Vapnope
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Most of the times, during hot debates Indian posters/members accuse Pakistan of intervening (and rightly so) in their neighbors' affairs, be it Afghanistan, India or Iran, the debates of how Pakistan has overtly and covertly supported the armed resistances never die down and most of the times Indian posters take the position that India has never used overt or covert armed or diplomatic means to destabilize any country. The usual response is that India has always been on defensive footing and never on offensive front.
Purpose of this thread is not to paint India as an evil state nor its an attempt to take pride in Pakistani follies committed in the name of foreign policy. Here are some of the article i found on internet. Members can contribute too.
Indo-Nepal Crisis
THE DEBATE
Image Credit: China Nepal flags image via Shutterstock.com
India's Self-Defeating Paranoia Over China in Nepal
“India must be more comfortable with the idea of Nepal dealing more with the rest of the world, including with China.”
By Biswas Baral
May 14, 2016
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April 25 marked a year since the start of a series of devastating earthquakes that shook Nepal to its core. The 7.8-magnitude quake and subsequent aftershockskilled over 8,500 people; thousands more were wounded. At least half a million families were rendered homeless. It was easily the biggest natural calamity to hit the small, landlocked country in South Asia since the great earthquake of 1934. Economic damages from last year’s earthquakes were estimated at $5 billion, around 25 percent of national GDP.
But little did Nepalis know that an even bigger calamity was around the corner. When the Constituent Assembly elected to write a new constitution for Nepal produced a charter on September 20, 2015, there were spontaneous protests against the new document in the southern parts of the country. The political parties representing these regions felt that the constitution discriminated against the natives of the southern plains. As a part of their protest, they set-up temporary camps on Nepal’s key border points with India, from which the country imports nearly all its fuel and other daily essentials.
The protestors wouldn’t allow any vehicles to enter Nepal from India, effectively closing the landlocked country’s lifeline. But the border-centric protests of small parties would most certainly have failed if they didn’t have the support of India.
India, the preeminent power in South Asia, was also unhappy with the new constitution, which it felt ignored India’s major concerns even as it went out of its way to accommodate the concerns of the West and particularly the Chinese, India’s geostrategic rival in Nepal.
The “blockade” thus imposed on Nepal lasted for four and a half months before it was lifted in early February this year. It did great damage to the already-battered Nepali economy; the blockade, according Nepal’s finance minister, inflicted greater economic damage than the earthquakes. It also led to a humanitarian crisis. “The declining stocks of gas, food and medicines, together with the closure of schools… and shortages of fuel throughout the country, are not only inflicting damage to the lives of the children now—they threaten the future of the country itself,” said UNICEF.
Although India all along denied it had any role in the disruption of supply of essential goods into Nepal, few in Nepal were inclined to believe it. As one Nepali commentator wrote at the time: “To signal its unhappiness with the Constitution, India has responded with an ‘unofficial’ blockade of goods on its side of the border, a breathtaking intrusion upon our sovereignty.”
Following the unofficial blockade, Nepal has warmed up to China, the only other country besides India with which Nepal shares a border. There is a feeling in Kathmandu that if Nepal does not diversify its trade away from India—with which it now does 70 percent of its business—it could again be made a victim of India’s high-handedness in the future. This explains Nepal’s recent overtures toward China to balance India’s influence. Such rebalancing, Nepalis feel, was long overdue.
What galls Nepalis is that after India’s independence in 1947, it has been treating Nepal as its “backyard“ where it won’t tolerate the presence of any other country, especially China. Particularly after India’s loss in the Indo-China war of 1962, India has been paranoid about protecting its old “sphere of influence“ in South Asia against Chinese incursions.
Smaller South Asian countries like Nepal, Bhutan, and Sri Lanka thus often find themselves caught between the geostrategic rivalry of India and China. The Indians seem especially insecure. Whenever one of these smaller countries is seen as getting close to China, India reacts furiously—and often counterproductively—employing highly coercive methods to bring these countries in line.
But such petulant diplomacy against its small neighbors doesn’t behoove the world’s largest democracy. In a sign that China is more comfortable with the idea of cooperating with India in South Asia than the other way around, Chinese President Xi Jinping recently proposed the idea of making Nepal an economic bridge between India and China, to the ultimate benefit of all three countries. But India isn’t sold on the idea.
Historically, unlike India, China has looked to maintain strict neutrality in Nepal, leaving Nepalis to decide what is best for their country. But following Nepal’s recent overtures to China —which, among other things, resulted in a historic transit treaty between the two countries that now allows Nepal to import goods from third countries via Chinese territories—China has seemed more comfortable making “suggestions” to Nepal. In fact, it is believed that was it not for last-minute Chinese intervention, the Nepali government headed by “pro-China”Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli would have collapsed by now.
But if India’s goal was to keep the Chinese at a safe distance from Nepal, its recent “sledgehammer-diplomacy”has been a spectacular failure. In the 70-year-old bilateral relationship between independent India and Nepal, anti-India feelings among common Nepalis (and the corresponding goodwill for China) have never been higher.
If India wants to retain its status as the predominant power in Nepal—and South Asia by extension—it must learn to keep a carefully calibrated distance. Thanks to its recent intervention, political polarization in Nepal has greatly increased and extremist elements in the areas that border India have been emboldened. Instability in Nepal could easily spill over into India through the open border.
India must also be more comfortable with the idea of Nepal dealing more with the rest of the world, including with China.
Just because Nepal wants better relations with China does not mean it undervalues its relations with India or is working against Indian interests. In fact, all the major political parties in Nepal are acutely aware of Indian sensitivities. They also realize that the deep people-to-people contacts between Nepal and India would be hard, if not impossible, to replicate with China. The cultural influence of India remains as formidable. Hindi songs, movies and soap operas are wildly popular in Nepal, but most Nepalis don’t know a single word of Mandarin. Likewise, the people of India and Nepal easily commingle through the open border, but the border with China is strictly regulated and Beijing will not agree to completely open Tibet just for the benefit of Nepal.
So India’s paranoia with China is unwarranted. It’s about time it started behaving as a more mature power that is comfortable with its role as the undisputed leader in South Asia.
http://thediplomat.com/2016/05/indias-self-defeating-paranoia-over-china-in-nepal/
India-Sri Lanka
The LTTE training camp in Kulathur, Salem district, India, where the 16th batch was trained in 1985/6. The photographs were taken by Wasanthan, an Indian national employed by the press section of the LTTE.
Although Tamil insurgents had established a few training camps in Tamil Nadu in 1982, there was no official assistance from the Central Government of India prior to August 1983 In the eyes of many Indian hard- liners, Sri Lanka since 1977 had stepped out of the non-aligned orbit and had become an ally of the West. There were Israeli intelligence operatives, British counter insurgency experts, South African mercenaries and rumours about offering Trincomalee one of the finest deep water harbours to the US navy. Sri Lanka had good relations with Pakistan and China, two countries that had fought border wars with India and they were in the process of stepping up military assistance to Colombo. Further, President J.R. Jayewardene of Sri Lanka did not enjoy with Premier Indira Gandhi the same warm relationship he had with her father, Premier Jawaharlal Nehru. After Premier Indira Gandhi, also the leader of the powerful Congress (I) Party, took a policy decision to support Sri Lankan northern insurgency from August 1983. The need to have leverage over Colombo was adequately demonstrated by the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the agency also responsible for advancing India's secret foreign policy goals. Within her inner circle, the decision was justified. Geopolitics and domestic compulsions validate the rationale.
The Third Agency of RAW a supra intelligence outfit, was entrusted with the task. Within a year, the number of Sri Lanka Tamil training camps in Tamil Nadu mushroomed to 32. By mid 1987, over 20,000 Sri Lankan Tamil insurgents had been provided sanctuary, finance, training and weapons either by the central government, state government of Tamil Nadu or by the insurgent groups themselves. While most of the initial training was confined to Indian military and paramilitary camps in Uttara Pradesh, specialized training was imparted by the Indian instructors attached to RAW to Sri Lankan insurgents in New Delhi, Bombay and Vishakhapatnam. The most secretive training was conducted in Chakrata, north of Dehra Dun, India's premier military academy for training service personnel, where RAW had also imparted training to Bangladesh, Pakistan and Tibetan dissidents.
