Avoiding War in Kashmir

Sumit Ganguly

From Foreign Affairs, Winter 1990/91

Article preview: first 500 of 6,270 words total.

Summary:  Explains how (1) neither India nor Pakistan could expect to benefit from a war over Kashmir (2) nevertheless their pre-emptive defence postures create the risk of war breaking out through inadvertence, miscalculation or misperception.

Sumit Ganguly is Associate Professor of Political Science at Hunter College, New York.

Will the current simmering conflict over Kashmir lead to another subcontinental war? This complex question has plagued India-Pakistan relations since both countries gained independence in 1947, and over the past year tensions in the area have risen sharply. Continuing border skirmishes threaten an already precarious situation, in which international and domestic politics are intertwined with the passions of rival ethnic, religious and partisan interests.

Three decades ago concerned diplomats in capitals near and far were acutely sensitive to the stresses of Kashmir. The United States, the Soviet Union and, at times, China were all engaged at varying levels of intensity; superpower rivalries focused on Kashmir, which sometimes stood as a surrogate for larger global interests.

Now the global situation has altered, even as the basic tensions of Kashmir remain the same. Washington, Moscow and, to a certain extent, Beijing share common interests in ensuring that the two belligerent nations of the subcontinent do not inadvertently stumble into a major conflagration that neither India nor Pakistan could afford, and that could even lead to nuclear escalation.

A new generation of policymakers has lost its predecessor's sensitivity to the Kashmir conflict, as other world crises have competed for attention. Now the fashioning of an American policy appropriate to this potentially volatile situation entails first of all renewed understanding of the forces that led up to it.

II

The Kashmir conflict is rooted in the colonial history of the subcontinent. At the time of British withdrawal from the subcontinent two competing visions of state-creation animated the nationalist political leaderships. One vision, championed by Jawaharlal Nehru, was quintessentially secular and democratic. This view held that British India's diverse religious, linguistic and ethnic groups could coexist only under the aegis of a strong secular state. Mohammed Ali Jinnah, the leader of the Muslim League, challenged Nehru's vision of a unified Indian subcontinent. Jinnah contended that the Muslims of the subcontinent constituted a nation separate from the rest of (Hindu) India, with a distinct religious heritage and markedly different social customs. He also argued that the Muslim minority would be discriminated against in a predominantly Hindu state.

Despite various last-minute efforts by the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League, as well as the British government, continued unity of the subcontinent proved unattainable. As British withdrawal approached, a complex formula was created for the division of the area. Contiguous Muslim-majority states under the direct rule of the British crown would become Pakistan, with the border states of Punjab and Bengal being divided. The real problem arose with the disposition of the so-called princely states. Nominally independent, the rulers of these states, some 565 in number, recognized the British crown to be the paramount power in South Asia. With British withdrawal the doctrine of paramountcy lapsed. Several of the princely potentates, especially Maharaja Hari Singh of Kashmir, had harbored visions of independence with British decolonization. Lord Mountbatten, under pressure from Nehru and others in the Indian nationalist movement, dashed their hopes. In the closing days of ...

End of preview: first 500 of 6,270 words total.