Pleas For Sanity as Sabres Rattle Over Mumbai Mayhem

Re: # 1246 publius

Do you beleive that left to itself one day the Pakistani state will simply stop terror against India ?

No one is talking of leaving Pakistan to itself. My position is that the current dispensation has made _some_ undeniable moves to de-escalate with India. Before the attacks, Z had made the offer of a No First Use pact. the main opposition leader, Nawaz sharif, is calling for a No-War pact. It has also appointed a supposed moderate as ISI DG. After the attacks and after a great deal of scepticism, Z&Co have made some moves against JuD, and today intensified those moves, in the face of concerted opposition, which is painting JuD solely as a relief agency.

http://www.dawn.net/wps/wcm/connect/Dawn%20Content%20Library/dawn/news/pakis tan/authorities-intensify-action-against-jamaatud-dawa--ha

The objective is not destabiliation, per se,( although I would welcome it) but punishment and deterrence.

Ah I see.

Both of these are ends in themselves( please try and understand what I mean by that. Justice i.e punishment as well as deterrence is something that we pursue for itself because these are things that we value in themselves, in this context).

Fair enough

Our only hope w.r.t Pakistani army is to raise their costs( both moral and physical) high enough and for a long enough period to achieve some level of deterrence.

Well, considering how many hundreds of troops die in the Siachen glacier every year, this cost to the Army will obviously have to be higher to achieve deterrence. But the problem with ratcheting up a punitive response is that quite apart from the fact that it will almost certainly invite retaliation, leading us to escalate, retaliate and so on, this cost has to be
a) high enough to the army to deter proxy war
AND
b) not so high enough that the nuclear trigger is pushed

Who the hell knows what the red line is ? what single death will be the straw that pushes the big red button? Can you deny it is a colossal gamble? I'm not saying that the gamble should never be made; should we not exhaust every other possible option? Considering the numbers of people at stake a strong military strike that we think will deter Pakistan's Army could possibly be the biggest ever roll of the dice in the history of mankind.

Once again what has disunity done for us ? The objective is not disunity but deterrence. I don't care if Pakistanis are united as long as they don't attack us and are punished when they do.

I agree that the objective should be deterrence against attacks

coming to the point of deterrence, I am hard pressed to find out where military deterrence has, unreservedly, worked. Consider Israel, nuclear armed and backed to the hilt by the US, with a small geographical area to defend, with no strong armies arrayed against it, with no nuclear powered enemies against it. It retaliates strongly against real and perceived threats, not making any distinction between combatant and non-combatant. It has massive international power. If that state cannot secure its citizens and territory against terror, and lives in perpetual fear of what retaliation it is promised by its enemies, what leads you to consider that Indian retaliation against Pakistan will

a) work, in that it will deter; and
b) not invite escalation; and
c) will not strengthen the ranks of those willing to die in fidayeen attack after fidayeen attack and suicide bomb after sucide bomb, thereby *increasing* the number of terrorist attacks?

The authority that *CAN* defang Pakistani terror _with the least amount of backlash_ is Pakistan's Government. It's a dirty filthy job. They say they are trying to do it. It's a new government 10 months in the saddle, against a massive force of Pakistanis arrayed against it. let it grow strong, let's see what action it takes.

Where did I argue for mass murder ? Where did I even argue for war ? Are you capable of accurately representing those with whom you disagree ?

I posted that stopping the Indus would be a violation of the Indus Water Treaty, forbidden against International law and a crime against humanity. You seemed to impliedly defend such an act in post # 1117 by talking about how the point was moot. In any case, if that was not your intention, I apologise.

Publius maharaj: your big talk wrt india-pakistan bs on the internet after mumbai would be slightly more convincing if you ever had anything else to say before mumbai. as it is, you are merely using the tragedy of mumbai to bolster your miserable little ego.

i dont think you are so stupid as to be unaware that the indian government doesnt have any options - it tried messing with Pakistan in 2001, and this time it knows better.

if you were slightly less stupid, you would be making a virtue out of a necessity and standing on that favorite platform of too many indians - the high moral pedestal.

