Obama mulls Clinton as special envoy on Kashmir

WASHINGTON: Kashmir, nuclear non-proliferation, free trade will be among the formerly touchy issues that are expected to resurface in the
prospective Obama administration's dealings with India, although officials say the tone of the exchanges on these matters will be vastly different now from yesteryears.

That's because India of 2008-2009 is a more confident and assertive country from what it was for much of the 1990s when the last Democratic administration of Bill Clinton hectored New Delhi about signing the nuclear test ban treaty and questioned the Indian narrative on Kashmir's status, even going to the extent of doubting the state's accession to the Indian union.

All that changed with the Kargil episode, when Washington finally recognized Islamabad as the serial aggressor intent on changing the status quo. Faced with a military rout, Pakistan rushed to Washington to effect a face-saving withdrawal from its misadventure that eventually changed US outlook in the region.

Now President-elect Obama has indicated he is considering appointing Clinton as a special envoy on Kashmir. While the possibility has caused disquiet in some quarters in both India and Pakistan, some officials and analysts are arguing there are actually mitigating or even positive features to the idea, insofar as India is concerned.

For one, it was Clinton who decreed before agreeing to Pakistan's plea for intervention in the Kargil crisis that the Line of Control in Kashmir will not be redrawn with blood, virtually backing India's position. In fact, the National Security official who made the pro-India call on the Kargil crisis was Bruce Riedel, a former CIA analyst, who has been part of Obama's foreign policy team.

Obama himself appears up to speed on the history of the subcontinent and the Kashmir issue, and has identified resolving the matter as a key to tempering Islamabad and concentrating its energy on the war on terror that is consuming Pakistan.

In a little noticed interview on the campaign trail last month posted on Time magazine's blog, Obama identified working with Pakistan and India to try to resolve the Kashmir issue in a "serious way" as one of the "critical tasks" for the next administration.

"Kashmir in particular is an interesting situation where that is obviously a potential tar pit diplomatically," he said, but indicating how aware it was of its complexity but saying he was in favour of devoting "serious diplomatic resources to get a special envoy in there."

Asked if it was not an ideal job for Clinton, Obama disclosed that he had already sounded out the former president on the idea when they had lunch at Harlem last month. He did reveal Clinton's mind on the matter.

Obama framed his approach to the Kashmir issue in the following manner: He would "essentially make the argument to the Indians, you guys are on the brink of being an economic superpower, why do you want to keep on messing with this? To make the argument to the Pakistanis, look at India and what they are doing, why do you want to keep being bogged down with this particularly at a time where the biggest threat now is coming from the Afghan border?"

"I think there is a moment where potentially we could get their attention. It won't be easy, but it's important," Obama said.

The presumptive US President's active interest in the issue has sent a frisson of excitement and apprehension both New Delhi and Islamabad, not to speak of in Srinagar.

In fact, there is now greater nervousness in Islamabad and Srinagar at the prospect of a US role because Pakistan and its separatist clients in Kashmir believe Washington will back the status quo, which means freezing the Line of Control as the border with some form of open or porous border to facilitate trade and movement of people.
Both anti-Indian separatists and pro-Indian nationalist Kashmiri groups are already dusting up arguments to make their case if the matter is taken
off the back burner by the Obama administration.

While the separatists are calling for a US intervention without its "anti-Muslim bias," the pro-India Kashmiri groups are calling Obama's attention to the largely unreported ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri pundits in the Valley.

"We do wish to convey to you that whatever has happened and is still happening in Kashmir is similar to the Talibanization that occurred in Afghanistan. The Islamic Jihadism that is being supported and abetted by Pakistan is still prevalent in the valley of Kashmir where minorities continue to be targeted," Lalit Koul, President of the Indo-American Kashmiri Forum said in a letter to President-elect Obama on Tuesday.

Koul maintained that the Kashmir issue was intricate and needs to be resolved bilaterally between India and Pakistan, but addressing issues of fundamentalism and terrorism in Pakistan will reinforce a sustainable solution to Kashmir as well.

Kashmir isn't the only issue that may return to the US diplomatic radar. Officials also expect a closer scrutiny of the civilian nuclear deal, not because Obama opposes it (he wrote a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last month reiterating his support), but because Washington's non-proliferation lobby will find voice again. Indian mandarins are leery of officials such as Anthony Lake, Richard Holbrooke, Strobe Talbott and Robert Einhorn returning to the corridors of power in the new Democratic dispensation.

One official told ToI that much depended on Obama's selection of cabinet-level principals, pointing out that even under the Bush administration, there was a world of difference in ties with India under Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, as against ties during the time of her predecessor Colin Powell. But the official was confident that Obama himself was well disposed towards India "simply because of the values it represents."