With the Indo-Lanka Accord of July 1987, RAW assistance culminated. Rajiv Gandhi ordered the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) to fight the LTTE, when it went back on its pledge to surrender its weapons. The LTTE-IPKF war, apparently deprived the LTTE of its invaluable base, India. But, Tamil Nadu assistance to the LTTE continued even after M.G. Ramachandran's death in December 1987. Tamil Nadu State assistance under the Karunanidhi Administration despite the presence of the IPKF, continued for the LTTE. Although the LTTE was at war with India, Tamil Nadu still remained LTTEÕs main source of supplies.
The Indian Net
LTTE leaders (RÐL), Sirumalai camp, 1984 - Chief of Intelligence Pottu Amman (M 16), Mannar commander Victor (M203), Trincomalee commander Pulendran (AK47), chairman Prabhakaran (pistol). Batticaloa commander Aruna (Berreta SMG), and Prabhakaran's bodyguard Lingam (Hungarian AK).
Throughout the IPKF episode and until Rajiv GandhiÕs assassination in 1991, the LTTE continued to maintain a substantial presence in India. When the law enforcement agencies stepped up surveillance, the LTTE moved a bulk of its cadres from Tamil Nadu to other towns such as Mysore, Bangalore and Bombay. Even at the height of the IPKF-LTTE confrontation, the LTTE had twelve sections in India to manage:
(1) Intelligence
(2) Communications
(3) Arms Production
(4) Procurement of explosives
(5) Propaganda
(6) Political work
(7) Food and essential supplies
(8) Medicines
(9) Fuel supplies
(10) Clothing
( 11 ) Transport
(12) Finance and currency conversion
The LTTE had also converted Madras, the capital of Tamil Nadu, and nine other Tamil Nadu districts, into centres for war supplies to the LTTE. Each centre was linked by a sophisticated wireless network. Individual units carried Sanyo walkie talkie sets. The centres of war supplies and other activities were:
( I ) Dharmapuri: Procurement of explosives
(2) Coimbatore: Arms and ammunition manufacturing
(3) Salem: Explosives manufacturing and military clothing manufacturing
(4) Periya (Erode) Military clothing manufacturing
(5) Vedaraniyam: Coastal area from where supplies were dispatched for the LTTE
(6) Madurai: Transit area
(7) Thanjavur: Communications centre
(8) Nagapattnam: Landing area for supplies from LTTE deep sea going vessels.
(9) Rameswaram: Refugee arriving area and recruitment
(10) Tiruchi: Treatment of wounded LTTE cadres
(11) Tuticorin: LTTE trade in gold, silver, narcotics and other merchandise goods
(12) Madras: Liaison with Tamil Nadu political leaders.
Implications for India
The LTTE-lndia nexus did not secure the geopolitical security New Delhi needed from Sri Lanka. It weakened Indian as well as Sri Lankan domestic security. In many ways, the presence of a foreign military strengthened the fighting spirit of LTTE and weakened the anti-terrorist capability of the Sri Lankan forces, then engaged in an anti-subversive campaign in the South The organization gained mastery of guerrilla warfare by fighting the fourth largest military in the world. The LTTE suffered heavy causalities but replenished their ranks and gained a confidence paralleled by the Viet Cong and the Afghan Mujahidin. LTTE also innovated new weapons, mostly projectiles and mines. Johnny mine, the anti personnel mine invented by Prabhakaran, has at least claimed 5,300 Indian and Sri Lankan war causalities. Many Tamil Nadu political leaders from Nedumaran to Gopalasamy and Ramakrishnan visited the LTTE jungle base - known as the one four base complex over the years - and expressed solidarity with Prabhakararn.
The role of the IPKF in Sri Lanka became a politically sensitive issue. When the IPKF returned to India, under the National Front government of V.P. Singh, the then Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi did not visit the port of Madras to welcome the Indian soldiers. Even after the IPKF departed the LTTE continued to maintain excellent relations with Tamil Nadu politicians. The LTTE had managed to preserve Tamil Nadu as a critical base by retaining the goodwill of the Tamil Nadu leaders.
In fact, when the LTTE hit teams under the one eyed Jack Sivarasan assassinated the anti-LTTE EPRLF leader Padmanabha and his colleagues in Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister Karunanidhi asked the Tamil Nadu police and the state agencies to turn a blind eye. A few months later, the LTTE used the very same infra- structure of the LTTE in Tamil Nadu to kill Rajiv Gandhi. The LTTE penetration of the Tamil Nadu polity was so good that a decision reached at a high level meeting comprising intelligence agencies in New Delhi about anti-LTTE operations was conveyed to the LTTE within 24 hours. Investigations revealed that the culprit was the then Tamil Nadu Home Secretary and at the instruction of Karunanidhi. The dismissal of Karunanidhi did not prevent the LTTE from continuing to operate in Tamil Nadu. The LTTE made a statement during the subsequent Jayalalitha administration, "If the Tamil Nadu leadership cannot support the LTTE, at least we expect them to be neutral to the LTTE." This meant that LTTE operations should continue unhindered in the state of Tamil Nadu.
In retrospect, the LTTE-India relationship has been one of love and hate. It is a relationship that will have its ups and downs but a relationship that will nevertheless continue. Despite the fact that the LTTE eliminated Rajiv Gandhi, the last of the Gandhi-Nehru dynasty, there will always be a segment of the Tamil. Nadu leaders and people that will support the LTTE. The contradiction stems, from India's own structure the diversity within India, particularly, the disparity in culture between the Indian Tamils and the rest of India's polity. The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi was imperative for the LTTE. If the LTTE did not, the IPKF that withdrew would have returned heralding another period of bloody fighting. Prabhakaran's calculus was right As a leader, he had done his duty by his rank and file. By assassinating Rajiv Gandhi, he prevented the reintroduction of the IPKF to Sri Lanka. Even for Prabhakaran, it would have been a painful decision. Antagonizing India at the southernmost point of peninsular India meant the permanent closure of the door for creating Tamil Eelam and Prabhakaran becoming its ruler.
http://www.sundaytimes.lk/970119/plus4.html
East Pakistan - India 1971,1972
India’s Intervention in East Pakistan: A Humanitarian Intervention or an Act of National Interest?
PARK, DANIEL C. | VOLUME 1, ISSUE 3 (FEBRUARY 2016) | ISSN 2369-8217 (ONLINE)
February 16, 2016 Daniel C. Park Academic Articles, Contemporary History, Politics, South Asia
This map shows the partition of India, West Pakistan, East Pakistan, and Kashmir, including the directions of movements of Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims : Image: Wikimedia Commons
Daniel C. Park is a 3rd Year student studying International Relations and Contemporary Asian Studies at the University of Toronto, Trinity College. Currently, Daniel serves as an Associate Editor-in-Chief for Synergy: The Journal of Contemporary Asian Studies. Outside of Synergy, he also contributes to the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the Parliamentary Division of the Canadian Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, and the G-20 Research Group.
Abstract
The question of why India declined to rationalize its entrance to the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971 as a humanitarian intervention is puzzling. This is because the intervention put an end to the 1971 Bangladesh genocide that killed an estimate of 300,000 to 3,000,000 Bengalis. This paper argues that India intervened in the war to cease the influx of Bengali refugees from entering its own borders. And, more importantly, to expand and pursue its geopolitical interests in South Asia, which included (a) weakening and dismembering its rival state Pakistan, and (b) rising as a regional hegemon in the northeastern South Asia region.
