Ann Marie Dailey, presently a policy researcher with RAND Corporation, a US military funded think-tank, had served in the US Army in the past. She now serves as an engineer captain in the US Army Reserves. Eastern Europe, Ukraine and Russia are her specialty in policy research. She said in a recent interview that there were two worlds in which United States could possibly confront China in a potential military conflict: one world would be where Ukraine loses the war against Russia, and the other world would be where Ukraine has won the war.
“Then you have a Ukraine that is going to be the largest and most capable army in Europe acting as a bulwark against Russian aggression. That gives you a strong European flank to the United States' east. You have countries that are confident not only in their own security, but in the collective capability of NATO to deter and defeat aggression. They are going to be more willing to contribute if the US finds itself in a war in the Indo-Pacific. This idea that somehow helping Ukraine leaves us less prepared for a war in China is just seeing the world as flat when it's not.”
Throughout the interview—which is published on the RAND Corporation official website since last week—she keeps on advocating for the provision of military assistance to Ukraine at this critical juncture in the war, when the Russian military has already launched a major military offensive against Ukrainian cities.
Captain Dailey is a military officer, and her jingoistic comments are understandable—she dreams of first defeating Russia through a proxy, and then the US confronting China militarily. There is not the slightest hint in her interview what the world will look like if nuclear armed Russia will be militarily defeated and thus pave the way for the United States to militarily confront a rising China.
Will there be nuclear sabre rattling and brinkmanship for the whole world to see? Will the Chinese and US military experience a military conflict in, let’s say, the South China Sea, the Indian Ocean or the Taiwan Strait or the larger Indo-Pacific Region? Or maybe in the Persian Gulf or Arabian Sea?
The world economy will certainly nosedive into a tailspin. We can say goodbye to globalization. The high level of interdependence the world has become so used to at the political and economic levels, right now, will become a tale of the past. Even a layperson with an elementary understanding of international politics could not escape such questions.
What we witnessed in our country and in terms of our role in the region was Pakistan serving as an instrument of great power militarism and militaristic ambitions in the region. This militarism, which our ruling elite facilitated, never allowed Pakistan to emerge as a nation which is at harmony with itself and its neighborhood.
In the China-US military confrontation, which in Captain Dailey’s imagination will follow the Russian defeat at the hands of the US empowered Ukrainian military, we are looking at something close to a world war—a world war that will make Adolf Hitler look like Mother Teresa. But who cares? Russia must be defeated in order to prepare the US for a military confrontation with China. The mindset Dailey displays in her interview is not an isolated thundering from an American military officer. You will have to scan the official websites of US think-tanks for a clearer picture of how war and military confrontation have ignited the imagination of US policy making circles during the past few years.
Terrorism, extremism and militancy occupy less and less space in this imagination. China and Russia are the new bogeymen. Some American strategic thinkers have recently published books on how the US non-governmental sector, think tanks in particular, exaggerate the threat to US security since the end of World War II, whether the international situation is set against the backdrop of the Cold War, the war on terror or in the developing international landscape, which will end up being the furthest thing from cold if people like Dailey have her way.
What will become of our region, which has never been able to escape the confrontational politics of great powers? Pakistani leadership, in the wake of independence, brought great power confrontation into South Asia. Pakistan was militarily weaker than India and wanted the involvement of extra-regional powers to balance the conventional military threat from a militarily superior India.
American pumped in dollars and military equipment to build a military force in Pakistan which they thought would counter the communist threat from Soviet Russia. India protested, but American weapons continued to pour into the Pakistani military inventory. The Americans never really withdrew from our region—the Afghan War and the CIA’s role in it is well documented.
Pakistan had three military governments, which provided services to the Americans. First against the Soviets in the Cold War, through Ayub Khan’s military government, then against the Soviets in Afghanistan through Zia’s military government, and then in the war against terror in Afghanistan, where Musharraf’s military government was all too happy to get the job done. The first two military governments were clearly marked by Pakistan’s desire to use American military assistance—which in American rendering were meant to bolster Pakistan military capability against the Soviets—in its confrontation with India.
