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C O M M E N T A R Y
Perilous liberalism
The new NSA has to live down his past as a pro-US Pakistan appeaser, says N.V.Subramanian.
25 January 2010: It is perhaps too early to find fault with the tasking of the new national security advisor (NSA), Shiv Shankar
Menon, but some issues deserve attention. The good part is that a few suggestions, quite incidentally advanced by this writer, and
after the most objective analysis of the situation, have been accepted. Intelligence related to counter-terrorism will go directly to the
internal security establishment lead by the Union home minister, P.Chidambaram. At the same time, Manmohan Singh, from all
accounts, will receive the complete intelligence details, and it will consequently be upto the PM to decide what actions to take on
them, and who to delegate responsibilities for this.
But in naming Menon as his NSA, some uncomfortable issues arise. The PM is entirely within his rights to choose his NSA. As this
writer has argued before, part of the qualifications for the job is the NSA's proximity to the PM. Menon, according to media reports,
is trusted by the prime minister, as Brajesh Mishra was before by A.B.Vajpayee. But there are considerations beyond trust and
proximity. One of them relates to capacity and the second to orientation. As a former foreign secretary, Menon can hardly be
accused of not being a diplomatic pro, a key recent qualification for the post. But it is his orientation that is suspect, which raises
some uncomfortable questions, and controversially highlights certain tasking issues. Perhaps the matter relates not so much to
Menon as to Manmohan Singh's ideas related to relationship-building with Pakistan and China, but the issue could be raised from
the angle of the appointment of the new NSA.
Menon superseded several colleagues to become foreign secretary, and the considerations that enabled his appointment, which
are probably contained in sensitive cabinet files, have been barred from examination under the right to information law. The
suspicion is that as high commissioner to Pakistan, he got close to the American view of an Indo-Pak engagement on Kashmir,
which lead to the Havana goof-up (where Manmohan Singh declared Pakistan to be a victim of terrorism like India), and, near to the
end of his foreign-service career, the Sharm-el-Sheikh blunder (in which the PM agreed to look at Pakistani allegations about Indian
support to Baluch insurgency), the second of which Menon owned up to as a personal drafting bungle.
It appeared then and it seems more the case now that Menon was covering up for the Sharm-el-Sheikh botchery of the PM, who
shared his views on engaging with Pakistan on Kashmir. It is unclear if Menon got converted to Manmohan Singh's view on
Pakistan (and China), or it happened the other way, but the American hand seems to have been there in either or both cases, which
makes the new NSA conceivably the most pro-American of all those who have held that office, or perhaps as much as Mishra. It is
not very material whether an NSA is pro- or anti-American, but its impact on India's national-security interests certainly counts, and
it is disingenuous to argue in the case of an Americanophile incumbent that the impact will be minimal because India and the US
are friends. In foreign affairs, friendship comes many rungs below common interests, and the US and India do not share common
interests on a host of issues, including Pakistan, Kashmir, China, Afghanistan, climate change and non-proliferation subjects.
On China and Pakistan, there is reasonable consensus in the country. Both states prosecuted wars against India and occupy
Indian territories. Pakistan's proxy war against India and especially under a nuclear overhang since the Eighties and more
pronouncedly from the latter Nineties has complete Chinese blessing and encouragement. China has proliferated nuclear
weapons' technologies and exported nuclear delivery missiles to Pakistan using a third rogue state, North Korea, as a front to
contain and reverse India's rise. In the circumstances, while good relations with Pakistan and China are necessary, these cannot
be obtained -- or sought to be obtained -- by compromising India's national interests. Media stories say that Manmohan Singh
wants the new NSA to advance his "vision" on engaging China and Pakistan. The problem is that such engagement, if Havana and
Sharm-el-Sheikh are anything to go by, will harm India. If the United States, the sole superpower, cannot control Pakistani
behaviour, and indeed inhibit its state policy of terrorism, how does Manmohan Singh imagine India, he and the new NSA will be
successful?
There is a framework that can be designed to engage Pakistan, but it will have to exclude Kashmir. The phrase, "composite
dialogue", has to be buried or cremated as decently quickly as possible. The only sensible terms on which to engage Pakistan
remains to strengthen its democratic institutions, work to rightsize its army to a sixth of its present strength and entirely retrain it
for a counter-terrorism role with light weapons, extirpate its jihadi school and college syllabi and encourage the return of the
Left-liberal political forces. On any engagement with Pakistan, the PM (who is not elected) and the NSA, knowing their beliefs and
impulses, cannot act unilaterally, but gain cabinet consensus, especially the approval of the hugely experienced Pranab Mukherjee
and of Chidambaram, who has actually contained (if temporarily) Pakistan's capacity to terrorize India and make it malleable on J
and K. In addition, the defence minister, A.K.Anthony, must have to be brought on board, because he brings in the all-crucial
military view.
The Manmohan Singh government cannot take any action that undermines the national will to combat Pakistani terrorism on a
sustained basis. There is no compulsion or pressing urgency to engage Pakistan. This does not make for sterile policy, because
the important difference from before is that India is coming closer to being able to counter Pakistani terrorism. The logical next step
is to convince Pakistan of overwhelming retaliation for any terrorist strike that emerges from its soil. With the assistance of the
Union home ministry, that is what Menon should be first tasked with. The new NSA must be evaluated on his ability to make
Pakistan fearful of India. Everything else counts for a sellout.
N.V.Subramanian is Editor, www.NewsInsight.net, and writes internationally on strategic affairs. He has authored two novels,
University of Love (Writers Workshop, Calcutta) and Courtesan of Storms (Har-Anand, Delhi).
Please visit N.V.Subramanian's blog http://courtesanofstorms.blog.com/ and write to him at envysub@gmail.com.
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