Keywords: Bangladesh Liberation War; Bengali Genocide; Humanitarian Intervention
India’s intervention in the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War has been noted as a humanitarian intervention for ending the 1971 Bengali genocide, yet India has never justified its intervention as such.Therefore, an assessment as to whether India had altruistic humanitarian or national interest-driven intentions is vital to comprehend what motivates states to commit their resources in wars reported of mass atrocity crimes. For an intervention to be classified as “humanitarian”, the intervening state’s sole objective must be putting an end to the human rights violations. By definition, the intervention must not be conducted out of national security woes or interests.1 To help readers better understand this topic, the background of both the Bangladesh Liberation War and the Bengali genocide is needed. When British rule over the Indian subcontinent dissolved in 1947, the British Raj was split into two sovereign states: the Union of India and the Dominion of Pakistan. The latter was further divided into two exclaves. West Pakistan bordered the northwestern front of India, while East Pakistan bordered India’s northeastern front. Due to this border arrangement, the two Pakistans were geographically separated by one thousand miles of Indian territory.2 This disunity between the two Pakistans was accentuated by their stark linguistic and ethno-cultural differences. The Punjabis were the ethnic majority in West Pakistan, while the Bengalis were that of the East.3 Their differences were further compounded by the politically dominant West’s discriminatory policies against the Bengalis. The Bengalis were denied their democratic rights to govern and participate in the decision-making processes of Pakistan, and were economically exploited for their labor and natural resources.4 These discriminatory policies collectively sparked a violent upsurge that eventually led to the fall of the then-military dictator, General Ayub Khan in 1969. What followed was a democratic election in 1970, where the Bengali-led Awami League Party (ALP) won, while the Punjabi-led Pakistani Peoples Party (PPP) was elected as the opposition party.5 This was primarily due to the Bengalis having a population larger than that of the Punjabis. A majority of the Bengalis and the Punjabis cast their votes for their own ethnic-affiliated parties. Because of this, neither party embodied any national character to garner the support of both the Bengali and Punjabi electorates. The PPP, who had not yet forfeited its seats in the Pakistani Parliament (Majlis-e-Shoora), took advantage of the polarizing election results to legitimize its refusal to give up its power. Although the refusal left the Bengali population frustrated and helpless, it fueled the Bengali nationalist and self-determination movement to gain considerable momentum. Because such populist movements risked a Bengali secession, the then-President, General Yahya Khan, opted for a military solution: The West Pakistani military launched a systematic campaign of indiscriminate slaughter of the Bengalis on 25 March 1971.6 This was the start of the Bengali genocide, which also simultaneously triggered the Bengali secessionist movement or the Bangladesh Liberation War. The genocide is estimated to have killed between 300,000 to 3,000,000 Bengalis.7 A year after General Khan’s order, on 3 December 1971, India entered the war and pushed Pakistan to defeat on the 16th of that month. {To avoid confusion, this paper refers to the population of West Pakistan as Pakistanis and that of East Pakistan (today’s Bangladesh) as Bengalis.}
This paper argues that while the Indian government did express its concerns about the Bengali genocide of 1971, its intervention in the Bangladesh Liberation War was not justified on humanitarian grounds, but rather by its national interests. Under this premise, the end of the genocide was an unintended by-product of India’s intervention to the war – not a cause. The first argument of this paper looks at the Bengali refugee crisis and the economic burden it placed on India. The following two arguments look at India’s geopolitical interests of entering the war. The former illustrates that India took advantage of the war as a means to weaken Pakistan. The argument also examines the relevance India’s diplomatic alliance with the USSR had on Pakistan’s defeat. Aside from India’s aim to weaken Pakistan, the latter demonstrates that India also had both geopolitical and economic interests in aiding the Bengalis in establishing their own sovereign state. By replacing a foe with a friendly, but weaker state as its neighbour, India would rise as a regional hegemon in the South Asian region. To prove this point, this argument looks at India’s post-war behavior towards Bangladesh and other neighbouring states like Nepal and Bhutan. Collectively, India intervened in the war to pursue its national interests.
The influx of Bengali war refugees from East Pakistan placed a burden on India’s economy – which was, at the time, dysfunctional and weak. Because of this, the then-Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi, was prompted to intervene in the war to return the refugees back to their motherland. A day after the outbreak of the war and reports of the genocidal killings, Gandhi addressed her concerns to the Indian public. She fully acknowledged the crisis, and urged the Indian Parliament (Bharatiya Sansad) to readily grant refugee status to the Bengalis entering Indian borders.8 This was and had been India’s standard procedure to previous refugee influxes from past regional conflicts. Historically, India had granted refuge to Tibetans in 1959 due to the Tibetan uprising and to the Nepalese in 1960 after King Mahendra of Nepal dissolved the country’s democratic rule.9 However, the rapid rise of Bengali refugees in India forced Gandhi to think otherwise. By the end of May 1971, only two months after the war’s outbreak, nine million refugees had taken shelter in the state of Tripura – a state that held a population of only 1.5 million. Near the war’s end on 15 December 1971, the refugee count climbed to over ten million across Tripura and six other states that took in refugees – both in and outside of the 825 camps that were set up.10
India was not equipped to accommodate ten million refugees. At the same time, both Gandhi and the Parliament had fears over the refugees’ permanent settlement in India. Such an outcome would cripple and exhaust India’s economic aid capacities, and its public infrastructure would be overburdened and fail. There were also worries of India’s own Bengali population uniting with the refugees to spark a secessionist movement within India.11 These scenarios were only feasible in the case of a Bengali defeat – a highly likely outcome since the Bengalis were undertrained and underequipped to fight the stronger Pakistanis. The prospect of these unwanted events prompted Gandhi to publicly threaten Pakistan. On 24 May 1971, Gandhi expressed her intentions to stop the refugee influx into India, and to guarantee their trip back to East Pakistan.12 Shortly after Gandhi’s announcement, the Indian government permitted the establishment of a Bangladeshi government in exile in Calcutta, and started the recruitment and training of Bengalis to fight the Pakistanis.13 Months after back-and-forth provocation between India and Pakistan, Pakistan attacked India on 3 December 1971. This resulted in India’s intervention in East Pakistan. On the 16th of that month, the Pakistanis declared their surrender to the Indian government.
Although Pakistan pre-emptively attacked India first, both countries exchanged multiple provocations with one another prior to the attack. This demonstrates that India, in its commitment to stop the refugee influx, continued to provoke Pakistan even at the risk of another Indo-Pakistani war. For that reason, India was not forced to intervene as to respond to and counter the Pakistani attack. Rather, it intended Pakistan to strike first as to more easily justify its entrance to the war. More critically, it should be emphasized that neither Gandhi nor the Parliament made any significant strives to stop the Bengali genocide: Gandhi did express her concerns, but none of it translated into action. It was only after the refugee crisis exacerbated that Gandhi publicly condemned and threatened Pakistan. Therefore, India’s entrance into the war in December had no intention of ending the Bengali genocide. India’s efforts to return the Bengalis to their motherland simply coincided with the aspirations of the Bengalis – to end the genocide and establish their own sovereign nation-state. As demonstrated, India intervened in the war as to prevent the permanent settlement of the Bengali refugees and the consequences such event could entail.