Aha_Snark , Here is part 2 of my response ( for the first part see below)

"Why? If your objective is destabilisation, are you telling me that _by itself_ the Pakistani state is not doing a superb job of destabilising itself?"

Has the current destablization prevented it from carrying on a Jihadi war with India ?

Do you beleive that left to itself one day the Pakistani state will simply stop terror against India ?

The objective is not destabiliation, per se,( although I would welcome it) but punishment and deterrence.

Both of these are ends in themselves( please try and understand what I mean by that. Justice i.e punishment as well as deterrence is something that we pursue for itself because these are things that we value in themselves, in this context).

Our only hope w.r.t Pakistani army is to raise their costs( both moral and physical) high enough and for a long enough period to achieve some level of deterrence.

"And for what? Action against India has united India. The mere fear of an Indian threat united the Pakistani parliament against us. What guarantee do you have that direct action against Pakistan will not unite the entire country - the media, the people, the parties, the militants, the army - against us?"


Once again what has disunity done for us ? The objective is not disunity but deterrence. I don't care if Pakistanis are united as long as they don't attack us and are punished when they do.

"But there is a difference between weighing and considering the loss of innocent lives as a major factor in planning any action and using the inevitability of harm to innocents as excuse for mass murder"

Where did I argue for mass murder ? Where did I even argue for war ? Are you capable of accurately representing those with whom you disagree ?

For a detailed view of what I have proposed read this.(http://www.chowk.com/unplugged/t/60906)

publius

publius, please also consider that Mush was dictator for 8 years and he wielded near-absolute power. Everyone lined up to do salaam. This government is a shaky one that has the Army and the ISI establishments lined up against it; it is one that has bitter enmity/rivalries/disagreements with the PMLN & the PMLQ and the MMA and the MQM.

It did not even have the political capital to censure the MNA who defended the burial of three girls alive as part of tribal honour and custom.

And not only is it beset on all sides, it's barely 10 months old! Compared to the faujis who have ruled Pakistan, abhi to iskey doodh ke daant nahin nikle!

It's back is to the wall. The international pressure and the UNSC ban is the perfect excuse to crack down on terrorists who, one day, will be shooting at the Govt. of Pakistan, in any case. Today, it can't say a word about Kashmir to any nation without hearing the long list of misdeeds it has to answer for.

India is in a strong position and we have retained the moral high ground. Let's not overplay our hand and lose what we have. If we play our cards right, we might make some serious gains on this front. And considering the unknown consequences of military action (especially when one actor is the Pakistani state, seeing bhoots of Indian invasion and with an itchy nuke finger) and the fact that there is a new player on the other side, and the old boss has been kicked out,

don't we have the obligation to at least try?

publius

No of course not. Because the actions that are implied in that view are conditioned by the context.

I think i'm referring to this obliquely as well in my discussion with harish garu. Your argument for differentiation between India and Pakistan is that India is a robust, raucous democracy that is flawed but has a system within itself that responds and corrects flaws while Pakistan is a totally different animal altogether.

While I would completely disagree about how "lawful" Gujarat was in 2002 [1] I would agree to an extent that India contains within itself a self-correcting and evolutionary mechanism. Sometimes the mechanism gums up but overall, all said and done, it's working, in fits and starts.

Your conception of Pakistan is what I'm not sure I agree with. I think if you look at Pakistan dispassionately, it is possible to consider it as something other than the state you make it out to be. Your casting of Pakistan is that of a phenomenally competent and implacably inimical supervillain state - a cross between Lex Luthor and Mogambo. The country is a federation that was halved, in living memory. It is actually barely a federation in anything but the most notional sense - just take a look at how bitter the dispute over water is between Sindh and Punjab, for example. From the weak and dissolute leaders who preceded him, the likes of Yahya, Ayub etc, we had
a) the fatal hubris of Bhutto,
b) the deathly dictatorship of Zia, complete with nation-stifling and society-warping petrodollar fanaticism,
d) the succession of civilians who proved every fauji's prophecies right by stuffing both hands in the till and begging the fauj to take over when they were out of power
e) Musharraf's frozen dictatorship that ensured that pakistan remained in virtual stasis

