FRIDAY TIMES, APRIL 4, 2003

America and the sub-continent

Farrukh Saleem

America's real interest in Pakistan is that we do not become a rogue state;
no more, no less

WHAT IS AMERICA'S INTEREST IN THE SUB-CONTINENT?

Let us first look at India. Mumbai is now home to at least three dozen
American companies including Kodak, Heinz, Monsanto, Warner Bros, Federal
Express, Bank of America, Bankers Trust, Parke Davis, Intel, JP Morgan,
Kellogg, Pfizer, Procter & Gamble, American Int'l Group, Exxon-Mobil, Delta
and Boston Consulting.

Delhi has AT&T, GE, General Motors, Oracle, Pepsi, Unocal, Xerox, Lockheed,
Raytheon, Rockwell, Honeywell, Adobe, AES, Alcoa, American Express,
Northrop, McKinsey, Amway, Polaroid and Coca Cola. Bangalore has
Caterpillar, Dell, Sun, Texas Instruments, NCR, Hewlett Packard, Motorola,
Lucent, IBM, Novell, Ingersoll-Rand, American Data and MetLife. Hyderabad
has Microsoft, Cognizant, Chip Engines and Brigade. Chennai has Ford,
Caltex, Tenneco, Covansys, Diebold, Citibank, Ernst & Young and Price
Waterhouse.

A large majority of US corporate giants are now dependent on Tata
Consultancy, Infosys Technologies, Wipro, Satyam Computer Services, HCL
Technologies, Patni Computer Systems, Silverline Technologies, Mahindra,
Pentasoft, Mascot, Mascom, Mastek, Polaris, L&T and Hexaware (all Indian
software giants).

Almost all large US companies now use Indian software giants to do their
inventory control, customer service, technical support, insurance claims
processing, mortgage processing, document management, bank reconciliation,
check processing, credit card processing, inventory management, transport
administration, billing services, account payables, payroll services, data
analysis or data management. Indian IT companies, in return, earn India a
handsome $10 billion a year which is projected to double in the next few
years.

Here's a list of major US entities that have, over the past decade, become
dependent on Tata Consultancy: Alcoa, American Express, AIG, AT&T, Boeing,
Citibank, Compaq, IBM, JC Penney, Kellogg, Lucent, Microsoft, Nike,
Northwest Airlines, Schlumberger, Dell Computer, Ford Motor, Hewlett
Packard, US Dept of Defense, EMC, Merrill Lynch, State of Pennsylvania,
Texas Instruments and Unocal.

Here's a list of US companies that are now dependent on Wipro: General
Motors, Xerox, Sun, Cisco, NCR, JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Farmers
Insurance, Seagate and Home Depot.

Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman, during his recent Indian tour announced
that his company would be investing an additional US$400 million to "expand
its activities and promote technology development in India." Oracle, the
world's second largest software company, is planning on doubling its Indian
operations. The announced expansion plans will create extra 1,800 jobs.
Oracle currently employs a staff of some 2,000 in India.

What are our goals and what is America's interest in Pakistan?

Our armed forces live for Kashmir. So do our religious parties. The defense
budget (including pensions) stands at Rs180 billion; nearly 6% of our GDP.
All the jihadi organisations put together collect an additional Rs70 billion
a year for the same cause. The total is a wholesome 8% of our GDP.

There have only been a handful of countries on the face of the planet that
used to spend as high a percentage of their GDP on defense as does Pakistan.
The list includes Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria,
Mozambique, Somalia and Yemen. Yugoslavia is no more. Split into
Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Slovenia and Serbia & Montenegro.
The Soviet Union is no more. Split into at least 15 pieces that few even
bother to count: Russian Federation, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Armenia,
Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan,
Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The conclusion being that almost
every country that has been spending a disproportionately large portion of
its GDP on defence has either split up, is in a state of civil war or is
economically insolvent.

Our military government is now engaged in a dicey double-dance, appeasing
the Americans on the international front and using the mullahs on the
domestic front. Internal policy is all about derailing democracy and
splitting up democratic forces. External policy is nothing but
India-centric.

The khakis and the mullahs both have an identical view of national identity
and that of national security. Both oppose the establishment of a
constitutional democracy and are against the idea of sovereignty belonging
to the people of Pakistan. Both are in favour of curbing fundamental
freedoms of the citizens of Pakistan. Both use Islam and India to distract
the population from real issues. Their common enemy outside of Pakistan is
India. Their common enemies within Pakistan are the mainstream, moderate
political entities. In 1947, Deobandi lashkars attacked Kashmir. In 1971, Al
Badar and Al Shams fought the Mukhti Bahni alongside 22 Baluch, 32 Punjab,
22 FF, 29 Cavalry and platoons of SSG. In the 1990s, the religious parties
provided pretexts to the overthrowing of both Nawaz and Benazir. JUI madaris
have been and continue to be recruiting grounds for jihad on the Western as
well as our Eastern borders.

On March 31, US Secretary of State Colin Powell, in an interview to the New
York Times, said that the "Indo-Pakistan and the whole subcontinent problem"
was part of the "broader agenda" that the US plans to go back to after Iraq.

America now needs India to grow. Top American companies have all set up
their back-offices (inventory management, payroll, etc.) in India. India, in
return, has accumulated US$70 billion in foreign exchange reserves. Pakistan
produces nothing that can help America grow. We possess nothing that could
be of value to American companies. The new façade we have now erected is
just too transparent. Our goals do not overlap America's. America's real
interest in Pakistan, as a consequence, is that we do not become a rogue
state and that we do not become an agent of instability in the region. No
more, no less