Nawaz Sharif set media wires buzzing when he proclaimed soon after the results of Pakistan’s elections were announced last month that he aims to (a) make peace with the terrorist outfits in Pakistan and (b) make peace with India. The two statements are inherently contradictory for India and immensely illogical from the Indian perspective.

…it is impossible for India to be friends with a nation that covertly supports those who would attack India’s Parliament, upset the peace in Indian states, launch attacks such as 26/11, and so on, uninterruptedly for 66 years.

While Sharif may well make peace with the terrorists, the trouble is that the terrorists are unlikely to make peace with India. Thus, India would supposedly be at peace with a neighbor whose sentiments are absolutely anti-Indian, and which, in turn, has a filial relationship with the terrorist outfits that haunt India.

There was truth to the statement when George Bush informed the whole world in 2001 that they were either with the USA in their fight against terrorists or against the USA. It is difficult to be friendly with a person or nation that is friendly with your arch enemy. Check this in your daily relationships in life. How easy do you feel being close to a person who is closely chummy with your mortal enemy?

Similarly, it is impossible for India to be friends with a nation that covertly supports those who would attack India’s Parliament, upset the peace in Indian states, launch attacks such as 26/11, and so on, uninterruptedly for 66 years.

The support to multiple jihadi outfits was palpable from the last time that Nawaz Sharif was prime minister, 1997-99. While from the front he engaged in bus diplomacy with Atal Vajpayee, he aided and abetted the various terrorist outfits on the side. He gave them funds, granted land to them for building their establishments, and in every other way greased the wheels for them in government paperwork. It is also likely that he funneled small arms to them via the ISI that were secretly procured for them from the Peshawar arms bazaar. How can all this bode well for India? It is also difficult to believe that Sharif is a changed person who has suddenly found religion. However, there are many in the Indian establishment who would believe this and parley in negotiations for the sake of advancing their diplomatic careers, notwithstanding that India could suffer in the process.

There is inherent double-speak in any Pakistani overture to India. Pakistan was born out of hatred for India, and till today harbors intense hatred. How can anyone expect India not to take cognizance of this, or to trust Pakistan when it spews hatred for Indians on a daily basis?

Every day, the Pakistani army justifies its existence to the Pakistani public because of an Indian military threat at their border. They conveniently forget that they, too, threaten India. However, this actually feeds very well into the mindset of the Pakistani military which feels morally guilty about its past actions against India, and so is rightfully already paranoid about a possible Indian invasion in revenge. They probably don’t realize they are likely to get what they fear most. In essence, the Pakistan military has maneuvered successfully to gain a place in the Pakistani psyche, with fear and hatred of India being the sole rallying point. At every turn, they make their Pakistani people feel more and more victimized at the hand of secular India. The Pakistani military doesn’t want to let that wound heal among their Pakistani public, because if they do, it will be their end, for they fear loss of respect on that count. In other words, they want India to sound and act belligerent. But, this should not silence India into doing what is morally just and right – defending itself and its interests and honor – and arming itself against what is a truthful and corporeal, de facto threat to India.

Every day, the Pakistani army justifies its existence to the Pakistani public because of an Indian military threat at their border. They conveniently forget that they, too, threaten India.

Though it is fully true that there is a possible Indian threat to Pakistan, the Pakistani military just loves it. It is not that India need mind that because it is usually better to catch the bull by the horns than let it trample you. Pakistan needs to know that it has angered India much too much, and very importantly, India need make no bones or excuses about that, else India’s own interests will stand compromised. India must stand tall and firm.

And while Nawaz Sharif talked — and talks — of peace, he did and still continues to want to enhance Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. How can that be construed as a sign of friendship when the main target of that arsenal is India, with only 10% or so of it being designed for Saudi Arabia for use against Shia Iran, and another approximate 10% that goes to help North Korea. It is widely believed that the sixth nuclear explosion at Chagai in 1998 was a North Korean bomb. Again, the schism in Sharif’s intentions is loud and clear.

Thus, India would be naive to trust any leader of Pakistan. But, one thing India can surely trust in is in the naivety of the Indian government for more times than not. Any Indian government or bureaucrat or group of people that wants India to pull back from Siachen, for instance, are simply out of their real mind!

Many a Pakistani leader from Jinnah onwards has stoked the feathers of the Islamists, the extremists, the terrorists, the fundamentalists, and the Taliban. Jinnah used irregular militia in 1947-48 to cover their invasion of Kashmir; Ayub Khan used “regular irregulars”[1] to plan Operation Gibraltar that infiltrated into Kashmir in 1965 alongside Pakistani forces; Yahya Khan followed in the policies of his predecessor, and infiltrated the regular irregulars into Kashmir in 1971, though not to much avail because of the drubbing they had received at the hands of India in 1965; Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto did everything he could to raise the terrorists in order to one day serve their purpose against India, giving them money and moral support. Z Bhutto further vowed to “eat grass” if he had to build a nuclear weapon to balance India’s Pokhran explosion in 1974. Such was his animosity towards India after signing a peace agreement with India in 1972.

