1971 War: How Russia sank Nixon’s gunboat diplomacy

Exactly 40 years ago, India won a famous victory over Pakistan due to its brilliant soldiers, an unwavering political leadership, and strong diplomatic support from Moscow. Less well known is Russia’s power play that prevented a joint British-American attack on India.

Washington DC, December 3, 1971, 10:45am. US President Richard Nixon is on the phone with Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, hours after Pakistan launched simultaneous attacks on six Indian airfields, a reckless act that prompted India to declare war.

Nixon: So West Pakistan giving trouble there. Kissinger: If they lose half of their country without fighting they will be destroyed. They may also be destroyed this way but they will go down fighting. Nixon: The Pakistan thing makes your heart sick. For them to be done so by the Indians and after we have warned the bitch (reference to Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi). Tell them that when India talks about West Pakistan attacking them it's like Russia claiming to be attacked by Finland.

Washington, December 10, 1971, 10:51am. A week later the war is not going very well for Pakistan, as Indian armour scythes through East Pakistan and the Pakistan Air Force is blown out of the subcontinent’s sky. Meanwhile, the Pakistani military in the west is demoralised and on the verge of collapse as the Indian Army and Air Force attack round the clock.

Nixon: Our desire is to save West Pakistan. That's all. Kissinger: That's right. That is exactly right. Nixon: All right. Keep those carriers moving now. Kissinger: The carriers—everything is moving. Four Jordanian planes have already moved to Pakistan, 22 more are coming. We're talking to the Saudis, the Turks we've now found are willing to give five. So we're going to keep that moving until there's a settlement. Nixon: Could you tell the Chinese it would be very helpful if they could move some forces or threaten to move some forces? Kissinger: Absolutely. Nixon: They've got to threaten or they've got to move, one of the two. You know what I mean? Kissinger: Yeah. Nixon: How about getting the French to sell some planes to the Paks? Kissinger: Yeah. They're already doing it. Nixon: This should have been done long ago. The Chinese have not warned the Indians. Kissinger: Oh, yeah. Nixon: All they've got to do is move something. Move a division. You know, move some trucks. Fly some planes. You know, some symbolic act. We're not doing a goddamn thing, Henry, you know that. Kissinger: Yeah. Nixon: But these Indians are cowards. Right? Kissinger: Right. But with Russian backing. You see, the Russians have sent notes to Iran, Turkey, to a lot of countries threatening them. The Russians have played a miserable game.

If the two American leaders were calling Indians cowards, a few months earlier the Indians were a different breed altogether. This phone call is from May 1971. Nixon: The Indians need—what they need really is a— Kissinger: They’re such bastards. Nixon: A mass famine. But they aren't going to get that…But if they're not going to have a famine the last thing they need is another war. Let the goddamn Indians fight a war. Kissinger: They are the most aggressive goddamn people around there.

The 1971 war is considered to be modern India’s finest hour, in military terms. The clinical professionalism of the Indian army, navy and air force; a charismatic brass led by the legendary Sam Maneckshaw; and ceaseless international lobbying by the political leadership worked brilliantly to set up a famous victory. After two weeks of vicious land, air and sea battles, nearly 100,000 Pakistani soldiers surrendered before India's rampaging army, the largest such capitulation since General Paulus' surrender at Stalingrad in 1943. However, it could all have come unstuck without help from veto-wielding Moscow, with which New Delhi had the foresight to sign a security treaty in 1970.

As Nixon’s conversations with the wily Kissinger show, the forces arrayed against India were formidable. The Pakistani military was being bolstered by aircraft from Jordan, Iran, Turkey and France. Moral and military support was amply provided by the US, China and the UK. Though not mentioned in the conversations here, the UAE sent in half a squadron of fighter aircraft and the Indonesians dispatched at least one naval vessel to fight alongside the Pakistani Navy.

However, Russia’s entry thwarted a scenario that could have led to multiple pincer movements against India.

