El sistema de control

12 . . . .

Richard M. Nixon, U.S. Forezgn Policy for the 1970' s: The Emergzng

Structure o f Peace, A Report to the Congress, February 9, 1972, p . 145.

13 . . .

This point is elaborated in G.S. Bhargava's Indian Security vn the 1960s (Adelphi Papers No.125). He argues that if East Bengali commandos remained in India they could pose a security threat to her. To him, the emergence of Bangladesh was not itself a security gain for India except in the marginal sense that sanctuaries for Mizos and other rebel tribes in the North-East would no longer be available (p.11).

14

62

It was clear, therefore, that the refugees had to go back; and they could only go back to an independent Bangl a d e s h achieved under Indian aegis.

Fifthly, there was growing pressure to a c t from the general Indian community w h i c h a p o p u l a r - b a s e d G o vernment could hardly afford to ignore. A l m o s t w i t h o u t e x c e ption all other political parties w a n t e d Mrs Gandhi to extend

moral and material support to the Liberation Front and accord 15

Bangladesh recognition. The Central Executive Committee of the Communist Party of India r e g retted Ne w Delhi's future

to 'discharge the responsibility in due measure to support the freedom struggle in B a n g l a d e s h 1."^ Demand for recognition came from such varied quarters as Indrajit Gupta, the pro- Soviet Communist l e a d e r ,^-7 A.B. V ajpayee of the H i n d u

Nationalist Jana Sangh P a r t y , P . C . Chunder, P r e s i d e n t of 19

the West Bengal Parlia m e n t a r y Congress Committee, and 20

Dinesh Singh, former External Affairs Minister. In fact, w i t h i n Mrs Gandhi's own cabinet a 'hawkish' strain emerged. A study of public statements shows that while Foreign M inister

^ One opposing voice was that of M.R. Masani, the Swatantra Party leader who commended Mrs Gandhi's 'policy of caution' and said that India

should not be the first country to recognise Bangladesh, for 'besides the authority of the West Pakistan Government, what other authority is there in Bangladesh to recognise?' Times o f India, 19 May 1971,

16ibid., 7 July 1971.

17

Peter Hazelhurst, 'Mrs Gandhi refuses Bangladesh Recognition',

The Times (London), 8 May 1971.

18. ibid.

19 .

Tzmes o f Indva, 16 May 1971.

Jagjivan Ram pressed for early action.

Sixthly, there was the tremendous psycho l o g i c a l sat i s ­ faction in being able to hit that implacable enemy, Pakistan, where it hurt most, e s pecially w h e n from the debris of this enemy's defeat, a friendly neighbour w o u l d emerge. In New Delhi's calculation if the Move m e n t came to fruition it wou l d negate the relig i o n - b a s e d ideology of Paki s t a n and

2 2

b o l ster the secular Indian ethos.

Seventhly, a research report from the p restigious Indian Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses, p r epared by its Director, K. Subrahmanyam, urged that India w o u l d be w e l l - a d v i s e d to go to war. The Report, entitled, 'Bangladesh and India's National S e curity - the Options for India',

suggested that India carve out a segment of E a s t Bengal,

21

The Swaran Singh line was clearly expressed in his forthcoming Rajya Sabha (Upper House) statement: 'If at any stage we feel that recognition is necessary, we will not hesitate to do so ... There are certain norms which have to be carefully weighed such as the extent of territory

controlled by the quantum of support, the extent of writ, and the repercussion of recognising a country which was till now a par t of P a k i s t a n ' ; Times o f India, 26 May 1971. As late as October, Singh argued at the All-India Congress Committee that the political solution of the Bangladesh issue which India h ad bee n advocating could take the form of a settlement within the framework of Pakistan, or an independent Bangladesh or a greater autonomy for the region. Times o f India, 9 October 1971. This was long after exiled Awami League leaders h a d publicly

totally rejected as unacceptable anything less than independence.

Jagjivan Ram, on the other hand, held that it was true India was in favour of a political solution, but what this solution should be had already been spelt out by the elected representatives of Bangladesh, who had opted unequivocally for independence and sovereignty, Times o f India, 10 October 1971. Mrs Gandhi, who was earlier sympathetic to the Swaran Singh line and was gradually drawn towards Ram's over time, found it necessary to retract Singh's AICC statement saying that what Singh meant was if the Awami League leaders agreed to remain within the framework of Pakistan, the Indian Government would have no objection, Times o f India, 14 October 1971.

22

See Ajit Bhattacharya, 'Fumbling for a Policy: India and Bangladesh',

vest it with the attributes of de f a c t o and de j u r e

independence, relocate the refugees there, and attempt to wi n for it international recognition. The newly e s t a b l i s h e d state of Bangladesh could be thus made a r e c o g n i s e d party to the dispute without who s e approval no cease-fire could be agreed upon and w h i c h w o u l d not approve such cease-fire

till all the objectives were attained. The Report argued that the chances of Chinese int e r v e n t i o n were minimal. E v e n if China doubled her force strength of 100,000 that she retained in Tibet, the m o u n t a i n passes wou l d pose acute d e ployment problems, es p e c i a l l y against the superior well-

armed Indian presence in the region. If Chinese incursions did take place in spite of these odds, they could hardly

stay for long as Winter was forthcoming w h e n snowed-in passes w o uld render w i t h d r a w a l impossible. Cons i d e r i n g the limited Chinese stake in this issue, the r e port concluded that it would not be mi l i t a r i l y meanin g f u l for them to

intervene. With o u t Chinese intervention, the Indian mili t a r y

n 2 3

p osition vis-a-vis P a k i s t a n was vastly superior.

