Indian
Troops As Cannon Fodder
By P Sainath
The Hindu
29 June, 2003
AT least 55 U.S. soldiers
have so far died in "peacekeeping" in Iraq since May 1. And
the United States says "Iraq is not ready for democracy."
If the Iraqis don't like it, they can lump it.
As it stands, the Americans
can't lump it. Their rising death toll alarms them. (Well, each time
one U.S. soldier dies, so do many Iraqis. But that's another story.)
And more and more people in that country are confronting the occupying
power.
Listen to the New York Times:
"American forces are carrying out their largest single military
operation in Iraq since the end of major fighting..." The Associated
Press puts it this way: "an amalgam of shadowy resistance forces,
including unknown numbers of non-Iraqi fighters, are carrying out almost
daily hit-and-run attacks against the American occupation forces."
The Guardian, U.K., says:
"Attacks occur daily more than a dozen every day in the
past week, according to some accounts." The paper had this to say
of the British Minister in charge of "reconstruction" in Iraq.
"Baroness Amos had to admit... that she is unable to visit that
country." Why? Because "of the risk of guerrilla attack."
It's in this mess that India
is being called up to act as chowkidar to the empire. The lives of Indian
soldiers are more expendable in American eyes. But should the
eyes of an Indian government see it the same way? That's frightening.
We are being hired to patrol the empire's latest outpost. To be the
fall guys for its folly.
We're being asked to do this
just when Bush might for the first time face questions in the U.S. Congress
on the Iraq war. On the fake "intelligence" that helped him
deceive his own people. When Labour MPs are calling Tony Blair a liar
in Britain. This is when we're being asked to carry the can in Iraq.
To legitimise a war always viewed as unlawful across the world. And
now increasingly seen that way in the U.S. and Britain the main
warriors themselves.
We'd be magnets for popular
anger in one of the world's most volatile spots -- at a time when the
Americans are contemplating a war on neighbouring Iran. What happens
if Indian troops are stuck in Iraq when the U.S. moves for "regime
change" in Iran? The possible consequences are mind-blowing. Indian
jawans would then be at extreme risk. As always, we'll re-learn that
it is far easier to get into such holes than out of them. Until next
time.
And, as always, the decisions
will be taken by those whose children will never fight on any front.
That too, on a war Indians hated in the first place. One that our parliament,
alone in the world, condemned in a resolution. Suddenly it's, "hey
guys, let's be real! It's only the lives of our poorer classes. There's
many more where those came from. Think of the gains to be made from
carrying the White Man's Burden." Might give us crumbs from the
White Man's Contracts.
It's odd that Vajpayee and
Advani should seek a "national consensus" on sending troops
to Iraq. The rest of us thought we had one. The Indian parliament's
resolution in April, condemning America's war against that country,
is the clearest consensus that exists in this nation on that issue.
But now we're being invited
to make our jawans the targets of explosive resentment. The anger directed
at American troops will then come our way. That, in a nation, which
has had nothing but goodwill for our own.
Sending Indian troops there
is an idea that could and most likely will go awfully
wrong. For one thing, the people of Iraq have suffered enough, without
our adding to it. For another, in the growing challenge to the occupation,
those seen as front men of the empire will attract deadly fire. As innocents
inevitably die, things will get much worse.
Meanwhile the U.S. has bullied
the Security Council (June 12) into giving its troops a year's exemption
from the new International War Crimes Tribunal. Only the American "peace
keeping forces" have got that. The U.S. sees trouble ahead and
will not have its military brought before the tribunal. So much better
to have Indians face that music. As they will, when hell breaks loose.
Note that Indian troops are not even being spoken of as peacekeepers.
They will be a "stabilisation force". Words that imply an
active, and if need be, aggressive role.
The journey to Iraq will
have little in common with the over 30 UN peacekeeping missions that
Indian troops have been part of in the past. This time our soldiers
will be seen as front men for the occupiers. And will face an increasingly
hostile Iraqi public.
Indian security personnel
haven't had the best of times right here at home. In the past decade
or so, we've had 15, 000 of them killed or wounded in Jammu and Kashmir,
Punjab and the North East. More than 3,500 killed in Kashmir alone since
1991. (Not to mention 11,000 dead civilians.) Here's the new step. Troop
exports. Now the government might pledge even more of these lives to
the U.S.
In Iraq, we will be on clearly
defined foreign territory. Once again, we're looking at the readiness
of India's ruling classes to risk the lives of poor Indians which
is what our jawans are. This time to align and ingratiate ourselves
with U.S. power. And take our place in America's New World Odour. (The
permission given this week to two U.S. warships to dock in Kochi is
one more step in that direction. Both ships are involved in the war
in Iraq.)
Plus, by sending our troops,
we get to earn a quick buck on the side. So Indian companies will gain
what lusting newspapers call "lucrative contracts". And we
can sacrifice a few hundred jawans, maybe many more, so that our CEOs
can do even better in the next Forbes and Fortune lists. Never mind
that these lucrative contracts could place us morally in the ranks of
contract killers. No wonder the Americans are seeking our help. They
are body shopping in a literal sense. This is one outsourcing of jobs
their unions won't protest. The job of dying for U.S. imperialism.
