NEW
DELHI - The world's most absurd war on the world's
highest battlefield, 6,000 meters-plus, may soon be
over. There are credible reports of a deal to settle the
Siachen war having been finalized between Indian and
Pakistani leaders, who met in New York last week. This
would mark an end to a 20-year battle for an isolated
piece of a 6,300 meter high lifeless glacier - Siachen -
in the Karakoram Range system of Kashmir near the
India-Pakistan border, extending for 78 kilometers
across Ladakh and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
Pakistan and India have been fighting for the
glacier since 1984, but the bigger enemy they face there
is the cold, with temperatures hovering between -30 and
-60 degrees Celsius. But despite the high costs of
holding onto the icy heights of Saltoro Ridge in terms
of manpower, hardware and the logistics of an arduous
and long supply line, many in the Indian army are not
yet ready to trust Pakistan President General Pervez
Musharraf not to send his troops in should Indian troops
vacate the area. The experience of what happened at the
brief skirmish in Kargil in 1999 is difficult to forget.
Musharraf has sought to allay Indian fears that
if it withdraws its forces from the Saltoro Ridge, the
position it occupied in 1984, Pakistani forces will move
in. India occupied the ridge easily, by airdropping its
soldiers, but maintained its occupation at great cost in
terms of lives lost - mostly fighting bad weather - and
money spent. The cost of a loaf of bread that would be
less than a rupee in the Kashmir Valley is estimated by
the Times of India to be worth Rs10,000 (US$217) by the
time it reaches Indian soldiers on Siachen.
Some
Indian strategists who oppose the demilitarization of
Siachen point to the problem of the verifiability of the
redeployment of Indian and Pakistani troops. This would
be difficult, even with the aid of the latest high-tech
gadgetry being recommended by some Western experts who
favor peace in the region.
Strategic experts
also point to the fact that it would be well-nigh
impossible to retake these positions once Pakistan
occupied them. At the moment the position is that
Indians cannot come down and the Pakistanis cannot climb
up the ridge. After withdrawal, if Pakistan occupied the
glacier, the position would be reversed.
Others
counter by pointing out that Pakistan simply doesn't
have the wherewithal to bear the cost of occupation,
about US$1 million a day, particularly when it brings in
no corresponding benefit. Hardliners counter this by
pointing out that Pakistan's costs of occupation would
be much less. The Indian cost of occupation is so high
because no natural ground routes connect the Indian side
of Kashmir to the Siachen Glacier. So India has to use
its air force to drop all of its forces, and helicopters
and aircraft to transport all supplies.
Talks
signal Siachen thaw India and Pakistan concluded
two days of talks on the Siachen Glacier on Friday with
an agreement to hold further discussions on the
modalities for disengagement and redeployments of
troops. "The two defense secretaries agreed to continue
their discussions to resolve the Siachen issue in a
peaceful manner," a joint statement issued at the end of
the talks said. "Frank and candid discussions were held
in a cordial and constructive atmosphere aimed at taking
the [peace] process forward."
A senior Indian
official, however, denied a Pakistan television report
that quoted the Pakistani defense secretary as saying
both sides had agreed on the demilitarization of the
glacier. The report also said the talks were held on the
basis of a 1989 agreement. "They are trying to put their
own spin on the issue," the official said. He also
called the report "unfortunate". Reliable sources
claimed differences continue to remain on the
demarcation of the glacier and the "authentication" of
maps showing the existing positions of Indian soldiers.
Sources said the Indian side insisted that
Pakistan accept the Indian position on the Actual Ground
Position Line (AGPL). Refusing to accept AGPL, Pakistan
on the other hand referred to the positions
authenticated by the 1973 Shimla Agreement, saying
Indian troops violated the agreement by launching
Operation Meghdoot in 1984, which brought most of the
area under their control. India claims to have made a
preemptive attempt at capturing Siachen for fear that
Pakistan would otherwise do so, whereas Pakistan calls
it pure aggression and invasion in violation of the
Shimla Agreement not to try and change the ground
position unilaterally. The problem had started in 1984
when Indians found out Pakistan was giving permission to
foreign mountaineers to climb the Siachen heights,
igniting fears that Pakistan might capture the glacier.
The two sides also disagreed on the redeployment
of troops and on a mechanism to monitor the
disengagement. Scared of the Kargil experience, Indians
troops sought assurances that Pakistani troops would not
"step in" once they withdrew from the glacier. Clearly
the Indian side wants a firm guarantee before Indian
troops give up their positions.
Demilitarization
of Siachen is one of those areas of the India-Pakistan
conflict that has always been thought to be easy to
resolve. On several occasions there have been reports
that the two countries had come to an agreement, and
then changed their positions for lack of political will
on the part of Indian leaders.
In the present
instance the situation appears to be more favorable.
Some observers point out that if Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh is able to trust President General Pervez
Musharraf's promise, India may start withdrawing troops
from Siachen soon after Maharashtra state elections on
October 13. Some seem to believe that a major deal with
Pakistan has been reached in the unprecedented hour-long
Manmohan-Musharraf one-to-one meet in New York. This
deal is said to include the eventual conversion of the
Line of Control that demarcates the Indian and Pakistani
areas in the state of Jammu and Kashmir into an
international border, with some minor adjustments and
rationalization.
