Last week, while Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Valpayee and Pakistan’s General Pervez Musharraf were concluding their historic summit in Agra, India, I was invited to share the stage at a media conference in Los Angeles with — among others — CNN’s Peter Arnett and David Jones, foreign desk editor at the Washington Times.
The subject of the conference was “Perspectives on South Asia.” I was asked, because of my experience as a Washington defense analyst and contributor to Arab News, to speak on the subject of “Stability Threats in South Asia.” Below is the text of my presentation:
It is a genuine pleasure for me to be here today to offer a Washington perspective on threats to stability in South Asia.
There are many unstable regions in the world, but South Asia is unique: It recently witnessed the mass murder of Nepal’s monarchy, there is a major insurgency in Sri Lanka, the government in neighboring Afghanistan is run by religious extremists, starving refugees are pouring into the region’s northern territories in order to flee a three-year drought, and the long-simmering feud between India and Pakistan over the disputed territory of Kashmir could erupt any day into a thermal-nuclear war. These issues, — coupled with corruption, food shortages, overcrowded cities, and a thriving illegal drugs trade — all pose serious threats to the stability of Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.
But there are many other issues — many of them neglected, all of them fundamental — that contribute to the steady decline of the quality of life in South Asia, and which place the stability of many of these governments at risk. During the next few minutes, I will identify some of these overlooked and potentially destabilizing issues. When practical, I will also offer remedies.
1. AIDS: Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome — poses a significant threat to South Asian stability. — Not just because it is overwhelming healthcare providers, but because it is destroying the region’s social fabric. According to the United Nations, cases of AIDS in the region jumped 15 percent last year, with the greatest increase in India. Today there are a total of 5.8 million people infected with AIDS in South and SouthEast Asia.
The destabilizing effect of the worldwide AIDS epidemic recently prompted the US Department of Defense to declare AIDS a threat to America’s national security. The Pentagon counts AIDS among terrorism, computer-warfare and other national security threats because it believes a foreign military decimated by AIDS is no longer prepared to fight.
2. Poverty: The poverty that pervades the economies of South Asia has several causes. The first is the failure of national education systems, which across the region have suffered a serious decline in recent years. According to the United Nations, all five South Asian countries have seen a significant decline in gross enrollments in primary, secondary and tertiary schools. In Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka, the disproportionate ratio of male graduates over women graduates has also widened. Yet even in countries such as India and Pakistan — where enormous segments of the population are well educated — meaningful employment is scarce, making poverty for most inescapable. Pakistan’s cycle of poverty is largely a product of corrupt leaders misspending or overspending development funds.
And in India — where much is made of the country’s two hundred million-strong middle class — 65-70 percent of the country’s 1 billion people are still living in abject poverty.
Clearly, what is needed to reverse this trend are better development and education programs, coupled with meaningful tax reforms and a heroic commitment by national governments to bring about social change.
3. Energy: Throughout the region, there are shortfalls in adequate energy supplies, especially oil. In Pakistan, the recent discovery of natural gas fields offers the potential of reducing regional dependence on imported oil, particularly if the region’s oil-burning electric power plants can be converted to natural gas. The region could also reduce it dependence on imported oil by constructing a pipeline connecting oil fields in Central Asia and near the Caspian Sea.
This proposed oil pipeline is on the agenda during this weekend’s unprecedented meeting between Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Valpayee and Pakistan’s General Pervez Musharraf.
Many South Asia experts believe India’s desire to complete this proposed pipeline is one of the main reasons why Prime Minister Valpayee agreed to this meeting.
India is constructing a new oil refinery on the India-Pakistan border, and closer ties between New Delhi and Islamabad is critical to the success of this venture.
4. Arms race: As destabilizing as the proliferation of nuclear weapons has been to the region, it the seemingly uncontrolled procurement of non-nuclear weaponry that is sapping money and resources from many of the issues I’ve just described.
By far, the biggest arms procurer in the region is India. This year, New Delhi announced plans to increase its defense spending by 28 percent. This escalation, coupled with last year’s defense increase, represents an overall leap in India’s military budget of 50 percent.
And where is this money going? India hopes to upgrade its blue-water navy, which will include the acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines with the capability of launching long-range missiles. India’s naval upgrade is part of a new defense strategy to create a triad of long-range bombers, land-based missiles and sea-based missiles capable of striking deep within the borders of neighboring countries, including China.
This will likely require India to perform new field tests of medium- and long-range missiles — particularly a renewed expansion of the country’s satellite launch program, whose missiles serve a duel role as intercontinental ballistic missiles.
China rightly interprets India’s new defense posture as a threat, and has positioned dozens of anti-missile systems along its southern border.
Pakistan has responded to this threat by embarking on a costly anti-missile defense program, acquiring theater-level and anti-ballistic missile systems from Russia.
Many South Asia security experts believe India have been prevented from fully developing its strategic defense triad because of US trade sanctions against the export of duel-use technology — particularly high-performance computers.
These same intelligence officials also fear the US government will soon yield to pressure from the American defense industry and other lobbyists to unilaterally lift trade sanctions on South Asia’s nuclear powers. Sources in the Bush administration believe the first country to see sanctions lifted is India. Regrettably, the move that will likely increase an already profligate conventional arms race in the region, and — sadly — rob precious funds desperately needed to improve national infrastructures, eradicate AIDS, develop new sources of energy, and meet the basic needs of the poor. Some have argued that US restraints on weapons trade with India and Pakistan are unfair and constrain bilateral relations. As recently as last week, Maleeha Lodhi, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States said that sanctions are, “a blunt instrument that rarely, if ever, enhance the objectives for which they are employed. I must respectfully disagree.
I believe US trade sanctions on both India and Pakistan have effectively slowed the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in South Asia.
Additionally, it is my belief that these sanctions should remain in place until India and Pakistan implement meaningful and substantial controls on both conventional and nuclear arms.