On December 10, even as Nixon and Kissinger were frothing at the mouth, Indian intelligence intercepted an American message, indicating that the US Seventh Fleet was steaming into the war zone. The Seventh Fleet, which was then stationed in the Gulf of Tonkin, was led by the 75,000 ton nuclear powered aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise. The world’s largest warship, it carried more than 70 fighters and bombers. The Seventh Fleet also included the guided missile cruiser USS King, guided missile destroyers USS Decatur, Parsons and Tartar Sam, and a large amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli.

Standing between the Indian cities and the American ships was the Indian Navy’s Eastern Fleet led by the 20,000-ton aircraft carrier, Vikrant, with barely 20 light fighter aircraft. When asked if India’s Eastern Fleet would take on the Seventh Fleet, the Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Vice Admiral N. Krishnan, said: “Just give us the orders.” The Indian Air Force, having wiped out the Pakistani Air Force within the first week of the war, was reported to be on alert for any possible intervention by aircraft from the Enterprise.

Meanwhile, Soviet intelligence reported that a British naval group led by the aircraft carrier Eagle had moved closer to India’s territorial waters. This was perhaps one of the most ironic events in modern history where the Western world’s two leading democracies were threatening the world’s largest democracy in order to protect the perpetrators of the largest genocide since the Holocaust in Nazi Germany. However, India did not panic. It quietly sent Moscow a request to activate a secret provision of the Indo-Soviet security treaty, under which Russia was bound to defend India in case of any external aggression.

The British and the Americans had planned a coordinated pincer to intimidate India: while the British ships in the Arabian Sea would target India’s western coast, the Americans would make a dash into the Bay of Bengal in the east where 100,000 Pakistani troops were caught between the advancing Indian troops and the sea.

To counter this two-pronged British-American threat, Russia dispatched a nuclear-armed flotilla from Vladivostok on December 13 under the overall command of Admiral Vladimir Kruglyakov, the Commander of the 10th Operative Battle Group (Pacific Fleet). Though the Russian fleet comprised a good number of nuclear-armed ships and atomic submarines, their missiles were of limited range (less than 300 km). Hence to effectively counter the British and American fleets the Russian commanders had to undertake the risk of encircling them to bring them within their target. This they did with military precision.

In an interview to a Russian TV programme after his retirement, Admiral Kruglyakov, who commanded the Pacific Fleet from 1970 to 1975, recalled that Moscow ordered the Russian ships to prevent the Americans and British from getting closer to “Indian military objects”. The genial Kruglyakov added: “The Chief Commander’s order was that our submarines should surface when the Americans appear. It was done to demonstrate to them that we had nuclear submarines in the Indian Ocean. So when our subs surfaced, they recognised us. In the way of the American Navy stood the Soviet cruisers, destroyers and atomic submarines equipped with anti-ship missiles. We encircled them and trained our missiles at the Enterprise. We blocked them and did not allow them to close in on Karachi, Chittagong or Dhaka."

At this point, the Russians intercepted a communication from the commander of the British carrier battle group, Admiral Dimon Gordon, to the Seventh Fleet commander: “Sir, we are too late. There are the Russian atomic submarines here, and a big collection of battleships.” The British ships fled towards Madagascar while the larger US task force stopped before entering the Bay of Bengal.

The Russian manoeuvres clearly helped prevent a direct clash between India and the US-UK combine. Newly declassified documents reveal that the Indian Prime Minister went ahead with her plan to liberate Bangladesh despite inputs that the Americans had kept three battalions of Marines on standby to deter India, and that the American aircraft carrier USS Enterprise had orders to target the Indian Army, which had broken through the Pakistani Army’s defences and was thundering down the highway to the gates of Lahore, West Pakistan’s second largest city.

According to a six-page note prepared by India's foreign ministry, "The bomber force aboard the Enterprise had the US President's authority to undertake bombing of the Indian Army's communications, if necessary."