Although the Indian government sought to enter the war to resolve its refugee crisis, it did so also to weaken Pakistan. This was only possible due to a security pact India had made with the USSR a few months prior to the war’s outbreak in December 1971. It should first be established that India and Pakistan had been rival states since the inception of their statehood. Since the Partition of India in 1947 and until 1971, India had fought two wars with Pakistan: the First Kashmir War in 1947 and the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965. These wars were fought over the contested territories of Kashmir and Jammu. To India, Pakistan was a constant threat, and thus, the Bengali secessionist movement served as a golden opportunity to dismember and weaken its rival state. To elaborate, a defeat meant a loss of unprecedented scale for Pakistan. Pakistan would first most notably be forced to surrender East Pakistan, which meant losing more than half of its population. This would cease all of Pakistan’s labor exploitations of the Bengali population and access to East Pakistan’s natural resources. More importantly, Pakistan would lose multiple strategic fronts. It would no longer have access to the Bay of Bengal. Because of this, Pakistan would (a) lose its ability to threaten India’s eastern coastlines, (b) only be able to access the Indian Ocean via the Arabian Sea, and (c) lose a maritime trade route to Southeast Asia. Therefore, a successful Bengali secession meant that India would have a significantly weaker rival state and two less fronts to be worried about. Aside from the defeat rendering Pakistan weaker, India would also enjoy a reduced Chinese presence in South Asia. China was an ally of Pakistan, and one of the three actors that fought over Kashmir and Jammu. Because of this, a Pakistani defeat meant that China’s access to fronts that border India would cease as well – which only meant a more secure India.14 For these reasons, India had multiple geopolitical interests in helping the Bengalis defeat the Pakistanis. This was a notion shared by Gandhi and the Parliament. Furthermore, their diplomatic alliance with the USSR before their intervention is indicative of their geopolitical interest in defeating the Pakistanis in the war.
It should first be highlighted that Pakistan historically had been an ally of the US and regularly received the US’ diplomatic support and military aid since 1954 and had multiple alliances in the Arab world – as it was an Islamic Republic. This was not the case for India; it remained a non-aligned state in the Cold War and had no alliances with powerful countries. Because of this, if India did intervene, it ran the risk of fighting the US and Pakistan’s Arab allies. These prospects rendered an Indian victory highly difficult. This prompted Gandhi to ally with the Soviets on August 1971 – five months into the war and four months before India’s intervention. The Soviets promised a full military support in the case of a US or a Chinese intervention.15
This treaty proved extremely helpful for India, as only a few days after India’s entry to the war, Pakistan was on the brink of defeat. As a result, the Pakistanis sought help from the US to draft an appeal to the United Nations Security Council on 7 December 1971. The draft pleaded for an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of both Indian and Pakistani troops from East Pakistan. Because the Soviets held a permanent seat in the Council, the Soviets vetoed the resolution and shut it down.16 Out of fear of a Pakistani defeat and a Soviet expansion in South and Southeast Asia, the then-US President, Richard Nixon, dispatched a fleet of battleships led by a nuclear weapon armed aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, to the Bay of Bengal. The arrival of the US fleet on 11 December 1971 prompted the Soviets to dispatch their own fleet armed with nuclear weapons two days after.17 The Soviet presence in the Bay prevented the US from taking any combat roles. India, as a result, was able to successfully defeat Pakistan on 16 December 1971 without interference from Pakistan’s allies.
As demonstrated, India developed an alliance with the USSR as a means to counter the US-backed Pakistan, ultimately, to pursue its geopolitical interests of dismembering and weakening Pakistan. Had India not formed an alliance with the Soviets, its military campaign against Pakistan would have been put to a halt by either the United Nations or the US’s military presence in the Bay of Bengal. This would have left Pakistan undefeated. More critically, while India’s pact with the USSR did help end the Bengali genocide, India’s intervention in East Pakistan cannot be considered a humanitarian intervention. By definition, the intervening state must have no ulterior interests in its intervention. However, as demonstrated, the strategic advantages India would gain from a Pakistani defeat were multiple and too clear to ignore. For the reasons explained above, it is clear that India intervened in East Pakistan out of its own national interests.
The previous argument addressed that India had multiple geopolitical interests in a Pakistani defeat in the Bangladesh Liberation War. However, India also had an interest in helping the Bengalis establish their own nation-state. This was because, instead of having a rival state in its northeastern front, India would have an ally – a weak ally that it could easily exploit. And clearly, post-war India’s diplomatic behavior towards Bangladesh was characterized by political dominance and economic exploitation. Furthermore, India capitalized on the absence of a Pakistani presence in northeast South Asia to dominate weaker states like Bhutan and Nepal and rise as a regional hegemon in that region.
Shortly after the establishment of an independent Bangladesh, India set up a subservient government to exert influence over Bangladeshi politics. And, to increase Bangladesh’s security dependency on India, the Indian government actively funded the Shanti Bahini rebels of the Chittagong Hill to destabilize the new state. Furthermore, India’s influence over Bangladesh also extended to the control of its economy. The Bangladeshi taka (currency of Bangladesh) was only to be printed in India, and the taka was devalued whenever it was favorable to India’s economic climate.18 India’s autonomy-violating behavior towards Bangladesh was similar to how India treated its other neighbor states. Specifically, Bhutan and Nepal, along with Bangladesh, were forced by India to sign and agree to the terms of the Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation and Peace (1972). Under the terms of this 25-year security treaty, neither Bangladesh, Bhutan, nor Nepal were allowed to actively support or participate in any armed conflict – without India’s permission to do so. These states were also obligated to militarily respond if any of its treaty members were attacked. They were also barred from signing other treaties incompatible with the Treaty of Friendship.19
Critically, post-war India’s behavior towards Bangladesh and its neighbour states indicates that India desired to rise as a hegemon in northeast South Asia. To sum, India had two visible geopolitical goals in the war: (a) dismembering and weakening Pakistan, and (b) rising as a hegemon in the region. Considering these two interests, India’s entrance to the war should only be interpreted as a pursuit of national interest – not as a humanitarian intervention. The end of the Bengali genocide was an inevitable by-product of India’s intervention and victory in the war.
In retrospect, India’s intervention in East Pakistan had no humanitarian goals. India instead entered the Bangladesh Liberation War to stop the influx of refugees, and took advantage of the war to expand its geopolitical influence over the northeastern South Asian region. India’s pre-intervention and post-war behavior clearly demonstrates that the state had no altruistic humanitarian goals of ending the Bengali genocide. Cases of interventions that produces humanitarian successes should always be subject to question to determine whether the intervening state had any ulterior motives.
References
Choudhury, G. W. The Last Days of United Pakistan. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1974. Print.
Haider, Z. “A Revisit to the Indian Role in the Bangladesh Liberation War.” Journal of Asian and African Studies 44.5 (2009): 537-51. Print.
Khan, Yasmin. The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan. New Haven: Yale UP, 2007. Print.
Scheffer, D. J. (1992). Towards a Modern Doctrine of Humanitarian Intervention. University of Toledo Law Review, 23, 253-274.
Sisson, Richard, and Leo E. Rose. War and Secession: Pakistan, India, and the Creation of Bangladesh. Berkeley: U of California, 1990. Print.
Singhvi, L. M. Bangladesh: Background and Perspectives (Stakes in Bangladesh). New Delhi: Institute of Constitutional and Parliamentary Studies, 1971. Print.
Totten, Samuel, William S. Parsons, and Israel W. Charny. Century of Genocide: Critical Essays and Eyewitness Accounts. New York: Routledge, 2004. Print.
Orton, Anna. “Border Disputes with Pakistan.” India’s Borderland Disputes: China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal. New Delhi: Epitome, 2010. 116. Print.
Weekes, Richard V. Muslim Peoples: A World Ethnographic Survey. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1978. Print.
The content of this article does not represent the positions, research methods, or opinions of the Synergy Editorial Committee. We are solely responsible for reviewing and editing submissions. Please address all scholarly concerns directly to the contributor(s) of the article.
Daniel C. Park is a 3rd Year student studying International Relations and Contemporary Asian Studies at the University of Toronto, Trinity College. Currently, Daniel serves as an Associate Editor-in-Chief for Synergy: The Journal of Contemporary Asian Studies. Outside of Synergy, he also contributes to the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the Parliamentary Division of the Canadian Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, and the G-20 Research Group.
Endnotes
Purpose of this thread is not to paint India as an evil state nor its an attempt to take pride in Pakistani follies committed in the name of foreign policy. Here are some of the article i found on internet. Members can contribute too.
Indo-Nepal Crisis
THE DEBATE
Image Credit: China Nepal flags image via Shutterstock.com
India's Self-Defeating Paranoia Over China in Nepal
“India must be more comfortable with the idea of Nepal dealing more with the rest of the world, including with China.”
