Plebiscite would never happen in Kashmir, said Ayub Khan in 1959
Why is your book important in this crowded market of India-Pakistan writing?
I have broken the pattern of Pakistanis who only blame India for the impasse in the relationship and also share details, which Indians will find surprising, about how India contributed to making this relationship adverse.
For example, I have listed occasions where Indians have missed opportunities to try and reach out to Pakistan, try and help Pakistan overcome the psychosis that has fed the culture of fear in Pakistan. On the other hand, I have listed and pointed out how Pakistan has been virtually consistent in its hostility to India.
One very interesting detail is the exchange of letters between the US secretary of state James Baker and PM Nawaz Sharif in 1992. To think that 24 years ago Pakistan was saying similar things to what it is saying now on terrorism and the international community was saying exactly what they are saying now. It shows that for a quarter of a century, there has been absolutely consistency in Pakistan's conduct as well as its excuses.
To ask you your own question, why can't India and Pakistan be friends?
One of the little incidents I did not write in the book -- in 1949, Prime Minister (Jawaharlal) Nehru was invited to the United States. It was the first visit by independent India's PM. According to the declassified minutes of the meeting with President Truman, he asks Nehru, "what can we do for India?" Nehru talked to him about how India needed to modernize its agriculture and build institutes of technology similar to MIT. He also asked for American assistance in these massive projects.
A few months later, Pakistan PM Liaquat Ali Khan was invited to Washington. He too met President Truman, who asked him the same question. Liaquat took out of his pocket a list of the military equipment Pakistan needed and handed it over. This episode of two prime ministers right at the beginning encapsulate the different national priorities. The consequence of those priorities is what we are living with today.
How has India contributed to this adverse relationship?
On the Indian side, I have found that while India talks about good neighborliness, it just refuses to recognize that partition and the circumstances thereafter have scarred Pakistan.
A huge scare was inflicted on Pakistan when Pakistan got 33 per cent of the British Indian army but only 17 per cent of the GDP. The consequence was that Pakistan elite decided to rule Pakistan by creating a constant fear of India. If India knows that, the best policy for India should have been, at least in good times, to take steps to reassure Pakistan, which it did not take, thereby playing right into the hands of Pakistan's elite which wanted a state of fear.
In my opinion, consistent engagement or sustained isolation are the only two options between India and Pakistan. These on-again-off-again talks do not yield results, nor do threats that are not carried out. That's our history.
Have you unearthed new details about our bilateral history?
Does any Indian or Pakistan know that in 1959 Ayub Khan had said that plebiscite would never happen? Yet Pakistan's public policy remains that plebiscite or nothing on Kashmir. Similarly the details that India actually offered 5000 square miles in 1963 as a way of settling the dispute forever.
On terrorism there are great details. I think the conversation between Pakistan intelligence chief and the Americans, as well as the conversation between him and me after 26/11, they are very important. This is the first time somebody has applied the rules of psychology to the India-Pakistan relationship. Instead of the logical solutions, I have talked about the psychological factors that have impeded the relationship.
Why is there this refrain about "cutting India down to size" in Pakistani discourse?
Most neighbours who have disproportionate asymmetries and have disputes between them usually begin by acknowledging their disparity of size. For example, Canada and US have five outstanding disputes including territory and border disputes. But Canada recognizes its military capability is disproportionately smaller.
Belgium and France is another example, as is Ukraine and Russia. In case of Pakistan, in 1947, the military ratio was 1:3. But 1971 brought that ratio down. But despite the loss of territory, Pakistan army continued to expand. And my point is, we will be exhausted, run out of breath trying to keep up with someone much larger than us. External actors like US have inadvertently or intentionally fed Pakistan fear and its desire to be a military equal. India and Pakistan therefore is one of the most unreal relationships between two countries with huge disparities, but a desire for military parity. How do you achieve that? By building yourself militarily or by doing what some people in Pakistan talk about, which is cutting India down to size.
I write this book as a Pakistani in anguish, about the prospects of my country and the most crucial external relationship of my country.
You write that the space for friendship is shrinking between us ...
I think it's time to start getting to know each other. An overwhelming number of Indians and Pakistanis have no memory of partition or even of the 1965 and 1971 wars. So all we have is transmitted memory. If Mexico transmitted to its people the memory of America from the Mexico-American war of the 19th century, Mexico and America would be in a perpetual state of war. I recommend we stop transmitting memory of anger and hatred. Let's talk about living with each other first. It would help to humanize the other.
But terrorism remains a barrier.
Terrorism has to absolutely stop. Even as a factor in conversation. It's poison to the relationship and all the players -- Pakistan, India, US have to change. On the Indian side too, India should not play a similar card on the other side, that would not help. This is one instance where an eye for an eye will make the whole world blind. There should be consistent international engagement to say, you know what, it's not acceptable. People like Hafiz Saeed and Masood Azhar need to be put out of business. Period. After that we start opening up the relationship, give long term visas, exchanges in education, healthcare etc.
