Geopolitics

UN is US – but what game is US playing with India?
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Issue Net Edition | Date : 14 Mar , 2016

Pic Courtesy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ban_Ki-moon#/media/File:Ban_Ki-moon_April_2015.jpg

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s acting deputy spokesperson Farhan Haq said on March 4 “our good offices are available if both sides (India and Pakistan) were to request” mediation. Haq was responding to a question on whether the UN Chief would propose to India to sit down and talk with Pakistan and resolve the longstanding Kashmir dispute. Now Farhan Haq may be of Pakistani origin but he certainly could not be acting on his own. Ban Ki-moon has been UN Secretary General since January 1, 2007 when he was elected to be the eighth Secretary General of the UN followed by a second term commencing January 1, 2012.

That his second term had complete support of the US is but obvious. But amidst all the turmoil in the world (mostly due to big powers rivalry) that Ban Ki-moon would have had to address in the past nine years since he first took over as UN Secretary General in January 2007 including now Kim Jong-un (the “un” part amusingly akin to UN) threatening to nuke Ban’s native country, one wonders how much time Ban Ki-moon had to look into background history of the State of Jammu & Kashmir? 

… when Pakistan keeps harping at international forums that plebiscite in J&K has not been held as required by the 1949 UN Resolution on J&K, has Ban Ki-moon or his spokesperson said even once that this Pakistani demand has been rendered invalid by Pakistan’s own actions years back?

Does Ban Ki-moon know for instance that: one, the United Nations is in complete know of entire State of J&K acceding to India by the then ruler of J&K, Maharaja Hari Singh through an Instrument of Accession signed on 26 October 1947, post massive Pakistan infiltration – Cease Fire Line (CFL) having been drawn in the 1949 Karachi Agreement under aegis of the UN Commission; two, that the 1949 UN Resolution on J&K called for plebiscite, categorically ruling ”first” Pakistan must withdraw all its security forces from territory of J&K; three, that Pakistan defied the UN directive that first Pakistan must withdraw all its security forces from territory of J&K – and in sharp contrast not only reinforced her security forces in J&K but also changed the demography of area through large number of settlers from the plains, which continues to-date, and; four, that results of first ever poll both sides of the Line of Control in J&K conducted by  Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House), UK in conjunction   King’s College during 2009-2010 (held on behest Musharraf and funded by Libya’s Muammar Gadafi’s second son Saif al-Islam Gaddafi) brought out that 98% of people in J&K do not wish to be part of Pakistan and 50% of people in POK do not wish to remain with Pakistan. 

So when Pakistan keeps harping at international forums that plebiscite in J&K has not been held as required by the 1949 UN Resolution on J&K and Nawaz Sharif trumpets  the same at UNGA, has Ban Ki-moon or his spokesperson said even once that this Pakistani demand has been rendered invalid by Pakistan’s own actions years back? Why is Ban Ki-moon, through his acting deputy spokesperson, talking now about mediation on Kashmir? On the contrary, if Farhan Haq was speaking of his own volition, what was stopping Ban Ki-moon stating the UN has no role on the Kashmir issue? He could have even stated this after India reacted to Haq’s statement by reiterating its stated position that there is no role for the UN in the Kashmir issue, J&K being an integral part of India.

A day after Farhan Haq’s statement, Sartaj Aziz described Kashmir as the “core issue” of Pakistan’s relationship with India saying it should be resolved according to the aspirations of the Kashmiris and with intervention of the world powers. It is the same Pakistan who has been raising the bogey of the ‘nuclear flashpoint’, and the same Sartj Aziz who does not want Pakistan to curb terrorist groups like LeT, JeM, HuM etc since they do not attack Pakistan but help Pakistan’s proxy war on India; augmenting Pakistan’s desperate efforts to internationalize the Kashmir issue.

That the ‘UN is US’ is an old adage, which has held ever since, US being a super power and holding complete sway over the west. That is why the US can afford to be the largest debtor to the UN and yet dictate terms. It is on record that when Obama headed to New York in September 2015 to make his penultimate appearance at the UN to address the UNGA, US debt to the UN had ballooned to US$ 3 billion. Ban Ki-moon naturally would be obliged to Obama for his second term as UN Secretary General and more significantly, the close of Ban Ki-moon’s second term as Secretary General coincides with Obama’s second term as the US President.