Pakistan launched the limited war in Kargil and then lied through its teeth to claim that the forces occupying the mountain tops were not its own military but irregular militia acting as freedom fighters. By now, the world knows that Pakistan is duplicitous, unbelievable, and unreliable.

Zia ul-Haq built hundreds of madrasas with Saudi money to teach fundamentalism to children, brought in fundamental Islamists into the army, and was the first President to Islamicize the military; it was during Zia ul-Haq’s watch that the Kashmir problem exploded in late 1987, and he sent in regular irregulars into Kashmir.

This policy was followed by Benazir Bhutto during her first tenure in 1988-90, and by Nawaz Sharif during his first tenure from 1990-93, when the Kashmir problem magnified, resulting in India sending up to 500,000 soldiers and para-military into Kashmir to protect and defend the region. Benazir Bhutto didn’t do a thing to stop the fundamentalists and terrorists, but instead bartered nuclear technology with North Korea in exchange for missile technology[2], thereby proliferating nuclear weapons and destabilizing the Korean peninsula; then Nawaz Sharif pampered the Taliban in the run up to the Afghan civil war that saw the Taliban gain power in Kabul in 1996; Musharraf further expanded on the madrasas, planned the Kargil invasion (before overthrowing Nawaz Sharif), spoke double-speak with India at every turn, and even walked stylishly across the vast and stretched-out meeting hall to initiate and shake hands with a stunned Vajpayee at the SAARC meeting in Kathmandu, 2002.

But at the same meeting, Musharraf gave a license to Pak-originated terrorists in Kashmir by referring to them as freedom-fighters. Musharraf further incited the regular irregulars over the past decade to continue with their creation of disturbance in Kashmir.

The chains of Pakistani provocations are a long list of events. Who can forget that Pakistan launched aggression in 1947-48 over Kashmir, even though the Hindu Maharaja of Kashmir used Sikh troops to quell a rebellion of former Moslem soldiers in Poonch who had been honorably discharged after World War II, which caused the militia rebels from Pakistan to illegitimately intervene in the internal affairs of a foreign power at the encouragement of the Government of Pakistan? Who can forget that Pakistan launched strong and unprovoked military action in 1965, first in the Rann of Kutch, and then in Kashmir, that was only stalled when India crossed the Line of Control on all fronts in September that year?

And who can forget that Pakistani actions in Bangladesh resulted in millions of East Pakistani refugees to pour into India, or that it was Pakistan that launched the first airstrike on December 3, 1971 on airfields in Western India? In the same vein, Pakistan launched the limited war in Kargil and then lied through its teeth to claim that the forces occupying the mountain tops were not its own military but irregular militia acting as freedom fighters. By now, the world knows that Pakistan is duplicitous, unbelievable, and unreliable. Pakistan is not behaving responsibly, and especially not with A Q Khan having proliferated nuclear technology to more than 15 Islamic countries – and only Islamic countries — which calls into question the Islamic agenda in the world.

After the ceasefire in Kashmir at 2359 hours on the night of 1-2 January 1949, Pakistan violated that ceasefire in 1965. Yet, the Tashkent declaration of 10 January 1966 vowed to restore peaceful relations between the two countries and observe the ceasefire conditions of January 1949, but yet Yahya Khan pushed that declaration aside by strafing Indian airfields on Dec 3, 1971. Once again the Shimla Agreement of 2 July 1972 explicitly declared in its Article (vi) of the first step of bullets

“[T]hat in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, they will refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of each other.”

…now, Nawaz Sharif hopes to perpetuate the cloak-in-dagger game and diplomacy, and continue to make a sucker of India once again. His feigns of credibility and genuineness are not believable.

And, more specifically, Article (ii) of the third step of bullets stated that

“[I]n Jammu and Kashmir, the line of control resulting from the ceasefire of December 17, 1971, shall be respected by both sides without prejudice to the recognized position of either side. Neither side shall seek to alter it unilaterally, irrespective of mutual differences and legal interpretations. Both sides further undertake to refrain from the threat or the use of force in violation of this line.”

And yet, Pervez Musharraf sought to alter the line of control in J&K in 1999 in a bitter war. That war remained limited only due to US influence on weak Indian leaders already buckling under sanctions. By now, a strong and resolute Indian leader would have eaten Pakistan four times over.

India is tired of being suckered time and time again, hearing and bearing numerous insults repeatedly. Notwithstanding the sentiments of India’s Muslims, who are India’s own, India is tired of Pakistan, and this is reflected in the sentiments of the Indian public, the military officers of India, and the commentaries on the subject in think tanks. Pakistan can be trusted no more. This distrust is of Pakistan’s own making, evidenced by them violating agreements repeatedly, and by sponsoring aggression against India without let, decade after decade.

And now, Nawaz Sharif hopes to perpetuate the cloak-in-dagger game and diplomacy, and continue to make a sucker of India once again. His feigns of credibility and genuineness are not believable.

But in India, there is no shortage of brilliant fools, especially at top leadership levels, many of who have never held a gun, though no matter how educated, such that they are decidedly taken for a ride very predictably by smooth-talking enemies.