Now, we have a regime that is at least making the right noises, has wrestled Mush out of office, has replaced the ISI chief with someone said to be more liberal, and has moved against the JuD and LeT (after a lot of international pressure and an overdose of denial, agreed)

And contrast this with the achievements of India vis-a-vis Kashmir/Pakistan. It's never ever fashionable to praise babus for the good work that they do but I happen to think that Indian diplomats have done a pretty darn decent job. They certainly get what they want, if you consider the 123 deal, for example. If you just look at hum kahaan the aur ab hum kahaan hain, you'll find that we've broken the hyphen that welded us to Pakistan, we've forged strong relationships with global powers, Pakistan has made unprecedented concessions on Kashmir, has cracked down on jehadis so that infiltration has dropped (our own Army corroborates this).

I would urge that you consider the possibility Publius sir, that Pakistan too is not a state in stasis - that it too is evolving.

Moreover, robust and bold diplomacy by a solid foreign service has worked, post Op. Parakram. it has worked before it. And there is a chance that it will continue to work.

Yes, a press conference or a treaty clause is not as flashy as a BRAHMOS missile, it doesn't satisfy the visceral urge for revenge that I feel, but in the long run, the 3 rice eaters and a college professor - Mukherjee, Chidambaram, Antony and Manmohan - might actually do something.


[1] thousands of cases were not registered or were wrongly registered, evidence was tampered with, names were not recorded properly - all in an effort to shield the accused... but let's not get sidetracked about Gujarat or we'll be here past 10000 posts.

harish,

it all depends, really, on whether you are right in your assessment of how _purposeful_ the Pakistani state is.

1. Does the Pakistani government know what it is doing?
2. Do Zardari & Co control the ISI/Army fully?
3. Is a policy of planned retention and deployment of LeT against India something that Zardari / ISI / Army are equally supportive of and complicit in?

Aha_Snark # 1207,

I will deal with your long post in chunks.

"You've just stepped down the same path that the jihadis did, by saying that people sipping coffee in the Leopold were somehow responsible for Godhra, for Kashmir, for the Babri Masjid. That a hardworking taxi driver was responsible. That a guy who even gave the bastards water when they were thirsty were responsible. That a rabbi and his pregnant wife are responsible for Palestine. That the newborn children and their new mothers in the damn maternity ward in Cama Hospital are responsible"

Let me try and untangle the various problems in your response.

There are different levels of moral culpability in any evil. There are people who carry out evil actions themselves , there are those that support those actions( morally or physically) and there are those who rationalize and deny them( in the face of sufficient reasons and evidence).

I am not suggesting that people of Pakistan are guilty in the same way for Jihad that the government of Pakistan is but they are guilty( in their own way).

[ Please note to say that the people of Pakistan are guilty is not to say each and every Pakistani person is so. Human language has to be interpreted in a common sensical manner when dealing with generalisations]

Now let's ask ourselve are the people of Gujarat not guilty of supporting somebody like Modi, who is apparently complict in mass murder. Yes they are.

So doesn't this logic, you ask , lead to the conculsion that the terrorists, in line with this thinking, would be justified in random killings of Gujaratis.

No of course not. Because the actions that are implied in that view are conditioned by the context.

The state of Gujarat is a democratic state within a liberal nation. It has several proper means of addressing the injustice and evil that was done there. One does not seek to address that evil by force because in a civilized ,democratic setup, force has been replaced by rights based voluntary action.

One files court cases, one takes public dharna, one does media campaigns. One passes moral judgement, one ostracizes and shuns.

Any terrorist opting to killing Gujaratis randomly is doing something deeply evil because he operates within the the context of a civilized society and a democratic setup.

Now consider the totally different context of the other situation. India has no effective non force based resort to get real justice from Pakistan. Pakistan is an enemy state that has been carrying out a Jihad against India and has no intention of giving it up( and once again it is the army that we are talking about here)

All the actions that have done by Pakistan so far are under presssure and are exactly the same that were done in 2001. They have no lasting significance. Let was banned then and it's leader placed under house arrest. Which was a complete show and it was back in business after a small interrugnum.

It meant nothing then and it means nothing now.

