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India, Pakistan Trade Heavy Fire, Tensions High
Reuters/Yahoo ^ | 5-20-2002 | Penny McRae

Posted on 05/20/2002 6:33:14 AM PDT by blam

India, Pakistan Trade Heavy Fire, Tension High Mon May 20, 5:14 AM ET By Penny MacRae

NEW DELHI. India (Reuters) - Indian and Pakistani forces traded fire across their frontier for a fourth day Monday raising fresh fears hostility between the nuclear-armed neighbors could drag them into war.

Financial markets in both countries were badly hit by war fears but despite signs India was preparing for conflict, most analysts said New Delhi was likely to exhaust all diplomatic channels before taking a military option.

India Sunday streamlined its armed forces' command by putting paramilitary border forces under army control and the coast guard under the navy.

Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh said the move was "standard operating procedure" when preparing for war.

But as part of its diplomatic efforts, senior Indian defense officials were due to brief their U.S. counterparts in Washington Monday.

Bloody guerrilla attacks that India has blamed on Pakistan-based militants, that have fueled the border tension, would be high on the agenda.

"What is happening on the border, cross-border terrorism and Jammu and Kashmir (news - web sites)," a defense ministry spokesman told Reuters.

"The entire gamut will come up."

Nearly a million men -- backed by tanks, missiles and warplanes -- have been mobilized by Pakistan and India on their border since a December raid on the Indian parliament that New Delhi blamed on Pakistan-based rebels.

TENSION SURGES, VILLAGERS FLEE

Fears of large-scale conflict surged after an attack on an Indian army camp last week that India again blamed on Pakistan-based militants fighting its rule in Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir state where a separatist revolt has raged for 12 years.

Some 34 people, many of them children and wives of Indian soldiers, were killed along with the three assailants, in last Tuesday's attack.

India says Islamic guerrillas fighting its rule are operating freely from Pakistan -- a charge Pakistan denies.

New Delhi was expected to press Washington to get Pakistan -- a vital ally in the U.S. war on terror -- to live up to a January pledge to crack down on what New Delhi says are Islamic militants battling its forces in Kashmir.

Over the weekend, India expelled Pakistan's chief envoy in protest against last week's raid that Pakistan has strongly condemned.

An Indian defense official said its forces used heavy machine guns and mortars against Pakistani positions in Monday's fighting. A Pakistani official said three villagers were killed while the Indian official said there had been no casualties.

Thousands of panicked villagers have fled Indian border areas over the past few days, joining an estimated 60,000 who ran away after tension mounted last December.

STRONG SIGNALS

Late last week, the United States gave strong signals it would soon send Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage to the region to try to cool the tension.

In addition to fears a war could spin out of control, U.S. officials are worried conflict between India and Pakistan could disrupt its drive to hunt down members of Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s al Qaeda network and endanger U.S. troops stationed in Pakistan.

"The U.S. presence in Pakistan is one of the deterrents to India exercising the military option. But it's one of many factors," foreign policy analyst K.K. Katyal told Reuters.

"An armed conflict between India and Pakistan would come in the way of America's crusade against terrorism," he said. "The Taliban and al Qaeda leaders are still intact and said to be in Pakistan. So the U.S. needs help from Pakistan and will not allow anything to distract Pakistan's attention from the job."

Bin Laden is prime suspect in the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.

As war fears mounted, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee (news - web sites) met opposition party leaders to discuss the next move of his government led by his Hindu nationalist-led Bharatiya Janata Party.

Vajpayee has faced pressure from some hawkish BJP members for a strike on some of the dozens of militant training camps that Indian officials say have sprung up recently in Pakistan Kashmir.

But A.B. Bardhan, a leader of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), said he told Vajpayee "war could not solve this problem."

He also said talk of a "limited war" was unrealistic. "There's nothing like limited war at least as far as these two neighbors are concerned with their nuclear armaments."

Fears of war sent shares tumbling in India and Pakistan. Indian shares slid to a three-month low, the rupee eased to within striking distance of its lifetime low against the dollar while government bond yields were close to five-month highs. On Pakistan's Karachi Stock Exchange, shares plunged over seven percent as investors dumped blue chips


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Front Page News
KEYWORDS: fire; heavy; india; pakistan; southasialist
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1 posted on 05/20/2002 6:33:14 AM PDT by blam
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To: blam
This problem potentially dwarfs the war between Israel and the Palestinian devils. Imagine if just one arab dictatorship had nuclear weapons.

