Rethinking Foreign Policy -- Can Pakistan and India Agree?

#47 manto - the only reason Musshy babe and your ilk want peace in kashmir - is not some brotherly love towards the unjuns.

Your ass is being burnt by the yanks regarding Afghan stuff and warizistan battles being fought by your army. You need more soldiers there - 80000 in Waristan is not enough apparently you need more to put an end to the insurgency. So you want peace to sort it out.

India is wanting gaurantees that you will not do a Ghauri on them. This you guys are not willing to give. Afterall how can the true inheritors of this world do such a thing. India has to listen to us the right owners of this earth - else....unfortuantely that is the situation....

so chill out and live life - you aint gonna solve this problem.

#47 manto - the only reason Musshy babe and your ilk want peace in kashmir - is not some brotherly love towards the unjuns.

Your ass is being burnt by the yanks regarding Afghan stuff and warizistan battles being fought by your army. You need more soldiers there - 80000 in Waristan is not enough apparently you need more to put an end to the insurgency. So you want peace to sort it out.

India is wanting gaurantees that you will not do a Ghauri on them. This you guys are not willing to give. Afterall how can the true inheritors of this world do such a thing. India has to listen to us the right owners of this earth - else....unfortuantely that is the situation....

so chill out and live life - you aint gonna solve this problem.

Dost:
You seem to count your chickens before they hatch! For example, you think that India should be magnanimous because it can afford to be so. This is amateurish. Affordability of anything has been just one of several criteria for making an investment! The returns will not simply not be there. You fail to consider other factors (see rejoinder* below).
You also state, `But to do so, India has to be acceptable as a leader in its own backyard. For that to happen, it needs to be perceived as a Big Brother and not as a Big Bully`. Again, that is at odds with the actual perception of US/Russia/China by their neighbors (Mexico -Cuba-Venezuela-Brazil/Ukraine-Baltic states/S. Korea-Japan-Taiwan-US). If these powers could rise despite not being accepted as a leader, why can`t India? Current trends indicate that it can!

You also write, `the terrorism problem, which was earlier limited to Jammu and Kashmir and North-East, is now spreading all over the country`. Nobody in India is fooled into thinking that this is home-grown. These are all Pakistani exports of LeT and JeM. Reacting to them in the manner that you suggest is to submit to terror.

I am disappointed at the shallowness of your analysis.

*Kashmir is not the cause - it is the consequence or symptom of a deep, abiding Pakistani elite hostiliy towards India. The ruling military junta in Pakistan now seeks to redeem glory in `71 lost in the only way they can - force India to go through her own Dec. 16, 1971. The military junta will not rest until a battlefield defeat is reversed or avenged. You put more faith in a personality (Musharraf) than in a process.

Iron mask,

Yaar your analysis of the Cold war was as half assed as the kind suggestion that you offered me in your latest post.

It seems to me that every Indian techie/menial worker like you who somehow makes it to the US and lands some boring dead end job begins to think that he ought to offer advice and analyse the situation in the subcontinent (here Dost Mittar is to be excepted because the man has genuine passion as well as ability to understand differing point of views and discourses) ... Ofcourse it is always written in a self congratulatory tone of how India has arrived to what those small minded Pakis ought to do to emulate you or try to emulate you.

The reality is that you are bored out of your wits living in some suburb working in some corporate entity ... making a measly amount 30% of which you give away as tax- living in a one room studio in the ghetto or if you own a house... a mortgage that you probably will never pay off... no sense of achievement ... no land of your own... so you come on this website to offer advice to Pakistan and India... Calling yourself the bania is an insult to the term... you are the kammi kameen of Amrika - thats what you are... the brahmins of India are Amrika`s Shoodars!

So drink to that... chug down that Heinekin ... and order another round. Then return to your mundane existence ... that is your life. You are Amrika`s mediocrity. That is your manifest destiny...

pewresearch: your analogy of India in the subcontinent vs US in the americas is just as pretentious as your nick.

Hey Bipolar Factoid Junkie Choutia:

What happened to a choutia response from you of this post on the Iran site?

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#152 by behram1 on March 12, 2006 9:22am PT
Bipolar factoid junkie choutia:

Immigration Bill is imminent in Congress. Senate is going to pass the toughest bill to get rid of all the rift rafts from other society, although the politicians keep on saying America is a society of immigrants.

