Husain Haqqani at UC Berkeley

Ras- You are a great writer...I think in the tradition of Tagore. Pakistan Zindabad!

re:#34 by aqazi

``Its always interesting to hear the Indian point of view on things. Always championing the great cause of peace. Did it EVER occur to any of you BJP fundos that had it not been the imperial India imposing its will on Kashmiris and forcing them to subjugation, Pakistan would have probably been one of the strongest Indian ally???? ``
Ha, Ha, Ha. Thanks for the good laugh. You are either naieve or cunning.
The difference between India and pak is ideological coming out of 2 nation theory, of which Kashmir is only a sad and tragic manifestation. Nothing would change even if Kashmir problem were to be solved tomorrow to everyone`s satisfaction.

``If on one hand India accepts the creation of Pakistan, then by God, there`s no argument that can stand against Kashmir joining Pakistan.``
As Clinton said one time: 2 wrongs do not make a right.

``The only thing standing in the way of peace between the two countries is the big Bunya ego.``
Not really. Deep down in South, even Tamilians are saying it is good to kick some Paki A$$. You see, Kargil changed everything. It brought the ugly face of Paki Mujahideens into everyone`s drawing rooms.
``Think of what Mahatma Gandhi would say about Kashmir.``
Gandhi defended the GOI`s action in Kashmir in 1947. If you do not believe me, do some research.
My advice to you: stop blabbering like a fool.
Sridhar

pmishra2 #64
I just realised that I infact am a baniya as charged and perhaps you are a brahmin.. Need any thing more be said? :)

nawaid #62
PS: No I am not defending BJP at all costs. I support the Central govt.(in which BJP is the main party)stand on J&K and Pakistan and I oppose BJP on Hindutva and in Gujarat.

sadna #64


You don`t get it do you? Every hindu is definitionally fascist. Every hindu has a secret commitment (``Protocol of the Elders of Hindutva``) to Bal Thackeray and Praveen Togadia. This is why there are no muslims left in India. Whereas in the land of the pure, the historically 20% hindu minority is now double that ! ooops, I meant 1/20th. But never mind...

nawaid #62
`defending BJP at any cost`

Huh? If jihadis come from Multan and Gujranwala, or if the Pakistani Army doesnot want to fight a war for Indian J&K, what does it have to do with the BJP and why am I accused of `defending the BJP `?

Sadhna#

[Its amazing that Pakistanis come all the way from Multan and Gujranwala to kill election candidates and participants in Jammu Kashmir without any interest in the elections IN Multan and Gujranwala. Its amazing you have no money for schools but there are a lot of donations for jihad. Noone in India thinks Pakistanis want Kashmiris `decide their own future`, because its land grab looking for a toehold. If Pakistanis feel so strongly about self determination, what prevents them from using their wonderful army and taking over Indian J&K and giving them the `right to decide their future`? No guts? }

amazing country? amazing people? of course as some one pointed out, its brain washing which is a result of Jalahat ......any way, i wanted to discuss the strategy of the India Govt, i never tried to defend Paksitan Army`s role here....but it seems that you are defending BJP at any cost because of interaction with a Paksitani......coz i read times of India daily and there Indians are quite critical of their Govt`s role but i dont think that going to come out on chowk............again, what i can see is too much obsession and importance for Pakistan.........

{Your comments about J&K CM Mufti`s interactions and even quarrels with the Central Goverment in Delhi demonstrate your ignorance about indian democracy and federalism. Such quarrels and give-and-take are completely part of the indian system. The states are quite powerful in their own domain and all CMs have these kinds of debates with the center. }

Mishra ji these debates are part of every democratic system, i was just wondering that it may be more appropriate if BJP can realise why Mufti Saheb released militants, of course its both its India`s internal politics and parties always fight.........and BJP should involve in more debates and qurrels with Gujrat Govt.

[There has been and will continue to be a huge impact on Pakistan of this policy. Jihadism and use of religous para-militaries have already led to huge impact on Pakistani economy. So, yes, certainly you can feel you have ``won`` --- India has to make such an effort to control these 2000-3000 trained islamist guerrillas ! Its large army cannot eliminate them. What a great victory ! But what have you ``won``? Not much, I am afraid]

India is asking for sanctions against Paksitan, sactions continued from MAY 1998 till 9/11....nothing much happned, Paksitan somehow survived...........do you think Paksitan army care about economy, i dont think so! and i dont think US going to attack Paksitan coz of infiltration in Kashmir. Any way, if all of you defending BJP Govt`s role here then i guess its one sided debate with no outcome.

By the way Mr. Haqqani was a leader of the Jamiat, the student wing of the Jamaat-i-Islami. He was the president of the Karachi University students union in the seventies.