If it indeed comes about, the
reason for the hurry will be practical as well as
political. It would make practical sense to withdraw
from Siachen before the onset of winter, the worst and
the most dangerous period of the year for Indian troops.
On the other side, it will suit Musharraf to have
achieved something spectacular before announcing that he
is keeping his uniform, if indeed that is what he
decides to do - he is constitutionally due to do so by
December. It will also suit the ruling Congress Party
that leads the coalition government in New Delhi to go
into the next polls not with the announcement of an
uncertain deal with Pakistan - that is bound to be
controversial regardless of what it is - but with the
fruits of the deal and its benefits having already
become apparent.
A major boost to India-Pakistan
trade and progress on a gas pipeline from Iran through
Pakistan to India, among other economic ties, will be
beneficial for both sides, but it will take some time.
The Congress leadership also feels that not making peace
with Pakistan and continuing with the stalemate on
Siachen or the more serious Kashmir issue is no longer
an option given the tremendous interest the
international community is taking in the matter of
establishing peace between the two nuclear powers. But
if the present momentum, generated by the previous Atal
Bihari Vajpayee government's statesmanship, is lost, it
will become very difficult to reignite later. The new
government has already taken several months to settle
in. Manmohan, primarily an economist, has also taken his
time studying the subject, but now must hurry things up.
One important fallout of this feeling is that
the prime minister's office is now dealing with the
entire gamut of relations with Pakistan and the state of
Jammu and Kashmir directly, instead of leaving them with
the home and external affairs ministries. This does away
with the multiplicity of authority that hampered
progress in peace talks with Kashmiri leaders and
follows the practice in the previous Congress
administration headed by former prime minister Narasimha
Rao. Thus, national security adviser and former foreign
secretary J N Dixit and internal security adviser and
former intelligence bureau chief M K Narayanan emerge as
the main point-persons handling Pakistan and Kashmir
respectively in close consultation with the prime
minister.
The United States, too, sees the
Siachen Glacier as a potential starter in breakthroughs
between the South Asian rivals. Washington has been
pressing both India and Pakistan to come to terms with
each other ever since they tested nuclear weapons in
1998, raising fears of Kashmir becoming a nuclear
flashpoint. Many in the sub-continent believe that the
ongoing peace process is being brokered by the US.
Interacting with Indian and Pakistani journalists
attending a fellowship on "conflict resolution and
non-proliferation" at Albuquerque in New Mexico last
week, for instance, US State Department officials
repeatedly highlighted their expectation that South Asia
will see an easing of tension at the Siachen Glacier.
From battleground to laboratory Even
a confirmed skeptic such as Stephen P Cohen, professor
of South Asian affairs at the Brookings Institution,
became sentimental while referring to Siachen, "While I
am very pessimistic about the [peace] talks process, yet
I strongly feel that the two countries should achieve
some common ground to save young soldiers dying at the
hands of chilling weather." The head of Sandia
Laboratory, America's most prestigious nuclear science
laboratories, Dr Bringer, even went to the extent of
visualizing setting up a joint science center there.
Several non-governmental peace groups are
actually considering the establishment of a Siachen
peace park, but Bringer believes his approach may go a
long way by having a scientific and technological aspect
to it. He proposes substitution of the military forces
in the region with scientists and engineers (from India
and Pakistan) "who would advance the knowledge in
science and engineering by operating a high-altitude
research station for the study of basic sciences,
engineering and human physiology". He argued that his
proposal also fulfills the need for a national presence
to "help ensure terms of a military disengagement
agreement", involving "other regional and international
participants and sponsors". This will perhaps also
obviate the need for verifying the presence of troops
after redeployment.
One of the occasional papers
prepared at the cooperative monitoring center of Sandia
labs spells out the research missions for the centers,
suggesting that they should focus on fields such as
astronomy, geology, atmospheric sciences, glaciology,
life sciences, physiology and behavioral sciences.
Another scientist observed that study of the glacier
could lead the two nations to study monsoon patterns to
help properly manage the world's largest water reserves.
The scientists at Sandia also claim that the proposed
center could help better mange the drought situations
for the agriculture-based economies of the two
countries.
Passionately espousing the cause of
demilitarization at Siachen, Bringer referred to the
success of the Antarctic Treaty in Washington in 1959,
which entered into force in 1961, between the then worst
nuclear rivals - the US and the former USSR. Explaining
that 39 nations are party to the environmentally
friendly treaty, including those seven that originally
had laid claim to land of the continent, he said the two
South Asian rivals could start from a common research
project at Antarctica. He believed that the joint
research at the continent would develop the much-needed
trust between the two nation's science corps.
"Like the Antarctic continent, Siachen could
then be exploited for scientific research primarily by
India and Pakistan and maybe other developed nations at
a later stage," visualizes the American scholar.
Once Siachen is demilitarized, India and
Pakistan can look forward to tackling other and more
difficult issues with greater confidence. Musharraf's
solemn promise, binding the state of Pakistan and its
army to refrain from doing a Kargil at Siachen, presents
Manmohan with a great opportunity to demonstrate
statesmanship.
Sultan Shahin is a New
Delhi-based writer.
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