However, making peace with India is not all hunky-dory for Nawaz Sharif. In a recent meeting, Gen Kayani pulled up Nawaz Sharif and asked him to go slow on talking of peace. This serves India quite well, actually, which will actually have the benefit of saving immense time in media hype and wasted energy in negotiations that once again will go nowhere. Not many Pakistanis want peace, anyway, being motivated by visions of a renewed Mughal durbar in India. And, Kayani wants to perpetuate the legitimacy of the army in Pakistan’s affairs by appearing to sound tough on India. In fact, Nawaz Sharif will find it difficult to do anything without the blessings of Kayani. And the once bitten-twice shy Sharif will be cautious in dealing with Kayani, because it further remains to be seen whether Kayani will retire peacefully on 27 November 2013, whether he will want another extension, or whether he will seize power from Sharif. In Pakistan, anything is possible; instability has shown itself to be visible in the genes of Pakistan. What’s further, even the West doesn’t seem to fully comprehend that nature of instability, given their prevailing policies with relation to Pakistan, and engrossed in its own great game for world domination.

…it is amazing how short a memory the Indian leaders have, in that they jump in hope each time Pakistan offers an olive branch.

It is wrong to think that if Sharif’s parents hailed from Amritsar that he will be kind to India. Musharraf was born in Daryaganj in Delhi, and look how he dealt with India and Kargil. The cricket diplomacy he fostered in 2005 was an eyewash, coming as it was on the heels of the LeT attack on India’s Parliament in 2001 that Musharraf secretly endorsed. The cricket diplomacy did not stop the 2008 Mumbai attack of 26/11, which was further proof that Pakistan will not cease in its anti-India activities though it will talk sweet to India as again evidenced in the second round of cricket diplomacy between Yusuf Gilani and Manmohan Singh in 2011.

It is further astounding of the enormous instances in history where Islamic armies have sworn on the Quran to not attack or take any particular action, and yet violated their word. In plain historical light is the time during the siege of Anandpur Sahib in December 1705 when the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb himself swore on the Quran not to attack Guru Gobind Singh if he left Anandpur Sahib, and give him safe passage, as well, only to pursue the Guru with his armies thereafter[3].

However, it is amazing how short a memory the Indian leaders have, in that they jump in hope each time Pakistan offers an olive branch. The actions of leaders must be informed by the vast decades and centuries of behavior, but that is definitely not so in India. In contrast, the Pakistani leadership keeps a long view of the day their Islamic armies will stomp over India.

In addition, the Pakistani populace finds it difficult to be friends with Indians. An apparently respectable Pakistani I met recently, who practices as a medical doctor, was most vehement and strongly emotional in his belief that Pakistani Muslims and Indian Hindus cannot live together. His body was observed to shake with felt anger when he spoke those words, notwithstanding that he was an educated person of the Pakistani polity. This is a reaction that has been affirmed repeatedly in other personal encounters. If such is the orientation and frame of mind of its educated elite, what can we expect from the madrasas and unemployed Pakistani?[4]

Pakistan has harassed India for much too long, affected its economic rise, and India now stands provoked. There is no peace with Pakistan unless Pakistan is fully finished.

The stars, events, and tea leaves are telling the same thing over and over again: the destiny of Pakistan vis-à-vis India will be decided on the battle field, once and for all, sooner or later. No conversing or negotiating or peace overtures will ever be successful between India and Pakistan, even if mediated by the USA. Reconciliation is much too difficult, but likely that it is genetically incompatible. India and Pakistan are both preparing for a war – one to vent their hatred against Indians – and the other to restore its honor for a thousand years of oppression. The real balance of power in the region, and complete stability, will only materialize once the battlefield outcome is clear.

If India does not realize it, let India also wake up: the destiny of India vis-à-vis Pakistan will necessarily be decided on the spatial battle field, once and for all, across the entire border, in a full-scale war. The sooner the Indian establishment realizes this, the better it is for India. Thus, the time for India to sleep is also long gone. But while it might be good for Pakistan if it let India sleep, Pakistan itself keeps ringing the alarm for India to wake up.

India may not want war, but war will be thrust on India. To take advantage of the next big military event, India must therefore be the first to attack Pakistan this time with a very severe and sudden blow, notwithstanding its current soft policies. There is now a moral justness in this. And, in fact, there is moral depravity in not fighting to crush evil when you should. Lord Krishna’s sermon to Arjun was all about taking up arms when the call to duty arrives to fight evil. India will be fighting not for conquest or pleasure, but for peace, honor, and survival. Pakistan has harassed India for much too long, affected its economic rise, and India now stands provoked. There is no peace with Pakistan unless Pakistan is fully finished. Sharif’s “peace” talk is just that – plain talk – and talk is cheap. History shows that Pakistan’s assurances and words cannot be taken seriously, and thus not be given any admission. The real peace on the sub-continent will come only when Pakistan’s teeth are pulled and its tentacles to terrorist outfits are cut. Regrettably, there is no peace till so long as Pakistan is a sovereign nation, and let no one in any country – including USA — be in any doubt about that.