Bharat (aka India) has been out maneuvered in Afghanistan. The international community has tried Bharat’s way for a decade and it produced negative results for ISAF and NATO. Now the US wants to put all its eggs in the Pakistan basket.

Bharat has strived soft power and hard power. Bharat claims that it has given aid to Afghanistan worth $1.3 Billion. This is not an accurate statement. The Bharati aid is actually given to Bharati companies which work in Afghanistan. The aid package is not given to the Afghans. The Bharati companies charge international inflated rates and do some work in Afghanistan using Bharati employees and Bharati products.

Pakistan hosted 3 million Afghan refugees for a decade in in Pakistan at great cost to the exchequer. It also continues to host 2 million Afghan refugees in Pakistan at a humongous cost to the Central and provincial governments. NWFP spent most of its development budget to host the displaced persons.

More importantly the Pakistani people provide support to Afghans in trouble when they need it. More thatn 3 million Afghans were born in Pakistan. They are half Pakistani.

Islamabad provides aid to Afghanistan in the form of transit facilities to the tune of $3 Billion per year. This is not a new package, Pakistan has been providing this package since 1947.

During the past ten years, Pakistan has built universities, and schools in Afghanistan to the tune of $1 Billion also.

CAN INDIA PROJECT HARD POWER?
Afghanistan and its future will prove to be India’s real test as a regional power. For the past decade, India has successfully turned itself into a huge presence and influence peddler in Afghanistan – through its biggest-ever use of soft power: roads, hospitals, schools, scholarships, community development projects. India’s financial commitment in Afghanistan is upwards of $1.2 billion. Opinion polls put India’s popularity rating among Afghans at 71%, in extreme contrast to only 2% for Pakistan.

India has refrained from using hard power in Afghanistan, and, in many ways, the Indian presence is guaranteed by the US’ security role. As soft-power author, Harvard University’s Joseph Nye says, “Achieving transformational objectives may require a combination of both hard and soft power.” Soft power is only credible when it is matched by or surpassed by hard power. India is paying the price, because, beyond a point, roads and dams don’t help buy influence. As one top-level Afghan official said, wryly, “We love India, but we fear Pakistan. That is a stronger emotion.” India’s power projection in Afghanistan has been primarily by showing its “goodness” . Pakistan, on the other hand, negotiates with the world with a gun held to its own head. That, as India has discovered several times in its history, is far more persuasive. Is India’s neighbourhood set to get even more dangerous? Indrani Bagchi , TOI Crest, 6 February 2010, 09:50am IST

The Bharati diplomats and the press acknowledge the Pakistani victory in Afghanistan and its deft handling of the situaion.

Described as the “gatekeepers” to the Taliban, Pakistan would have a crucial role in delivering the Taliban to the table, either through coercion or persuasion. But it is being careful not to be seen as muscling in to impose its own agenda in Afghanistan. The mantra in Islamabad is that the process should be “Afghan-led”.

“Pakistan is perhaps better placed than any other country in the world to support Afghan reintegration and reconciliation. Why? We speak the same language, we have common tribes, a common religion, we have a commonality of history, culture and tradition” Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi told the Guardian. “But it [Pakistani mediation] depends on whether we are asked to do so. If asked, the government of Pakistan would be happy to facilitate.” Pakistan: vindication on Afghanistan, assertive with India // Nirupama Subramanian. Hindustan Times.

The options for Bharat remain limited.

For the moment, Pakistan has the upper hand, because both the UK and US need it more than ever. Pakistan is playing an adroit diplomatic game of chicken with the US – and winning. Islamabad may be hopelessly dependent on Washington’s money, but that doesn’t stop it from refusing to give visas to US officials, refusing money that comes with ‘conditions’. Pakistan has made it clear it will not stop supporting the Afghan Taliban; there is absolutely no attempt to tackle al Qaida; and Mullah Omar’s Quetta Shura functions unimpeded. In short, it holds veto power over whether the Obama surge succeeds in Afghanistan. Washington, said an Indian official scornfully, is “kowtowing to Pakistan just like they did to China.”