There is a famous couplet by Faiz: "Hum thehre ajnabi itni madaraton ke baad,Phir banenge aashnaa kitni mulaqaton ke baad?" (We became strangers after many intimacies, how many meetings do we now need to become acquainted?")
You write that after 2008, the new civilian government could not find the records of the backchannel conversation between SK Lambah and Tariq Aziz. Were the official records destroyed?
I'm sure the record existed but the Pakistan military leaders did not want to share it with the civilians and they actually wanted the negotiating process to go back to square one. After all, Gen Musharraf was both COAS and president. So disciplined military officers who did not want normalization with India could not say anything. Once a civilian government came in, those in the Pakistan intelligence services and Pakistan military who thought Musharraf may have given away too much, thought this was a golden opportunity to take the conversation back. That's a recurrent pattern, by the way. In 1958, Feroz Khan Noon, PM of Pakistan, went to India. And he came back saying hostility forever is not an option and that we need a no-war pact and normalize relations. He is deposed and martial law imposed. Then, Ayub Khan is in power, he goes to war but the 1965 war does not play out as expected. The Tashkent declaration is followed by marches on the streets by Islamists. Ayub Khan is out of power and we have a new general, Yahya Khan. Then we go to war again in 1971 and after that Bhutto signed the Shimla Accord. But by 1979, Bhutto is gone. Each time we have some progress, we go back to square one, with a change in government in Pakistan.
Where do you stand on the current US-Pakistan F-16 row?
It's obvious the US Congress is unhappy with Pakistan. They are not refusing to give the F-16s but just want Pakistan to pay full price for them. This will be interpreted in Pakistan as an anti-Pakistan act. It will be used to generate, once again, the psychosis in Pakistan that the whole world is against us instead of paying attention to the details. If the Americans are consistent in giving the message that we are happy to do business with Pakistan and sell it military equipment only if Pakistan changes policy -- if that message is consistent, then it might work.
But eight F-16s are not going to change the military balance. Pakistan needs them to balance its squadrons. In Pakistan it's a symbolic thing -- is America behind us or not. For Indians it's a symbolic thing too. That's where the problem lies.
Pakistan wants to maintain the consistency of its policies and wants to maintain international concessions that are linked to changing of that policy. That's what creates the dilemma.
I'm not against the F-16, nor do I think it's a make-or-break deal in US-Pakistan relations. I think we need to rise above and look at the bigger picture, which is that Pakistan's economy is not growing. That 42 per cent of children in the school-going age are not going to school. So Pakistan has to think beyond this issue of eight planes and six guns, which is what we have done since 1949.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...id-Ayub-Khan-in-1959/articleshow/52195541.cms
Why is your book important in this crowded market of India-Pakistan writing?
I have broken the pattern of Pakistanis who only blame India for the impasse in the relationship and also share details, which Indians will find surprising, about how India contributed to making this relationship adverse.
For example, I have listed occasions where Indians have missed opportunities to try and reach out to Pakistan, try and help Pakistan overcome the psychosis that has fed the culture of fear in Pakistan. On the other hand, I have listed and pointed out how Pakistan has been virtually consistent in its hostility to India.
One very interesting detail is the exchange of letters between the US secretary of state James Baker and PM Nawaz Sharif in 1992. To think that 24 years ago Pakistan was saying similar things to what it is saying now on terrorism and the international community was saying exactly what they are saying now. It shows that for a quarter of a century, there has been absolutely consistency in Pakistan's conduct as well as its excuses.
To ask you your own question, why can't India and Pakistan be friends?
One of the little incidents I did not write in the book -- in 1949, Prime Minister (Jawaharlal) Nehru was invited to the United States. It was the first visit by independent India's PM. According to the declassified minutes of the meeting with President Truman, he asks Nehru, "what can we do for India?" Nehru talked to him about how India needed to modernize its agriculture and build institutes of technology similar to MIT. He also asked for American assistance in these massive projects.
A few months later, Pakistan PM Liaquat Ali Khan was invited to Washington. He too met President Truman, who asked him the same question. Liaquat took out of his pocket a list of the military equipment Pakistan needed and handed it over. This episode of two prime ministers right at the beginning encapsulate the different national priorities. The consequence of those priorities is what we are living with today.
How has India contributed to this adverse relationship?
On the Indian side, I have found that while India talks about good neighborliness, it just refuses to recognize that partition and the circumstances thereafter have scarred Pakistan.
A huge scare was inflicted on Pakistan when Pakistan got 33 per cent of the British Indian army but only 17 per cent of the GDP. The consequence was that Pakistan elite decided to rule Pakistan by creating a constant fear of India. If India knows that, the best policy for India should have been, at least in good times, to take steps to reassure Pakistan, which it did not take, thereby playing right into the hands of Pakistan's elite which wanted a state of fear.
In my opinion, consistent engagement or sustained isolation are the only two options between India and Pakistan. These on-again-off-again talks do not yield results, nor do threats that are not carried out. That's our history.
Have you unearthed new details about our bilateral history?