By Biswas Baral
May 14, 2016
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April 25 marked a year since the start of a series of devastating earthquakes that shook Nepal to its core. The 7.8-magnitude quake and subsequent aftershockskilled over 8,500 people; thousands more were wounded. At least half a million families were rendered homeless. It was easily the biggest natural calamity to hit the small, landlocked country in South Asia since the great earthquake of 1934. Economic damages from last year’s earthquakes were estimated at $5 billion, around 25 percent of national GDP.
But little did Nepalis know that an even bigger calamity was around the corner. When the Constituent Assembly elected to write a new constitution for Nepal produced a charter on September 20, 2015, there were spontaneous protests against the new document in the southern parts of the country. The political parties representing these regions felt that the constitution discriminated against the natives of the southern plains. As a part of their protest, they set-up temporary camps on Nepal’s key border points with India, from which the country imports nearly all its fuel and other daily essentials.
The protestors wouldn’t allow any vehicles to enter Nepal from India, effectively closing the landlocked country’s lifeline. But the border-centric protests of small parties would most certainly have failed if they didn’t have the support of India.
India, the preeminent power in South Asia, was also unhappy with the new constitution, which it felt ignored India’s major concerns even as it went out of its way to accommodate the concerns of the West and particularly the Chinese, India’s geostrategic rival in Nepal.
The “blockade” thus imposed on Nepal lasted for four and a half months before it was lifted in early February this year. It did great damage to the already-battered Nepali economy; the blockade, according Nepal’s finance minister, inflicted greater economic damage than the earthquakes. It also led to a humanitarian crisis. “The declining stocks of gas, food and medicines, together with the closure of schools… and shortages of fuel throughout the country, are not only inflicting damage to the lives of the children now—they threaten the future of the country itself,” said UNICEF.
Although India all along denied it had any role in the disruption of supply of essential goods into Nepal, few in Nepal were inclined to believe it. As one Nepali commentator wrote at the time: “To signal its unhappiness with the Constitution, India has responded with an ‘unofficial’ blockade of goods on its side of the border, a breathtaking intrusion upon our sovereignty.”
Following the unofficial blockade, Nepal has warmed up to China, the only other country besides India with which Nepal shares a border. There is a feeling in Kathmandu that if Nepal does not diversify its trade away from India—with which it now does 70 percent of its business—it could again be made a victim of India’s high-handedness in the future. This explains Nepal’s recent overtures toward China to balance India’s influence. Such rebalancing, Nepalis feel, was long overdue.
What galls Nepalis is that after India’s independence in 1947, it has been treating Nepal as its “backyard“ where it won’t tolerate the presence of any other country, especially China. Particularly after India’s loss in the Indo-China war of 1962, India has been paranoid about protecting its old “sphere of influence“ in South Asia against Chinese incursions.
Smaller South Asian countries like Nepal, Bhutan, and Sri Lanka thus often find themselves caught between the geostrategic rivalry of India and China. The Indians seem especially insecure. Whenever one of these smaller countries is seen as getting close to China, India reacts furiously—and often counterproductively—employing highly coercive methods to bring these countries in line.
But such petulant diplomacy against its small neighbors doesn’t behoove the world’s largest democracy. In a sign that China is more comfortable with the idea of cooperating with India in South Asia than the other way around, Chinese President Xi Jinping recently proposed the idea of making Nepal an economic bridge between India and China, to the ultimate benefit of all three countries. But India isn’t sold on the idea.
Historically, unlike India, China has looked to maintain strict neutrality in Nepal, leaving Nepalis to decide what is best for their country. But following Nepal’s recent overtures to China —which, among other things, resulted in a historic transit treaty between the two countries that now allows Nepal to import goods from third countries via Chinese territories—China has seemed more comfortable making “suggestions” to Nepal. In fact, it is believed that was it not for last-minute Chinese intervention, the Nepali government headed by “pro-China”Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli would have collapsed by now.
But if India’s goal was to keep the Chinese at a safe distance from Nepal, its recent “sledgehammer-diplomacy”has been a spectacular failure. In the 70-year-old bilateral relationship between independent India and Nepal, anti-India feelings among common Nepalis (and the corresponding goodwill for China) have never been higher.
If India wants to retain its status as the predominant power in Nepal—and South Asia by extension—it must learn to keep a carefully calibrated distance. Thanks to its recent intervention, political polarization in Nepal has greatly increased and extremist elements in the areas that border India have been emboldened. Instability in Nepal could easily spill over into India through the open border.
India must also be more comfortable with the idea of Nepal dealing more with the rest of the world, including with China.
Just because Nepal wants better relations with China does not mean it undervalues its relations with India or is working against Indian interests. In fact, all the major political parties in Nepal are acutely aware of Indian sensitivities. They also realize that the deep people-to-people contacts between Nepal and India would be hard, if not impossible, to replicate with China. The cultural influence of India remains as formidable. Hindi songs, movies and soap operas are wildly popular in Nepal, but most Nepalis don’t know a single word of Mandarin. Likewise, the people of India and Nepal easily commingle through the open border, but the border with China is strictly regulated and Beijing will not agree to completely open Tibet just for the benefit of Nepal.
So India’s paranoia with China is unwarranted. It’s about time it started behaving as a more mature power that is comfortable with its role as the undisputed leader in South Asia.
http://thediplomat.com/2016/05/indias-self-defeating-paranoia-over-china-in-nepal/
India-Sri Lanka
The LTTE training camp in Kulathur, Salem district, India, where the 16th batch was trained in 1985/6. The photographs were taken by Wasanthan, an Indian national employed by the press section of the LTTE.
Although Tamil insurgents had established a few training camps in Tamil Nadu in 1982, there was no official assistance from the Central Government of India prior to August 1983 In the eyes of many Indian hard- liners, Sri Lanka since 1977 had stepped out of the non-aligned orbit and had become an ally of the West. There were Israeli intelligence operatives, British counter insurgency experts, South African mercenaries and rumours about offering Trincomalee one of the finest deep water harbours to the US navy. Sri Lanka had good relations with Pakistan and China, two countries that had fought border wars with India and they were in the process of stepping up military assistance to Colombo. Further, President J.R. Jayewardene of Sri Lanka did not enjoy with Premier Indira Gandhi the same warm relationship he had with her father, Premier Jawaharlal Nehru. After Premier Indira Gandhi, also the leader of the powerful Congress (I) Party, took a policy decision to support Sri Lankan northern insurgency from August 1983. The need to have leverage over Colombo was adequately demonstrated by the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the agency also responsible for advancing India's secret foreign policy goals. Within her inner circle, the decision was justified. Geopolitics and domestic compulsions validate the rationale.
The Third Agency of RAW a supra intelligence outfit, was entrusted with the task. Within a year, the number of Sri Lanka Tamil training camps in Tamil Nadu mushroomed to 32. By mid 1987, over 20,000 Sri Lankan Tamil insurgents had been provided sanctuary, finance, training and weapons either by the central government, state government of Tamil Nadu or by the insurgent groups themselves. While most of the initial training was confined to Indian military and paramilitary camps in Uttara Pradesh, specialized training was imparted by the Indian instructors attached to RAW to Sri Lankan insurgents in New Delhi, Bombay and Vishakhapatnam. The most secretive training was conducted in Chakrata, north of Dehra Dun, India's premier military academy for training service personnel, where RAW had also imparted training to Bangladesh, Pakistan and Tibetan dissidents.
With the Indo-Lanka Accord of July 1987, RAW assistance culminated. Rajiv Gandhi ordered the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) to fight the LTTE, when it went back on its pledge to surrender its weapons. The LTTE-IPKF war, apparently deprived the LTTE of its invaluable base, India. But, Tamil Nadu assistance to the LTTE continued even after M.G. Ramachandran's death in December 1987. Tamil Nadu State assistance under the Karunanidhi Administration despite the presence of the IPKF, continued for the LTTE. Although the LTTE was at war with India, Tamil Nadu still remained LTTEÕs main source of supplies.
