The Hindu : Call for talks to end India-Pakistan `blood feud'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Feb 03, 2004

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Call for talks to end India-Pakistan `blood feud'

By Sandeep Dikshit

NEW DELHI, FEB 2. The former Chief of the Army Staff, S. Padmanabhan, has called for greater interaction between India and Pakistan at all levels, including talks at the military level to end the "blood feud" and resolve all outstanding issues.

Gen. Padmanabhan was speaking before the launch of his book `The writing on the wall - India checkmates America 2017'. " The more you speak, the chances of peace increase. Dialogue between both countries is good as it helps to break the ice," he said.

"The composition of the Pakistan Government in future will also not be a hindering factor. As the present plot is unfolding, Pervez Musharraf, will give up command of the Army. There is a civilian government there though I won't go into how well it represents the people of Pakistan," he said.

"The time has come" for beginning an army-to-army dialogue though perhaps not at the highest levels. On whether there was a window of opportunity for a war with Pakistan during "Operation Parakram" — a tense year-long standoff between the Indian and Pakistani armies — Gen. Padmanabhan said: "The window was there. One big and open window and I am a great man for open air."

He did not comment on the reported observation of his predecessors that "Operation Parakram" was a strategic blunder. He dispelled impressions of the Army being kept out of the decision-making loop during the biggest-ever troop build-up on the border with Pakistan.

"If you want to know whether the military's opinion was considered? The answer is yes." Asked whether the year-long eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation turned out differently from what was earlier planned, the General said the build-up started in a "cogent way" but later "many issues were played by the year."

Gen. Padmanabhan's book narrates the build-up to a futuristic war with Pakistan in 2017 which is also joined by the U.S. The war lasts 60 hours and America gets as good as it gives. Asked whether a book with a war-like topic was being launched in an environment when the hostility with Pakistan was ebbing, he said: "I will be the happiest man alive if events turn out differently from what have been described in the book."

Admitting that at present the U.S. did not pose a danger to the security, he said his book painted the U.S. as the "villain of the piece." Asked if the U.S. was a rogue state, he said "it is one in its own way" but complimented it for allowing the freedom of expression and unfettered democracy.

He drew upon his post-retirement reading of post-cold War history to underline American "waywardness" on the global stage.

In the Balkans, the U.S. wanted to fill the void created by the collapse of the Soviet Union. Towards this end, unknown animosities were conjured and the entry of NATO was contrived. In the end, the conflict served the U.S. well and it moved in to fill the power vacuum in the region.

The American intervention in Afghanistan left him "very angry" though the September 11 attack on World Trade Center was a terrible shock to everybody.

"In the end, whether you are a Bamiyan Buddha basher or attack Afghanistan from the air, both are acts of terrorism.'' Iraq too is a very telling example of U.S. hegemony.

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