The roles we play

Indian foreign secretary,Shiv Shankar Menon,in Washington a few days ago. The reports add that India rejected the suggestion outright. Before parsing the merits of the proposed troop reduction,we must return to the larger myth.

A myth by definition is fiction that is widely believed to be history. A careful reading of the record of the triangular relationship between India,Pakistan and the United States suggests that Washington has never been able to force New Delhi to comply with its demands on either Kashmir or the relationship with Islamabad.

It is not that Washington did not try. In the 50s when the Kashmir question was high on the agenda of the United Nations Security Council,in the early 60s when India went to the US for assistance in fighting against Maoist aggression from China,and in the early 90s when the Clinton administration characterised Kashmir as the worlds most dangerous nuclear flashpoint,Washington did embark upon diplomatic activism to resolve the Kashmir question and reframe the Indo-Pak relationship.

It is this well-established tradition in Washington,especially during the Democratic administrations,that Barack Obama seemed to embrace during his presidential campaign. Those familiar with the history of the triangular relationship were quick to point out that India,even at its weakest moments,did not accept American pressures on Kashmir and the relationship with Pakistan. An India that is so much stronger today has no reason at all to comply. It was also underlined that the surest way of killing any big idea for improving India-Pakistan ties would be American sponsorship for it.

The predictable and noisy Indian reaction to the Obama proposals on linking Afghanistan and Kashmir underlined the foreign policy establishments technique of passive resistance: hype up the foreign pressure,whip up domestic frenzy,and tell outsiders that the government has no room to give even an inch.

The first few weeks of the Obama administration seemed to suggest that both Washington and New Delhi have learnt to overcome their traditional impulses Americas ill-conceived diplomatic initiatives on Kashmir and Indias defensive over-reaction to them.

For its part,the Obama administration chose not to name India and Kashmir as part of Holbrookes formal mandate; as Washington took care of public optics,New Delhi was happy to receive the special envoy.

Although Holbrookes engagement with India seemed to start off well,it now appears that the establishments in Washington and New Delhi are reverting to form. That is the meaning of the latest media leaks on US pressure and Indian resistance on troop reductions.

As Washington completes its review of the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan,and President Obama signs off a new Af-Pak strategy in the next few days,India and the US will have a lot to talk about in the coming weeks.

Some of it might take place at the highest political level,when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh meets Obama for the first time on the margins of the G-20 summit in London early next month. Here below are a few thoughts on how New Delhi could make that conversation productive.

For one,India must come to terms with the fact that it could do with some international cooperation in addressing some of its problems with Pakistan. That bilateralism is not always the best way of dealing with Pakistan has been evident in the kind of successful joint investigations into the Mumbai attacks that India has undertaken with the US agencies.

Second,India is not the only one in need of help on Pakistan. President Obama needs it even more in managing the security threats to the US emanating from the Af-Pak region. Unlike India,which can and has lived with repeated set-backs in its Pakistan policy,Obama today cant afford failure in the badlands across the Durand Line.

If Al-Qaeda,which is consolidating in the Af-Pak region by aligning with the Taliban and other extremist groups,succeeds in launching another terror attack on the US,Obama knows that his political credibility may be lost irretrievably.

That both Washington and New Delhi need international cooperation in achieving their respective objectives takes us to a final proposition the immense scope for mutual give and take in the Af-Pak region.

If it can differentiate between the fixed and the flexible in its policy towards Pakistan,India would not be rejecting outright such American proposals as troop reductions. Instead,New Delhi would be asking Washington a simple question: what will India get in return for reducing the military temperature with Pakistan? Could the US get Pakistan to hand over those who plotted the Mumbai terror attacks? Would Pakistan dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism?

The moment it shifts away from its constricting tradition of passive resistance to strategic bargaining,New Delhi will find that it has a rare opportunity to leverage the current American concerns to achieve Indias own long-term interests in the Af-Pak region.

During the 1999 Kargil war and the military confrontation that followed the December 13,2001 attack on the Indian Parliament,Atal Bihari Vajpayee grasped that he could profitably redirect American pressures towards Pakistan.

In both these conflicts India positioned itself as the demandeur and was open to bargaining with the US. Despite the massive political imperatives on it after the Mumbai aggression,the Congress-led government seems bereft of either imagination or opportunism and has retreated back into the defensive shell of passive resistance.

The writer is a professor at S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies,Nanyang Technological University,Singapore

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