Indo-Pak: Escalating use of force has limits
Political parties should abstain from exploiting a foreign policy issue for short-term domestic gains
It has been several months since Indian and Pakistani forces have been locked into a tit-fortat exchange of fire across the Line of Control (LoC), although the Indian side believes that by making its tat more deadly than the Pakistani tit, it is imposing more costs than it incurs itself. But so far, there is no evidence that deliberate escalation of fire by the Indian side is leading to any change in Pakistani calculus. On the contrary, there is a matching escalatory dynamic at work on the other side, with significant damage being inflicted on border villages on the Indian side. The casualty rate among our forces has gone up. Is the sacrifice of their lives, always a tragedy, justified by any identifiable gain? Since the current policy of escalatory response began with the objective of punishing Pakistan for cross-border terrorism, have we seen a restraint on such activity? Quite the contrary, the incidence, scale, and lethality of such attacks, including the most recent ones in the Kashmir Valley, have increased. The answer to this heightened activity has been a threat of even greater escalation in using our firepower across the LoC but this is unlikely to achieve results.
One, since both countries are nuclear weapon states, there is a real though unacknowledged limit to escalation in the conventional domain. We should recall the costly stand-off that Operation Parakrama became when Indian forces were massed at the borders for nearly a whole year in response to the terrorist attack against Indian Parliament in 2001. The anticipated war across the border did not materialise because of the tacit and sober recognition by both sides that conventional war could easily escalate into a catastrophic nuclear exchange with neither winners nor losers. Surgical strikes of the kind which were carried out in 2016, described as punitive action below the nuclear overhang, did not change Pakistani behaviour whatever may have been the domestic political payoff for the ruling party.
Two, India has to take into account the regional and international context within which the current hostilities with Pakistan will play out. Pakistan is more likely to engage in brinkmanship and indulge in a higher level of escalation precisely because this is likely to trigger international concern and intervention. It has always claimed that the India-Pakistan conflict can only be managed if not resolved through international or third-party mediation. On the contrary for India, any foreign meddling in India-Pakistan relations and, by inevitable extension, the Kashmir issue, would be most unwelcome. This is particularly so now when Pakistan’s “Iron Brother”, China, is straining at the leash to become the arbiter in South Asian conflicts. Therefore, we need to acknowledge that Pakistan is likely to escalate hostilities to a higher threshold than India. So is this a road we wish to be tread on?
Three, the China factor now plays a more important role in India-Pakistan relations. Since 1980, China had begun to play a more neutral role by asserting that the two countries ought to resolve their differences through peaceful dialogue. The earlier more partisan pro-Pakistan posturing on Kashmir became muted. During the Kargil conflict, China joined the US in insisting that Pakistan respect the sanctity of the LoC. But the situation has now changed because Pakistan is no longer just a useful proxy to keep India off-balance but has assumed a key role in China’s larger geopolitical strategy. The heavy investment in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and the Gwadar port have given China much greater stake in the security of Pakistan than ever before. This is also the reason that Pakistan feels more confident in sustaining an overtly hostile posture towards India including its increasing resort to cross-border terrorism. Therefore, in escalating punitive action against Pakistan across the LoC, India will have to take into consideration more seriously than it may have before of a diversionary Chinese action on the India-China border. Despite its closer relations with the US and other major powers, India will have to deal with this threat on its own.
For these reasons, a policy of what could become open-ended escalation in the use of force as punitive action against Pakistan has its limits and has not yielded the results anticipated when it was launched. More of the same will prove equally infructuous and perhaps even dangerous. It is in the interest of both sides to revive the ceasefire that held for a decade since being put into effect since 2003. Other means will have to be considered to change Pakistani behaviour.
There is another trend which has the potential of further complicating any coherent well-thought-out policy towards Pakistan. This is the growing predilection to bring Pakistan into domestic political discourse and attempt to equate nationalism and patriotism with unremitting and even abusive and intemperate expressions of hostility towards our neighbour. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had been wise in asserting that our confrontation is with a hostile Pakistani state and not its people. Somewhere down the line this eminently sensible position has been lost in the noise and din of hateful speech and screech. This shrinks the space for diplomacy which can only operate in greys and not if issues are framed in black and white. It has also encouraged elements which seek to equate Pakistan with the Muslim population in the country and transfer the hate directed against Pakistan towards our own citizens. Is this not a reflection of the two-nation theory which justified Pakistan’s creation? We are perched on a slippery slope and our political parties would do well to reach an early consensus on not allowing foreign policy issues become embroiled in competitive domestic politics. Whatever may be the anticipated short-term political payoff for any political party, it may lead to long-term damage to the very fabric of Indian society.