What Does Trump’s Kashmir Storm Mean for US-India Relations?, The Diplomat, 26 July 2019

In this week's column for The Diplomat, I wrote on Trump's statements on Jammu and Kashmir and see if this would have any significant lasting impact on U.S.-India relations. I argue that while the controversy risked being added to the list of issues both sides are having, thus far the fallout has been managed relatively well.

While attention ahead of Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan’s visit to Washington focused on a list of expected discussion points and deliverables, ultimately the trip was dominated by the fallout from an unexpected controversy that emerged during his meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump. While responding to Khan’s request for U.S. assistance to resolve the issue of Kashmir, Trump said that India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi had also asked Trump to mediate the Kashmir dispute.
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The Pakistani government was understandably gleeful. In India, meanwhile, there was consternation, with opposition parties raising the issue in the Parliament and demanding that Modi clarify whether he had indeed asked Trump to mediate. Nonetheless, overall, India has thus far managed the issue quite well and prevented another challenge from being added to the list New Delhi and Washington both face.

India’s long-standing position has been that Kashmir is a bilateral issue that needs to be negotiated directly between India and Pakistan. India had always refused overt third-party involvement in the Kashmir dispute especially in terms of any mediation between India and Pakistan. India’s External Affairs Minister Dr. S. Jaishankar reiterated that position and stated that India had not indeed asked for any mediation. India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) also put out a statement rebutting Trump’s assertion that Modi had asked him to mediate.

This unexpected kerfuffle briefly threatened to put a dent in U.S.-India relations, which is already facing a number of other difficulties. For instance, India’s decision to buy the S-400 air defense missile from Russia puts India afoul of the U.S. Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), even though India felt that the capabilities that it was acquiring with the missile were too important for it to give in to the U.S. objections about buying the missile.

Similarly, the worsening tensions between the United States and Iran and Washington’s demands that India comply with the U.S. sanctions on Tehran have not gone down well in New Delhi because India sees Iran as strategically important to flank Pakistan. Finally, the U.S. efforts to find a way out of Afghanistan led Washington to once again seek Pakistan’s help, much to India’s discomfort. India has been left out of the discussions on the future of Afghanistan and it feels abandoned by the United States. In addition, Trump’s withdrawal of the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) on India and the tariff war between the two countries are not helping either.

Indian unhappiness with Washington is only one part of the problem. In Washington itself, there is are still doubts about the balance of obligations and whether the American strategic bet on India is worthwhile. Though these are as yet murmurs, the fact that even some of the strongest supporters of closer U.S.-India relations are now expressing doubt about India’s commitment should be worrisome to New Delhi.

Coming on top of these growing mutual doubts, Trump’s gaffe could potentially have proved to be quite damaging. But New Delhi has reacted with surprising maturity. That suggests that this will not lead to any lasting negative fallout.

Though the Indian foreign minister was firm in rejecting Trump’s assertion that he was asked to mediate, the response was also quite measured. While India’s opposition parties raised a ruckus in the Parliament on the issue, the Indian government did not panic.

The government could have taken a much stronger stance in the Parliament in order to pacify the domestic opinion in India, but it may have felt it did not need to given political dynamics. Despite the noise, the Indian opposition is in a considerably weak state. They are yet to recover from the drubbing they received in the recent general elections. The main opposition party, the Indian National Congress, is grappling with internal problems and is currently leader-less and direction-less. Despite a lot of pre-election chatter about regional parties coming together to form a national alternative to the BJP, nothing has come of it and many regional parties suffered serious setbacks in the elections. The comfortable domestic political situation might be one reason why the government felt little need to go overboard in criticizing the Trump statement.

Another factor is the general state of U.S.-India relations itself. With a number of issues already rocking the relationship, New Delhi probably did not want to fuel any further controversy in the relationship. Though India is trying to maintain some level of stable relationships with all the major powers, including Russia and China, there is probably a recognition that India also has to maintain its closeness to the United States.

Finally, there is also probably acceptance that Trump will be Trump and that India should discount some of Trump’s antics in the interest of the relationship. It helped that within hours of Trump’s statement, the U.S. State Department discounted Trump’s statement about India seeking mediation. Other U.S. leaders such as the Congressman Brad Sherman also publicly castigated Trump for the statement. The U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs too came out with a statement supporting the Indian point of view. Not only that, Representative Eliot L Engel, chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, “reaffirmed that in order for dialogue to be meaningful, Pakistan must first take concrete and irreversible steps to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure on Pakistan’s soil.”

Since all of these statements, coming from various sources beyond just the president himself, clarified that Trump’s statement was not U.S. policy, New Delhi probably felt confident that it need not worry that Trump’s statement had presaged any change in the U.S. policy on Kashmir.

