KARGIL: IN PERSPECTIVE
The Kargil developments have three
dimensions--military, diplomatic and political.
Militarily, it is a joint
counter-insurgency operation in our territory by the army and the air force, but it is the
most technically complex and professionally difficult counter-insurgency operation ever
undertaken anywhere in the world due to the following reasons:
* Our forces are confronted with not indigenous insurgents,
but an invading force of well-trained, well-armed and experienced
mercenaries-cum-terrorists of Afghan war vintage buttressed by Pakistani army regulars.It
is invasion across the legally-sanctified Line of Control (LOC) under the cover of
insurgency.
The difficult terrain in this area with 15,000 feet plus high ridges gives the initial
advantage to the invader and the breaker of international law and treaties.Since the
invaders' encampments are located on high ridges and not at ground level and at a distance
of about 6 kms from Pakistani territory, aircraft manoeuvrability is restricted lest
inadvertent violations of Pakistani air space lead to unwise escalation and diplomatic
incidents.
* It is not a counter-insurgency operation with no holds
barred, but one carried out in carefully measured pace with voluntarily-assumed do's
and dont's to avoid a wider conflagaration.
The Indian Air
Force operations have two main objectives:
* To soften the encampments as a prelude to ground
operations by the army.
* To monitor the activities in the encampments through aerial surveillance before
and during the army operations.
The Army operations have four
objectives:
* To protect the civilian population.
* To prevent any further ingress by the invaders.
* To frustrate the invaders' attempts to disrupt communications on the vital
Srinagar-Leh road.
* Ultimately, to clear the infiltrators from the ridges occupied by them,end the
occupation of Indian territory and restore the sanctity of the LOC.
The difficulties faced by the Air Force arise from the
following:
* The location of the encampments at high altitudes, which
reduces the distance between the encampments and the aircraft and thereby makes evasive
action more difficult.
* The supply by the Pakistan Army and the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to the
invading force of the Stinger shoulder-fired, heat-seeking missiles and other
sophisticated anti-aircraft weapons, which the ISI had received from the US Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA) for use against Soviet aircraft during the Afghan war.The
reported use of a Stinger by the invaders against an IAF helicopter has discredited past
US assurances, discounting the dangers of the likely use of this weapon by the insurgents
and terrorists in Kashmir because of the limited life period of their batteries and the
non-supply (as claimed by the US) of any fresh batteries to the ISI after
1988.
The difficulties of the Army are due to the
following:
* The high ridges occupied by the invaders make the Army's
advance slow and costly in human terms.
* The advance is made more difficult by the continuous heavy artillery support
provided by the Pakistan Army to the invaders, which renders dangerous the transport of
troops to the higher ridges by choppers.
* The continuous reinforcement of the encampments by the Pakistani Army and ISI rear
bases located in Pakistani-controlled territory. To avoid an unwise escalation, the Indian
Army and the Air Force have to forego the legitimate right to hit at the rear
bases.
Reports available so far have identified the composition of
the invading force as consisting of the following:
- Pakistani army regulars.
- Mercenaries of the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM), which was declared as an
international terrorist organisation by the US in October,1997.
- Mercenaries of the Lashkar-e-Toiba, the militant wing of the Markaz Dawa Al
Irshad.
- Mercenaries of the Al Badr, which consists of many Afghans.
- Members of bin Laden's Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami also known as
Tehrik-e-Jihad and also as Al Qaeda (The Base).
These organisations are all members of the
International Islamic Front For Jihad Against the US and Israel formed by Osama bin Laden
last year and their leaders had signed the fatwa issued by bin Laden in February last year
calling for terrorist strikes against the US and Israel.
In view of the difficulties faced by the Army and the
Air Force and the care and caution required of them to avoid a wider conflagaration, it
would not be reasonable to expect quick results. The ultimate vacation of the aggression
on our territory and the restoration of the sanctity of the LOC and the time and tactics
required for these objectives have to be left to the Army and the Air Force and their
professionalism.All that the rest of the population need do is to stand united behind them
and let them know that the nation's prayers, good wishes and admiration are with
them.
DIPLOMATIC DIMENSION
Diplomatically, the Pakistani objective was to bring the Kashmir
issue back in the media headlines and on the international agenda and manoeuvre its
diplomatic moves in such a way as to have its violation of the sanctity of the LOC and
occupation of Indian territoty legitimised through international intervention.
It has not so far succeeded. The issue is back in the media
headlines, but for reasons which are detrimental to Pakistan. Since 1995, India has been
saying that the Kashmir insurgency was no longer being waged by indigenous Kashmiris, but
by mercenaries of various Pakistan and Afghanistan-based terrorist organisations
instigated, trained and armed by the ISI, but the international community exhibited
misgivings about the validity of the Indian contention.
