WASHINGTON, July 31 (UPI) -- Since Dec. 15, when a terrorist attack on the Indian parliament launched India and Pakistan back on the war path, the United States has had a one-point agenda in the subcontinent: preventing the two nuclear rivals from cutting each other's throats.
But during his weekend visit to the region, Secretary of State Colin Powell went beyond crisis management and clearly indicated that the United States also wants stay engaged in the region. It wants facilitate direct talks between India and Pakistan and wants them to resolve their differences peacefully.
The U.S. message is clear: when India and Pakistan conducted their nuclear tests in May 1998, they also gave up the option of going to war for resolving disputes. The international community does not want a nuclear holocaust and will not allow them to do so, no matter how serious the dispute.
During a news briefing in Islamabad on Sunday, Powell also declined to take a public stand on the issue of democracy in Pakistan, although privately he is believed to have conveyed Washington's views to the government of President Gen. Pervez Musharraf on this issue.
This was interpreted in Pakistan as an indication that Washington is willing to give Musharraf a free hand to manage his internal affairs as long as he continues to support the U.S.-led war on terrorism.
On Tuesday, the U.S. ambassador-designate to Pakistan, Nancy Powell, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that she believed that Musharraf was still "firmly in control" in Pakistan despite a growing opposition to his rule following the controversial national referendum in late April that extended his term as president. She also described his support to the war on terror as "unstinting."
Asked to comment on these obvious signals from the Bush administration, a State Department official told United Press International: "We still have a very strong interest in the restoration of democracy in Pakistan, but it is up to the Pakistani people to decide what sort of government they want."
Explaining Washington's policy towards the Musharraf government, the official said: "We want Pakistan to have a government that moves it toward moderation and tolerance and that's the policy President Musharraf is following.
"We support a lot of his approaches, but we are also encouraging him to press ahead on restoration of democracy in Pakistan," the official added.
Although it is an open expression of support for the Musharraf government, the statement also makes it clear that the United States would like him to fulfill his pledge to hold elections in October this year. For this purpose Christina Rocca, U.S. assistant secretary of state for South Asian affairs, has offered to send international observers to Pakistan.
Powell made a similar offer to India when he told a news briefing in New Delhi this week that India too should allow international observers to monitor the state elections in occupied Kashmir scheduled in early October.
The suggestion was particularly annoying for India, which regards Kashmir as an internal issue and refuses to discuss it even with Pakistan. Accepting international observers would have strengthened the Pakistani position that Kashmir is an international dispute requiring external mediation. Therefore, it came as no surprise when India quickly rejected the proposal.
Explaining the U.S. position on Kashmir, State Department's deputy spokesman, Phil Reeker, told a briefing in Washington on Monday that the Kashmir dispute must be resolved through a healthy political process and a vibrant dialogue between India and Pakistan that takes into account the wishes of the people of Kashmir. However, he hastily added that Washington was not seeking a mediator's role and was instead offering only to provide facilitative assistance.
The suggestion that the United States and other nations are going to take an active interest in resolving the Kashmir disputes also negates the Indian position that it will accept no outside mediation.
Observers in Washington say that before sending Powell to the region, the Bush administration had decided to publicly spell out its policy on the India-Pakistan dispute. They say that while recent militant attacks in Kashmir had caused frictions between Islamabad and Washington, India's continued refusal to withdraw troops and resume talks with Pakistan had also irked the Bush administration.
That's why, the observers say, Washington decided to tell India as well that it should not only resume talks with Pakistan but it should take steps for reducing tensions in Kashmir.
"There is a fear that if the West continued to push Pakistan alone, as it has been doing throughout the current crisis, Pakistan may stop listening to it," said a Pakistani diplomat. "They ought to realize that Pakistan is not PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization) and the Kashmiri militants are not Al Qaida."
But Karl Inderfurth, who headed the State Department's South Asia desk during the Clinton administration, said there is also a growing realization in Washington that the United States needs to go beyond crisis management in resolving the India-Pakistan conflict.
While the South Asia experts praise the Bush administration for successfully averting a possible nuclear conflict between India and Pakistan earlier this summer, they warn that with more than a million troops still facing each other on the border, the threat has only subsided. It has not gone away.
"This is monsoon season. The next fighting season will be in September," said Michael Krepon of the Stimson Center, a Washington think-tank. He has been supported by Inderfurth, who has urged the Bush administration not to disregard the ever-present danger that this conflict could slip into a war of global implications.
Lee Feinstein of the Council on Foreign Relations has gone a step further and urged the United States to encourage talks on Kashmir. "Until there is a process for talks on Kashmir, the situation will remain tense," he warned.
Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, who played a key role in disengaging India and Pakistan last month, returns to the region early August. John Wolf, assistant secretary of state for non-proliferation, goes there early September.
Rocca, who as State's senior South Asia expert accompanied Powell on his recent trips, also heads there in September. Under Secretary for Political Affairs Mark Grossman will continue the security dialogue while Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill will be in New Delhi in November and Under Secretary of Commerce Ken Juster will also visit the region this autumn.
