While Indo-US strategic dialogue on July 18-19 seemed to have met its objectives adequately, it heads off fresh frictions with fragile US coalition partner Pakistan fighting a common war against terror.
The strategic dialogue has a lot of implications for both the countries. For the US, India was the depressing agent to rising China.
For India, the United States of America was a means to achieve their lifelong dream of becoming regional leader with better access to global markets. But, it has some Pakistan-specific implications beginning from defence arrangements to the international relations:
a) The US commitment of ‘civil nuclear pact’ gave a green signal to India’s nuclear programme from the status of treating it as ‘illegal’ to legitimising India’s status as a nuclear power.
b) Encouraged India to play a bigger role in Asia – stretching towards China and Central Asia.
c) The rise of India as a regional power is meant to be the destabilisation of the region. It may compel Pakistan to look for advanced weapon technology, triggering arms race involving Pakistan, India and China.
d) It provided India with an opportunity to manipulate the US influence on Pakistan in its favour regarding multiple outstanding disputes between India and Pakistan.
f) It endorsed support to India for permanent seat in UNSC, having intrusive implications for Pakistan’s interests on number of outstanding conflicts with India, like Kashmir issue, water problem, etc.
As the Indo-US strategic partnership has a potential to place Pakistan in a less secure position, therefore, Pakistan must use diplomatic channels to get civilian nuclear agreement akin to the US-India civilian nuclear deal of 2005.
DR JALIL ANSARI
Islamabad