Interstate war and conflict have returned to the mainstream of international politics after years of scholars suggesting that they were confined to the dustbin of history. Gaza is not strictly an inter-state conflict as Palestine is not recognized as an independent sovereign state. But the Ukraine war is an interstate conflict. There are other potential interstate conflicts in the offing—potential conflict on the Korean peninsula, over Taiwan, an escalation between Iran and Israel, and the persistent and ever-present danger of a war between Pakistan and India – all remain present threats. On a larger scale, the United States has declared in recent security doctrine documents, that China is a military competitor and thus a security threat, setting off another chapter in geopolitics’ great power rivalries.
The short of the long story is that the attitude of Western powers towards military conflicts is undergoing a change; the Western world is putting aside their rhetorical aversion to the war as an institution to resolve political disputes and conflicts. Since the end of the Cold War, the Western powers, led by the United States have been advocating that war as an institution of international politics should be banished from the system. For instance, American and Western diplomacy has been forcefully selling the idea to South Asian states that peaceful resolution of conflicts is the only way forward. Peaceful resolution of conflicts through negotiations and international political mechanisms has been romantically idealized by western intellectuals and diplomats in the last 25 to 30 years in South Asia, while presenting the European Union as an idealized mechanism for the resolution of conflicts and political disputes.
Under Trump, Washington declared China a military threat. American military research and development has in the time since reoriented towards countering Chinese military and technology development plans. American strategists are flirting with the idea of integrative deterrence. The question is how will this change impact US diplomacy towards preventing a war in South Asia?
American diplomacy has always played a crucial role in India Pakistan military conflicts. In 1971 and 1965, Washington imposed sanctions on both countries. What role will Washington play now when they possibly will be strategizing more aggressively about possible military conflicts with two military rivals - Russia and China?
Washington and its Western allies have effectively shed the military paradigms they picked up when they were pitted against bands of freelancing terrorist factions, most of whom were militarily non-entities.
It is not that the US didn't use military power as a tool to influence outcomes in different regions since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Immediately after the Soviet collapse, Washington deployed its military in Kosovo and Somalia, then Iraq, and Afghanistan. However, all of these conflicts and wars were more or less one-sided affairs, with massive US military power pulverizing much smaller and weaker military opponents in one-sided conflict. Many of the above conflicts do not even qualify as interstate conflicts. Kosovo and Somalia could at best be described as policing operations. In Afghanistan, US forces intervened in an intrastate conflict and the Iraqi military proved to be a wall of sand in the face of the American military onslaught.
This is about to change—China is fast converting its economic success into military strength, and Russia has one of the largest militaries in the world and is in possession of the largest nuclear arsenals in the world. The Iranians flaunt their military strength all the time, but how much the bluster is worth - only time will tell.
Any conflict between Pakistan and India would be immensely destructive, even if it doesn’t lead to a nuclear exchange. The destruction caused by a potential China-India conflict will be beyond contemplation. North Korea possesses nuclear weapons, and effective delivery systems could single handedly inflict immense destruction in the region. Conflict in Taiwan could provoke a great power war.
Washington and its Western allies have effectively shed the military paradigms they picked up when they were pitted against bands of freelancing terrorist factions, most of whom were militarily non-entities. These terrorist groups were using military technology mostly of Cold War vintage, and mostly of Soviet origin. So military invocation was not the main headache for US military planners in this period.
Now Washington faces a military threat, China, which is as sophisticated in military technology and innovation as the United States itself. China is spending a substantial amount of money and effort into innovation in military technology and ramping up its presence in the South China Sea and around the world. The US military industrial complex has emerged out of the slumber imposed on it during the 20 odd years of fighting a force much inferior to itself in military technology. It is rising up to the challenge with hundreds of new projects.
Will massive deployment of US economic and political power to prepare itself for a possible conflict with China, and possibly Iran, affect the American diplomatic position in South Asia?
