Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
emphasize those aspects of Islamic teachings that portray a world divided
between believers and unbelievers, and set forth the obligation of the former to
convert the latter.
While Pakistani ideologues see the spread of Islam to South Asia as having
purged and reformed the unbelievers, their Indian counterparts read this history
as reinforcing the notion of a comprehensive civilizational and cultural threat to
India. When the Muslims arrived, India was temporarily weaker, but morally
greater. India's riches and treasures attracted outside predators who, despite their
momentary technical or military superiority, lacked the deeper moral qualities of
an old and established civilization. The first predators were the Islamic invaders;
these in turn betrayed India and failed to protect it from the subsequent wave of
Western conquerors. In the history of Islam and Christianity in India, Hindus
were the odd men out.
Indians also see Pakistan as an important example of neo-imperialism. The
Indian view is that that when neighbors (that is, Pakistan) are allied to powerful
intruders (such as Britain, the United States, or China), their domestic politics
and
their foreign policies are distorted.
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The US-Pakistan alliance is widely
believed to have militarized Pakistani politics and foreign policy through the
connection between the Pakistan army and the United States, making it
impossible for Delhi to come to an accommodation with Islamabad over
Kashmir.
Most Indians also believe that Pakistan compounded the error by allowing its
territory to be used for Cold War alliance objectives, introducing a superpower
into the region. The American tie is also seen as encouraging Pakistan to
challenge the rightfully dominant regional power by providing the advanced
weapons that enabled Pakistan to attack India in 1965. The preferred Indian
solution to such a distortion of the natural regional power structure is the
international recognition of benign, accommodating, liberal regional dominant
powers—not the meddling in one region by either a global hegemon or adjacent
regional powers.
Pakistan is seen as an essential element in a shifting alliance between the
West, Islam, China, and other hostile states directed against New Delhi. In recent
years the emphasis has expanded to include the sea of extremist Islamic forces
led by Pakistan, with China as a silent partner. Samuel P. Huntington's thesis of
a grand alliance between Islamic and 'Confucian' civilization was greeted
warmly by that portion of the Indian strategic community that had long since
made the connection. The ring of states around India provides a ready-made
image of encirclement, of threat from all quarters. India has threats from the
north, the east, the west, and over the horizon, as naval theoreticians eagerly
point out the threat from the sea, from whence both the Arabs and the Europeans
came, and—30 years ago—the aircraft carrier
USS Enterprise
sent by President
Nixon to intimidate New Delhi.