Now, Western intelligence organisations, through their own
independent enquiries, have identified the invading force in the Kargil sector as
consisting of Pakistan-backed mercenaries of Afghan war vintage, with close links to bin
Laden.
Most Western analysts, having access to their
intelligence officers, have concluded as follows:
* There has been a violation of the LOC by a
Pakistani-backed invasion force.
* The operation has all the hallmarks of an ISI operation
and could not have been undertaken without the knowledge of the Pakistani Prime Minister,
Mr.Nawaz Sharif.
In this connection, it would be worthwhile to quote from the New
Delhi-datelined despatch of Mr.Julian West of the "Electronic Telegraph"
of the UK (May 30):
"Western intelligence believes that many (of the invaders) are Afghan, Pakistani and
even international Muslim militants backed by Pakistan's ISI. Principal among these is Al
Badr, a terrorist group linked to Osama bin Laden.An intelligence source, who believes
about 3,000 to 5,000 militants are currently being trained in various camps run by the
Pakistani intelligence in Pakistan and possibly Afghanistan, said:" This current
operation has all the hallmarks of the ISI....It could not have been launched without the
knowledge of the Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif.".
Discussing the likely Pakistani motives, he
then adds:
"What puzzles many observers, however, is why Mr.Sharif---who only three months ago
signed a declaration of entente with India----should instigate what amounts to a virtual
declaration of war. The answer may lie in Pakistan's long-standing wish to
internationalise the Kashmir issue, as well as a desire to tie up Indian troops and
embarrass India's caretaker Government. Western intelligence sources also believe
that the ISI is simply pursuing its customary agenda of fomenting instability within the
territories bordering Pakistan."
Mr.Shujaat Bukhari, the Srinagar
correspondent of "The Hindu" of Chennai, has reported (June 4) as follows from
Kargil:
"In Batalik, 80 per cent of the intruders are stated to be Afghan and Taliban
militiamen with a significant number from the Osama bin Laden camp."
How did these people come to the Kargil-Dras-Batalik area?
To answer this question, one has to go back to the first week February, when Mr.Strobe
Talbott, the US Deputy Secretary of State, visited Islamabad for talks on the
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. He was accompanied by Mr.Karl Inderfurth, Assistant
Secretary of State, Gen. Joseph Ralston, Vice-Chairman, US Joint Chiefs of Staff, and a
team of CIA and FBI officers handling the operation for the capture and extradition of bin
Laden.
On February 1, Maulvi Jalil Akhund, the Deputy Foreign
Minister of the Taliban Government in Afghanistan, was flown from Kandahar to Islamabad in
a special ISI plane. Initially, he met Mr.Nawaz Sharif and his Foreign Minister,Mr.Sartaj
Aziz. Thereafter, Mr.Inderfurth went to Mr.Aziz's house and met Maulvi Akhund
there.
Mr.Inderfurth then went to Peshawar and met the
moderate, anti-Taliban Mujahideen leaders based there and sought their co-operation in
tracing bin Laden and his accomplices wanted by the FBI.
During their meetings, Mr.Talbott and
Mr.Inderfurth reportedly made it clear to their Pakistani and Afghan interlocutors that
the US was determined to capture bin Laden, with their co-operation, if possible, and
without it, if necessary,
Rattled by these warnings, Mr.Sharif went to the ISI
headquarters and had discussions with Gen.Pervez Musharraf, his Chief of the Army
Staff (COAS), and Lt.Gen. Ziauddin,the new ISI Director-General,on what to do with bin
Laden and his 1,000 folllowers---about 300 belonging to his Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami and
the remaining 700 from the HUM, the Lashkar and the Al Badr, who were camping in Afghan
territory adjoining Pakistani border.No announcement was made about what was
decided.
On February 13, Mr.Mohammad Tayyab, a Taliban
spokesman, told a Press conference at Kandahar as follows:
"bin Laden has disappeared. We didn't ask him to leave. We don't know where he
is."
On March 2, Zafar Iqbal of the Laskar-e-Toiba told a
press conference at Muzzafarabad in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir that the Lashkar had invited
bin Laden to join the "freedom struggle" in Kashmir. He added: "Osama is
our erstwhile colleague. We had fought jointly against the Soviet troops in
Afghanistan."
The US refused to accept the Taliban's claim that bin
Laden, his lieutenants and their force of about 1,000 had left Afghanistan and intensified
satellite surveillance of the area to locate them. The US Congressional committees dealing
with national security held frequent meetings at which Mr.Inderfurth was required to
report progress in tracing bin Laden and his group.
The satellite surveillance was reported to have
indicated that during March, the Pakistan Army and the ISI transported this entire group
to the Skardu region of the Northern Areas (NA) and then helped them in creating new
sanctuaries for themselves on the ridges in the Kargil area.While the individual presence
of bin Laden and his lieutenants in the Kargil area has not yet been established, there is
no doubt about the presence of their followers in this area.