Humsab #54:
[* Jinnah was an extremely intelligent man leading a secular, honest life. Do you think, he actually believed that he could use `muslim identity card` without getting into religious distinctiveness quagmire? ]
I think he actually believed it. The reason is simple. British have been doing it for 100 years by warming pockets of sufis, pirs, gaddi nasheens and mullahs. Next door in Afghanistan also this had been the standard procedure which Russians did not follow and paid the price.
In 1947 and before, Saudi Arabia and wahabiat had no influence. The deobandi movement did not have the teeth as they do now because of coldwar politics and Saudi influence. Jamaat-e-Islami was negligible in influence. All Jinnah had to do was to bribe sufis and pirs. As I said in the previous post, ML leadership outside UP and Bengal did not have leaders who could excite public like Bhutto. Either use religious card or face defeat in the all important election.
[* Secondly, most of Pakistani secular intelligentia believe that had Jinnah survived longer, Pakistan would have been different. Do you think, Jinnah would have been able to take U-turn after getting a country on the basis of religious identity even after giving that much quoted August speech? I believe after giving that idea of religious distinctiveness and rubbing that in vigorously for a few years, it would not have been possible for even Jinnah to chart a totally different course at the end. Here, the distinction between Jinnah and Nehru is that Nehru never used religious identity card. ]
Had Jinnah lived, he would have opted for cnstitution rather than elections because after split with most popular Bengali leader Suharwardi, ML would have lost in Bengal and in Punjab, Sindh, NWFP and Balochistan had to resort to same Muslim identity card against resurgent ethnic based leaders. Not much happened in Rawalpindi when Liaquat Ali Khan was assassinated overthere because ML was no longer popular. Jinnah would have proposed a secular constitution quickly alongwith warming pockets of religious figures to keep them quiet. He would have opted for acceptance of distinct native cultures and weaker center. He would have realized earlier the fatal potential of unity in oneness of everything important. sooner or later, he would have to go for election and TNT and its extensions would not have won him votes. He would have been forced to play politics local style.
Basically it was wrong to have two horse european style race in subcontinent. The local cultures and conditions demanded free for all race but British made it impossible for more than two horses. A race between many horses and localized would have delayed independence but possibly with better outcome. They should have given independence to Bengal and allowed ethno-nationalism to compete against Congress and ML for few years to get an idea for the rest of subcontinent. I bet at the end of the day, Bengali nationalism would have defeated both Congress and ML.

Anyone else catch Husain Haqqani on the CBS program ``Sixty Minutes``
last night? He seemed to make a lot of sense!

Ras

nawaid #53

Your comments about J&K CM Mufti`s interactions and even quarrels with the Central Goverment in Delhi demonstrate your ignorance about indian democracy and federalism. Such quarrels and give-and-take are completely part of the indian system. The states are quite powerful in their own domain and all CMs have these kinds of debates with the center. Of course, not all of them have to deal with 2000-3000 well funded and armed fanatics !

Finally, an insurgency that is supported by millions ($$$) in funding from Gulf States and Pakistani goverment is not going to easily die down. India is relatively open society (compared to its neighbors it is very open) and terrorists can penetrate it without great difficulty. To an extent this is true of the industrialized West as well. So, the continuation of violence in J&K mostly means that the stupid people funding the extremists havent yet given up, just as attacks on WTC and western toursist demonstrates that well-organized murderers will always find victims.

There has been and will continue to be a huge impact on Pakistan of this policy. Jihadism and use of religous para-militaries have already led to huge impact on Pakistani economy. So, yes, certainly you can feel you have ``won`` --- India has to make such an effort to control these 2000-3000 trained islamist guerrillas ! Its large army cannot eliminate them. What a great victory ! But what have you ``won``? Not much, I am afraid.

Here is a small sample of the fall-out:

http://www.sulekha.com/redirectnh.asp?cid=274117

Exporters were expecting an increase in demand in 2001 to $42 million from $20-25 million in 2000, but under present conditions, exports were predicted to range between $16-17 million. Over 70 per cent of exports are destined for the US.

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nawaid #various

If Pakistanis donot get to decide about their own futures, and didnot let the Afghans `decide their own futures` noone pays attention to them lecturing Indians on what to do about other Indians such as Jammu- Kashmiris. If Pakistan had genuinely wanted Kashmiris to decide their futures, they wouldnot have initiated war in 1948, then refused to implement terms of referendum later, then attacked Kashmir in 1965 and then signed Simla agreement in 1971. Later after 1989, if Pakistanis wanted Kahsmiris to decide their future, Pakistanis wouldnot have suppressed the independence-minded Kashmiris, killed Kashmiri moderates including Hindus and injected Afghan veterans into the struggle.