Despite Kissinger’s goading and desperate Pakistani calls for help, the Chinese did nothing. US diplomatic documents reveal that Indira Gandhi knew the Soviets had factored in the possibility of Chinese intervention. According to a cable referring to an Indian cabinet meeting held on December 10, “If the Chinese were to become directly involved in the conflict, Indira Gandhi said, the Chinese know that the Soviet Union would act in the Sinkiang region. Soviet air support may be made available to India at that time.”

Interestingly, while the cable is declassified, the source and extensive details of the Indian Prime Minister’s briefing remain classified. “He is a reliable source” is all that the document says. There was very clearly a cabinet level mole the Americans were getting their information from.

On December 14, General A.A.K. Niazi, Pakistan's military commander in East Pakistan, told the American consul-general in Dhaka that he was willing to surrender. The message was relayed to Washington, but it took the US 19 hours to relay it to New Delhi. Files suggest senior Indian diplomats suspected the delay was because Washington was possibly contemplating military action against India.

Kissinger went so far as to call the crisis “our Rhineland” a reference to Hitler’s militarisation of German Rhineland at the outset of World War II. This kind of powerful imagery indicates how strongly Kissinger and Nixon came to see Indians as a threat.

An Indian University study of the conflict says: “The violation of human rights on a massive scale—described in a March 30 US cable as “selective genocide”—and the complete disregard for democracy were irrelevant to Nixon and Kissinger. In fact, the non-democratic aspects of Pakistani dictator Yahya Khan’s behaviour seemed to be what impressed them the most. As evidence mounted of military atrocities in East Pakistan, Nixon and Kissinger remained unmoved. In a Senior Review Group meeting, Kissinger commented at news of significant casualties at a university that, ‘The British didn’t dominate 400 million Indians all those years by being gentle’.”

Nixon and Kissinger phoned Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev and asked for guarantees that India would not attack West Pakistan. “Nixon was ready to link the future summit in Moscow to Soviet behaviour on this issue," writes professor Vladislav M. Zubok in A Failed Empire. "The Soviets could not see why the White House supported Pakistan, who they believed had started the war against India. Brezhnev, puzzled at first, was soon enraged. In his narrow circle, he even suggested giving India the secret of the atomic bomb. His advisers did their best to kill this idea. Several years later, Brezhnev still reacted angrily and spoke spitefully about American behaviour."

Another telephone conversation between the scheming duo reveals a lot about the mindset of those at the highest echelons of American decision making: Kissinger: And the point you made yesterday, we have to continue to squeeze the Indians even when this thing is settled. Nixon: We've got to for rehabilitation. I mean, Jesus Christ, they've bombed—I want all the war damage; I want to help Pakistan on the war damage in Karachi and other areas, see? Kissinger: Yeah Nixon: I don't want the Indians to be happy. I want a public relations programme developed to piss on the Indians. Kissinger: Yeah. Nixon: I want to piss on them for their responsibility. Get a white paper out. Put down, White paper. White paper. Understand that? Kissinger: Oh, yeah. Nixon: I don't mean for just your reading. But a white paper on this. Kissinger: No, no. I know. Nixon: I want the Indians blamed for this, you know what I mean? We can't let these goddamn, sanctimonious Indians get away with this. They've pissed on us on Vietnam for 5 years, Henry. Kissinger: Yeah. Nixon: Aren't the Indians killing a lot of these people? Kissinger: Well, we don't know the facts yet. But I'm sure they're not as stupid as the West Pakistanis—they don't let the press in. The idiot Paks have the press all over their place.

In hindsight, it’s a good thing that Nixon and Kissinger failed.

The problem was that Indira Gandhi chose, for whatever reason, to side with the USSR, perhaps in part because of the Chinese threat to India’s northern borders, perhaps in part from lingering resentment of the British colonization. That pretty much forced the U.S. to side with Pakistan in response, even though it is clear that India is a far more civilized country with far more in common with us than Pakistan.