The only purpose from India's pov here is to let the world see that non force options are being used and once it becomes clear that they are ineffective then it becomes India's moral right (by the reasoning that I have used above) to use force( by which I do not necessarily mean military options).

So to sum up the moral theory that I have proposed does not create a moral equivalence between the actions of the terrorists and the proposed action against Pakistan.

There are other aspects of your post that I will address later.

#1239 by dost_mittar

Trust or no trust, the US mission in Afghanistan is still critically dependant upon Pak cooperation.

That may well be true DM sahib, but after the truck-burning incident, the US has already began looking into alternative routes from Central Asia. If things deteriorate, the US won't hesitate to put boots on the ground and as Obama indicated, the American focus is shifting towards South Asia from Iraq.

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HH#1238:
Trust or no trust, the US mission in Afghanistan is still critically dependant upon Pak cooperation. The Peshawar incident that you mention may be intended as a message to the US of how dependant it is on Pakistan.

#1237 by dost_mittar

If Pakistan did indeed come up with some info. it still would not mean that these are not non-state actors. After all, it has admitted and arrested such "actors".

DM sahib, Pakistan has not officially admitted to the involvement of any of its institutions. But if at all the FBI manages to lay its hands on the terrorists, that would become a real possibility.

As far as handing them over to FBI or any outside agency is concerned, that is a non-starter. They refused to let the americans question AQKhan and even Omar Sheikh who is in jail for killing Daniel Pearl. After all, assets have to be protected.

Those were different times DM sahib. The US was heavily reliant on Pakistan to do its dirty work in Afghanistan. It let go of AQ Khan and Omar Saeed in expectation of Paki cooperation. After 7 years and countless betrayals, things are different. It no more trusts Pakistan to do its bidding and has to resort to blackmail to get things done or even direct action in the form of cross-border raids and Predator drone attacks. The latest attack on US armored vehicles in which 150 APCs including Humvees were burnt down by the Taliban near Peshawar is another item in the long list of Paki betrayal/incompetence, depending on which way you look at it.

hh#1235:

If Pakistan did indeed come up with some info. it still would not mean that these are not non-state actors. After all, it has admitted and arrested such "actors".

As far as handing them over to FBI or any outside agency is concerned, that is a non-starter. They refused to let the americans question AQKhan and even Omar Sheikh who is in jail for killing Daniel Pearl. After all, assets have to be protected.

To make sure the war was being declared on terror and not on Pakistan, Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee clarified: “I am making it quite clear that it (war) is not a solution.�

http://www.dawn.com/2008/12/12/top2.htm

#1233 by dost_mittar

It can interrogate people it has arrested to find out the whereabouts of the missing trainees in the camp where the mumbai terrorists were trained.

DM sahib, why would Pakistan even attempt such a foolish thing? That would be a dead giveaway. Up until now, Pakistan has been maintaining a state of plausible deniability; that these were non-state actors who had nothing to do with the state of Pakistan. If they manage to nab the remaining 15 and if the FBI extracts the right to interrogate them (which is a possibility), a lot of unsavory things will come to the fore and Pakistan will have nowhere to hide.

Re: # 1233 dost_mittar

absolutely, that would be a bold move forward which would be received very well indeed. right now, the preception is that pakistan was bending over backwards to not do anything or admit anything and it is only after the UNSC ban that the offices were sealed. I don't know how credible this is but i've also read reports about how the LeT men were allowed to transfer documents and "seal the offices themselves!"

freeze their bank accounts, confiscate their properties - after all, theyre a banned organisation, right?

Moreover, why in the world is hafeez Mohammed Saeed being allowed to speak on TV ? this is the arrest ? Masood Azhar in house arrest in his palatial bungalow and HM Saeed free to talk on TV ?

eklavya#1209:

Actually, Pakistan can do one thing that will immediately transform Indian and world opinion about it. It can interrogate people it has arrested to find out the whereabouts of the missing trainees in the camp where the mumbai terrorists were trained. According to reports, there were 25 of them of which ten were meant for the mumbai attacks. If Pak authorities can find out where the others are even if can determine what are their intended targets, it will immediately establish their credibility.

Will they do it? I am not betting my depleted stock account on it.