Feb 28 : The surprise about Friday’s concerted attack on the living quarters of many Indians in Kabul is that it came just a day after the Indian and Pakistan foreign secretaries met in New Delhi to de-freeze official relations after the Mumbai attacks of November 2008.
The contact was made through an Indian initiative husbanded behind the scenes by Washington, which is eager to see a reduction in tension between the two neighbours in pursuit of its own imperatives in Afghanistan. The Friday assault, in all likelihood executed by the Taliban’s Haqqani faction, would suggest that while Pakistan finds it officially difficult to turn away from opportunities to restore official ties with India, significant elements in Islamabad have a vested interest in keeping up hostilities. A state of tension gives Pakistan an alibi not to go after the Afghan Taliban it has nourished and shielded over the years. The seeming justification is that it must keep its military capabilities sharp and ready to deal with a potential Indian threat, and not to deploy these to fight the Taliban, much as the US and Nato may desire this.
Islamabad also views the Taliban as its insurance against the stabilising of Indian influence in Afghanistan. It calculates that if the Taliban can be insinuated into power in Kabul once again since the draw-down or withdrawal of the US and Nato forces in Afghanistan is foreseeable, they would ensure the rollback of India’s presence in the country, given their ideological underpinnings. This is a key reason for the policymakers in Islamabad to keep their relations with the Taliban in good order. Since the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, Pakistan has not concealed its resentment against the return of goodwill for India in Kabul and this country’s much-valued contribution to the reconstruction effort in Afghanistan. The animosity has led key elements in Islamabad to mobilise the “jihadi” detachments they patronise to mount offensives against Indian interests in Kabul and elsewhere in that country. The massive and intricately organised attacks against the Indian embassy in Kabul in July 2008 and October 2009 behind carefully erected barriers of deniability were strong signals that Islamabad wanted India out of Afghanistan at the earliest and would not count the costs in gaining this objective. It has also been clear that Pakistan would seek to work the political levers with the key international players in Afghanistan, especially the US, in an effort to leave India short. Since the latter course can be complex and uncertain, given the non-military nature of India’s involvement in Afghanistan and the deepening quality of the political capital it has earned not only with the government but also the people of that country, violent tactics are being unleashed against Indian interests to frighten Indian public opinion into staying away from Kabul. This is a mind game that has worked extremely well with several European countries.
In the US last November, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh indicated that India planned to stay the course in Afghanistan. It has good reasons to see the maturing of a non-Talibanised Afghanistan. However, New Delhi is yet to give evidence that it has worked out the tactics in which to anchor its strategy.
