India-Pakistan Talks - 2010

[DavyJones]

@xeric - Taliban was holding most parts of Swat, South Waziristan before the Pak army ops including major towns and villages. This has never happened in Kashmir thanks to our "huge troop level". I'm not saying that the Pak army did badly - but they need to hold the ground they have won - which is the toughest thing to do. Wait for a year atleast before making such bold statements.
Even today Taliban is active in South and North Waziristan or have fled elsewhere. Are you confident that you have killed, captured all the Taliban fighters ? Lemme guess you have won the War against taliban just like the Americans won the Afghan War in 2001!
BTW - have you seen the LoC or how many troops each side has deployed there ? ask Pak army people how people are sent across the LoC and IB to India - off the record offcourse !

 

[weaponx]

I want to ask all pakistani members..when u say solution to Kashmir..

what according to u is solution which will be acceptable to all the three parties(India,pakistan and kashmiri seperatists)....

One think i can tell for sure that from indian perspective ..1) total dismantling of terrorist infrastructure....

2)short of another partition on basis of religion....anything will be acceptable...

If pakistan accepts that much..then we can proceed for talks..but if not..then i think its a waste of time and taxpayers money...

 

[Xeric]

Well there you go. You have ended the discussion by comparing our tribal areas with Occupied Kashmir...

 

[DavyJones]

Quoted from TechLahore
There are 5-10K Taliban. 30,000 troops are dealing with them. If you add FC it is about 100K troops.

There have been as high as 600-650K troops deployed in Kashmir. Are they all there to prevent infiltration? If you honestly analyze the situation, you will hopefully see that this is the highest per-capita level of military deployment anywhere in the world and is a "hold and secure" force.

I guess xeric I was the one who started the comparison

 

[TechLahore]

@TechLahore - I will gladly keep my suggestions to myself if you stop exhibiting that you have little knowledge of ground situation in Kashmir or Afghanistan.

Well, we'll just have to wait a year or two and see who has "little knowledge of the ground situation", then, won't we. In the meanwhile, I will call it like it is.

Just a few qus :
1. Is there zero infiltration across the Pak Afghan border ? In fact most attacks on NATO forces originate from Pak and the attackers sneak back into Pak after the attacks.. how many instances should I quote for you to be convinced that your forces are not adequate along the Afghan border. Off course since the attacks are on NATO and not yourselves you don;t really care about that.

Infiltration is in the opposite direction most of the time - that's how the Uzbeks etc. landed up in Pakistan. Also, while hardly any Pakistanis are living in Afghanistan, unfortunately, 3 million + Afghans *are* living in Pakistan. They have ties across the border and keep jumping back and forth. We've offered to mine, fence and seal the border but the northern alliance thugs in the Afghan government had a problem with that. Probably something to do with their drug smuggling being impacted...

Your assertion that "we don't care about" infiltration is false. If this were true, the President of Pakistan, the COAS and many Lt. Gen's of the PA would not have been on record as having suggested the complete closure of the Pak-Afghan border.

2. The unfortunate shooting of the Kashmiri boy. You have bombings in Dir, Karachi, Balochistan. Shootings in Swat, Peshawar - need i say more ?

You're grasping at straws now... the Kashmiri boy has exactly nothing to do with violence anywhere else in the world. We were talking about Kashmir but if you can't defend your position without invoking random acts of violence elsewhere on the planet, then that simply exposes the weakness of your position.

How many caught Taliban men were executed in Swat ?

Thousands of Taliban have been killed in battle, but the way you've phrased the question, it appears you are a supporter of extra judicial killings... While you are free to advocate such measures, I personally don't condone barbarity. The foreign funded insurgents that get killed in battle are fair game, but once someone is captured or surrenders they deserve a trial.

 

[Xeric]

Quoted from TechLahore
There are 5-10K Taliban. 30,000 troops are dealing with them. If you add FC it is about 100K troops.

There have been as high as 600-650K troops deployed in Kashmir. Are they all there to prevent infiltration? If you honestly analyze the situation, you will hopefully see that this is the highest per-capita level of military deployment anywhere in the world and is a "hold and secure" force.

I guess xeric I was the one who started the comparison

You are again fooling around, dont you?

Just because both zones have been militarized (though they dont even match up) and you have started finding parallels between them.

