pakistani342
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Great article on Swarajya Mag here, excerpts below:
...
The Indian government squandered Afghanistan’s goodwill through years of vacillating and incoherent policy towards the country. This failure will have repercussions in the entire region.
There used to be a time, not long ago, when Afghanistan could not get enough of India. Just in 2013, in addition to the usual delegations on business, health, security, and other sectors, then Afghan president Hamid Karzai paid three visits to India. Then suddenly, a coolness developed in India-Afghanistan relations when Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai took over as President after the Afghan elections of April 2014. Just like that, the hot romance cooled down to casual acquaintance.
....
... Washington appealed to Delhi several times during the tenure of India-friendly president George W. Bush—even for Indian boots on the ground since 2006, but Raisina Hill did not budge. Perhaps some felt that the United States owed India for creating a grand mess in the region in the 1980s in the first place.
...
This is not enough for Kabul, which has been blunt about what they expect from India: second-hand weapons such as MiG-21 fighter jets, T-72 tanks, Bofors howitzers, AN-32 transport aircraft, MI-17 helicopters, trucks, bridge-laying equipment, radios, radars, other equipment critical to command and control, and significantly more military trainers. India’s excuses so far have been baffling, from claiming that India does not have surplus weapons and Pakistani refusal to grant overflight permission to requiring Russian permission to manufacture weapons for export under license. Admittedly with the benefit of hindsight, it is nonetheless unclear why Delhi could not anticipate Kabul’s requests and work towards resolving these logjams once it received the first requests from Washington and Kabul in 2006.
...
India itself invited China, Iran and Japan to find ways of providing for Afghanistan’s security. As most realists would point out, this was a grave mistake by the Indian government—one never offers other governments an opportunity to enter one’s own backyard, especially when one of them harbours hostile intentions and has been known to support a rival neighbour.
...
... As one analyst argued, India already deploys almost 10,000 troops abroad under the UN flag; it really would not have been that difficult or alien an experience for India to put boots on the ground in Afghanistan if it so decided.
...
Ghani is by no means anti-India. However, having watched the South Asian giant vacillate for years, he is following the prudent path by dealing with those ready to do so. Delhi fears that Ghani might overcompensate for his predecessor’s brusqueness with Pakistan and cooperate with them to reduce India’s footprint in Afghanistan in exchange for reducing support to the Taliban.
The pity of it all is that Delhi remained aloof while it had Afghanistan trying to woo it and is now realising its folly, albeit under a different government, when Kabul has turned away to other partners. In many ways, Afghanistan is a litmus test for Delhi’s ascendance as a regional power. One of the many lessons a regional power must understand is that soft power, while useful, is meaningless without hard power.
For a decade, Delhi proudly recalled that the most popular TV serial in Afghanistan was an Indian soap opera, Kyun Ki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi, as proof of the superiority of its soft power over US military force. Yet Kabul burned, and as they used to say back home, dum Romae consulitur, Saguntum expugnatur—while Rome deliberated, Saguntum was captured.
...
The Indian government squandered Afghanistan’s goodwill through years of vacillating and incoherent policy towards the country. This failure will have repercussions in the entire region.
There used to be a time, not long ago, when Afghanistan could not get enough of India. Just in 2013, in addition to the usual delegations on business, health, security, and other sectors, then Afghan president Hamid Karzai paid three visits to India. Then suddenly, a coolness developed in India-Afghanistan relations when Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai took over as President after the Afghan elections of April 2014. Just like that, the hot romance cooled down to casual acquaintance.
....
... Washington appealed to Delhi several times during the tenure of India-friendly president George W. Bush—even for Indian boots on the ground since 2006, but Raisina Hill did not budge. Perhaps some felt that the United States owed India for creating a grand mess in the region in the 1980s in the first place.
...
This is not enough for Kabul, which has been blunt about what they expect from India: second-hand weapons such as MiG-21 fighter jets, T-72 tanks, Bofors howitzers, AN-32 transport aircraft, MI-17 helicopters, trucks, bridge-laying equipment, radios, radars, other equipment critical to command and control, and significantly more military trainers. India’s excuses so far have been baffling, from claiming that India does not have surplus weapons and Pakistani refusal to grant overflight permission to requiring Russian permission to manufacture weapons for export under license. Admittedly with the benefit of hindsight, it is nonetheless unclear why Delhi could not anticipate Kabul’s requests and work towards resolving these logjams once it received the first requests from Washington and Kabul in 2006.
...
India itself invited China, Iran and Japan to find ways of providing for Afghanistan’s security. As most realists would point out, this was a grave mistake by the Indian government—one never offers other governments an opportunity to enter one’s own backyard, especially when one of them harbours hostile intentions and has been known to support a rival neighbour.
...
... As one analyst argued, India already deploys almost 10,000 troops abroad under the UN flag; it really would not have been that difficult or alien an experience for India to put boots on the ground in Afghanistan if it so decided.
...
Ghani is by no means anti-India. However, having watched the South Asian giant vacillate for years, he is following the prudent path by dealing with those ready to do so. Delhi fears that Ghani might overcompensate for his predecessor’s brusqueness with Pakistan and cooperate with them to reduce India’s footprint in Afghanistan in exchange for reducing support to the Taliban.
The pity of it all is that Delhi remained aloof while it had Afghanistan trying to woo it and is now realising its folly, albeit under a different government, when Kabul has turned away to other partners. In many ways, Afghanistan is a litmus test for Delhi’s ascendance as a regional power. One of the many lessons a regional power must understand is that soft power, while useful, is meaningless without hard power.
For a decade, Delhi proudly recalled that the most popular TV serial in Afghanistan was an Indian soap opera, Kyun Ki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi, as proof of the superiority of its soft power over US military force. Yet Kabul burned, and as they used to say back home, dum Romae consulitur, Saguntum expugnatur—while Rome deliberated, Saguntum was captured.
