PAKISTAN
The war no one is winning
BRUCE DOUGLAS-MANN
It is impossible that Pakistan can ever again be one country. Its two wings, separated by 1,000 miles of India, by language and by cultural differences, united only by the Moslem faith, are now irrevocably separated by the killings of the last few weeks. Esti- mates of the numbers who have been killed so far vary widely; some are as low as 100,000; others are over a million. What is clear is that about two million people have been sufficiently terrorised to flee to appalling living conditions as refugees in India, and that millions more are likely to die of star- vation unless food supplies can be introduced quickly into East Pakistan itself.
It is also virtually certain that fighting and the almost total disruption of civil adminis- tration will continue for so long as West Pakistan continues to try to hold East Pakistan down by military force. That sub- stantial fighting is still going on is confirmed by the continuing reports of 'victories' by both sides. The press releases from the Pakistan High Commission sent daily to Members of Parliament, continue to report that large contingents of 'Indian insurgents' have been wiped out. Having visited an army camp of the Bangla Desh forces and inspect ted their rather inadequate weapons, dis- cussed the situation with the Prime Minister of Independent Bangla Desh, heard him complaining of the 'correctness' of the Indian government's attitude, and seen the clear demarcation of the Indian frontier posts maintained by Indian army personnel, I have no shadow of doubt that the Bangla Desh army is what it claims to be—a volun- tary force of East Pakistanis who are derer- mined to free their country.
Volunteers from amongst the refugees are swelling the ranks of the Bangla Desh army faster than the trained personnel from the East Bengal Regiment and the East Pakistan Rifles can cope with them. The refugee camps in India will continue to provide recruits, and training will go on in the vicinity of the camps. Though I saw no sign of Bangla Desh weapons on the Indian side of the border, if the West Pakistan military push the Bangla Desh forces back to the Indian frontier, guerrilla raids and border incidents will become so numerous that clashes be- tween India and Pakistan could easily develop into open conflict in which China might become involved. The Indian Foreign Secretary and other senior officials to whom I spoke are well aware of this danger, but Indian public opinion would not permit them to seal the border, even if their sym- pathies were not fully with the Bangla Desh.
Two million refugees are creating a prob- lem for India with which, as a poor country, it is ill-equipped to cope. One rupee (six new pence) per head per day provides ade- quate food, but with 200 million of its own population living well below this standard, it cannot be maintained for long. The living conditions, ten feet square of corrugated iron laid on the ground• under a tarpaulin per family, were pathetic enough when I saw them but the rain was only just starting. The camps were nearly all on low-lying ground that will flood in the monsoon which has now started. Dry land in the vicinity will barely provide standing room for the•num- bers who were in the camps when I saw them at the end of last month, all reports indicate that the flow has increased since then.
Refugees to whom I spoke, choosing fami- lies at random rather than those who pressed forward to tell their story, all gave roughly similar accounts of why they had left their villages. A troop of West Pakistan military had arrived, shooting indiscriminately at any- one they saw—men in the fields, women and children, although no resistance was being presented. The village was then set on fire and the troop drove on. In areas in the vicinity of the cantonment towns the country- side is, I was told, almost deserted. The planting of the main rice-crop, which should be going on now, is not being done.
The Prime Minister of Bangla Desh, Mr Tajuddin Ahmed told me that he and his Cabinet were doing their best to ensure that agricultural work continued in the areas his forces controlled, but as the country in any event has to import two to three million tons of food-grain annually, the loss of about a third of the agricultural land due to these terror tactics, coupled with the blockade, the destruction of a large part of the food stocks, and the damage caused by the cyclone disas- ter, will lead to far greater loss of life than the bullets have so far caused. Mr Ian Mac- Donald of 'War on Want', has estimated that millions of deaths from starvation and disease is a very real possibility.
It is possible that the war could be stopped fairly quickly if world opinion were not blinded by the fallacy that this is an 'internal affair' of a Commonwealth country. Pakistan is two countries, which voluntarily decided to join in 1947: East Bengal, with the larger population, showed by the 80 per cent vote given to the Awami League in the elections its determination to secure economic auton- omy. Economic freedom within a federal state would have been a practical proposi- tion until 25 fvfarch, but the killing of Bengalis which started at 11 pm that night destroyed that possibility.
Economic independence is essential to East Bengal. As an article in the Financial Tinier said on 29 March, 'The appalling economic plight of the East, which places it among the eight poorest countries of the world, can be attributed, in part, to the very fact that it is part of Pakistan. In 1947 . . . the East Wing was actually better off than the West in a number of important respects.'
The cutting-off of trade between East Bengal and India, particularly West Bengal and Calcutta whose needs and products are largely complementary to those of East Bengal, has caused great hardship to both regions and added immensely to the desper- ate poverty of Calcutta. Other measures disparity in the collection and spending of tax revenue, a serious imbalance in the spending of aid, and job preferences to Pun- jabis, also favoured West Pakistan, so that by 1970 average per capita income was officially estimated to be nearly 47 per cent higher in West Pakistan than in the East.
West Pakistan would not lightly give up the advantage of what was a profitable colony, but the events of recent weeks have caused such destruction and generated such hatred that East Pakistan can only now be held down by a large and ruthless military force. It will not only no longer be profit- able, but the cost of maintaining and supply- ing this force will be a tremendous and continuing drain on West Pakistan's pre- carious economy. West Pakistan's total in- debtedness is now estimated at about i1.800 million and its reserves at about £80m. Debt repayments of £80m due in May have been deferred for six months. Overseas aid pays for 35 per cent of Pakistan's imports. With- out overseas assistance, Pakistan is bank- rupt.
If international monetary and aid organ- isations apply concerted pressure on West Pakistan, refusing all further credit and fresh aid, appropriating payments under existing aid • agreements to the servicing of existing debts to the extent that Pakistan is failing to meet its obligations, West Paki- stan can be compelled to call off this war which it can never hope to win. It is un- likely that China will shoulder the burden of supporting a relatively rich country fight- ing an oppressive war against a poor one. whatever power politics might tempt it to do. This is one war which economic sanc- tions might stop. They should be applied quickly.
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