In his interview to Time magazine on December 29, 2008, President-elect Obama has spelt out his foreign policy priorities. He has said, among other things, “Managing a more effective strategy in Afghanistan will be a top priority. Recognising that it is not simply an Afghan problem but it’s an Afghanistan-Pakistan-India-Kashmir-Iran problem is going to be a priority.” It is strange that neither terrorism nor jihadi extremism figures in this formulation. Prima facie it would suggest that the incoming administration looks at the issue as a regional interstate problem.

Let us remind Obama and his team that this phase of the Afghan problem started with ‘Operation Enduring Freedom’ in October 2001 following the refusal of the Taliban regime in Kabul to surrender Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda cadres. The Taliban regime was cleared out of Afghanistan by the US Special Forces and troops of the Northern Alliance supported by US air power. As the operation was coming to a close and Osama bin Laden and remnants of Al Qaeda were cornered in the Torah Borah mountains, terrorists with links to Pakistan’s ISI attacked the Indian parliament. That compelled India to mobilise its forces on the border. Pakistan countered that move and  by vacating its western borders permitted Al Qaeda and Taliban leadership to find safe havens in Pakistan. It is now quite clear that the attack on the Indian Parliament was a provocative ruse to trap India into a military move which would justify Pakistan’s convenient troop withdrawal.

The same strategem has been employed in November 2008. The Mumbai terrorist attack was to provoke an Indian military response and provide an alibi to Pakistan to withdraw its forces from the western border and enable a Taliban surge into the tribal areas and Afghan territory to preempt and wreck the proposed US surge strategy. In 2001-2, the attention from Al Qaeda and Taliban consolidating themselves  in Pakistan was diverted by raising Indo-Pakistan tension. Thereafter Iraq preempted all US attention. Now when the attention of US and the NATO are refocussing on Afghanistan, the same diversionary tactics are being employed.

... contd.