War is no solution, negotiations may find one

Internal armed conflicts, wars and proxy wars---some of those prolonged--- have been continuing in quite a few regions of the world. But none of those between two nuclear powers! The latest air strike codenamed "Operation Sindoor" launched on Pakistan by India on the early morning of Wednesday now brings the two nuclear-armed neighbours on to the brink of an all-out war. This has some similarities with the invasion of Ukraine by Russia but the contexts and stated aims are totally different.

While Russia wanted to get back its strategic territories such as Crimea that was attached to Ukraine during the Soviet Union and stop the latter from joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), the arch rivals of the subcontinent have fought over Kashmir ever since its division into the two nations in 1947. This time tension started to build up following the killing of 26 innocent tourists in Pahalgam in India-administered Kashmir on April 22.

Although India claims it carried out 'precision attacks' non-escalatory in nature, once such attacks are unleashed, escalation of the feud is no longer under its control. Since there is India's rival which claims it has been unjustifiably blamed for the Pahalgam massacre, much will depend on how the latter reacts. The Indian air strike, as Pakistan considers, is violence of its sovereignty. So, the National Security Committee of Pakistan government also authorised the country's armed forces to respond to Indian aggression at "time and manner" of their choosing. Retaliatory action is on the cards.

How intense and extensive the counter offensive will be may decide whether the war will be a large-scale conventional war or worse, will trigger a nuclear war. A top leader of Pakistan did not rule out such a possibility. Can India and Pakistan afford even a conventional war of scale? Spokesperson for UN chief Antonio Guterres has put it succinctly even in a broader context, "The world cannot afford a military confrontation between India and Pakistan".

At a time when global trade and manufacturing have been severely jolted by Donald Trump's reciprocal tariffs, the fallouts of a war between India and Pakistan will not only cripple the economies of the two warring nations but also cause those of the South Asian nations to bleed. Even its negative ramification for the global economy is likely to be significant. Already Israel's escalating aggression on Palestine, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen has turned the Middle East into a cinder box and the Ukraine war shows no sign of ceasing. The Myanmar conflict stays at a stalemate because of the earthquake. Another war in South Asia, a region already counting trade losses because of aggressive tariff policy, will either harm or shatter economies of some of the neighbours.

Flight and cargo operation will be costlier and import and exports are likely to face disruptions or may be delayed. But the greatest casualty will be the regional tie that has been under stress for sometime. The India-Pakistan rivalry has made the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) non-functional. The political non-cooperation has been responsible for rendering the South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA), a free trade arrangement within the bloc, equally irrelevant. Now this latest escalation of conflict between the two powerful nation in the region will have its adverse impacts on social, people-to-people and cultural relations as well. The least said about economic and commercial cooperation the better.

World leaders have urged restraint from both sides. The Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has started shuttling between Islamabad and New Delhi to impress upon the leaders of the two nations about the futility of armed aggressions against each other. Meanwhile, the news that Jaish-e-Mohammed confirmed that 10 relatives of its leader Masood Azhar, the architect of terrorist attacks on Indian parliament in 2001and the Taj Hotel in Mumbai, were killed in Indian air strike gives some idea about the objective India had in mind. The fate of Masood who was released from Indian jail in exchange for 155 hostages from a hijacked Indian Airlines plane in 1999, however, is not known.

Undeniably, terrorist groups from Pakistan have a long history of carrying out operations inside India. This has no doubt soured relations between the two neighbours. Yet war cannot be an option for settling contentious issues. History offers lessons for non-aggression. Adolf Hitler in his demonic theory of "Final Solution" wanted to exterminate the Jewish people within reach, not limited to the European continent. The irony is that today, the Jews planted in Palestine from all across the world, are now carrying out one of the worst genocides in human history.

Thus war does not settle things, rather it sows the seeds of future enmity and worse crimes again humanity. The India-Pakistan armed conflict may not be solved right away but at least the two sides should opt for de-escalation of tension and status quo in the interest of their economy and the civilians who will suffer the most in case the war escalates and prolongs. Right now the stakes are high for both countries because the war will push them back by a few years because of the turmoil the global economy is in on account of Trump's indiscriminate and aggressive tariff policy.

nilratanhalder2000@yahoo.com