India Pak: The world's most dangerous border line

Bangalore: The line separating India and Pakistan is the most dangerous border in the world and if we recall India's past instances and history with Pakistan the statement holds very true. With Independence in the year 1947 India witnessed a bleeding partition which went on to form Pakistan. The 'Wars and Genocides of the 20th Century' survey revealed that around 1 million people died in this blood-spattered war of partition. However according to government reports it is estimated that more than 15,000 dead in three wars and 25 years spent fighting over a glacier; 40,000-100,000 dead in the insurgency in the disputed province of Kashmir. The impact of partition and its after effects can still be felt in the relations between the two countries. Individually too both the countries had gone through its own share of issues. However it is Pakistan who is seen to be worse affected. Pakistan's obsession with India had lead them nowhere but instead various issues had cropped up in the own home territory. Due to its Kashmir fascination it ended up giving its generals too much power. Pakistan's army is at 550,000 men which is too small to match India's 1.1million although too large for Pakistan. About 16 percent of the government budget is spent on Defense and a meager percentage of 1.2 is spent on education. The armed forces are so powerful that often the military has the power to overthrow a government, hence leaving no room for democracy. Moreover Pakistan has been hugely responsible for creation of the Taliban in 1990 in order to undermine India's allies in northern Afghanistan. Last but not the least Pakistan has been constantly promoting Islamic terrorism especially the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), a Punjab-based outfit whose purpose is to attack India. But since the Indian parliament was attacked by the LeT in December 2001 Pakistan banned it, however, the outfit continued to exist. Perhaps it is noteworthy to point out that India is not the only victim of terrorism, Pakistan is being fuelled by splinter groups from the LeT and is going global. But today both the countries have emerged as big nuclear powers. However neither side could use a nuclear weapon because the aggressor would suffer from the fallout. After America destabilized things in 2008 by agreeing to give India civil nuclear technology, Pakistan's determination to build up its nuclear arsenal has increased. Last month it announced that it had tested a new mobile missile with a miniaturized nuclear warhead designed to destroy invading tanks with little radiation beyond the battlefield, thus increasing the risk that a border incursion could escalate into something much more dangerous. On May 13th the head of Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence told parliament that he had already picked targets in India, and rehearsed attacks. He did not specify nuclear attacks, but did not exclude them. This is a dangerous time as Pakistan's militants are clearly keen to show that Islamist terror will survive bin Laden's death, and unlike the cold war there is scope for terrorists either to provoke a nuclear conflict or to explode a dirty nuclear device. India always has been surrounded with thin border lines. Apart from Pakistan, threats from China are ever evident. Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim has always been eyed by China. Bangladesh on the other hand can be termed as one more dangerous border line because of which India has been witnessing huge influx of immigrants. U.S. has always shown keen interest in solving the issue of India and Pakistan conflict. In this initiation U.S. should make full utilization of its diplomatic resources and get special envoy in there to figure out a conceivable approach.