[nukkad] How US and China worked together to save Pakistan in 1971

["Amit A Mayekar" <Amit_A_Mayekar@ril.com>]

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How US and China worked together to save Pakistan in 1971
The story of the United States' infamous tilt towards the Pakistani
dictatorship in its war against India in 1971 is part of 20th century
diplomatic folklore. But newly declassified transcripts of then
troubleshooter Henry Kissinger's conversations with Chinese leaders sheds
new light on what has since been regarded a major American diplomatic
folly.
The transcripts reveal among other things the extent to which Washington
went to prevent the complete decimation of Pakistan; the American use of
India as a whipping boy to ingratiate itself to Beijing with whom it was
just beginning to establish formal ties: and the Chinese use of the bogey
of an India-USSR axis to push Washington closer to Pakistan.The transcripts
of the secret talks, which were only recently declassified against
Kissinger's wishes, have been gathered in a just-published book by William
Burr, a Senior Analyst at the National Security Archives. Although the
volume offers glimpses of Kissinger's interaction with Chinese leaders
Mao-Tse Tungand Zhou En Lai, some of the most revealing conversations which
offer a startling insight into Washington's diabolical role in the region
are with Huang Hua, the then Chinese envoy to the UN who acted as a conduit
with the leadership in Beijing.In one meeting with Huang at a CIA safehouse
in New York at the height of the Indo-Pak war of 1971, Kissinger updates
him about the imminent Pakistani rout, lamenting that the Pakistani army in
the East has been destroyed and the Pakistani army in the West will run out
of POL (petroleum, oil and lubricants) in another two or three weeks
(because the Indians had destroyed storage tanks in Karachi.)``We think the
immediate objective must be to prevent an attack on the West Pakistan army
by India. We are afraid that if nothing is done to stop it, East Pakistan
will become a Bhutan and West Pakistan will become a Nepal. And India with
Soviet help would be free to turn its energies elsewhere,'' Kissinger tells
Huang.
``So it seems to us that through a combinationof pressure and political
moves it is important to keep India from attacking the West, to gain time
to get more arms into Pakistan and to restore the situation,'' Kissinger
adds.And what are these pressures and political moves? In a series of
disingenuous gambits, Kissinger appears to suggest that the US will counter
the Soviets if the Chinese want to bail out the Pakistanis. He tells Huang
that the US is sending an aircraft carrier to intimidate India. The Soviet
naval force in the region is no match for the US armada, he says. He then
offers the Chinese US satellite intelligence about the disposition of
Soviet forces, before virtually inviting Beijing to attack India.``The
President wants you to know that it's, of course, up to the People's
Republic to decide its own course of action in this situation, but if the
People's Republic were to consider the situation in the Indian
sub-continent a threat to its security, and it took measures to protect its
security, the US would oppose efforts of others tointerfere with the
People's Republic,'' Kissinger tells Huang.Just how perverse, cynical, and
totally against the public and Congressional sentiment the US stand was
during the 1971 war is revealed repeatedly in several exchanges. Kissinger
goes to great lengths to pin the blame for the war on India.Kissinger says:
``You read the New York Times every day, and you will see that the movement
of supplies and the movement of our fleet will not have the universal
admiration of the media to put it mildly. And it will have the total
opposition of our political opponents.''As it turned out, it wasn't just
the political opponents, but even the then Secretary of State William
Rogers who opposed the tilt towards Pakistan. Burr, in his commentary, says
Rogers was furious about the White House policy, forcing Nixon and
Kissinger to make key decisions in secret.he horrendous Nixon-Kissinger
folly and its domestic repercussions are also revealed elsewhere in the
transcript of a conversation betweenKissinger and then Prime Minister
Zhou-En-Lai, as the Chinese leader urges Washington to rebuild and rearm
Pakistan.Prime Minister Zhou: ...we will be in great favour of your
assisting Pakistan and building a naval port in Pakistan. Of course, that
would take time but it would also be a significant step. And as you told
us, and as Prime Minister Bhutto and other Pakistani friends have
mentioned, you are also considering how to assist them in military
ways.Kissinger: We have a tough time with our Congress on Pakistan -- and
their attitude is ridiculous. You should talk to Senator Mansfield when he
comes. Zhou: They (the Congress) are probably favourable towards India.
Kissinger: Yes.
Zhou: Perhaps it is the national character of the Americans to be taken in
by those who seem kind and mild.India's pacific outlook also invites
disdain from the Chinese leadership on another occasion. In a separate
dialogue, Kissinger and Chairman Mao-Tse Tung are discussing Indian history
and philosophy, aconversation which reveals Mao's famous contempt for
India.
Kissinger: There is a sentimental love affair between Western intellectuals
and India based on a complete misreading of the Indian philosophy of life.
Indian philosophy was never meant to have a practical application.Mao: It's
just a bunch of empty words.
Kissinger: For Ghandi (sic), non-violence wasn't a philosophical principle,
but because he thought the British were too moralistic and sentimental to
use violence against. They are nonsentimental people. For Ghandi it was a
revolutionary tactic, not an ethical principle.
Mao: And he himself would spin his own wool and drink goat's milk.
Kissinger: But it was essentially a tactical device for him.
Mao: And the influence of Ghandi's doctrine on the Indian people was to
induce them into nonresistance.
Kissinger: Partly, but also given the character and diversity of the
English people, it was only a way to conduct the struggle against the
British. So I think Ghandi deserves credit for havingwon independence
against the British.
Mao: India did not win independence. If it did not attach itself to the
Britain, it attaches itself to the Soviet Union. And more than one-half of
their economy depends on you.Burr's introduction to the 500-page book also
suggests the United States used India as a pawn to ingratiate itself to
China. ``Nixon and Kissinger kept pressure on the Soviets during December
1971 through the South Asian war when they weighed in the side of China's
ally Pakistan, against India, whom they regarded as a Soviet proxy. With
these threatening signals to Moscow and New Delhi, Nixon and Kissinger
sought to demonstrate their reliability to the Chinese as a prelude to
Nixon's talks with Zhou and Mao,'' Burr writes.The transcripts reveal
Kissinger was exactly what many Indians thought him to be -- a brilliant,
but completely amoral and artful diplomat who did great damage to Indo-US
ties along with his mercurial president. Despite the widespread perception
in the US and elsewhere inthe western world that India was forced into the
war because of the Pakistani reign of terror in then East Pakistan,
Kissinger gratuitously pins the blame on India to please China.
In one conversation, he tells Huang: ``What is happening in the Indian
sub-continent is a threat to all people. It's a more immediate threat to
China, but its a threat to all people. We have no agreement with the
British to do anything. In fact we are talking with you to come to a common
position. We know that Pakistan is being punished because it is a friend of
China and because it is a friend of the United States.''
Yet, in many conversations it is evident that domestic sentiment is totally
against Pakistan. In a later chat with Deng Xiao Ping, Kissinger talks
about plans to resume arms sales to Pakistan and remarks (in reference to
the domestic opposition): ``I will probably have to shoot half of Mr Lord's
staff before we can execute this.''According to Burr, during the South Asia
crisis, Kissinger was deeply upset withpress criticism, and livid over
Secretary of State Rogers' opposition to his India policy. At one point,
even Nixon had stopped taking his calls and (according to some) wondered of
Kissinger needed ``psychiatric care''. Kissinger thought of resigning in
January 1972, but the situation changed as Nixon's trip to Beijing and
Moscow approached and the President found it useful to speak to him again.
Footnote: Henry Kissinger remains one of the foremost supporters of China
and his firm Kissinger Inc has business interests in China. He also
advocates close US-India ties.




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