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The Rediff Special/ Professor Stephen P Cohen

The question, 'should Bill Clinton visit Pakistan,' is the wrong one

The question, "should Bill Clinton visit Pakistan," is the wrong one. Obviously, Pakistan is an important enough country that he should HAVE visited long ago; perhaps a few months after a visit to India. All of this should have taken place in 1994 or 1995 at the latest.

If he had made those visits, it is possible that subsequent events: the nuclearization of the region, a major war, a coup, and so forth, might have happened differently -- or at least the US might have been able to influence these events in a positive way.

But this administration has been focused on a few issues from its inception. It only came to appreciate India's larger importance much later and also to the recognition that Pakistan, while no India, is not an insignificant country.

The "should he go or not" question now is a difficult choice between two bad alternatives. Reasonable people who know the region (and Pakistan) well, can differ on the question. He should go if he wants to influence Pakistan's unstable domestic political order and persuade it to cease its support for groups which have made the regional situation much worse; also, Pakistan's support against terrorism is valuable, as is its influence (if any) over the Taleban; he might also want to make the point that Pakistan and India should revive their dialogue over Kashmir and other issues.

However, there are good arguments against a stopover. It will be seen to be a reward to a military dictatorship, it will anger India, it might even fan anti-Americanism, and it is giving in to Pakistan's blackmail ("if you don't come we'll be taken over by the bad guys").

On balance, I would avoid this choice by disaggregating the visits and have a return trip to the region later in the year. Pakistan is an important country in its own right, and the United States needs to work with it -- incredibly, no American president has visited Pakistan since Richard M Nixon. That visit should include a presidential speech urging the restoration of democracy and the rebuilding of Pakistan's battered civilian institutions. I am afraid, however, that Clinton will want to "do" South Asia in one trip.

As for the India portion, it is a long running embarrassment for me as an American specialist on the country that no president has visited Delhi since Carter's disastrous trip in 1978 (I saw it first-hand). As far as this administration is concerned, it is shocking that Clinton has visited over one hundred countries before he has gotten around to New Delhi in this last lap around the world.

"Should he go?" begs larger questions. These are:

1. "How can the United States establish a solid relationship with Pakistan without alienating India -- and how might that relationship work to India's advantage?" and
2. "Can the administration initiate a process of broad-based consultations with New Delhi so that our many common interests (and several conflicting ones) can be addressed?"

My hopes for the Clinton trip to India (and perhaps Pakistan) are modest: that he not say or do things which worsen relations between the US and these two countries (and between them), and that he begins a process of consultation and dialogue that could be picked up by his successor.

Professor Stephen P Cohen, the well-known expert on South Asia, and senior fellow at the US-based Brookings Institution, kindly agreed to add this opinion to his commentary from the Brookings Policy Brief. Exclusive to rediff.com

PART I: Need for a fresh look at US policies in South Asia

PART II:Need for US engagement in the Kashmir dispute

PART III:India as an emerging power

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