Does any Indian or Pakistan know that in 1959 Ayub Khan had said that plebiscite would never happen? Yet Pakistan's public policy remains that plebiscite or nothing on Kashmir. Similarly the details that India actually offered 5000 square miles in 1963 as a way of settling the dispute forever.
On terrorism there are great details. I think the conversation between Pakistan intelligence chief and the Americans, as well as the conversation between him and me after 26/11, they are very important. This is the first time somebody has applied the rules of psychology to the India-Pakistan relationship. Instead of the logical solutions, I have talked about the psychological factors that have impeded the relationship.
Why is there this refrain about "cutting India down to size" in Pakistani discourse?
Most neighbours who have disproportionate asymmetries and have disputes between them usually begin by acknowledging their disparity of size. For example, Canada and US have five outstanding disputes including territory and border disputes. But Canada recognizes its military capability is disproportionately smaller.
Belgium and France is another example, as is Ukraine and Russia. In case of Pakistan, in 1947, the military ratio was 1:3. But 1971 brought that ratio down. But despite the loss of territory, Pakistan army continued to expand. And my point is, we will be exhausted, run out of breath trying to keep up with someone much larger than us. External actors like US have inadvertently or intentionally fed Pakistan fear and its desire to be a military equal. India and Pakistan therefore is one of the most unreal relationships between two countries with huge disparities, but a desire for military parity. How do you achieve that? By building yourself militarily or by doing what some people in Pakistan talk about, which is cutting India down to size.
I write this book as a Pakistani in anguish, about the prospects of my country and the most crucial external relationship of my country.
You write that the space for friendship is shrinking between us ...
I think it's time to start getting to know each other. An overwhelming number of Indians and Pakistanis have no memory of partition or even of the 1965 and 1971 wars. So all we have is transmitted memory. If Mexico transmitted to its people the memory of America from the Mexico-American war of the 19th century, Mexico and America would be in a perpetual state of war. I recommend we stop transmitting memory of anger and hatred. Let's talk about living with each other first. It would help to humanize the other.
But terrorism remains a barrier.
Terrorism has to absolutely stop. Even as a factor in conversation. It's poison to the relationship and all the players -- Pakistan, India, US have to change. On the Indian side too, India should not play a similar card on the other side, that would not help. This is one instance where an eye for an eye will make the whole world blind. There should be consistent international engagement to say, you know what, it's not acceptable. People like Hafiz Saeed and Masood Azhar need to be put out of business. Period. After that we start opening up the relationship, give long term visas, exchanges in education, healthcare etc.
There is a famous couplet by Faiz: "Hum thehre ajnabi itni madaraton ke baad,Phir banenge aashnaa kitni mulaqaton ke baad?" (We became strangers after many intimacies, how many meetings do we now need to become acquainted?")
You write that after 2008, the new civilian government could not find the records of the backchannel conversation between SK Lambah and Tariq Aziz. Were the official records destroyed?
I'm sure the record existed but the Pakistan military leaders did not want to share it with the civilians and they actually wanted the negotiating process to go back to square one. After all, Gen Musharraf was both COAS and president. So disciplined military officers who did not want normalization with India could not say anything. Once a civilian government came in, those in the Pakistan intelligence services and Pakistan military who thought Musharraf may have given away too much, thought this was a golden opportunity to take the conversation back. That's a recurrent pattern, by the way. In 1958, Feroz Khan Noon, PM of Pakistan, went to India. And he came back saying hostility forever is not an option and that we need a no-war pact and normalize relations. He is deposed and martial law imposed. Then, Ayub Khan is in power, he goes to war but the 1965 war does not play out as expected. The Tashkent declaration is followed by marches on the streets by Islamists. Ayub Khan is out of power and we have a new general, Yahya Khan. Then we go to war again in 1971 and after that Bhutto signed the Shimla Accord. But by 1979, Bhutto is gone. Each time we have some progress, we go back to square one, with a change in government in Pakistan.
Where do you stand on the current US-Pakistan F-16 row?
It's obvious the US Congress is unhappy with Pakistan. They are not refusing to give the F-16s but just want Pakistan to pay full price for them. This will be interpreted in Pakistan as an anti-Pakistan act. It will be used to generate, once again, the psychosis in Pakistan that the whole world is against us instead of paying attention to the details. If the Americans are consistent in giving the message that we are happy to do business with Pakistan and sell it military equipment only if Pakistan changes policy -- if that message is consistent, then it might work.
But eight F-16s are not going to change the military balance. Pakistan needs them to balance its squadrons. In Pakistan it's a symbolic thing -- is America behind us or not. For Indians it's a symbolic thing too. That's where the problem lies.
Pakistan wants to maintain the consistency of its policies and wants to maintain international concessions that are linked to changing of that policy. That's what creates the dilemma.
I'm not against the F-16, nor do I think it's a make-or-break deal in US-Pakistan relations. I think we need to rise above and look at the bigger picture, which is that Pakistan's economy is not growing. That 42 per cent of children in the school-going age are not going to school. So Pakistan has to think beyond this issue of eight planes and six guns, which is what we have done since 1949.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...id-Ayub-Khan-in-1959/articleshow/52195541.cms
