August 5, 2019 is proving to be watershed moment for the region. India unilaterally abrogated article 370 and changed the status quo. Although it was direct attack on UN resolution and Pakistan’s stance, but Pakistan showed restrain. Pakistan is working with global system and wants to win it by applying rules of law. Pakistan is fighting the case of Kashmir at all forums. It is good policy to avert war but the chances of success of this policy is limited or no chances at all. We have seen many times that global law does not protect the weak, in this case the Kashmiris, and it only protects the interests of strong. Palestine is glaring example of this reality. Everybody knows that Israel has occupied the land, but system does not support Palestine. Rather the system is declaring the Palestine people as terrorist.
We can also count a number of other cases including invasion of Iraq, Libya, Syria, sanctions on Venezuela, Palestine, and Afghanistan etc. Western powers played havoc in these countries without feeling any pressures or facing accountability. India learnt this strategy and is trying to apply the strategy in the region. The current actions of India highlight that it had made two glaring or strategic mistakes in calculations, as it has been pointed out by many writers and experts. First, India thinks that West need India to counter China, so that India can do anything and will find supporters in West, especially form USA. Second, India is a military might. India started to take unilateral decisions and presented itself as hegemonic power. However, India forget that neither India has might of any Western power but most importantly nor regional countries are weak like above mentioned countries. India met with this reality at Doklam and after Balakot incident, but India refused to learn.
Rather than learning from these incidents India adopted an all-out conflict policy. India first changed the status quo in Kashmir. Regrettably, world community did not show strength to counter the move of India. World community seems to be more interested in economic benefit rather than human rights. It became more shameful as world took it as an opportunity to sell the arms and secure substantial economic benefits. UN was also unable to play any meaningful role, due to dubious role of so-called champions of human right from the West, which gave India feeling of hegemonic power. Owning to these reasons, region is constantly under the threat of hot conflict between Pakistan and India. It is also evident from the hot exchanges at line of control. Although Pakistan is showing patience right now, but the question is how long Pakistan can show patience. Patience also has a limit.
Now India is trying to apply the same strategy with China. It started to interfere with LAC. China started to warn the India and tell them to remember the Doklam incident and try to avoid any interference. China clearly stated that no interference will be tolerated. Despite the clear warning and advice India did not refrained from interfering. China took it very seriously and applied the stringent measures to force India to stop the interference. The worst impact of interference has started to emerge. On 15 June, a bloody clash happened between the armies of two countries. It resulted in the causalities of 20 Indian soldier and many more injured. It is feared the causalities will increase as many injured soldiers are in critical condition. The situation is still tense at the LAC. It has endangered the peace of whole region.
India wants to be global economic power, which is legitimate right of India but the path they have adopted it will only lead to disaster
Indian actions are not only targeting Pakistan and China but also its longtime allies like Bangladesh and Nepal. Nepal is also in standoff position with India. Nepal has strongly condemned the unilateral actions of India on border. Bangladesh is annoyed over the citizen act.
The question is why India doing this? What India wants to achieve? The analysis shows that the elite of India is deeply misguided by the assumption that they can be hegemonic power in region. They need to understand that there is no space for hegemonic power even at global level. It is evident from the struggle of USA to sustain its hegemonic power but with no success. Global system is now moving towards multi-players system and there is intense competition among the countries. China has even challenged the hegemony of USA at global level, then how can China tolerate this behavior at regional level.
Second, Indian elite also thinks that India is a military might, which is completely baseless assumption. Third, India think that due to its market size countries will try to appease India. It is again wrong assumption, at least in the case of China. China is way ahead of India in this field. China has launched BRI and more than 129 countries are cooperating with China under this program. Even many Western countries are in race to build long term economic relation with China. It is evident from the planned meeting between President Xi Jinping and leaders of the European Union in September 2020. The traditional strong hold of India in African markets has also been challenged by China. Now African countries are following China enthusiastically and building multidimensional partnerships. Lastly, India wants to be global economic power, which is legitimate right of India but the path they have adopted it will only lead to disaster.
If India wants to be economic power it has to learn from China, even from 1800s, 1900s, USA, how these countries avoided conflicts and try to forge the cooperation. Hence, India needs to change path of conflict and engage in purposeful activities. For that purpose, first of all, India needs to come out of illusion of military might or market size. The market size of China is bigger and more developed. Second, India needs to stop listening to interest groups from different countries. Those interest groups will be interested only of their economic or political benefits not of India.
Lastly, India needs to learn to work with neighboring countries and forge partnerships for bringing prosperity to region. For that purpose, there is need to establish a forum for enhancing cooperation among three leading countries of the region, with name of China-Pakistan-India Tri-lateral Forum. The starting point would be to start a tri-lateral dialogue to break the iceamong the countries. The dialogue should be started immediately without any ifs and buts. It is direly needed at this point of time to control the expanding conflicts. The tri-lateral dialogue can be launched under the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) as three parties are members of the SCO. The second, step would be to convert this into a permanent forum.
It is assumed that the creation of tri-lateral forum will pave way for sustainable peace and prosperity in region. The conflicts will only lead to disasters, which no country can bear. Therefore, the wise strategy would be to cooperate and bury the conflicts. If we are successful to cooperate, then future generations will be thankful to us.
The writer is Director, Asia Study Center, SDPI