…is there something cooking to pressurize India to the advantage of the US, even to India’s strategic disadvantage?

So, is there something cooking to pressurize India to the advantage of the US, even to India’s strategic disadvantage? That is why while US Admiral Harry B Harris Jr, US Pacific Command speaking at the recent Raisina Dialogue 2016 urged India to pursue even closer military ties with the US to strengthen a relatively new partnership in the region, as China expands its military footprint in ways that alarm its neighbors, on the other hand US permitted Pakistan for the first time to  insert the Kashmir issue into the agenda of its institutionalized annual Strategic Dialogue with the US held recently, implications of which are too obvious.

The joint statement issued in Washington at the end of the US-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue said, “The United States and Pakistan emphasized the importance of meaningful dialogue in support of peaceful resolution of outstanding issues, including Kashmir. The delegations underscored that all parties in the region should continuously act with maximum restraint and work collaboratively toward reducing tensions”. Significantly, this was clubbed under ‘Regional Cooperation’ which also dealt with Afghanistan. 

But if hyphenating Afghanistan was not enough (while John Kerry hyphenated Pakistan with India by describing the F-16’s sale to Pakistan for “maintaining balance”), through the above joint statement the US went ahead to “commend” Pakistan for: constructive role in the search for an Afghan settlement; and, taking note of the steps taken to date, including detention of JeM leader Masood Azhar and appreciating Nawaz Sharif’s stated commitment to take prompt and decisive action on this investigation and to bring the perpetrators of the January 2, 2016 attack on the Pathankot air base to justice. So Barak Obama appears mighty happy that Pakistan has filed an FIR against “unknown persons” in the Pathankot airbase terror attack while the SIT has absolved Masood Azhar of complicity but well detained him anyway – perhaps in similar red carpet environments as Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi. Of course there was no need to make any mention about the ‘terrific’ progress by Pakistan in bringing the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai terrorist attacks to book. Anyway the US obviously is more than satisfied with Pakistan including continuing to take Afghanistan up the gum tree through the prospects of bringing the Taliban to join the peace process.

Obama and Ban Ki-moon’s last year in office is sure to see much turbulence. India will need to take in all these factors into account especially when US continues to side with Pakistan…

Keith Jones, in his recent article ‘US moves to harness India to anti-China “pivot” says that US strategists have been touting it as a “strategic prize” since the beginning of the 21st century, and that efforts to harness India to US imperialism’s predatory global agenda, through a combination of threats and poison-chaliced inducements, have greatly intensified since the Obama administration announced its anti-China “pivot” in 2011. Keith doesn’t mention but even George W Bush had gone on record to say “India needs to fall in place”. As per Keith, the speech by Admiral Harris at Raisina Dialogue 2016 amounted to urge India become a “frontline state” in the US drive to strategically isolate, encircle and potentially wage war against China. Keith quotes a press report saying, when US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter travels to India next month he will sign at least one of these – a Logistics Support Agreement (LSA) giving the US military routine access to Indian ports and naval bases, including for refueling. The LSA’s importance is underlined by the comment of a high-level Indian official who last December said that the only remaining hitch in giving the US military access to Indian bases was, “What happens in the case of war?”

Keith Jones may be biased but the indirect pressure that the Obama administration is putting on India by supporting the forked tongue-terror exporting Pakistan is obvious. Britain, ever-ready to tow US policies has its Prime Minister harping on India-Pakistan dialogue, even as strangely Obama is blaming the mess in Libya on Britain. The fact however is with all the mess created around the world, the record of US as a friend is erratic. The US claims it is a friend of Iraq but half Iraq is gone. What happened to the US-Shah of Iran friendship is too well known. America’s current camaraderie with Iran is because Russia and China did not let Syria be bombed into submission by the US, after which Iran was the next target. Libya was destroyed moment it gave up its nuclear program. Obama and Ban Ki-moon’s last year in office is sure to see much turbulence. India will need to take in all these factors into account especially when US continues to side with Pakistan to India’s strategic disadvantage despite Pakistan being a client state of both the US and China.

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The views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions or policies of the Indian Defence Review.

About the Author

Lt Gen Prakash Katoch

is Former Director General of Information Systems and A Special Forces Veteran, Indian Army.

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6 thoughts on “UN is US – but what game is US playing with India?