U.S.-India relations do face some challenges. But the mature handling in New Delhi of this unexpected controversy during Khan’s visit to Washington has ensured that another item was not added to the list of grievances on both sides.

Imran Khan Goes to Washington: What’s on the Agenda for US-Pakistan Security Relations? - The Diplomat, 19 July 2019

In this week's column for The Diplomat, I wrote on Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's visit to the United States by looking closely at some of the security-related agenda items for the upcoming development and how they could impact bilateral security relations.

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan is set for his maiden visit to the United States in the next few days. The trip will include a stop at the White House as well. Reports indicate that the delegation will comprise of officials such as the foreign minister, Shah Mehmood Qureshi, the trade and investment adviser, Razzak Dawood, finance adviser Hafeez Pasha, and security officials including the army chief, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, the ISI chief, Faiz Hameed, and the head of the ISPR Major General Asif Ghafoor.

As with these sorts of the visits, the composition of the delegation gives a sense of the potential agenda, particularly on the security side. This will likely include Afghanistan as well as trying to reset the “acrimonious relationship” between Washington and Islamabad which has been playing out of late.

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Afghanistan is likely to be a key issue of discussion during Imran Khan’s meetings in the United States, including with President Donald Trump and members of the U.S. Congress. The Pakistani Foreign Office in a statement highlighted “Pakistan’s commitment to peace and stability and the importance of constructive engagement to promote a political solution in Afghanistan.” Foreign Minister Qureshi is reported to have said recently at an interaction that Pakistan “has been facilitating the U.S.-Taliban talks in good faith, underscoring that it remains a shared responsibility.”

With the election campaign picking up pace in the United States, President Trump also has a strong incentive to push for an Afghanistan solution. Ending one of America’s longest military engagements would make Trump look good. Despite being critical of Obama’s handling of Afghanistan, Trump in fact increased the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan. That, however, has had little impact on the war.

The U.S. effort to find a peaceful exit is not going to be easy. The Taliban demand for complete U.S. military withdrawal is one big stumbling block. Washington has been trying to get Islamabad to put pressure on the Taliban to show some flexibility.

Just a few days ago, Pakistan scored a major diplomatic victory, getting an invitation from the United States, Russia and China to help craft a long-term solution to the Afghanistan problem. The request to Pakistan to join the Afghan peace talks came after the third round of U.S.-China-Russia consultations on Afghanistan in Beijing on July 10-11. India, its regional nemesis, has been pushed to the sidelines.

Though India had made significant investments to the tune of more than $2 billion in Afghanistan – constructing one of the largest hospitals for women and children, schools, the Salma Dam (called the Afghan-India Friendship Dam) and the new parliament building – no one seems particularly interested in New Delhi’s views on the situation in Afghanistan.

During the recent visit of the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, India’s National Security Adviser Ajit Doval is reported to have aired Indian concerns, but to no avail. India maintains that Afghanistan’s election schedule should be unaffected even if the peace process is on. India was also at odds with both Russia and the U.S. special envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, on the idea of an interim government in Afghanistan.

Terrorism is another major issue on the agenda. As in the past, Pakistan has arrested a high-profile terrorist – Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind behind the 2008 Mumbai attack – before the premier’s visit to the United States. Such arrests have usually been inconsequential. But Islamabad would like to milk it as much as possible, and hope that the United States will reinstating some of the Coalition Support Funds that were suspended by the Trump Administration.

Recall that in the beginning of 2018, Trump asserted in a tweet that the United States has “foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years and they have given us nothing but lies & deceit.” He went on to add that Pakistan is providing safe haven to the very terrorists that the United States is fighting against in Afghanistan. Actions have since followed. The United States held back a total of $800 million from Pakistan last year.

Imran Khan will make every effort to convince the United States of Islamabad’s sincerity in the fight against global terror. Given that the United States needs to accommodate Pakistan in order to find a face-saving exit from Afghanistan, he might get lucky.

Pakistan would also like to turn a page on the bad relations with the United States. Imran Khan has been in office for almost a full year, but this is his first visit to the United States, a reflection of this bad relationship. The current difficulties in U.S.-India relations may also encourage Islamabad to think it can gain some sympathy in Washington.

Pakistani security analysts claim that there is also another concern for Islamabad – “a growing disenchantment with the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.” Reports indicate a deep skepticism within Pakistan about the CPEC, which is seen as “on the verge of dying.” This is not to suggest that Pakistan will give up on its all-weather friendship with China but Pakistan would like other options than just Beijing.

It is too early to say how successful Khan’s visit will be, and we will have to assess things once the trip has concluded. But there are clearly incentives on both sides to improve the relationship, and broader strategic shifts could provide the room for them to do so at least to some degree.