In the first seventy years of our independence, the recipient of American military assistance and largesse was the Pakistani military elite. This time, American largesse will consolidate the position of Hindu nationalism in Indian society through the ruling BJP. The BJP is considered by many military experts as a natural habitat for military jingoism from the Indian state.
What we witnessed in our country and in terms of our role in the region was Pakistan serving as an instrument of great power militarism and militaristic ambitions in the region. This militarism, which our ruling elite facilitated, never allowed Pakistan to emerge as a nation which is at harmony with itself and its neighborhood. The American role in Pakistan and the region during Musharraf’s nine years was a slightly different story. There was no great power confrontation, but the habit of finding military solutions to cultural, economic and social problems played itself out again as the US not only failed to get rid of terrorism and militancy, but also tried to impose its cultural solutions on a deeply traditional Afghan society.
The United States confronting China militarily—as suggested by Captain Dailey—has implications for our region and Pakistan. As I said, great power politics have never left the South Asian region. First, the US used Pakistan against the Soviets. Our military elite proved to be deeply gullible and played into the hands of the Americans. Now the Americans want to use India against a rising China.
However, India's elite is not as gullible and malleable. First, Indians resisted the American move to co-opt India into a military alliance against China. It was only after China-India military tensions that the latter agreed to include military dimensions into the Quad alliance. The US is arming India to the teeth. America security strategy papers have coined a new term for defining the Asia-Pacific Region—that comprises two oceans, the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, which are connected through the Malacca Strait—to accord significance to India in a political and military alliance to counter China. The new term, Indo-Pacific, has been popularized by world leaders, including the military and political elite in Japan and Australia, the US foreign policy elite and Indians themselves as well.
The problem is the US has not parted with its militaristic mindset. There are strong voices in New Delhi which advocate for a policy of not becoming a party in the military alliance against China. But the lures of American military assistance and technology are proving stronger.
A militarily stronger India will pose a threat to Pakistan. Pakistan’s reliance on its nuclear arsenal as part of its war fighting strategy will increase, since Pakistan cannot match India in the purchase of conventional military weapons. In the past, US diplomacy has on several occasions prevented the two nuclear armed South Asian rivals from descending into full-fledged war.
Now the question is - when the US militaristic mindset is on full display, does the US have the diplomatic and political capacity and willingness to undertake another diplomatic mission for peace in South Asia in case the region takes a plunge into another military crisis like 1986-87, 1990, 2002 and 2019?
In the first seventy years of our independence, the recipient of American military assistance and largesse was the Pakistani military elite. This time, American largesse will consolidate the position of Hindu nationalism in Indian society through the ruling BJP. The BJP is considered by many military experts as a natural habitat for military jingoism from the Indian state.
At present the US is doing everything to disturb the conventional military balance between Pakistan and India. Has Washington taken into account the implications for the South Asian region of its decision to provide India with state or the art military technology? Pakistan is too weak to protest.
I haven’t come across any meaningful voice from Islamabad against the US arming of New Delhi with new weaponry. Perhaps they know that their voices will fall on deaf ears. However, one fact is established beyond an iota of doubt: that the American militaristic mindset can potentially destroy our region. The habit of seeking military solutions to political problems has proved disastrous in the past. The result will be no different this time.
In the first seventy years of our independence, the recipient of American military assistance and largesse was the Pakistani military elite. This time, American largesse will consolidate the position of Hindu nationalism in Indian society through the ruling BJP. The BJP is considered by many military experts as a natural habitat for military jingoism from the Indian state. There are experts who believe that Americans now want to enlist the Indian military as part of a collective deterrence strategy in case conflict erupts in the Taiwan Strait.
Unfortunately, there will be nobody in New Delhi or Islamabad to heed the argument that conflicts in far off lands and great power rivalries should not ruin the prospects for peace in the South Asian region—a region where hunger, poverty and disease and now climate change are bigger threats than military confrontations between great powers.