Illegals have brought their huge extended families in the US....and so did the hindoos from India.

Illegals send their monies back home to their countries....and so do the hindoos from India.

Illegals have brought their own culture and language in the US....and so did the hindoos from India.

Illegals mostly live a showdy life isolated and insulated ....and so do the hindoos from India.

Besides, illegals do not rob American Jobs away from Americans, but hindoos from India do.

Now you be the judge. Who is the worst community of immigrants in the US? Hindoos from India, of course. Not only do these hindoos rob American jobs, they rob American monies that they make, they bring their temples and their insidious culture and language, and they are arrogant.

Remember Uganda, under Idi Amin, how Indians were kicked out. History is about to repeat itself, but in a very subtle way because we are living in the 21 century. But getting rid of unwanted illegals and Hindoos will all be packaged together under the security and war on terror act.

Indians were brought to Africa to lay railroad tracks by the British, and they took over the society. It is happening all over again, but these are white folks, and brownies will have real tough time to prove their worth.

Would you not support those of us, who love the American people, in getting this immigartion legislation passed to get rid of these hindoos from India who are really anti-American people?

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To all the hindoos who have come to the US:

What is the difference between an illegal alien and a hindoo from India?

None. Except hindoos of India would rob American jobs, and considers that an honor. To steal American`s livelihood is an honor for hindoos of India.

Respectfully submitted,

right now Pakistan and India are in a Shot Gun marriage -- performed by Reverend Bush --

may be -- once the two cousin countries find some bliss in settled (cousin-cousin) married life instead of sleeping around with unknown unsavory characters -- everything will be alright hopefully without any genetic damage --

with Kashmir kids cared by both parents.....happily ever after.....

very nice article -- reminds me of Faiz line: -- ``yooN nu thaa meiN nay fuqut chaaha thaa yooN hojai ......for Indo-Pak amity.....a possible dream

you are a decent man dost-mitter ji....

#52 yaar manto why reduce this to my personal circumstances - something about which you know didly squat.

See, DM is living a fools paradise - as his predictions re:bush visit indicated (they were all wrong). The great baba is trying to relive his old glory. Unfortunately the semaphore reading of his is outdated, and so is yours.

There is a great deal of distrust at institutional level and history has proved it. Nothing will change here. If you think you can, you are whistling into the wind. You will realise this when you get to that chair - in the near future. That distrust is called ``the gauri syndrome`` for nothing.

So young politician wannabe, get rid of the bee in your bonnet, enjoy life and get to the top of the greacy pole - the way up is slippery and you need to get the right accoutrement to get there. This injun-pak peace thing will not get you up it, but on the other might get it up you.

dost mittar: good article, fact based and constructive (and, btw, therefore anathema to many indians on chowk, as one can see from their posts).

While I think your analysis of the shifts in alignment taking place are appropriate, i have one small quibble with it - this analysis is in the mold of the balance of power between nation-states in a metternichan world. Given that this mold itself is changing due to globalization, I think the day of the ``Great Powers`` is almost over. What we will see emerging instead is strengthened international agencies like the UN as well as expanded regional bodies like the EU and possibly NAFTA and ASEAN. I wonder how factoring these aspects in will change your conclusions, if any. Any thoughts??

oh BTW manto - your post #52 is an indication of things wrong with the South Asian Subcontinenet. In india they have changed - banias rule the roost and they have the pwoer - and they seem to be doing some good. And a great deal of good they are doing. In pakistan, the distaste for their activities is great and very much institutionalised (your reaction is is surely just a tip of the berg), and hence the bad turn around of investment.

Banis are never to be looked down upon. They are to be cherished for what they do. Your poor attitude and insulting behaviour towards them is an indication of a closed mind - a closed mind which made you admire the nazis!

In 1972 after winning a war, IG agreed to leave something verbal so that Bhutto could save face. How many tens of thousands of Indians have been killed by Pakistani intent since then?

Giving face saving room today can mean wiggle room for manuevre tomorrow and justification for fullscale war the day after. Agreements are not made for this year or next year, they determine relations for decades to come and must have a sounder basis than pity for an individual, otherwise Indians making such agreements will be acting highly irresponsibly.