Indira Ghandi appointed herself as leader of the “Third World” in the UN. The first and second worlds were the U.S. and Europe vs Russia and the Communist states. But in most instances, Indira Ghandi stood with the USSR, and persuaded numerous other third world countries to stand with her and vote in the UN against U.S. interests.

So, the Nixon-Kissinger policy is understandable—if regretable. We sided with Pakistan because (as I thought at the time) second best was the only choice we were offered.

The Russians supplied India with armaments when America refused to sell them, and even forced Britain to stop such sales - one of the Soviet premiers famously gave India’s Nehru tours of Russian aircraft factories with promises of supplying India with the latest of Russian weaponry - at a time when the West refused to entertain any such efforts. If I recall correctly, that was what irked India enough to cause the tilt, although no basing rights were given to the Russians by India.

The American bet was on a religiously “cohesive” Pakistan to survive over the long term, in comparison with what was thought to be a very unstable, secular India. On top of that, the Russians quite early on shored up support for India in booting out French and Portuguese territorial claims from within her territory - especially Goa.

Things turned out quite differently, for all parties, through the years. India, no doubt, acted in India’s interests and stuck with it.

As for India itself, the Nehru-Gandhis were extremely close with Britain all through the time.

You are totally wrong. Indira Gandhi first came to power in 1966. By then, US-Pakistan military alliance was well established. Pakistan was part of SEATO and CENTO in 1954-55. US supported Pakistan in the 1965 Indo-Pak war, one year before Indira Gandhi came to power. And Indira Gandhi didnt appointed herself as leader of the “Third World”. India was the founder member of NAM and being the largest democracy India was the most influential among the post colonization, newly independent third world countries.

You need to do a little more research before piling it all on Indira Gandhi. US never considered India to be best choice back then. Pakistan-China seemed much better choice .

Not for whatever reason. The administrations before Nixon also sided with Islamic Republic of Pakistan. I think we should curb this penchant of trying to justify every action using some moral argument. Why not admit mistakes and realize that we have no business interfering in other countries.

The US (Nixon) had tried to provoke the Chinese into attacking India in 1971, too, while the Bangladeshi people (especially the non-Muslims there) were being mowed down and slaughtered whole-scale by the Pakistani military (with US equipment and support - they even coaxed their Middle East friends to supply weaponry to Pakistan) under Operation Searchlight. The Russians neutralised both Chinese AND American threats (USS Enterprise was moved into the Bay of Bengal, to be quickly trailed by a Russian nuke sub) and only a total dimwit unaware of history would call india’s alliance with them a folly for India:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Searchlight

Kissinger is one of the most overrated historical figures. His policy was gobbledygook, and he didn’t achieve one thing diplomatically. What’s that you say, the China Thaw? What, like they weren’t going to go on roughhousing Russia without us? Or as if we wouldn’t buy their stuff on the open market once they veered capitalist without making a show of recognizing them?

About Kissinger - yeah, the guy was an unabashed lover of mass murderers. Read Kissinger's "White House Years" memoirs sometime - the affection he has for the likes of Pakistani military dictator Yahya Khan is cringe-inducing, and the outright adoration Kissinger expresses for Mao Zedong is beyond belief. Yahya Khan and Mao both had death counts measured in the millions.

There's no question the US backed the wrong dog in the fight between India and Pakistan - the world would probably be a better place today if India had been allowed to complete it's disintegration of Pakistan back then. But it wasn't all one-sided. Nehru was a Fabian socialist who spurned overtures from the US and his alignment with the Soviet Union while posing as a neutralist made a mockery of his credibility and hurt India both economically and geo-politically for decades. His daughter Indira Gandhi continued his policies.

Times and alliances change. India was on the side of the Soviets, while preaching "non-alignment", more or less continuously from Independence and the breakup with what became Pakistan until the assassination of "the bitch", as Nixon apparently called Indira Ghandi (in many ways an apt description). The US and what we used to call "Red China" were on the Pakistani side. The "Great Game" of South Asia has been going on for more than two hundred years now. The names of the countries change, the leaders change, and they even change sides in the game. But it never really stops.

