Originally published by India Express,03 Sept 2010

By K. Subrahmanyam

 It is becoming clear to India and the rest of the world that China is embarking on a new strategy with respect to Pakistan. The stapled visa for Indians from Kashmir, including the army’s Northern Command head; major projects in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir or PoK; the latest reports on large scale military presence in PoK (denied, as expected, by Pakistan); reported plans for a railway line and oil and gas pipelines connecting Xinjiang and the Pakistani port of Gwadar; and an agreement to supply Pakistan with two nuclear reactors, breaching the guidelines of the Nuclear Suppliers Group. All these taken together indicate that Pakistan is likely to play the major role in China’s West Asia strategy that North Korea does in its East Asia strategy.

China’s policy towards Iran, especially with respect to nuclear proliferation, and its reported sale of solid-fuel missiles to Saudi Arabia, are further indicators of China’s global strategy to challenge what it perceives as declining US power. So, too, the gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to China that bypasses Russian territory. US strategist Robert Kaplan has talked of the expansion of the Chinese navy, and of China stepping up its activities in the western Pacific. But more attention needs to be paid to Chinese strategy in West Asia and their need for hydrocarbon resources from there.

China cannot become Asia’s predominant power till US power in West Asia is countervailed. While China justifies its stapled visa policy for residents of Kashmir in India, it does not issue stapled visas to residents of PoK, indicating clearly that its stakes in Pakistan are high enough to ignore long-pursued policy on J&K, and the fact that the UN recognises the Indian legal position on Kashmir .This can be explained only by the assumption that the launching pad for Chinese global strategy vis-à-vis the US in West Asia and the Indian Ocean appears to be Pakistan.

It is now obvious, after the disastrous floods, that the Pakistani army is likely to plead that they are in no position to launch any operations against terrorist groups for two reasons. The army itself is involved in relief and rehabilitation operations; and since the various jihadi groups are working on relief and rehabilitation, in most cases more effectively than government agencies, popular opinion will not permit any action against them. The US administration and army have also clarified that they have no intention of withdrawing from Afghanistan in 2011, though a nominal drawdown may begin. Therefore, the Pakistani army would consider a need for jihadis as “insurance” after the delayed US departure even more vital. At the same time, US drone attacks are likely to be stepped up. In such circumstances, will the present arrangement, with America continuing to finance Pakistan militarily and economically even as the Pakistan-supported groups continue to inflict casualties on US and NATO forces, be sustainable? Not unless the Pakistani army fundamentally changes its policy.

 Writing in the US journal National Interest, veteran Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid pointed out that “it is insufficient for the army to merely acknowledge that its past pursuit of foreign-policy goals through extremist proxies has proven so destructive; it is also necessary for the army to agree to a civilian-led peace process with India. Civilians must have a greater say in what constitutes national security. Until that happens, the army’s focus on the threat from New Delhi prevents it from truly acknowledging the problems it faces from extremism at home… Today there is much greater awareness among the Pakistani people that extremism poses a severe threat to the country and their livelihoods. There is also a much greater acceptance that ultimately civilian rule is better than military or mullah dictatorship. What is still lacking in the war against extremism, however, is a consistent and powerful message from both the government and the army that they will combat all terrorists — not just those who threaten their security.”

Pakistan’s army will not surrender its pre-eminent position in the state and politics. Already there is disillusionment about civilian rule, as voiced by the MQM’s leader, Altaf Hussain, and in the widespread criticism of the civilian government’s inability to deliver on flood relief. The parting of ways between the Pakistani army and the US has to happen sooner or later. It is for that moment China is getting itself ready to step in, as the saviour of an army which fancies itself as equivalent to the state and the nation. China, with its enormous cash reserves, can easily replace the US as Pakistan’s military and economic benefactor. Pakistan’s army, given its anti-India orientation, will be prepared to make Pakistan available lock, stock and barrel to China as its West Asia launch platform. China’s and Pakistan’s army have a lot in common as states within states.

China and Pakistan are contiguous and there are reports of Chinese military activity in PoK involving tunnels — useful, speculatively, as missile shelters. In that event it will be possible for China to deploy its nuclear missiles in Pakistan. Given the two nations’ past history of flagrantly violating the non-proliferation regime, one cannot overlook such possibilities. This has strategic implications for India and for US forces in the Indian Ocean area.

And if the reports of Chinese supply of long-range solid-fuel missiles to Saudi Arabia are confirmed, those missiles may be armed with additional nuclear warheads that are likely to be produced at the plutonium production reactors given to Islamabad by Beijing and located at Khushab. Two US authors, the nuclear scientists Thomas Reed and Danny Stillman, argued in their book Nuclear Express that in 1982 Deng Xiaoping’s government began the deliberate proliferation of nuclear and ballistic missile technology to the Islamic and the Marxist world. That led to a Pakistani nuclear weapon — tested by China, according to the authors, on May 26, 1990 at the Lop Nor test site; and also to the transfer of CSS-2 ballistic missiles to Saudi Arabia and both nuclear and missile technologies to North Korea.

Deng not only initiated China’s fantastic economic growth, but also its grand strategy for gaining world power status. He advised the leadership, in his famous “28 characters”, to play a low-key role initially. Evidently the present leadership feels it has arrived at a stage when it can assert itself against the present hegemon — one it perceives as declining.

The writer is a senior defence analyst