There is, of course, another
reason why some in government are so keen to get into this chowkidari.
Election year draws near. And the cynical "Back us. Our boys are
dying", which we heard in Kargil could make the rounds again.
Kargil saw the most incompetent
Defence Minister in our history cover up a colossal failure. And succeed
because the media wouldn't call his bluff. Our soldiers died in hundreds.
The minister, many scandals later including one about over-priced
coffins for dead soldiers is still there. A Government with its
back to the wall on every issue was able to make that cynical "Stand
united behind the NDA" appeal.
Stoking Iraqi hatred in a
new and unwarranted direction doesn't count. Elections do. And a diversion
from the serious political and economic issues of the day is crucial.
If you have an Indian force in Iraq, daily losing lives to snipers and
other local attacks, that's the sort of mess an Advani revels in. Maybe
he'll take out a rath yatra to rally support for the troops. Men whose
lives could in the first place be jeopardised by his colleagues and
himself.
Arguably, India should have
done well as peacekeeper in Sri Lanka. Didn't both sides accept us,
at least to begin with? Instead, our stint there provided Colombo with
a diversion. It gave the LTTE a focus for their hatred. Over 1100 men
of the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) laid down their lives in Sri
Lanka. That's more than double the number who died at Kargil.
There will be no one happy
to see us in Baghdad. There will, of course, be the usual bunch of regime
PROs (some still call themselves journalists) filing those first few
stories of a euphoric welcome. Pictures of someone garlanding an Indian
soldier. Maybe one of our guys kissing a baby. Then reality sets in.
With all the experience of
Sri Lanka behind them. With all the evidence of Iraq before them. Still,
quite a few experts, analysts and editors argue it's a good idea. Take
a look at the editorials in some of our leading newspapers.
One says it "makes sense
to send a stabilisation force to that country". Indeed the situation
"demand(s)" that we do so. Another says that Russia, Germany
and France have now dropped their "principled" stand against
the war for "a real time share in the lucrative Iraqi reconstruction
pie. The moral: New Delhi cannot stand on principle in thinking out
its foreign policy options in post-war Iraq." It's time to start
planning, boys, for the "Baghdad Bandobast".
One newspaper is thrilled
by the team from Washington that came to Delhi seeking a rent-an-army
deal. Our soldiers may be handed a United Nations fig leaf. Their expenses
could be borne nominally by that body. But the Americans will pay us
a few dollars more. That didn't excite the paper. What did was that
the team "...highlighted New Delhi's impeccable record in peacekeeping
abroad."
Well, we withdrew battered
from Sri Lanka. And scrambled out of Somalia in chaos. That's an impeccable
record?
Think, too, of the fallout
at home of our troops getting bogged down in Iraq. When every militant
Islamic group there (and perhaps from Iran and elsewhere) targets the
jawans as an occupation force. How will that tell on communal tensions
here? What a tonic it would be for Togadia and Thackeray, amongst so
many others. But that shouldn't upset a bunch whose careers were built
on ideologies of hatred. Maybe as the Americans withdraw, we'll send
Modi in as Governor of occupied Iraq. He'd be impartial in hating all
the Muslims there, Shia and Sunni alike. Christians, too.
At the base, are crude motives
of electoral and financial gain for a few. Pointing to post-facto UN
resolutions okaying U.S. actions just makes it worse. Do the people
of the nations voting for these resolutions see it that way? The Spanish
government supported a war 85 per cent of its public opposed. Far more
importantly, will the people of Iraq view it that way? Do our own people
see it that way?
Historically, the British
used Indian troops as cannon fodder for their conquests across the globe.
Close to 90, 000 Indian troops died for the Raj in just World War I.
That's more soldiers than India has lost in all our wars and insurgencies
since independence.
In 1915-16 alone, thousands
of Indian soldiers died in Iraq, the then Mesopotamia. Then too, a western
power was attempting a "regime change". Our men were sacrificed
by the British in their war against Turkey. The year had been disastrous
for the Brits. The debacle at Gallipoli meant the war ministry in London
needed a propaganda success.
So they threw away the lives
of over 22,000 soldiers thousands of them Indians. That, in a
bid to take Baghdad, as the Guardian, U.K. pointed out last year. Even
today in the region, wrote Ross Davies in that paper, "...there
are 22,400 graves (more than two-thirds of the troops who fought in
Mesopotamia were Indians whose faith required cremation rather than
burial)."
Then they died for the British
empire. Now, they're being asked to die for the American empire. Then,
it could be argued, we were a colony and had no choice. Today,
in the era of globalised markets, we'll be doing it for "lucrative
contracts". An independent nation driven by the greed and delusions
of a few to seek what might well be a quisling's reward.
P. Sainath is one of the
two recipients of the A.H. Boerma Award, 2001, granted for his contribution
in changing the nature of the development debate on food, hunger and
rural development in the Indian media.