The Indian Net
Throughout the IPKF episode and until Rajiv GandhiÕs assassination in 1991, the LTTE continued to maintain a substantial presence in India. When the law enforcement agencies stepped up surveillance, the LTTE moved a bulk of its cadres from Tamil Nadu to other towns such as Mysore, Bangalore and Bombay. Even at the height of the IPKF-LTTE confrontation, the LTTE had twelve sections in India to manage:
(1) Intelligence
(2) Communications
(3) Arms Production
(4) Procurement of explosives
(5) Propaganda
(6) Political work
(7) Food and essential supplies
(8) Medicines
(9) Fuel supplies
(10) Clothing
( 11 ) Transport
(12) Finance and currency conversion
The LTTE had also converted Madras, the capital of Tamil Nadu, and nine other Tamil Nadu districts, into centres for war supplies to the LTTE. Each centre was linked by a sophisticated wireless network. Individual units carried Sanyo walkie talkie sets. The centres of war supplies and other activities were:
( I ) Dharmapuri: Procurement of explosives
(2) Coimbatore: Arms and ammunition manufacturing
(3) Salem: Explosives manufacturing and military clothing manufacturing
(4) Periya (Erode) Military clothing manufacturing
(5) Vedaraniyam: Coastal area from where supplies were dispatched for the LTTE
(6) Madurai: Transit area
(7) Thanjavur: Communications centre
(8) Nagapattnam: Landing area for supplies from LTTE deep sea going vessels.
(9) Rameswaram: Refugee arriving area and recruitment
(10) Tiruchi: Treatment of wounded LTTE cadres
(11) Tuticorin: LTTE trade in gold, silver, narcotics and other merchandise goods
(12) Madras: Liaison with Tamil Nadu political leaders.
Implications for India
The LTTE-lndia nexus did not secure the geopolitical security New Delhi needed from Sri Lanka. It weakened Indian as well as Sri Lankan domestic security. In many ways, the presence of a foreign military strengthened the fighting spirit of LTTE and weakened the anti-terrorist capability of the Sri Lankan forces, then engaged in an anti-subversive campaign in the South The organization gained mastery of guerrilla warfare by fighting the fourth largest military in the world. The LTTE suffered heavy causalities but replenished their ranks and gained a confidence paralleled by the Viet Cong and the Afghan Mujahidin. LTTE also innovated new weapons, mostly projectiles and mines. Johnny mine, the anti personnel mine invented by Prabhakaran, has at least claimed 5,300 Indian and Sri Lankan war causalities. Many Tamil Nadu political leaders from Nedumaran to Gopalasamy and Ramakrishnan visited the LTTE jungle base - known as the one four base complex over the years - and expressed solidarity with Prabhakararn.
The role of the IPKF in Sri Lanka became a politically sensitive issue. When the IPKF returned to India, under the National Front government of V.P. Singh, the then Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi did not visit the port of Madras to welcome the Indian soldiers. Even after the IPKF departed the LTTE continued to maintain excellent relations with Tamil Nadu politicians. The LTTE had managed to preserve Tamil Nadu as a critical base by retaining the goodwill of the Tamil Nadu leaders.
In fact, when the LTTE hit teams under the one eyed Jack Sivarasan assassinated the anti-LTTE EPRLF leader Padmanabha and his colleagues in Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister Karunanidhi asked the Tamil Nadu police and the state agencies to turn a blind eye. A few months later, the LTTE used the very same infra- structure of the LTTE in Tamil Nadu to kill Rajiv Gandhi. The LTTE penetration of the Tamil Nadu polity was so good that a decision reached at a high level meeting comprising intelligence agencies in New Delhi about anti-LTTE operations was conveyed to the LTTE within 24 hours. Investigations revealed that the culprit was the then Tamil Nadu Home Secretary and at the instruction of Karunanidhi. The dismissal of Karunanidhi did not prevent the LTTE from continuing to operate in Tamil Nadu. The LTTE made a statement during the subsequent Jayalalitha administration, "If the Tamil Nadu leadership cannot support the LTTE, at least we expect them to be neutral to the LTTE." This meant that LTTE operations should continue unhindered in the state of Tamil Nadu.
In retrospect, the LTTE-India relationship has been one of love and hate. It is a relationship that will have its ups and downs but a relationship that will nevertheless continue. Despite the fact that the LTTE eliminated Rajiv Gandhi, the last of the Gandhi-Nehru dynasty, there will always be a segment of the Tamil. Nadu leaders and people that will support the LTTE. The contradiction stems, from India's own structure the diversity within India, particularly, the disparity in culture between the Indian Tamils and the rest of India's polity. The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi was imperative for the LTTE. If the LTTE did not, the IPKF that withdrew would have returned heralding another period of bloody fighting. Prabhakaran's calculus was right As a leader, he had done his duty by his rank and file. By assassinating Rajiv Gandhi, he prevented the reintroduction of the IPKF to Sri Lanka. Even for Prabhakaran, it would have been a painful decision. Antagonizing India at the southernmost point of peninsular India meant the permanent closure of the door for creating Tamil Eelam and Prabhakaran becoming its ruler.
http://www.sundaytimes.lk/970119/plus4.html
East Pakistan - India 1971,1972
India’s Intervention in East Pakistan: A Humanitarian Intervention or an Act of National Interest?
PARK, DANIEL C. | VOLUME 1, ISSUE 3 (FEBRUARY 2016) | ISSN 2369-8217 (ONLINE)
February 16, 2016 Daniel C. Park Academic Articles, Contemporary History, Politics, South Asia
This map shows the partition of India, West Pakistan, East Pakistan, and Kashmir, including the directions of movements of Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims : Image: Wikimedia Commons
Daniel C. Park is a 3rd Year student studying International Relations and Contemporary Asian Studies at the University of Toronto, Trinity College. Currently, Daniel serves as an Associate Editor-in-Chief for Synergy: The Journal of Contemporary Asian Studies. Outside of Synergy, he also contributes to the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the Parliamentary Division of the Canadian Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, and the G-20 Research Group.
Abstract
The question of why India declined to rationalize its entrance to the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971 as a humanitarian intervention is puzzling. This is because the intervention put an end to the 1971 Bangladesh genocide that killed an estimate of 300,000 to 3,000,000 Bengalis. This paper argues that India intervened in the war to cease the influx of Bengali refugees from entering its own borders. And, more importantly, to expand and pursue its geopolitical interests in South Asia, which included (a) weakening and dismembering its rival state Pakistan, and (b) rising as a regional hegemon in the northeastern South Asia region.
