faced same kind of pressure from Washington. Now Islamabad’s new friends like Moscow are also cajoling it to initiate some kind of normalization process with India.
The mass casualty attacks in Indian cities and terror attacks on its military formations have destabilized the military situation between the two countries several times in the past 15 years.
And as we have seen during the last decade this type of “mass casualty attack” have not only domestic repercussions within the country where it takes place, but have also affected inter-state relations, especially in South Asia or India-Pakistan relations to be more specific.
We have seen two dangerous military tensions between Pakistan and India (first in 2002 and second in 2008) in the wake of “mass casualty attack on Indian parliament and attacks and killings of ordinary citizens in Mumabi in 2008.
Both these “mass casualty attacks” brought Pakistan and India to the brink of military confrontation. On both sides of the border militaries were mobilized on large scale. Jingoism defined attitudes of military and political leadership on both sides of the border.
On Indian side, we heard people saying that they have the capacity to force Pakistan into a situation where it would cease to function as a functioning state. In Pakistan some lunatic even suggested that Pakistan has the capacity to obliterate Indian civilization as the world has known it since the time of antiquity.
Military confrontations were eventually prevented when the cooler heads prevailed in New Delhi and Islamabad after the diplomats, military officials and spymasters from Washington started to shuttle between two capitals.
But the “mass casualty attacks” left a deep scar on inter-state relations in South Asia and there are no signs that they can be removed any sooner. Worst still are the apprehension that another “Mass casualty attack” on any Indian city could provoke another military face off, which even an otherwise influential Washington would not be able to control.
For instance, American nuclear and security expert Michael Krepon has suggested in one of his recent works that Washington’s ability to prevent a military confrontation between Pakistan and India as a result of any future “Mass casualty attack” has dwindled drastically.
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