India Pakistan: Terrorists Pushing for War

Pakistani based terrorists attacked the heart of Mumbai in December 2008, killing 166 people. 9 of the 10 terrorists were killed, while a lone terrorist is in Indian captivity. Pakistan based terrorist groups, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammed have been continuously plotting and striking against Indian targets. But now the word is that if a Mumbai type terror attack is repeated, Indian forces would definitely retaliate, and this retaliation would be directly against Pakistan. This would spiral into a major conflict between the 2 nuclear powers and have catastrophic consequences.

Daniel Markey, Senior Fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) said, "India faces the real prospect of another major terrorist attack by Pakistan-based terrorist organizations in the near future. But unlike the aftermath of the 2008 attack on Mumbai, in which 166 people died, Indian military restraint cannot be taken for granted if terrorists strike again. The threat of another Mumbai-type attack is undeniable. Numerous Pakistan-based groups remain motivated and able to strike Indian targets, as they have incentives to act as spoilers, whether to disrupt efforts to improve Indo-Pakistani relations or to distract Islamabad from counter-terror crackdowns at home. Thus, the immediate risk of terrorism may actually increase if New Delhi and Islamabad make progress on resolving their differences or if Pakistan-based terrorists are effectively backed into a corner. Al-Qaeda has historically focused its efforts outside India, but if the group's leadership feels threatened in the Pakistan Afghanistan border areas, it might direct and assist regional proxies to attack India as a way to ignite a distracting Indo-Pakistani confrontation. To defend against a terrorist attack, Washington should share information and technical tools with India and work with Pakistan to clamp down on materials that might be used in weapons of mass destruction. It should also press Islamabad to accelerate the judicial process against the Mumbai plotters and crack down on militants throughout Pakistan, Markey says and "If US cooperation with Islamabad proves inadequate, Washington should develop its own capacity to infiltrate or attack these groups. In a worst-case scenario, Washington would have to choose between accepting an Indian strike on Pakistan and leveling its own coercive military threats against Islamabad," he says. But it should avoid policies that are likely to rule out effective working relationships with Islamabad and New Delhi once the crisis is over."

The simple concept is that terrorist organizations like the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, Lashkar and Jaish will always work towards creating terror in India, so as to instigate India to retaliate against Pakistan and strike on Pakistan soil, thus forcing Pakistan to shift their focus from the Afghan border to the border with India. This would give the terrorists respite, but is not something that the United States wants. So preventing an India-Pakistan conflict is very much a US interest.