Keywords: Bangladesh Liberation War; Bengali Genocide; Humanitarian Intervention
India’s intervention in the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War has been noted as a humanitarian intervention for ending the 1971 Bengali genocide, yet India has never justified its intervention as such.Therefore, an assessment as to whether India had altruistic humanitarian or national interest-driven intentions is vital to comprehend what motivates states to commit their resources in wars reported of mass atrocity crimes. For an intervention to be classified as “humanitarian”, the intervening state’s sole objective must be putting an end to the human rights violations. By definition, the intervention must not be conducted out of national security woes or interests.1 To help readers better understand this topic, the background of both the Bangladesh Liberation War and the Bengali genocide is needed. When British rule over the Indian subcontinent dissolved in 1947, the British Raj was split into two sovereign states: the Union of India and the Dominion of Pakistan. The latter was further divided into two exclaves. West Pakistan bordered the northwestern front of India, while East Pakistan bordered India’s northeastern front. Due to this border arrangement, the two Pakistans were geographically separated by one thousand miles of Indian territory.2 This disunity between the two Pakistans was accentuated by their stark linguistic and ethno-cultural differences. The Punjabis were the ethnic majority in West Pakistan, while the Bengalis were that of the East.3 Their differences were further compounded by the politically dominant West’s discriminatory policies against the Bengalis. The Bengalis were denied their democratic rights to govern and participate in the decision-making processes of Pakistan, and were economically exploited for their labor and natural resources.4 These discriminatory policies collectively sparked a violent upsurge that eventually led to the fall of the then-military dictator, General Ayub Khan in 1969. What followed was a democratic election in 1970, where the Bengali-led Awami League Party (ALP) won, while the Punjabi-led Pakistani Peoples Party (PPP) was elected as the opposition party.5 This was primarily due to the Bengalis having a population larger than that of the Punjabis. A majority of the Bengalis and the Punjabis cast their votes for their own ethnic-affiliated parties. Because of this, neither party embodied any national character to garner the support of both the Bengali and Punjabi electorates. The PPP, who had not yet forfeited its seats in the Pakistani Parliament (Majlis-e-Shoora), took advantage of the polarizing election results to legitimize its refusal to give up its power. Although the refusal left the Bengali population frustrated and helpless, it fueled the Bengali nationalist and self-determination movement to gain considerable momentum. Because such populist movements risked a Bengali secession, the then-President, General Yahya Khan, opted for a military solution: The West Pakistani military launched a systematic campaign of indiscriminate slaughter of the Bengalis on 25 March 1971.6 This was the start of the Bengali genocide, which also simultaneously triggered the Bengali secessionist movement or the Bangladesh Liberation War. The genocide is estimated to have killed between 300,000 to 3,000,000 Bengalis.7 A year after General Khan’s order, on 3 December 1971, India entered the war and pushed Pakistan to defeat on the 16th of that month. {To avoid confusion, this paper refers to the population of West Pakistan as Pakistanis and that of East Pakistan (today’s Bangladesh) as Bengalis.}
This paper argues that while the Indian government did express its concerns about the Bengali genocide of 1971, its intervention in the Bangladesh Liberation War was not justified on humanitarian grounds, but rather by its national interests. Under this premise, the end of the genocide was an unintended by-product of India’s intervention to the war – not a cause. The first argument of this paper looks at the Bengali refugee crisis and the economic burden it placed on India. The following two arguments look at India’s geopolitical interests of entering the war. The former illustrates that India took advantage of the war as a means to weaken Pakistan. The argument also examines the relevance India’s diplomatic alliance with the USSR had on Pakistan’s defeat. Aside from India’s aim to weaken Pakistan, the latter demonstrates that India also had both geopolitical and economic interests in aiding the Bengalis in establishing their own sovereign state. By replacing a foe with a friendly, but weaker state as its neighbour, India would rise as a regional hegemon in the South Asian region. To prove this point, this argument looks at India’s post-war behavior towards Bangladesh and other neighbouring states like Nepal and Bhutan. Collectively, India intervened in the war to pursue its national interests.
The influx of Bengali war refugees from East Pakistan placed a burden on India’s economy – which was, at the time, dysfunctional and weak. Because of this, the then-Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi, was prompted to intervene in the war to return the refugees back to their motherland. A day after the outbreak of the war and reports of the genocidal killings, Gandhi addressed her concerns to the Indian public. She fully acknowledged the crisis, and urged the Indian Parliament (Bharatiya Sansad) to readily grant refugee status to the Bengalis entering Indian borders.8 This was and had been India’s standard procedure to previous refugee influxes from past regional conflicts. Historically, India had granted refuge to Tibetans in 1959 due to the Tibetan uprising and to the Nepalese in 1960 after King Mahendra of Nepal dissolved the country’s democratic rule.9 However, the rapid rise of Bengali refugees in India forced Gandhi to think otherwise. By the end of May 1971, only two months after the war’s outbreak, nine million refugees had taken shelter in the state of Tripura – a state that held a population of only 1.5 million. Near the war’s end on 15 December 1971, the refugee count climbed to over ten million across Tripura and six other states that took in refugees – both in and outside of the 825 camps that were set up.10
India was not equipped to accommodate ten million refugees. At the same time, both Gandhi and the Parliament had fears over the refugees’ permanent settlement in India. Such an outcome would cripple and exhaust India’s economic aid capacities, and its public infrastructure would be overburdened and fail. There were also worries of India’s own Bengali population uniting with the refugees to spark a secessionist movement within India.11 These scenarios were only feasible in the case of a Bengali defeat – a highly likely outcome since the Bengalis were undertrained and underequipped to fight the stronger Pakistanis. The prospect of these unwanted events prompted Gandhi to publicly threaten Pakistan. On 24 May 1971, Gandhi expressed her intentions to stop the refugee influx into India, and to guarantee their trip back to East Pakistan.12 Shortly after Gandhi’s announcement, the Indian government permitted the establishment of a Bangladeshi government in exile in Calcutta, and started the recruitment and training of Bengalis to fight the Pakistanis.13 Months after back-and-forth provocation between India and Pakistan, Pakistan attacked India on 3 December 1971. This resulted in India’s intervention in East Pakistan. On the 16th of that month, the Pakistanis declared their surrender to the Indian government.
Although Pakistan pre-emptively attacked India first, both countries exchanged multiple provocations with one another prior to the attack. This demonstrates that India, in its commitment to stop the refugee influx, continued to provoke Pakistan even at the risk of another Indo-Pakistani war. For that reason, India was not forced to intervene as to respond to and counter the Pakistani attack. Rather, it intended Pakistan to strike first as to more easily justify its entrance to the war. More critically, it should be emphasized that neither Gandhi nor the Parliament made any significant strives to stop the Bengali genocide: Gandhi did express her concerns, but none of it translated into action. It was only after the refugee crisis exacerbated that Gandhi publicly condemned and threatened Pakistan. Therefore, India’s entrance into the war in December had no intention of ending the Bengali genocide. India’s efforts to return the Bengalis to their motherland simply coincided with the aspirations of the Bengalis – to end the genocide and establish their own sovereign nation-state. As demonstrated, India intervened in the war as to prevent the permanent settlement of the Bengali refugees and the consequences such event could entail.
Although the Indian government sought to enter the war to resolve its refugee crisis, it did so also to weaken Pakistan. This was only possible due to a security pact India had made with the USSR a few months prior to the war’s outbreak in December 1971. It should first be established that India and Pakistan had been rival states since the inception of their statehood. Since the Partition of India in 1947 and until 1971, India had fought two wars with Pakistan: the First Kashmir War in 1947 and the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965. These wars were fought over the contested territories of Kashmir and Jammu. To India, Pakistan was a constant threat, and thus, the Bengali secessionist movement served as a golden opportunity to dismember and weaken its rival state. To elaborate, a defeat meant a loss of unprecedented scale for Pakistan. Pakistan would first most notably be forced to surrender East Pakistan, which meant losing more than half of its population. This would cease all of Pakistan’s labor exploitations of the Bengali population and access to East Pakistan’s natural resources. More importantly, Pakistan would lose multiple strategic fronts. It would no longer have access to the Bay of Bengal. Because of this, Pakistan would (a) lose its ability to threaten India’s eastern coastlines, (b) only be able to access the Indian Ocean via the Arabian Sea, and (c) lose a maritime trade route to Southeast Asia. Therefore, a successful Bengali secession meant that India would have a significantly weaker rival state and two less fronts to be worried about. Aside from the defeat rendering Pakistan weaker, India would also enjoy a reduced Chinese presence in South Asia. China was an ally of Pakistan, and one of the three actors that fought over Kashmir and Jammu. Because of this, a Pakistani defeat meant that China’s access to fronts that border India would cease as well – which only meant a more secure India.14 For these reasons, India had multiple geopolitical interests in helping the Bengalis defeat the Pakistanis. This was a notion shared by Gandhi and the Parliament. Furthermore, their diplomatic alliance with the USSR before their intervention is indicative of their geopolitical interest in defeating the Pakistanis in the war.