At that time Pakistan had a pro-western government run behind the scenes and sometimes overtly by their military. It was smaller but richer and more "advanced" by far than Socialist India and the Islamic element were kept in their mosques. That ALL changed in 1979 when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan (long recognized like Mongolia as a backwater part of their "sphere of influence"). While we had already (thanks, again, Jimmy, you worthless POS) lost our greatest ally in the region besides Israel (Iran) we assisted the Afghan Mujahadeen (Holy Warriors) with Paki cooperation and Saudi money in resisting the Soviets trying, successfully in the end, to give Russia a Viet Nam of her very own and offset what looked like a Soviet march to warm water and oil.

Then the madrassas in Pakistan released their tens of thousands of young indoctrinated "scholars" ("Taliban") across the border to overthrow what was left of a Russian puppet government, they won all but a small fraction of the country, instituted a reign of religious terror that made China's Cultural or the French revolution look benign, nurtured and supported a rich Saudi who had fought with them through the Soviet years by the name of Osama bin Laden, and the rest as they say is history.

I have a few bones to pick with this article.

First off, it must be noted that the Nixon administration had a stake in preserving the integrity of Pakistan, longtime US ally during the Cold War that Nixon was using Pakistan as a go-between in its ongoing secret diplomacy with China.

In 1971, Nixon and Kissinger feared that India would use the Bengali revolt in East Pakistan as a pretext to “destroy” Pakistan. Furthermore, India abandoned its longstanding policy of “nonalignment” and became a Soviet ally when it signed the Indo-Soviet Treaty of “Peace, Friendship and Cooperation” in 1971—not 1970, as the article states. Shortly thereafter, Soviet armaments began pouring into India.

The writer also doesn’t mention the fact that the Nixon administration was trying to solve the conflict between the Pakistani government and the Bengalis by pressuring Islamabad to grant sweeping concessions to East Pakistan that would have eventually led to its independence. The Nixon administration also tried to get the Indians and Pakistanis to agree to a troop withdrawal from their borders and offered to have the US assume responsibility for the millions of Bengali refugees that were pouring into India, but got no response from India’s premier Indira Gandhi.

The article implies that the Soviet navy successfully faced down the US naval force, an eight-ship fleet known as Task Group 74. However, in no accounts of the conflict have I read of a naval face-of, and the message from the British commander to the US commander that the Soviets had arrived with a “fleet of battleships” sounds bogus, because the Soviet navy had no battleships.

In any case, when the war ended with West Pakistan intact, Kissinger remarked to Nixon, “Congratulations, Mr. President. You saved West Pakistan.”

Everything then was seen through a Cold War lens. India was seen as favoring the Soviets, and that was enough. Even at that, though, I saw it as very wrong when we sided against India when they liberated Bangla Desh.

I’m glad those days are done. One of the things Bush seemed to focus on was building a real alliance with India, and India has been valuable in the good-cop-bad-cop diplomacy with Pakistan the last few years.

We need to continue to build on the natural affinity we have for one another.

This article appears to be a psy-ops propaganda piece generated in a Russian intelligence group using alleged Indian writers dedicated to kissing up to Indians to keep them aligned with Russia.

The Russian military-industrial complex and/or elements of the Indian industrial complex that subcontracts building Russian arms is in desperate competition with the US now that Russian arms are increasingly obsolete relative to US/UK/French/Israeli offerings to the Russians.

The article makes out the Soviets to be such wonderful friends of the Indians and invites Indians to view today's Russians in the same light.