Pakistan has a robust economy... Shaukat Aziz when he was the Finance Minister has borne fruit ... All sectors of the economy are growing ... the foreign exchange reserves are high ... There are now over 23 million mobile phone users in Pakistan ..

Dost saheb, all of above is simply not true as a description of Pakistan economy. Pakistan economy in fact is in deep trouble due to blunders by this government. They have lost a historical opportunity which is rare to arise. Allow me to explain:

1) Before 11 Sept 2001, the economy was at a standstill, nothing happening, and the forex reserves were around the same level as June 1998 i.e. post detonation. Never mind the official figures. They are just false. There was hardly anything in the kitty to fund imports and the Rupee was at $/65.

2) Reverse capital flight took place after 11 Sept 2001 and an estimated 14 billion dollars entered Pakistan all of a sudden within two months. With these dollars the Government built up it`s reserves, prepaid lots of expensive loans, and was able to lower domestic lending rates from 21% to 2% because of too much liquidity floating around. That resulted in huge profits for the large corporate borrowers, made bubbles in the stock market and real estate (both tripled), and the Rupee strengthened to $/57.50. All of this was because the economy was not able to absorb the huge inflows. The money had to go somewhere.

3) The government had hoped that with the cheap rates and stuff, there will be new industrial investment. That didn`t happen. Only thing that happened was better capacity utilization. The domestic industrialist knows no sector which can compete in a WTO regime. So they pocketed the higher profits and that`s it. The banks were awash with liquidity with no borrowers so they started to lend retail in credit cards, auto loans and things like that. That`s where the consumer boom began when the consumer rates were at 7% and the auto assembly industry picked up. Nothing else. The consumer growth accounted for the *official* figure of 8% growth. BUT and it`s a big BUT, it also resulted in much higher imports because the production never increased, only assembly of vehicles and other consumer durables. It also resulted in core inflation of 11% plus.

4) Now the chickens are coming home to roost. Consumer loans are now re-priced at 14%, getting out of reach of the happy consumer`s paying capacity; trade deficit for 2005-2006 is expected to hit 9 billion dollars by June when the *actual* reserves are down to around the same amount (Don`t believe that $12 billion stuff). The cellular phone revolution didn`t do anything for the economy other than the initial FDI, and import coverage of available foreign exchange has gone down from 11 months to six months. The *Logistic Support* payments from USA have waned and will completely stop shortly.

5) The Government will manage to tide over another year through sale of Pakistan Telecom etc., but after that the balance of payments will be in severe red. Oil is not likely to come down, only rise. The deregulation/elimination of wheat, sugar support prices has hit the farmer hard and now they`re shifting to other cash crops resulting in sugar prices hitting Rs. 45/kg from Rs. 27/kg. People are real angry.

The lost historic opportunity I mentioned earlier is that a $14 billion windfall after 9/11 was almost Rs. One hundred billion. If only the Government had absorbed it through issue of its securities, instead of letting it lose in the market, it could have spent it on infrastructure and state enterprises to replace private investment which wasn`t forthcoming, and avoided the speculative bubbles which are bound to burst.

Stupid. Pakistan only had a breather because of 9/11. It wasted that surprisingly opportune time to amend. Now Pakistan has to wait for another 9/11.

So, in my opinion, its better to accept the LOC as permanent border, and make a trade pact with India. Pakistan cannot survive in the manner it is proceeding.

Rgds

Ref parthaab #10

[As long as the Hindu fanatics of India preach hatred against muslims in general and against Pakistan, through indoctrinating `Made in Britain` history, and Pakistani jihadis do the same, there is very little chance of understanding or lasting peace between the neighbours.]

So why don`t you set an exmple of a reasonable Hindu and pimp your family`s women to Muslims?

#60 its called the ``ghauri syndrome`` - the institutional trust coeeficient is very low. It needs to be raised. That is what I said and poor manto has his knickers in a twist as a result.

Re: # 61
yaar manto - read zeemax. He has said what I said earlier. The bania`s of India were more far sighted in that they managed to use monies for some development. The bania`s of pakistan if they exist couldnot do it because people (elite) pocketed the monies!