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Stardate 20011219.0635 (On Screen): I'm having strong feelings of deja vu. There was a suicide attack on the Indian Parliament building, which because of simple chance (and incompetence on the part of some of the plotters) just missed becoming a major massacre of top Indian politicians. India has not lashed out in anger, yet. But they are investigating the attack and say that it was launched by forces under control of Pakistan.

The Pakistani government denies it. For the moment war has not broken out. And that's where I am getting this feeling of having been here before: India now reminds me overwhelmingly of what the US did in late September. My intuition is that India is going to attack.

From the things I've been reading, I'm getting the impression that Musharraf doesn't actually control everything in Pakistan. There is a shadow group, the ISI, which seems to operate largely on its own and which has its own foreign policy. They appear to be behind the attack on the Indian Parliament building; they were also the group which backed the Taliban. Musharraf either can not or will not stop them. It's uncannily like the al Qaeda and the Taliban, with Musharraf playing the role of "Mullah Omar" in the big screen version. I think he would do well to ponder that fact.

This bothered me:

On Tuesday, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said India had a legitimate right to self-defense, but that the attack on its legislature "is not a reason for India or Pakistan to take action against each other."

"This is a time for India and Pakistan to take action against terrorists," he said.

But if, indeed, it is the case that the attack was ultimately inspired by a rogue agency in the Pakistani government which Musharraf can not or will not control, then how is India's situation any different than that of the US in late September? President Bush declared that nations which harbor and support terrorists will be treated as terrorists. Does that not apply here?

Fleischer's reaction is based solely on the fact that a new war between India and Pakistan would massively complicate the US operation in Afghanistan. In such an eventuality, the Pakistani government might well ask for a quid pro quo, and that would put the US in a tricky situation. So it's understandable that he's hoping that won't happen. But India is the victim here, and even-handedness in diplomacy is a sham. If the attack on the Indian Parliament really was sponsored by a Pakistani agency, then the solution is for Musharraf to shut it down. (discuss)