Indo-Pak saga of aggression and terrorism

The general belief is that much could be learnt from history and that history has answers to complex conflicts. However, we must always take that argument with a grain of salt. History is but an ocean of lies. History needs to be corrected in many instances. History at times, is actually the cause of major conflicts. Truth be told, truth alone can be a potent elixir while addressing some of the most complex and hard to solve global conflicts.

In Pakistan-India conflict, history is a culprit. As strange as it may sound, they can find peace if there is a will (which India has repeatedly shown that it doesn’t) and secondly, the patience to merely understand some basic definitions. Will get to that momentarily. Whenever peace talks between Pakistan and India come up, India wants to associate terror with Pakistan and wants to make terror the main talking point, while comfortably ignoring the real issue of Kashmir. The bickering goes on for a while before the peace talks come to a complete halt. In this latest season of possible peace talks in the wake of Imran Khan’s Prime Ministership, India has once again shown its true colours by choosing belligerence over peace. Let us take a moment to knock on the conscience of those self-proclaimed intellectuals in Pakistan who claim that it is the Pakistani generals who do not want peace with India because it helps them take a huge bite from the country’s budget.

Pakistan wants to resolve the Kashmir conflict with India for which the former has continued to urge the United Nations. India’s aggressive diplomacy globally has successfully banded Pakistan and terrorism in the minds of the global community. Ironically, the reverse is the truth. The truth is reminiscent of the strategy that president Bush employed in Afghanistan for choking Taliban’s finances. Bush wanted to borrow from president Clinton’s playbook called “Plan Colombia”. The coca fields in Colombia were sprayed with chemicals from airplanes. It had worked with a significant level of success in leaving the Colombian drug cartels weak.

In Afghanistan, Bush wanted to similarly spray the Helmand and Kandahar opium fields with chemicals to choke Taliban’s finances. However, the reason “Plan Colombia” wasn’t compatible in Afghanistan was because of one major difference between Colombia and Afghanistan: In Colombia, the drug (coca) production caused the war. In Afghanistan, the war caused the drug (opium) production. The world affairs are replete with examples of where cause and effect are wrongfully interchanged.

India needs to merely understand where terrorism comes from. Terrorism is the product of aggression. There are three regions in the world that are under military occupation namely, Palestine, Western Sahara and Kashmir. There are about 700, 000 Indian soldiers deployed in Kashmir. It is the most militarised zone in the world as well as the largest region occupied by Indian forces. Humiliation is a sad corollary of aggression, which people on the receiving end of it feel. Aggression is a supreme international (war) crime because it involves in it everything that follows. Indian actions in Kashmir fuel terrorism. If India really wants to see terror come to an end, it should end the occupation and aggression instead of blaming Pakistan for its lack of vision.

Furthermore, the elementary definition of terrorism is the unlawful use of violence in order to achieve goals that are political and ideological in nature. Kulbhushan Jadhav had come to Pakistan to destabilise Pakistan by strengthening a separatist movement in Balochistan and Karachi. That is using violence to achieve a decades-old Indian political goal of unravelling Pakistan, an elementary definition of terrorism. And that is just one example. The world needs to fathom the nefarious Indian designs. Pakistan is a victim of terror and is a nation of peace-loving people. India must stop the aggression, occupation as well as terrorism on Pakistani soil. 

Published in The Express Tribune, October 4^th, 2018.

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