All this has compelled a change in military planning and thinking in Washington, with US military strategy gearing up for a variety of possibilities with respect to interstate conflict in several regions of the world. How does this change in military thinking impact corresponding US diplomacy? It is politically possible to advocate for peace and peaceful resolution of conflicts when fighting much inferior military forces, an appropriate analogy for which is killing insects with a hammer. This is possible because you are not employing your whole industrial power and the entirety of your political and economic might to fight some poorly equipped and over enthusiastic followers of a terror leader or religious fundamentalist. Fighting another state as powerful as China is a totally different ball game.
US diplomacy has been actively engaged in preventing a war between Pakistan and India since the time both South Asian nations embarked on the path of weaponization of their nuclear program. American, French and British diplomats had to do a lot of shuttle diplomacy in 2002 to avert a war between Pakistan and India in the wake of the terrorist attack on the Indian parliament building in December 2001. Theories abound as to whether it was Western diplomacy or the Pakistani nuclear deterrent that averted the war eventually.
Pakistani nuclear enthusiasts argue that Pakistan’s nuclear deterrent prevented the Indian military from attacking Pakistan during the twin peaks crisis that brought massive deployment of Indian land forces on our borders. Indian narration credits General Musharraf’s actions towards banning and cracking down on militant groups inside Pakistani territory, and corresponding Western diplomacy as the reasons for war having been averted.
In the midst of this evolving geopolitical landscape, it is worth pondering how the massive change in American and Western military paradigms will affect the possible US role in South Asia in any future military crisis. Will massive deployment of US economic and political power to prepare itself for a possible conflict with China, and possibly Iran, affect the American diplomatic position in South Asia?
Since 1986, South Asia has witnessed at least one military crisis between Pakistan and India every decade... In every crisis, US diplomacy was instrumental in defusing the crisis.
Two factors could possibly influence US diplomacy in South Asia. The US now sees India as a military ally which it wants to be part of its “integrated deterrence” strategy to counter China’s rise. The US is massively arming India, to make its military power effective in deterring China. On a much smaller scale, Washington also needs the Pakistani military and intelligence services as a possible channel to influence events in Afghanistan, from where its strategists still perceive the threat of a massive terrorist attack on mainland United States, an attack that can possibly divert Washington’s attentions away from the great power rivalry with China. These two apparently conflicting interests might again force Washington to reengage the leadership of the two South Asian rivals in peace diplomacy, though much less enthusiastically.
However, a third term for Modi will mean a militarily more assertive India and an economically weaker Pakistan would mean Pakistani military leaders treading into non-military ventures like seeking to transform Pakistan into a regional connectivity hub—something both Army Chiefs, General Asim Munir and his predecessor, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, have been advocating for.
Since 1986, South Asia has witnessed at least one military crisis between Pakistan and India every decade. In 1986, we witnessed the brass-tacks military crisis, when ambitious Indian political and military leaders deployed massive land forces close to the Pakistani border. In 1990, we witnessed another large-scale Indian tank deployment in reaction to the uprising in Kashmir. In 1999, we had the Kargil conflict in response to the Pakistani intrusion into the Indian side of the LOC. In 2002, there was a massive Indian deployment in response to a terror attack on the Indian parliament. In 2008, we had heightened military tensions after the Mumbai terrorist attacks. In 2019, there were military tensions following a suicide attack on a military convoy in Pulwama. In every crisis, US diplomacy was instrumental in defusing the crisis.
On some occasions, US diplomacy rescued Pakistani leaders out of complex internal and external crisis situations. Many powerful voices in Washington now opine that America’s capacity to influence military events in South Asia has dwindled, especially its capacity to compel the Indian leadership not to take decisive military action against Pakistan. Now that the US would itself be engaged in military planning of one or the other kind to prepare with interstate conflicts in a variety of theatres, how will this influence Washington’s diplomatic capacity to force Islamabad and New Delhi to talk about peace instead of coming to blows? The answer to that question gives me goosebumps.