  1. In my opinion The Us & its western allies never had India as a partner. They want use of the defence facilities in India for their own selfish gain which will not help India in anyway. Secondly, the Indian government & defence, once in the clutches of the US will find the US intelligence service causing problems if at any stage India decided to shed themselves of the US presence in India. Even a blind person can analyse that the countries ( other than Germany& Japan ) who were befriended by the US are in ruins & in a chaotic state. Why! because they wanted they decided to leave the US sphere of influence. I could go on & on. The US psyche is to dominate & if a country in their sphere does not do so then there are consequences.

  2. India should not sign this LSA treaty with US at all. That would be tantamount to compromising our sovereignty and strategic defence to a foreign nation, who is not altogether benevolent towards us. India is essentially in the process of allowing the operation of “foreign enclaves” within the most sensitive of our military establishments! I am frankly astonished why there has been no public outcry so far from the top brass of our armed forces about this. There need to considerable debates in the media and civil society before the government can proceed on the LSA. I would hope that the editors and columnists of IDR will do more to acquaint its influential readership to voice their opposition to this outrageous treaty that is totally weighted on the other side. Lt. Gen. Katoch has addressed this somewhat here, but this topic needs to be featured more prominently on the IDR website.

  3. Any Indian tie up with the US will surrender Indian sovereignty in both military and foreign policy terms to the United States and see India over run by Sunni Moslems like US’ “allies” in Europe. India will become subservient to Pakistan (Sunni Islam’s) designs and make India an instrument of the US-NATO-Sunni Axis. It will turn the Indian Army into cannon fodder proxies like the Taliban in the up coming war with China. It will also reduce India to the status of countries that were conquered and occupied by the United States after the Second World War such as Germany and Japan where the US Armed Forces have a free run, are above the law of the land, and get away with rape and murder like Dalits and Moslems in India.

  4. Continued:

    US actions have been the deliberate advancement of a consistent pro-Sunni Islamic Policy since Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger and Sheikh Yamani forged the US-NATO-Sunni Petro Dollar Axis that led, among other things, to sending the Seventh Fleet up the Bay of Bengal to defend Pakistan;s right to practice Islam (mass rapes, sex slavery, genocide, vandalism etc) in 1971 and Turkey’s annexation of half of Cyprus in 1973 and the persecution of Shia Iran in International affairs. The US is a Polyphemus being ridden by Sunni (Petro Dollar) Islam as Sindbad was by the “Old Man of the Sea”. The White Hice, the State Department and the CIA are not accountable to the US people as much as internal US governance. From Nixon’s China and Pakistan to “contain India” (a suicidal India that is its own worst enemy, standing as a Totalitarian Anti-Hindu State on the two fundamental pillars of “reservations” and “corruption”) as State Policy, Bush (the Father’s) CIA when he founded the Bush wealth from largesse found under the Tent of Saud, to Reagan’s Iran-Contra and Taliban, to Clinton (the husband’s) bombing of Belgrade to cede Islam its first ethnically cleansed enclaves (Bosnia and Kosovo) in Europe since 1489, to Bush (the Son’s) Iraq and Obama (The Holy Ghost’s) ISIS, the White Hice have been acting just as any mercenary on the pay roll of Sunni (Petro Dollar) Islam might. Pakistan is the US’s consistent cat’s paw to contain India since Nixon as it has been China’s since inception. Islamic Terror is Pakistan’s favoured and consistent weapon in dealing with India and has full White Hice blessings. The US has tossed one country after another into the maws of Sunni Islam. Afghanistan, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Cyprus, Tunisia, “The Arab Spring” and Libya. Now the US has thrown its NATO allies in Europe into the anti-civilization and dehumanizing chaos called Islam.

  5. The UN is the US. BUT the US is a Polyphemes being ridden by Sunni (Petro Dollar) Islam as Sindbad was by the “Old Man of the Sea”. So what is it that Pakistan wants?

    US Greed and Islam’s hate made the perfect consort dancing together since Nixon, Kissinger and Sheikh Yamani forged the US-NATO-Sunni axis. The Islam Mahomet created was born from his selling his soul to Satan to sate his hatred with revenge on Muqqa. The US became partners in crime as it submitted to the oil well betwixt the mammoth thighs of Mammon.

    Continued….

  6. Very appropriate. How did India figure in US – Pakistan bilateral Annual Strategic Dialogue and why did US decide ti interfere with a matter which is a bilateral issue between India and Pakistan?

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