272. Memorandum From the Department of State Counselor and Chairman of the Policy Planning Council (Rostow) to President Kennedy0
SUBJECT
- India-Pakistan Conversations, April 1-7, 1963:1 The Impending Negotiating Crisis
The message was delivered loud and clear in the two countries; and they [it] may have marginally helped our Ambassadors set the stage for the presentation of Principles and Round Five. In any case, as we left, the two parties and the assorted doves of peace were girding themselves for what they know to be a fateful period.
The reactions to our messages and the emotional and political posture of the various principal actors followed a well-worn script wholly familiar to those in the Kashmir business and even to observers at one remove like myself.
But one reaction emerged, which I had not anticipated. It took different forms with different men; it almost always surfaced as the final thought, the last sentence; it was expressed at high levels and low almost unconsciously, always in a moment of sincerity, by Indians and Pakistani, British and Americans; with fatalism, scepticism, or anxiety; and in the case of a few bitter die-hards, with anticipation.
The reaction was this: no one can yet see by what process the negotiation over Kashmir—any negotiation over Kashmir—can be brought to a politically viable conclusion. Nehru, after agreeing the case for a settlement, asked aloud: “But how can it be done without creating more tension than we now have?” Ayub, after warning that a Kashmir settlement might raise tensions, went through his concept of moving by stages, closing in on the Vale only at the end. Ken Galbraith’s last thought was: “Perhaps the lines will never meet, but we’ve got to try.” The Indian High Commissioner in Karachi said: “We’ll discuss the Vale all right in the Fifth Round; but we won’t settle it; and then what do we do?”
And so it went.
This prevalent, vision of a stone wall ahead arises from a complex of psychological, political, and technical negotiating problems.
First, of course, Indian minds run into a real block in surrendering any substantial part of the Vale; and Pakistani minds run into an even [Page 539] greater block in ceding once and for all any part of the Vale to India. Quite aside from political pressures; the issue is so highly charged and men’s minds have run so often over the tracks which rationalize their respective present positions that it is literally difficult and literally painful for them to visualize a change in the way things are (for Indians) or anything short of the fulfillment of their dream and crusade (for Pakistani).
In addition, back in a more rational world, both sets of politicians see trouble as they contemplate any conceivably negotiable Kashmir compromise; and tolerably objective observers concede the possibility of trouble—for example, the Pakistan High Commissioner in Delhi concedes Nehru’s problem, and the Indian High Commissioner in Karachi, Ayub’s. At the same time, men perceive that Ayub and Nehru both retain, if they are determined, very large potential influence to alter the political scene. Their problem, as I see it, is that they cannot afford to move off their present political postures until two conditions are satisfied: the terms of the whole deal are known; and each is satisfied that the other will wholeheartedly commit himself before his own people to that deal. By “the whole deal” I mean the terms of economic coexistence and at least implicit military collaboration (as well as disengagement), not merely the Kashmir deal. The dilemma, then, is this: only a radical change in political atmosphere, plus economic and military ameliorations, can justify the inevitable pain of a possible Kashmir settlement; but it is possible that the change in atmosphere cannot be brought about until Ayub and Nehru see the whole package; and our present negotiating sequence, for good and sufficient reasons—notably the Pak desire to get at the Vale before being diverted to other issues—does not permit the other, softening issues to be gripped and the vested interests in both countries connected with them, to be brought effectively into play.
The problem may well be complicated by the emergence of negotiating postures, designed to put the other fellow in the wrong and to impress Washington and world opinion rather than to move forward.
Ayub, for example, is so deeply convinced of Nehru’s political unreliability (not without recent reinforcing ammunition) that only very hard commitments by the Indians are likely to lead him to defend reconciliation before his people. Similarly, Desai asked us: “Why should we give anything to the Pakistani if their hostility to us is so deeply rooted and fixed that reconciliation is impossible?”; and after I heard Dehlavi, I was damned if I knew what I could have replied to Desai. Thus, the Indians will require very firm assurances that they will, in fact, get the advantages of a new relation to Pakistan before surrendering any part of what they hold.
It is quite clear that thoughtful men on both sides appreciate the irrationality of the present arrangements and the advantages of sensible coexistence; although the economic advantages are, I suspect, even [Page 540] greater than most political figures now understand. But the Pakistani dare not expound these nor evoke the political forces that are directly interested (e.g., East Pakistan) until something substantial in the Vale is sewed up; and the Indians dare not give up something substantial in the Vale until it is clear that Pakistan is broadly committed to a policy of conciliation and that the military benefits of that policy will be available to India.
The vicious circle will operate, I suspect, even within the narrow orbit of the Kashmir and Vale discussions. The complexities are inherently such that “clean surgery” is either likely to lead to events which will produce the higher tensions Nehru and Ayub fear; or it will require for its success a degree of intensive and sympathetic Indo-Pak cooperation which, in turn, is only possible if the two leaders had already committed themselves before their own peoples to a fundamental change in policy.
I conclude, therefore, that if the principles are accepted or if the Vale gets gripped in negotiation by other means, we are likely to run into a dangerous cul-de-sac. At the moment the notion is, as I understand it, that under such circumstances various high-level Anglo-American chaps might be rushed into the breach to hold appropriate hands and try to bring the lines closer together; or, in the last resort, to trot out an internationalized Vale. If this analysis is correct, any amount of pressure and hand holding about Kashmir will not then do the trick. Two other elements must then be introduced, perhaps in sequence, before a Kashmir settlement could become viable:
- a.
- While the Kashmir discussion proceeds on some sustained basis, the other issues must be brought into negotiation in a separate but equal forum (or forums) with an understanding that a total package will be brought together and no part of the negotiated deal is final until all elements are brought together.
- b.
- At a certain point, when the deal as a whole is clear, but before it is signed and announced, Nehru and Ayub would have to enter into a solemn commitment, verifiable by what they say and do before the sign off, to take the case for reconciliation to their people and to be prepared to deal with violent dissidents on a ruthless basis, if necessary.
The latter provision may appear farfetched; but the mutual suspicions go so deep and the interactions of the two governments’ policies are so sensitive, that until the deal is consummated—and perhaps for some time thereafter—it could spiral off into a debacle unless each government performs its part of the bargain with unexampled consistency and rigor.
I would only add this: assistance to Ayub and Nehru in finding their way through this political and psychological maze will be vastly more important than any direct bargaining pressure or exhortation we can mount in getting a solution. Or, put another way, bargaining pressure [Page 541] and exhortation at the right moment may prove useful, but only if there is a workable track that these two highly responsible politicians can perceive. Right now the central fact about Nehru and Ayub is that they do not see such a track, embracing the full complexity of the problem—and neither does anyone else on the subcontinent.