All the more urgency to defang Saddam Hussein and his tinhorn neighbors soon!!

2 posted on 05/20/2002 7:14:57 AM PDT by CROSSHIGHWAYMAN
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To: blam
most analysts said New Delhi was likely to exhaust all diplomatic channels before taking a military option.

India is doing just the opposite. They are expelling the Pakistani ambassador to India, and they withdrew their own ambassador months ago. They've cut communications, travel, and even overflight privileges.

The one thing they are NOT doing is talking to the Pakistan government.

India is either banging the wardrums for domestic political purposes with no intention of actually attacking, or they are simply insane. The latter is not out of the question, because the hatred between those two countries is pathological.

3 posted on 05/20/2002 7:31:05 AM PDT by Dog Gone
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To: *southasia_list
Check the Bump List folders for articles related to and descriptions of the above topic(s) or for other topics of interest.
4 posted on 05/20/2002 9:25:24 AM PDT by Free the USA
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To: Dog Gone
Or maybe the Indian gov't believes that Musharef is about to lose control and the Indians want to be ready if things go south.
5 posted on 05/20/2002 9:30:01 AM PDT by mewzilla
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To: Dog Gone
Is INDIA insane? Seems to me that it is Pakistan that continues to either support or ignore a series of murderous cross-border terrorist attacks against the Hindus in Kashmir, e.g. the 34 civilians that were murdered in a single attack just this week. It also seems, if other posts on this forum are to be believed, that support for a nuclear first-strike against India is running quite high among the Paks. Their Madrasas are, after all, filled with hateful barbarians who dream of flying airliners into the Sears Tower at their first opportunity. I would support India in whatever action they take. Unfortunately, Musharaf is OUR "ally". A war between the two might complicate our war on terrorism- but were India to CONQUER Pakistan, it might simplify our work significantly. Here's hoping the USA won't prove too steadfast an ally for the Paks.
6 posted on 05/20/2002 1:52:08 PM PDT by Burr5
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To: Burr5
I don't take the comments about a Pakistani first strike too seriously. I'm sure some people there hate India enough to engage in what would effectively be a suicidal gesture, but they aren't the ones in control of the nukes.

I think India could conquer Pakistan, although not without a devastating nuclear exchange as the cost. But if it did, it wouldn't be able to govern it. The Pakistanis are probably the most heavily-armed citizens on the planet, and Indian troops would never be safe there.

I sympathize with the Indian position. The attacks in Kashmir are unacceptable. But if they're bad in Kashmir, just think what they'd be like if India occupied all or part of Pakistan itself.

7 posted on 05/20/2002 2:06:02 PM PDT by Dog Gone
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To: Dog Gone
India could, if it wished, in a matter of weeks conquer the whole of Pakistan by conventional warfare, and set up a puppet state there like they did in Bangladesh.
8 posted on 05/20/2002 2:13:20 PM PDT by crystalk
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To: blam
It's a heck of a place where they can trade heavy fire for 4 days and still say they are not at war. Anybody know the size of the morters? Are they using the 160 mm or have they started with the 260 mm?
9 posted on 05/20/2002 2:19:06 PM PDT by RightWhale
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To: Burr5
but were India to CONQUER Pakistan, it might simplify our work significantly.

India may be able to conquer Pakistan (ie defeat/destroy its armed forces), but it will not be able to occupy/rule Pakistan. It would probably find itself having to ethnicly cleanse Kashmir and Pakistan by driving all the Muslims into Afghanistan or Iran

10 posted on 05/20/2002 2:29:48 PM PDT by SauronOfMordor
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To: SauronOfMordor
150 million people is a lot to kill or put on boxcars. I don't see it.
11 posted on 05/20/2002 2:32:17 PM PDT by Dog Gone
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To: Dog Gone
The years around Partition saw about 40 million Hindus and Muslims either killed or put on boxcars. If 40's doable, then 150 is too. Just a matter of scale.

Not that I think that's right, of course.

12 posted on 05/20/2002 2:40:45 PM PDT by AM2000
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To: AM2000
Yeah, there was a lot of that sort of thing going on in the 1940's.

