CSS Forums - President Bush’s odyssey

For India awards, for Afghanistan applause, and for Pakistan pious vows, if not expectations; how else can you truthfully describe President Bush’s just-concluded journeys to these three nations? He gave a nuclear deal to Indian that would leave it with its fast breeder reactors unmonitored to keep producing as much fuel for weapons as it likes, with Pakistan desperately trailing all the time to maintain its minimum deterrence at great economic costs. He was all praise for President Hamid Karzai, whose effective authority doesn’t run beyond his own mansion, for taking his people marching on the road of democracy. And for Pakistan? Well, much may have transpired in his meeting with his host, President Pervez Musharraf. But what came to the public fore wasn’t that exhilarating. It was only promises or expectations, nothing tangible to dance and sing about.

Before his visit, the official spin-doctors here had put out that a raft of agreements and memoranda of understanding would be signed when he arrives in Islamabad. None was signed. Not even a bilateral investment treaty, which they had touted to be the opener of new vistas of trade and economic ties between the two countries. For the nuclear deal with India, the American officials had burnt the midnight oil with their Indian interlocutors to finalise it for signing during his New Delhi visit. No such urgency was shown by the Americans to close this investment agreement with Pakistan for its signing during his Islamabad sojourn.

And if some incorrigible optimists, who were reading a lot in US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s magic words “not for the time being” to give themselves to the delusion that an India-like nuclear deal could also come to Pakistan, their hopes were put paid by Mr. Bush. He left no doubt about it that for such a deal his administration doesn’t view India and Pakistan alike but differently. The only sop he had for Pakistan was that his energy secretary would come here some time to discuss its energy needs. What thereafter, he didn’t mention that, too. Is this how the Bush administration is to augment America’s strategic partnership with Pakistan on long-term basis?
Nor was there anything new about his utterances on the Kashmir issue, which the spin-doctors had stated to be his discussions’ focal point with his host. America, he stated, could play a facilitator’s role, which it was performing, but the issue has to be resolved through bilateral negotiations by the two leaders of India and Pakistan, whom he paid rich tributes for conducting them courageously. But this is neither here nor there, even as the issue might have been discussed intensively by the two presidents in their talks. If something big emerged in those discussions, that is a different matter. But these public statements do not signify any extraordinary interest on his part to use his clout for the settlement of this dispute which is so fundamental to lasting peace and normality on the subcontinent.
I
n these times, President Musharraf has publicly floated many a proposal for resolving the dispute, only to draw silence or rejection from the Indian leadership. For whatever reasons, Mr. Bush didn’t allude to these initiatives in his public discourse either in New Delhi or in Islamabad. But he was not a wee bit reticent in stating, at least in his Indian media encounters, that he would take up India’s allegations of cross-border terrorism in his meetings with the Pakistan leadership during his visit to Islamabad.

By every reckoning, it was terrorism that was the main agenda of his visit to Islamabad. And even as he spoke some words of praise for President Musharraf’s commitment to fight this evil out and Pakistan’s role in the war on terror, the Indian and the Afghan allegations of cross border infiltration had apparently carried much weight with him. This was quite evident from his pronouncement that much needs to be done to nab the al-Qaeda leaders and fighters. Our own grouse, which we presume was voiced by our leadership in the meeting with him, that Afghanistan has become the hub of Indian intelligence agencies to wok against us, doesn’t seem to have bothered him any measurably. He, in fact, wants Pakistan to pull out his chestnuts from the fire in Afghanistan, no matter whatever costs it, as do the Indians in occupied Kashmir. And it is for our leaders to ponder very seriously over the pros and cons of what we are expected to do.

[B]And we really are shocked the way our commentators and private media channels have projected his visit in relation to our prevalent political dispensation.[/B] The elite across the spectrum may have appointed the Americans this country’s headmasters and viceroys, but the people do not recognise them to be so. They abhor the interference of foreigners, whoever they be, in our internal matters which they want our own leaders to resolve themselves without seeking the guidance or meddling of the outsiders. [B]Isn’t it disgraceful that panelists of the talk shows were focussed on what this visit meant for our internal political matters and not as much on what it meant for our international relationships, especially the ties with the United States? Something has really gone wrong with our elite across the spectrum.[/B]