Thus, the US and other Western powers have their own
independent evidence regarding Pakistan's use of bin Laden's mercenary force from
Afghanistan for attempting to change the LOC in this sector through occupation of Indian
territory.It is this which explains their strong support for the Indian version of the
recent developments and their action in spurning Pakistan's attempt to have the issue
internationalised in order to secure post-facto legitimisation of its proxy
invasion.
At the same time, despite the independent, authentic
evidence available with them, the US and other Western powers are not prepared to go to
the extent of condemning Pakistan, declaring it a State-sponsor of International
Terrorism, suspending the execution of the IMF's rescue package for the Pakistani economy
and re-imposing the other economic sanctions which were lifted or eased by the Clinton
Administration last year.
The Nawaz Sharif Government also seems to be reasonably
confident that while the US might exercise political and moral pressure on it, which it
could withstand, it would not go to the extent of taking any punitive action against it.
This confidence arises from the ISI's role in Kosovo.
It is not widely known that the working relationship
between the ISI and the CIA continues to be strong, though possibly not as strong as
during the Afghan war. During Mrs.Benazir Bhutto's second tenure as Prime Minister from
1993 to 1996, the CIA had used the ISI for training the Bosnian Muslims and for acting as
a conduit for the supply of arms and ammunition to them. The supplies were made from the
surplus stocks of the Afghan war weapons left with the ISI.Many retired ISI officers,
including Lt.Gen. Hamid Gul, DG of the ISI in the late 1980s, were deputed to Bosnia to
act as advisers to the Bosnian Muslims.The US did not look upon the HUM and the
Lashkar-e-Toiba as terrorist organisations at that time and had encouraged them to go to
Bosnia to assist the local Muslims against the Serbs.
Similarly,the ISI has been closely involved since the
beginning of this year in the training of the Kosovo Liberation Army and in the supply of
arms and ammunition to them. By using the ISI as the intermediary,the CIA is able to
maintain its deniability of any role in training and arming the KLA.Mr.Shabaz Sharif, the
brother of Mr.Nawaz Sharif, and the Chief Minister of Punjab, has been co-ordinating this
operation for the training of the KLA and had made a low-profile visit to Washington at
the beginning of the NATO air strikes for discussions with officials of the CIA and the
State and Defence Departments on this issue.
In view of this, it may not be realistic on our part to
expect the US to go to the extent of taking any punitive action against Pakistan unless
and until the Indian forces are able to get the smoking gun in the form of capture alive
or dead of bin Laden and/or any of his lieutenants figuring in the FBI's wanted list.Even
if we get the smoking gun, the US might still wriggle out of taking any punitive
action against Pakistan by saying that there is no evidence that the Pakistani Government
was aware of the presence of bin Laden and/or his associates in the Kargil
area.
The US took a similar excuse during the Mumbai blasts of 1993.
The Indian investigative agencies captured hand-grenades of Austrian design from the
perpetrators of the blasts and got a certificate from the Austrian factory which sold the
design to Pakistan that the grenades had been manufactured with the machinery supplied by
it to Pakistan. They also recovered chemical explosive timers of US ordnance manufacture
which had been supplied by the CIA to the ISI.Despite this, officials of the Clinton
Administration took the stand that this evidence, though proving that the explosive
material and the hand-grenades used in Mumbai had come from Pakistan Govt. stocks, did not
necessarily prove that the Nawaz Sharif Government was aware of this.
However,this should not make us relent in
our efforts to collect and collate all evidence having a bearing on this subject and
present it to the international community.
POLITICAL DIMENSION
The political dimension relates to the
questions whether it was wise to have started a comprehensive and composite dialogue
process with Pakistan at Lahore and whether we should resume even a limited dialogue with
Pakistan till the status quo ante is restored.As two nuclear powers with a common land
border, there is no alternative to a dialogue and to keeping the lines of
communications open in the best as well as in the worst of times.India's trust in
the words of Mr.Nawaz Sharif has been belied and we have been stabbed in the back . One
should condemn the stabber and not the stabbed for not all the time looking over his
shoulder. At the same time, there is a valid case for avoiding overexpectations from
any dialogue with Pakistan because of the mindset of its leaders and the byzantine nature
of the society and its power structure.While continuing to maintain a dialogue with
Pakistan, we should keep in view the fact that in the history books for Pakistani
children, it is not Akbar, but Aurangazeb who is projected as an ideal ruler to be
emulated. We should be wiser by the post-Lahore events and avoid walking into
another trap.
B.Raman
(5-6-99)
(The writer is Additional Secretary (Retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India,
and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai.
E-mail: corde@vsnl.com )