I don't quite understand the mentality of those who think that "transfer" is a solution to problems on the border of a country, whether it's here or in Israel. Even if the logistical problems are overcome, all that has been accomplished is a new location for border problems. I think what these people really want is genocide, but it's not considered a polite thing to say.

That solution makes a lot more sense. The Indian/Pakistani conflict could finally be resolved if one of them successfully eliminated the other entirely. Short of achieving that goal, the parties need to sit down and figure out a way to peacefully co-exist.

Neither solution seems to be achievable, for some reason.

13 posted on 05/20/2002 2:51:11 PM PDT by Dog Gone
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To: Dog Gone
The potential for this thing to get out of hand, appears to be very great indeed. It is, frankly, amazing to me that this conflict gets relatively so little attention in the West. (It is not that we can do very much to prevent an explosion. But it deserves a lot more attention than it is getting. Keep in mind that it isn't just the 1,000,000,000+ people now on the Indian sub-continent. There is the immense Nation of Red China to the North, that might possibly try to pick up the pieces after a devastating exchange between the Hindus and Moslems.)

No, I do not have any good idea as to what we can or should do. But the lack of attention is very striking. If this thing gets well underway, it may be the only news from the year 2002, that anyone will be studying in 2052.

William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site

14 posted on 05/20/2002 3:03:28 PM PDT by Ohioan
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To: Ohioan
I don't think it gets any attention because few reporters understand it.

Besides, it's just a conflict between Hindus and Moslems in a region where toilet paper is rare. There's no Muslim lobby or Hindu lobby in this country to speak of, and the whole region has been off of the American radar for some time. In fact, George W Bush couldn't give the name of the Pakistani president when he was ambushed by a journalist early in his campaign.

There aren't enough Christians, Jews, or "white people" involved to make the situation interesting, I guess. That's completely wrong, of course, but the press is often wrong.

15 posted on 05/20/2002 4:25:10 PM PDT by Dog Gone
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To: Ohioan
...the immense Nation of Red China to the North, that might possibly try to pick up the pieces after a devastating exchange between the Hindus and Moslems

Well, South Asia has already been occupied/oppressed by Arabs (the Mughal dynasty) and Europeans (colonialism).

I guess it is the yellow mans turn.

I mean no disrespect.

16 posted on 05/20/2002 4:36:31 PM PDT by AM2000
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To: Dog Gone
I agree with mewzilla.

MAybe they are quite simply fed up with all this BS. Pakistan formed solely because once the population converted to ISlam, they went insane. There was no reasoning with them.

India wanted to kick some ass but the world(Britian in particular," intervened and thus Pakistan was born.

Its not enough, it is never enough. Yes, they hate eachother in KAshmir but do you honestly think that if INdia walked away, the HIndus would have peace under Muslim governance? THAT is INSANE.

If you think I am sick of them then just imagine hoe India feels...

17 posted on 05/20/2002 4:40:48 PM PDT by Arioch7
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To: Arioch7
Turkey is the only place I know of where one can comfortably be something other than a moslem in an Islamic society. If moslems controlled all of Kashmir, I'm sure the Hindus would be oppressed, at a minimum.

Right now, it's probably not too comfortable to be a muslim in western India, either, but I think that's generally an isolated problem. Muslims have been historically more intolerant and Hindu extremists we are seeing more of are probably a reaction to that.

Unfortunately, it seems as if it's getting more polarized, not less, at a time when each side is more capable of killing hundreds of thousands of people with their new war toys.

18 posted on 05/20/2002 5:06:19 PM PDT by Dog Gone
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To: Dog Gone
What is so insane about the Indians wanting to root out and destroy muslim invaders in pakistan? If the American public knew how al-queada and the taliban came to power (through the good offices of paki intelligence services) and are still supported to this day by elements of the pak government, they would be demanding the US join the Indians.
19 posted on 05/20/2002 5:11:11 PM PDT by Former Proud Canadian
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To: Former Proud Canadian
I think the American public already knows that. It certainly hasn't been hidden from them.

As to why it's insane, read further down the thread. An attack by India might achieve its military goal, but it wouldn't stop terrorism.

20 posted on 05/20/2002 5:25:20 PM PDT by Dog Gone
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