Its amazing that Pakistanis come all the way from Multan and Gujranwala to kill election candidates and participants in Jammu Kashmir without any interest in the elections IN Multan and Gujranwala. Its amazing you have no money for schools but there are a lot of donations for jihad. Noone in India thinks Pakistanis want Kashmiris `decide their own future`, because its land grab looking for a toehold. If Pakistanis feel so strongly about self determination, what prevents them from using their wonderful army and taking over Indian J&K and giving them the `right to decide their future`? No guts?


You also need to apply yourself more to Indian news. The Mufti was being blamed for indirectly increasing violence by releasing militants. To which his government and Sonia Gandhi replied that militants were released only after checking with the intelligence community.

Yashwant Sinha himself didnot blame Mufti, he even said its too early to judge the performance of the Mufti government. BJP did create a noise about Mufti releasing militants to embarrass Sonia Gandhi and the Cong before the Gujarat elections, but in its Gujarat campaign it is also holding up the successful elections and change of government in J&K as a BJP achievement. It is an achievement, but doesnot mean people will refrain from criticising their political opponents. Thats the way democracy works.

I watched Yashwant Sinha in Hardtalk too, btw, where he denied a BJP role in the Gujarat riots. That shameful part came in the end of a good interview of which you seem to have conveniently forgotten everything else he said, including about being grateful for only one of WTC falling and hence holding talks with Osama.

The US can now sympathise with Indian complaints of infiltration to/from Pakistan because it keeps appearing in the Western press how they are having the same problem with Taliban/Al Qaeda on your western borders in Afghanistan.

SameerJB # 43

First of all, thanks for such an informative piece. You are walkiing encycleopedia on most of the subjects.
I agree with your analysis but can you throw some light on following points:-

* Jinnah was an extremely intelligent man leading a secular, honest life. Do you think, he actually believed that he could use `muslim identity card` without getting into religious distinctiveness quagmire?

* Secondly, most of Pakistani secular intelligentia believe that had Jinnah survived longer, Pakistan would have been different. Do you think, Jinnah would have been able to take U-turn after getting a country on the basis of religious identity even after giving that much quoted August speech? I believe after giving that idea of religious distinctiveness and rubbing that in vigorously for a few years, it would not have been possible for even Jinnah to chart a totally different course at the end. Here, the distinction between Jinnah and Nehru is that Nehru never used religious identity card.

Whatever I have written above that should not give any idea that Cogress or majority community of India was not responsible for 1947. That issue is historically different.
But what I want to stress is that Pakistani public should open up and start looking at their one and only one icon Jinnah also critically without getting emotional. This has happened in India more that a decade ago and Nehru and Gandhi are no longer considered infallible. This has no way reduced their respect in public mind.

This particular article by Ishtiaq Ahned, I liked because not many Pakistani try to tread this path. And then Ishtiaq Ahmed does believe in genuine peace in the sub-continent.

arjun_m#51
+++That logic obviously didnt apply whe Pakistan GIFTED away part of Kashmir to China. +++++

ok, here i dont get it... may be you can explain as i am not here to fight or calling names, ........................so Kashmiri ppl have no right to choose their future because Pakistan Army done something wrong in past................how that make sense!

and again one thing i never get it, it will be really helpful for me if someone can give me some info on that, what is strategy of Indian Govt`s here.........what is the capibility of Indian Army? when Paksitan were gifting Kashmir what Indian Army was doing to protect its Kashmir? `` we cant stop infiltration Please USA and western world ask Paksitan to stop infiltration............it seems that Paksitan is controling the region..............i heard that its more then 500,000 army in Jammu? How people cross LOC if that much troops are in border....Indian spending million of Dollars on what?

either Indian army is really hopeless or its really a freedom struggle which cant be controlled.

May be its not Indian Army`s fault, one day PM visits troops at border and asked Jawans to be ready as time has come for final fight.....second day suddenly something happens and sky become clear, third day PM feels that he is very tired should go on vacations at HamachalPerdesh.....excellent moral boosting technique.........................

nawaid #49

[quote]
.....you people seem more obssesed to Paksitan then Pakistani to Kashmir.
[end-quote]

The day Pakistan stops funding mass murderers in J&K, it will dissapear of the screen in India. Growing up in the 60s and 70s, I barely recall a discussion about Pakistan (70-71 is an exception).

But then creation of jihad is the only successful Pakistani export ! How can you abandon it! Only when the stick is shown and complete banruptcy arrives ! Don`t worry, post Iraq both of these eventualities will ariive.