Let me clear this up for once and all; Balochistan and our Tribal areas are integral parts of Pakistan. They are not disputed, nor does the world recognize them as such. We had a low level insurgency in Balochistan (which has been kicked back to the womb now) that too not because they were occupied or invaded but because they had issues with the center (most of them being genuine). Balochistan is not alienated from Pakistan by an IB or LoC but an inter-provincial boundary. It is one of our provinces and just because some foreign funded sardar says that he needs independence doesnt quilify it as a disputed or an occupied state. If that be the case, davy, you seriously need to worry about your 220 districts that have been ruled by naxalites. Also you should take into account those uncountable movements (which indeed require atleast two pages to jot down even if acronymized) and then we dont have much left of incredible india.

As far our tribal areas are concerned, well they again are very much our integral part with the exception that they were ruled by the center. This again was as per the wishes of people (which though was not quite popular there). The problem there is of entirely different nature as they not have been asking for independence nor they have been asking for liberation from the country. A few mullahs got over-efficient and (mis) took the leniency of the center as a weakness and thought that they can run a parallel system there. This was shunted out and now if you happen to visit swat the same people who were accusing the center are now full of praise for it.

The use of force in these areas was supposed to be short lived and was planned to be completed in a shock action, which it did. Unlike in Kashmir where the military presence (at the ratio of 1 civilian: 5 soldiers) is fighting for its survival for the past 6 decades!

May be if someone tomorrow goes on a killing spree (as were the Beer man and Stoneman in india) and we need to employ Rangers to stop it (as we did during the anti-dacoit operations in Sindh), you may also like to compare it with Kashmir?!

 

[karan.1970]

What do you exactly want to suggest?

Probably that Pakistan should forget indian-occupied-Kashmir just because india amended its holy constitution and rejected an international decree, but on the other hand india can suggest, do and propose whatever suits her. Voila!

Alternately we can stay at each others' throats. Pakistan keeps asking for Plebiscite and India kepps asking for Pak Occupied Kashmir. In the mean time a few hundred terrorists/Sec forces/Civilians keep dying every year..

india has not exactly 'come to terms with Pakistan driven problems' as no such thing exists. Indeed, india has kneeled to the freedom movement that has been there since the last 6 decades. An indication to this was the recent offer from india to militants (read freedom fighters) to 'surrender' while india would offer them amenity.

You may not define Pakistan's sponsored terrorism in India as Pakistan driven problems but we do. It will do you well to look up the similar offer to Khalistani militants way back in 1980s and its impact. You may feed your macho ego by calling this kneeling, but anything that serves the national objective without compromising the national integrity is fine...

Well coming back to the topic, until india shows a legit stand on the water issue and upholds the IWT to its essence and it shed off its stubbornness over Kashmir and come to the table with an open mind and the will to resolve the issue, things cant move any further. We cant just keep on solving india's problems by talking them out and leave the issues that are our lifeline just because some indians think talks should be furthered on a step-by-step basis.

I believe that India's stand on Kashmir will not move an inch. The success of the talks will depend on whether Pakistan can live with that..
About solving problems sir, at this time, Pakistan is a part of the problem for India and not part of the solution..

 

[Xeric]

Swal gandoom, jawab chana..??!!

 

[karan.1970]

Swal gandoom, jawab chana..??!!

?Translation please..

 

[Parashuram1]

More lives have been lost to these so called territorial disputes than to terrorism, infact terrorism itself originated because of these disputes. They need to be resolved in order to ensure stability in the region. Im interested as to how a dispute in which 50,000 people have been killed so far, is the cause of three wars between india and pakistan is a "so-called" dispute

Well that is where you both need to check your leadership. Every conflict has a lot of collateral damage and this is not new to Asia either. You are quite wrong regarding more lives being lost by war than terrorism.

As a researcher I would like to tell you that there are lot of inefficiencies in every research no matter what method the researcher plans to employ. There are many deaths that have the possibility to have gone unreported on perhaps both your sides of territory and therefore this might be possibly making an Indian feel that Pakistanis are responsible for terrorism and vice versa.

But I think now terrorism has become a joint problem for both you and the Indians. and it is hence your responsibility to start dealing with terrorism first and then start a diplomatic dialog. There is no point of dealing with both the things at the same time. It is just like trying to complete two letters with both hands simultaneously. Neither will be as good as they could be.