Harsh perhaps, but this view is prevalent in the upper reaches of the Indian government – to the extent that even the PM is believed to have remarked that if India and Pakistan have another fracas, Washington may not weigh in on India’s side.

According to high-level officials in New Delhi, a successful Taliban reintegration is another term for a Taliban takeover in Kabul. “Look at Yemen and you see the Afghan future. If and when that happens, we may be looking at a pre-9 /11 situation,” said one of them.

Will Karzai survive? Unlikely. But if he is to avoid the kind of fate that befell Afghanistan’s president Mohammed Najibullah - who was tortured and strung up from a light post by the Taliban in Kabul in 1996 after the Soviets withdrew – Karzai needs new and improved survival strategies. These must include working out deals with warlords – tribal leaders who can help him survive the Taliban – because despite everything, the average Afghan still prefers the present government to the harsh rules of the Taliban. He can’t look to the UK, US or Pakistan for help. He can look to India. Will India step up to the table? This would entail getting our hands dirty. So far, India has shied away from a robust security role in Afghanistan. Is India’s neighbourhood set to get even more dangerous?
Indrani Bagchi , TOI Crest, 6 February 2010, 09:50am IST

Delhi now wants to bifurcate Afghanistan between Pakistani and Indian parts. This has to be stopped. The threats of hard power in Afghanistan has its limits. The US and Russia tried hard power to gets it will. Bharat is most welcome to try hard power, but it will not succeed.

If the future of Afghanistan unravels in the way the London conference envisaged, there are likely to be profound consequences for the sub-continent. First, Pakistan, … is going to be gifted Afghanistan on a platter by a disoriented West. Pakistan has claimed that it alone has the commitment and expertise to manage things in such a way that the Al Qaeda doesn’t return to Afghanistan — even if Mullah Omar does. The West is inclined to believe Islamabad and outsource what seems an ‘unwinnable’ war.

Second, the recovery of Pakistan’s ‘strategic depth’ in Afghanistan will lead to an immediate escalation of tensions in Jammu & Kashmir. The Pakistani military is aware that jihadi energies will need to find a focus once Western soldiers are out of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai’s Government toppled and the Afghan Constitution replaced by sharia’h rule. The jihadis will have two clear options: To either aim for a capture of power in Islamabad or resume the battle to ‘liberate’ Kashmir. It may safely be assumed that the Pakistani military will do its utmost to ensure that the latter option prevails.

Finally, regardless of Pakistan’s projection of itself as a modern Islamic nation, a Taliban victory in Afghanistan will tilt the balance of power in the Muslim world in favour of the Islamists. The sheer exhilaration of holy warriors having defeated two superpowers in just three decades will result in an immediate radicalisation of Muslims which won’t remain confined to Afghanistan, or even Pakistan. This time it is certain to create tremors all over West, South and South-East Asia, not least India. The West hopes that from threatening the heartlands of the West, jihad will become a purely Asian problem which, at best, touches North Africa. This optimism is based on Pakistani assurances, hardly something a prudent banker will accept.

Over the past months, many Indians have warned the West of the consequences of withdrawing from Afghanistan and outsourcing that unfortunate country to Pakistan’s crisis managers. It is not that India’s warnings are dismissed out of hand but they invariably elicit a common response: But what are you doing about it? The belief that preachy Indians are piggy-backing on the lives of Western soldiers and are unwilling to get their hands dirty is widespread. It may explain why India was marginal to the proceedings of the London conference.

It is not that India has been an armchair pundit in Afghanistan. India’s role in the reconstruction process is impressive and should have got better global recognition. Yet, the absence of even a symbolic military presence in Afghanistan — a soft entry point could have involved assisting the Afghan police — has proved costly. Indian Pioneer.

Bharat has limited options available to it Afghanistan. India must seek Army role in Afghanistan, Swapan Dasgupta It has had a good ten year run. Now it should simply back off like Lord Curzon did and give up the notion of power in West Asia. It should concentrate on rebuilding it own infrastructure and project its power to the East and into the oceans.