It should first be highlighted that Pakistan historically had been an ally of the US and regularly received the US’ diplomatic support and military aid since 1954 and had multiple alliances in the Arab world – as it was an Islamic Republic. This was not the case for India; it remained a non-aligned state in the Cold War and had no alliances with powerful countries. Because of this, if India did intervene, it ran the risk of fighting the US and Pakistan’s Arab allies. These prospects rendered an Indian victory highly difficult. This prompted Gandhi to ally with the Soviets on August 1971 – five months into the war and four months before India’s intervention. The Soviets promised a full military support in the case of a US or a Chinese intervention.15
This treaty proved extremely helpful for India, as only a few days after India’s entry to the war, Pakistan was on the brink of defeat. As a result, the Pakistanis sought help from the US to draft an appeal to the United Nations Security Council on 7 December 1971. The draft pleaded for an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of both Indian and Pakistani troops from East Pakistan. Because the Soviets held a permanent seat in the Council, the Soviets vetoed the resolution and shut it down.16 Out of fear of a Pakistani defeat and a Soviet expansion in South and Southeast Asia, the then-US President, Richard Nixon, dispatched a fleet of battleships led by a nuclear weapon armed aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, to the Bay of Bengal. The arrival of the US fleet on 11 December 1971 prompted the Soviets to dispatch their own fleet armed with nuclear weapons two days after.17 The Soviet presence in the Bay prevented the US from taking any combat roles. India, as a result, was able to successfully defeat Pakistan on 16 December 1971 without interference from Pakistan’s allies.
As demonstrated, India developed an alliance with the USSR as a means to counter the US-backed Pakistan, ultimately, to pursue its geopolitical interests of dismembering and weakening Pakistan. Had India not formed an alliance with the Soviets, its military campaign against Pakistan would have been put to a halt by either the United Nations or the US’s military presence in the Bay of Bengal. This would have left Pakistan undefeated. More critically, while India’s pact with the USSR did help end the Bengali genocide, India’s intervention in East Pakistan cannot be considered a humanitarian intervention. By definition, the intervening state must have no ulterior interests in its intervention. However, as demonstrated, the strategic advantages India would gain from a Pakistani defeat were multiple and too clear to ignore. For the reasons explained above, it is clear that India intervened in East Pakistan out of its own national interests.
The previous argument addressed that India had multiple geopolitical interests in a Pakistani defeat in the Bangladesh Liberation War. However, India also had an interest in helping the Bengalis establish their own nation-state. This was because, instead of having a rival state in its northeastern front, India would have an ally – a weak ally that it could easily exploit. And clearly, post-war India’s diplomatic behavior towards Bangladesh was characterized by political dominance and economic exploitation. Furthermore, India capitalized on the absence of a Pakistani presence in northeast South Asia to dominate weaker states like Bhutan and Nepal and rise as a regional hegemon in that region.
Shortly after the establishment of an independent Bangladesh, India set up a subservient government to exert influence over Bangladeshi politics. And, to increase Bangladesh’s security dependency on India, the Indian government actively funded the Shanti Bahini rebels of the Chittagong Hill to destabilize the new state. Furthermore, India’s influence over Bangladesh also extended to the control of its economy. The Bangladeshi taka (currency of Bangladesh) was only to be printed in India, and the taka was devalued whenever it was favorable to India’s economic climate.18 India’s autonomy-violating behavior towards Bangladesh was similar to how India treated its other neighbor states. Specifically, Bhutan and Nepal, along with Bangladesh, were forced by India to sign and agree to the terms of the Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation and Peace (1972). Under the terms of this 25-year security treaty, neither Bangladesh, Bhutan, nor Nepal were allowed to actively support or participate in any armed conflict – without India’s permission to do so. These states were also obligated to militarily respond if any of its treaty members were attacked. They were also barred from signing other treaties incompatible with the Treaty of Friendship.19
Critically, post-war India’s behavior towards Bangladesh and its neighbour states indicates that India desired to rise as a hegemon in northeast South Asia. To sum, India had two visible geopolitical goals in the war: (a) dismembering and weakening Pakistan, and (b) rising as a hegemon in the region. Considering these two interests, India’s entrance to the war should only be interpreted as a pursuit of national interest – not as a humanitarian intervention. The end of the Bengali genocide was an inevitable by-product of India’s intervention and victory in the war.
In retrospect, India’s intervention in East Pakistan had no humanitarian goals. India instead entered the Bangladesh Liberation War to stop the influx of refugees, and took advantage of the war to expand its geopolitical influence over the northeastern South Asian region. India’s pre-intervention and post-war behavior clearly demonstrates that the state had no altruistic humanitarian goals of ending the Bengali genocide. Cases of interventions that produces humanitarian successes should always be subject to question to determine whether the intervening state had any ulterior motives.
References
Choudhury, G. W. The Last Days of United Pakistan. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1974. Print.
Haider, Z. “A Revisit to the Indian Role in the Bangladesh Liberation War.” Journal of Asian and African Studies 44.5 (2009): 537-51. Print.
Khan, Yasmin. The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan. New Haven: Yale UP, 2007. Print.
Scheffer, D. J. (1992). Towards a Modern Doctrine of Humanitarian Intervention. University of Toledo Law Review, 23, 253-274.
Sisson, Richard, and Leo E. Rose. War and Secession: Pakistan, India, and the Creation of Bangladesh. Berkeley: U of California, 1990. Print.
Singhvi, L. M. Bangladesh: Background and Perspectives (Stakes in Bangladesh). New Delhi: Institute of Constitutional and Parliamentary Studies, 1971. Print.
Totten, Samuel, William S. Parsons, and Israel W. Charny. Century of Genocide: Critical Essays and Eyewitness Accounts. New York: Routledge, 2004. Print.
Orton, Anna. “Border Disputes with Pakistan.” India’s Borderland Disputes: China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal. New Delhi: Epitome, 2010. 116. Print.
Weekes, Richard V. Muslim Peoples: A World Ethnographic Survey. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1978. Print.
The content of this article does not represent the positions, research methods, or opinions of the Synergy Editorial Committee. We are solely responsible for reviewing and editing submissions. Please address all scholarly concerns directly to the contributor(s) of the article.
Daniel C. Park is a 3rd Year student studying International Relations and Contemporary Asian Studies at the University of Toronto, Trinity College. Currently, Daniel serves as an Associate Editor-in-Chief for Synergy: The Journal of Contemporary Asian Studies. Outside of Synergy, he also contributes to the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the Parliamentary Division of the Canadian Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, and the G-20 Research Group.
Endnotes
- Scheffer, D. J. (1992). Towards a Modern Doctrine of Humanitarian Intervention. University of Toledo Law Review, 23, 266.
- Khan, Yasmin. The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan. New Haven: Yale UP, 2007. Print.
- Weekes, Richard V. Muslim Peoples: A World Ethnographic Survey. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1978. Print.
- Ahmed, Moudud. South Asia: Crisis of Development: The Case of Bangladesh. Dhaka: U, 2002. Print.
- The ALP won 160 seats, while the PPP won 81 seats in the 1970 National Assembly election.
- Choudhury, G. W. The Last Days of United Pakistan. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1974. Print.
- Totten, Samuel, William S. Parsons, and Israel W. Charny. Century of Genocide: Critical Essays and Eyewitness Accounts. New York: Routledge, 2004. Print.
- Haider, Z. “A Revisit to the Indian Role in the Bangladesh Liberation War.” Journal of Asian and African Studies 44.5 (2009): 539. Print.
- Sisson, Richard, and Leo E. Rose. War and Secession: Pakistan, India, and the Creation of Bangladesh. Berkeley: U of California, 1990. Print.
- Haider, Z. 540.
- Ibid. 541-542.
- Ibid. 541.
- Ibid. 540.
- Singhvi, L. M. Bangladesh: Background and Perspectives (Stakes in Bangladesh). New Delhi: Institute of Constitutional and Parliamentary Studies, 1971. Print.
- Orton, Anna. “Border Disputes with Pakistan.” India’s Borderland Disputes: China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal. New Delhi: Epitome, 2010. 116. Print.
- Ibid. 110.
- Ibid. 115.
- Haider, Z. 545.
- Ibid. 544.
But of no use..