 

[HAIDER]

Well every single day Kashmir is going to be life line for India. Growing population and water needs....and only source of water runs through Kashmir both for Pak and India.
Where the Kashmir should stand, let the Kashmiri decide. But keep 7 lakh army can't keep Kashmir togather for long.

 

[weaponx]

Well every single day Kashmir is going to be life line for India. Growing population and water needs....and only source of water runs through Kashmir both for Pak and India.
Where the Kashmir should stand, let the Kashmiri decide. But keep 7 lakh army can't keep Kashmir togather for long.

O Yeaaah!!!

we have been listening this claim from 1989...when kashmiri pandits where thrown out of their homes by so called kashmiri seperatists..20 yrs have gone and still u dont have an inch of kashmir...i think u guys have to wait for another 1000yrs for kashmir....

 

[araz]

We (Pakistan) think that is a highly flawed viewpoint. Terrorism cannot be addressed until the underlying issues of alienation and anger are addressed. This requires Kashmir and other Pak-India disputes to be resolved.

A few days ago when we were discussing this Indian offer of talks in a different thread, I had suggested that Pakistan will demand to add Kashmir to the talks agenda. If India gives in to the demand, it would be a diplomatic victory. And if India refuses, Pakistan will claim that the offer was never well intentioned to begin with and reject it.

Net-net, while one has to wait for the above scenario to play out, I don't think it is in Pakistan's interest to negotiate at the moment. The regional situation is very fluid and we must wait for the Afghan scenario to fully play out before focusing our attention elsewhere.

An interesting post which opens a few more questions than our usual oneliners. I must have missed you along the way.
I think as a matter of principle it is right to initiate talks with a set agendqa and an aim to achieve a result. Talks for the sake of talking is not going to achieve anything. You are also right that from the pakistani perspective, we want to include as many of the burning issues as we can to get a composite results. However, knowing india's stance on kashmir and knowing that water issue will also need to be talked through(probably with very little gain at this point in time) does it translate into the fact that we will not talk at all, as these issues will be burning issues for decadess to come? i feel that the onus still ies on us to show a willingness to talk. From the indian perspective, as long as they have made an offer to talk, their stance will be vindicated. This is unjust, but unfortunately it is an unjust world that we live in.
Interestingly , you seem to think that pakistan does not want talks and have equated it to the fluidity of situation in Afghanistan. In my humble opinion it will be the stress on the US which will determine how much gains Pakistan can make towards its concept of strategic depth(howsoever flawed it maybe!!). India may be an interested party but its influence in afgahnistan will forever remain dependant on American perception of pakistans importance in the whole bigger picture. kayani has to some extent, laid his cards down on the table and made pakistans perception of the evolving situation known to the US. However, the talks with India will not have any off shoot on this scene and if they try to come to the aid of Afghan army, their fate will be no worse than the Americans. Pakistan may or may not fare any better but only time will tell. We do however have a head start on the situation and have held a hand on Afghanistan's thought process and its pulse over many decades. However, it may be the negotiations with the taliban that may win us a the insurgency much more so than training the Army, which we want to do because we dont want someone else to cultivate seeds of mistrust between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Coming back to the topic of talks, I think pakistan has taken a principled stance on the issue so we should stick to it. However , in the indo pak scenario, it is as much about lack of trust, as about issues, which has prevented major issues to never be resolved inspite of both parties making very pragmatic and difficult decisions(last time under musharraf is a mute point!!). I wonder if a few more doors need to be opened by means of establishing trade and facilitating paople to people dialogue and interaction. Perhaps with a little bit more trust we can get with negotiations what would eventually lead to war in the region to resolve.
Araz

 

[HAIDER]

O Yeaaah!!!

we have been listening this claim from 1989...when kashmiri pandits where thrown out of their homes by so called kashmiri seperatists..20 yrs have gone and still u dont have an inch of kashmir...i think u guys have to wait for another 1000yrs for kashmir....

Well force is not the answer of any question. If you guys think, then Indian army killed more then 90,000 and campaign is tougher and tougher day by day.

 

[PakSher]

Talks will not get us anywhere. Bullet is the way to deal with bullies like India. 27% of Kashmir in Pakistan is not because of talks but because of war. We do not need to talk with India @ the moment.