George Packer from the New Yorker analyzes the situation in South Asia in light of the Mumbai attack.
There are several key principles that come out of his analysis that need to be emphasized. First the analysis.
- “But moral revulsion doesn’t suggest an intelligent course of action.” Cf. the post quoting Schneir from yesterday.
- “The attacks in Mumbai reveal the vexing complexity of the interconnected conflicts throughout south Asia.” Conflicts are extremely complex and often reflect regional and even cross-regional tensions, along with internal national conflicts.
- “Pakistan is no longer really a country, if it ever was.” The same can be said of Palestine, Iraq, Sudan and so many other areas around the globe which are caught up in a vortex of violence. There are many non-stage and regional actors in al these conflicts that are not subject to the same set of incentives and deterrents that state actors are.
Hence solutions to regional conflicts require the following principles to be applied:
- Since conflicts involve regional issues, co-operation across major players in the region is necessary to reduce tensions and isolate disruptive non-state players.
- Such co-operation cannot be secured unless points of conflict between regional players are directly addressed.
- The conflicts that need to be addressed as per point 2 are precisely those that stand in the way of the co-operation needed as per point 1. Hence international consensus and involvement is needed to pursue the requisite set of incentives (positive and negative) to prod all sides to resolution of conflicts and co-operation.
- Outside players should prod not push. Ultimately the local actors must resolve their own problems, and all sides must feel minimal satisfaction with the solution. As Packer states “The answers for Pakistan lie largely in its own hands…” Imposed solutions rarely if ever last very long, and tend to increase rather than decrease tensions as one side or another feels “injustices” have not been addresses.
One factor not at all addressed by Packer are internal problems which are usually related to ethnic and religious differences that define regional conflicts. Ethnic tensions often tie into class tensions which make the problems even more complex.
The conflict between India and Pakistan is based on long standing Hindu/Muslim tensions in the region that goes much further back than Jewish/Muslim conflict in Israel/Palestine. The partition of India and Pakistan was much more violent and led to far more deaths and refugees than did the contemporaneous partition of Israel/Palestine. The subsequent break up of Pakistan and Bangladesh only made things worse. While Kashmir is the the thorn that continues to rub at the India/Pakistan wound, the conflict is much deeper and more serious than just a territorial issue.
In the decades subsequent to Indian independence, India became an ally of the USSR and Pakistan of the US. US meddling in Pakistan played a huge role in setting up the conditions for the current dysfunctional nature of Pakistan. The US did quite a bit of pushing often in the wrong direction.
After the break-up of the Soviet Union, India changed course and hitched its future on becoming an outpost of Western capitalism. The already complex ethnic and communal difference in the Indian caste based society, were further complicated by class divisions created by the rise of capitalism. Violence, long part of the region, continued to get worse involving ethnic, religious and class lines, along with cross-border rivalries.
Bush & Co used 9/11 to create a dichotomy in the world to replace the US/Soviet dichotomy of the cold war era. On the one side there is “the West” which stands for “freedom” and “democracy.” On the other side there are the “enemies of freedom,” which are, for the most part, Muslim fundamentalists. India, like Israel, has Muslim “enemies” and so can whole heartedly embrace this dichotomy and place themselves firmly on the side of the good guys.
Despite the “moral clarity” of this dichotomy, US alliances are based on other, more important principles. So the US under Bush & Co continued to describe Pakistan as a “great friend and ally” despite Pakistan being a nuclear power that spreads nuclear know how to countries hostile to the US and continues to protect the very forces claimed to be the West’s greatest enemies.
Nonetheless, it is not surprising that many in India have tried to emphasize their attachment to the “side of light” by comparing the attacks in Mumbai to 9/11. For similar reasons, after 9/11 many Israelis tried to tie that attack to Israel’s struggles. The day after after 9/11 Bibi Netanyahu famously said when asked what the 9/11 attacks means for relations between the US and Israel: “It’s very good,” then edited himself: “Well, not very good, but it will generate immediate sympathy.” He repeated the same thoughts a few months ago.
Such simplistic formulas might serve well as propagandistic sound bites. Propaganda helps the actors involved to reduce the complexity and messiness of the real world issues and avoid taking responsibility for their own contribution to these problems. They can then justify simple and emotionally satisfying actions (usually some form of violence that further complicates the situation) and avoid taking the difficult and complex steps necessary to address the real issues. For more on this, I highly recommend reading Arundhati Roy, who further explores the use of 9/11 as propaganda in relation to the Mumbai attacks.
Tags: Nationalism, Propaganda, South Asia