Finally, w h a t may have clinched the decision in favour of Indian mili t a r y action was the e v a p oration of the hope that the international c o m m unity w o u l d bri n g to b e a r pressure on Yahya for an acceptable settlement. In May Mrs Gandhi said she w anted the In t e r n a t i o n a l Community to realise that w h a t had beg u n as Pakistan's internal p r o b l e m was gradually b e coming an internal p r o b l e m for I ndia.^4 she w o n d e r e d w h y

23

Peter Hazelhurst, 'Shadow of War on the Indian Subco n t i n e n t ', The

Times (London), 13 July 1971.

24 . „

help was not forthcoming from the richer nations. At the Lok Sabha she regretted that the W e s tern countries, who had a llegedly fought the Second W o r l d War 'to save Democracy', were not responding now w h e n democracy was 'so flagrantly

25

and so brutally being d e s t r o y e d ' . She was very critical of U.N. Secretary General U Thant's offer in July for the placing of observers on both sides of the border. She argued that in the first place it tended to equate India and Pakistan, implying part Indian r e s p o n s i b i l i t y for the crisis and

secondly, it would support the Pakistani projec t i o n that 26 the issue was a bil a t e r a l one b e t w e e n the two countries. Mrs Gandhi was now convinced neither the wor l d community nor the U.N. could be counted on, and India n e eded to act by herself.

The decision could not be acted upon at once. The Indian Armed Forces needed three to four months to make n e c essary preparations. More o v e r the appropriate time to act w o u l d be w inter w h e n the Monsoons wou l d not bog down the invading forces and the N o rthern passes w o u l d remain snowed-in reducing the probability of Chinese intervention. Mrs Gandhi had now some time to concentrate on politics, whose e x t e nsion the forthcoming war was likely to be. She now had two major objectives: one was seeking a s u perpower deterrence to

p otential Chinese or American (or a combination of both)

25

Indira Gandhi, op.cit., p . 20.

26

Peter Hazelhurst, 'Indian Anger at the U.N. Observer Plan for Both Sides of the B o r d e r ' , The Times (London), 27 July 1971.

66

resistance to Indian plans and the second was the b uilding up of favourable international p ublic opinion to dilute as m u c h as possible adverse reaction to future Indian intervention.

As to the first, the S i n o - A m e r i c a n rappro c h e m e n t boded ill for India. Concern was evident in Swaran Singh's

statement that India could not 'view it w ith equan a m i t y if it means the domination of the two superpowers over the region

27

or a tacit agreement b e t w e e n them to this e f f e c t ' . The Soviet Union was the only possible counter to any potential Sino-American entente. As ye t the USSR had an ambivalent

attitude towards the South Asian Crisis. Mrs Gandhi calculated that the b est wa y to w i n M oscow over was to sign the Treaty of Friendship and C o o p e r a t i o n which had been under discussion for' two years now. She k new her offer to do so w o u l d be too tempting for Moscow to resist.

The Treaty was thus signed in August. Indo-Soviet

consultations were held in terms of the Treaty thus signalling to Peking and W a s h i n g t o n that both signatories took the

Treaty seriously. The fact that in private the Soviets

2 8

advocated 'restraint' did not m atter so long as the wor l d read into the pact a firm commi t m e n t to India's security by the Soviet Union. Though New Delhi had very n early ruled out by this time the p o s s i b i l i t y of serious Chinese military

27The Times (London), 21 July 1971.

intervention, especially in w inter w h e n the Indian initiatives were scheduled, the Indo- S o v i e t P act was m e a n t to b e a

r e a s s u r a n c e .

The second objective of creating a favourable international public opinion was b e i n g s i m u l t aneously pursued. The means

employed were the holding of seminars and conferences, and visits abroad by Indian leaders. The Gandhi Peace Foundation o r g a nised a three-day i n t e rnational seminar in New Delhi in September, attended by 60 unofficial delegates from 26

countries. Memories of the Spanish Civil War were rekindled by such suggestions as the formation of an International Brigade and the staging of an international March to Islamabad.

As an additional p ublic relations project, Mrs Gandhi undertook in Oct o b e r - N o v e m b e r a three-week tour of Belgium, Australia, the U.K., the U.S.A., France and the Federal Republic of Germany. In her own words, she undertook this journey 'to leave nothing u n e x p l o r e d which mig h t lead to an easing of the b urden imposed upon us and to discourage those w h o are bent upon excuses to threaten our security'

The visits were only p a r tially successful: firstly,

because of her recent rej e c t i o n of the U.N. offer and secondly because it was now clear that the solution acceptable to

her implied the d i s m e m b e r m e n t of a recognised international State Actor, the leaders of the w o r l d seemed to shy away

29 .

Aszan. Recorder (October 8-14, 1971), p p . 10396-7.

30

68

from the Indian point of view. Her dis s a t i s f a c t t i o n was evident, for on her re t u r n she said:

I must make it clear that we cannot depend on the i nternational community, or even the countries whi c h I visited to solve our

problems for us. We appreciate their sympathy and moral and p o l i tical support, but the

brunt of the bu r d e n has to be borne by us and by the p e o p l e o f B a n g l a d e s h

There was some success, however. For instance though her personal relations w i t h Nixon m arked no i m p r o v e m e n t , ^ she was probably able to take a reading of the attitudinal division in the A m e r i c a n community on the South A s i a n crisis. The Indian attempt was to d eepen this division. The idea was to neutralise the strength of the U.S. A d m i n i s t r a t i o n to m i litarily commit itself on the Pakistani side w h e n the actual conflict occurred.

Sensing his deep danger Yahya mel l o w e d and on 19 November in his greetings to Mrs Gandhi on the M u s l i m festival of

3 3

Eid, appealed for the easing of tensions. But New Delhi

34