The article available at the same link to how Chuck Yeager's personal plane got shot up by the Indians during the last Indo-Pak war was very interesting and a clear anti-US propaganda piece:

“How India brought down the US’ supersonic man”

http://indrus.in/articles/2012/01/17/how_india_brought_down_the_us_supersonic_man_14208.html

See also propaganda piece of Australia's new Darwin outpost for US troops:

“Australia’s Darwinian blunder”

December 13, 2011
Rakesh Krishnan Simha, specially for RIR

“Australia’s decision to host a permanent US military presence in the northern city of Darwin is likely to spark a fierce arms race in the Asia-Pacific region.”

“This article appears to be a psy-ops propaganda piece generated in a Russian intelligence group using alleged Indian writers dedicated to kissing up to Indians to keep them aligned with Russia.”

A propaganda by definition implies deliberate spreading of false information, doctrines, rumors etc for a political purpose. Is there anything in THIS article that is false information? Surely it cant be a propaganda only because you don't like opinions expressed can it? As far as I know, the facts presented in this article is absolutely 100% correct.

Yes this article does makes the Soviets to be wonderful friends of Indians, which they were. You think that isn't true?

“The Russian military-industrial complex and/or elements of the Indian industrial complex that subcontracts building Russian arms is in desperate competition with the US now that Russian arms are increasingly obsolete relative to US/UK/French/Israeli offerings to the Russians.”

India has arms deals with Russia today far more then anytime in all of cold war history with Soviet/Russia. India has several multi-billion dollar arms deal that includes stealth fighter jets, aircraft carrier, nuclear subs, stealth destroyers, naval fighters jets, medium transport jets, AWACS, aerial refuelers, and hundreds of tanks and fighter upgrade programs. In comparison India's arms purchase from US amounts to only a few transport jets and maritime surveillance planes. That doesn't sound like "desperate competition" to me.

I also read the article on Chuck Yeager. All I can say is its bang on the buck.

The most foolish policy was to arm Osama bin Laden. Don’t give me the line about fighting Soviets because (a) it is insulting to the soldiers when you claim that American soldiers are all incompetent and so we need to go seek the help of some camel rider to save us, (b) it is still immoral to support Taliban and the terrorists and arm them, and (c) you imply that 9/11 attacks were justified because it was some sort of collateral damage that occurred as a result of fighting the Soviets.
Don't talk about foolish policies until you know basic facts. The Taliban did not exist until 1991, 3 years after the Soviets left Afghanistan. The US did not ever fund or arm Osama Bin Laden. Bin Laden took over Maktab al-Khidamat, which was an Arab organization funded by Gulf State Arabs like its former money man, OBL. The US funded native Afghans.

The problem with this article is the flagrand SPIN.

And the Russian equipment you mention...

“India has arms deals with Russia today far more then anytime in all of cold war history with Soviet/Russia. India has several multi-billion dollar arms deal that includes stealth fighter jets, aircraft carrier, nuclear subs, stealth destroyers, naval fighters jets, medium transport jets, AWACS, aerial refuelers, and hundreds of tanks and fighter upgrade programs.”

...it is all Soviet era crap barely updated.

If the Indians are going to confront the new Chinese weapons R&D (which is now far in excess of the Russians) they are going to need non-Russian Western arms.

China is building a gigantic naval base in Pakistan at Gwadar and Pakistan and China are trying to encircle India.

Consistent the the newly emerging US-India strategic alignment of interests India recently attended a conference with the US, Australia, Japan and the other nations threatened by China's aggressive territorial claims in the South China Sea for a friendly chat...prompting the anti-Australian Darwin US outpost article on this website.

Russian Equipment are craps ????

>Are you talking about SU 30 MKI and other versions (4++) Jet that even US and her allies feared the most .

>Aint am right that US provided the most updated fighter Jets and Equpiment to pakistan against India bt still they been defeated within 14 days ,not to mention other 3 wars.

> Chinese Weapons are still decades behind Russian so called Junk ,all they do is Copy Paste things which is yet to be tested in real war unlike russian Junks.

> India is happy with russian junk atleast there are no aatached string and they work fine in WAR.

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