From Containment to Cooperation:
Indian Ocean Perspective

Columnist Dr SM RAHMAN looks at the various options available to the Indian Ocean Rim nations

Proliferation of weapons of mass destruction - nuclear, chemical and biological - was the obsessive commitment of nations for the elusive and narrowly conceived goal termed 'security'. Ironically, these weapons were not closet weapons. Many of these were used in nearly hundred and fifty (150) additional wars escalating human casualties to a staggering figure of over 20 million. The propensity to kill people was so over-bearing that more than half of the world scientists and engineers during the cold-war, period consumed their 'creative' skills towards research and production of instruments of death. An Urdu poet of repute Akbar Allahabadi had lamented:

Jan hi leney ki hikmat mein taraqi dekhi

Maut ko roknay walla koi paida na howa

(All ingenuity was towards perfecting skill of killing human beings, none was born to arrest death)

Had the misdirected pursuits been channellised towards positive ends of health and happiness for humanity, the world would not have been as dangerous an abode to live as it is today. For the developing countries, the cold war epithet is hardly relevant and appropriate. There were hundred and twenty (120) conflicts of varying magnitude during this era, e.g., in Vietnam, Korea, Iran, Iraq, Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Somalia, Rwanda, India, Pakistan and others - all within the orbit of the Third World countries. Big powers, through a tacit understanding avoided coming to a frontal blow. Their 'stooges' were made to fight through proxy wars and skirmishes. After all, the affluence of the developed world maintained through massive arms trade was only possible if the developing nations served as their ever increasing market. Moreover, the salesmanship required that the lethality of sophisticated weapons are demonstrated on soils other than their own.

'Containment', says, Gaddis, is 'the term generally used to characterize American policy toward the Soviet Union during the post-war era, as a series of attempts to deal with the consequences of that World war II Faustian bargain: the idea has been to prevent the Soviet Union from using the power and position it won as a result of that conflict to reshape the post war international order, a prospect that has seemed, in the West, no less dangerous than what Germany and Japan might have done had they had the chance. George F. Kennan coined the term in July 1947, when he called publicly for a 'long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies'1. There was inherently a Machiavellian design contained in the Containment concept. Truman made no attempt to camouflage its crudeness and said it quite bluntly: 'If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help Russia and if Russia is winning we ought to help Germany and in that way let them kill as many as possible.'2. No wonder, as a natural concomitant to this dehumanized sensibility, peace remained elusive even though the war was won. A former ambassador to Soviet Union, William Bullitt, said it best in a 1948 Life magazine article entitled: 'How we won the war and lost the peace.'3

Doctrines and concepts, if conceived for the furtherance of power, dominance and hegemony can only serve as dissolvent of peace, and humane order. Containment served as an anti thesis to holistic nature of peace and security. The UNICEF in 1992 laid down a new paradigm for assessing progress of nations: 'The day will come when the progress of nations will be judged not by their military or economic strength, nor by the splendour of their capital cities and public buildings, but by the well-being of their peoples: by their levels of health, nutrition and education; by their opportunities to earn a fair reward for their labours; by their ability to participate in the decisions that affect their lives; by the respect that is shown for their civil and political liberties; by the provision that is made for those who are vulnerable and disadvantaged; and by the protection that is afforded to the growing minds and bodies of their children.'4

It is indeed a redeeming feature of the post-cold-war era, which took its birth on July 1, 1991, when the Soviet Union and its erstwhile satellites formally abrogated the Warsaw Pact, that search for alternative doctrines and constructs began, where geo-economics assumed a greater salience over geo-politics. Not completely by-passing the imperatives of military power, the geo-economics is conceived as a new arsenal to combat chaos and conflicts in the world. There is a marked realization that threat of weapons and arms - nuclear or otherwise, are not the only threats. No less volatile and dangerous are the threats such as poverty, ethnic and racial strifes, political instability, drug and environmental degradation.

The conflicts today, occur more among people within nations as opposed to conflicts between nations, as was the trend in the past. During the nineties there is a reawakening to what President Roosevelt, had very passionately proclaimed in the Congress of the United States, on January 6, 1941 - the Four Freedom Concept: Freedom of Speech, Worship and Freedom from Want and Fear. The last two freedoms have remained unfulfilled. He had elaborated these two as follows: 'The Third freedom from want which translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure every nation a healthy peace time life for its inhabitants - everywhere in the world.'5 'The fourth ... translated into world terms, means a world wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbour - anywhere in the world'.6

Freedom of Fear can only be ensured if disarmament is vigorously pursued and implemented in a non-discriminatory manner. Not only nuclear, chemical and biological weapons are to be feared, and recognized as 'immoral', but even the conventional weapons fall into the same category. The death toll in Hiroshima, as a consequences of the first savage demonstration of nuclear weapons was approximately 1,40,000 and added to this was 70,000 in Nagasaki - the total loss was around 2,10,000 of human lives. As per Human Development Report 1994, use of conventional weapons have been instrumental to deaths over 20 million.7 Light weapons, have contributed to the massive proliferation of terrorism. Availability of conventional and light weapons, have the inherent risk that where tensions and conflicts exist, these are likely to manifest in aggression and war.

Freedom of Want entails fulfilment of Fundamental Economic Rights as contained in the UN Charter. This is essentially a survival issue. Poverty, population pressures are the gravest challenges facing humanity. People are increasingly awakening to their basic and human rights and they cannot accept the 'status quo', which in essence, is an exploitative order. They rise in rebellion to the kind we have seen in Chechnya, Bosnia, Kosovo, Palestine and Kashmir. The ruthless rulers have a pathological predilection to suppress through brutal violence. But it is increasingly becoming a patent reality that military interventions compound problems. They do not resolve them. The world is now moving fast towards regionalization, globalization and integration. There constructs are not impositions, but fundamental imperatives of a new paradigm of existence, which places premium on peace and prosperity of nations. It is a new vision which hopefully aims to salvage humanity from the debilitating and morbid impact of hegemonistic constructs like confrontation and containment. These are flickers of hope and there is a light at the end of the tunnel. This is a parting gift of the ongoing century, which has had a nightmarish impact on the minds of the people of the impoverished world.

Peace and prosperity - necessary adjuncts to each other - are built on the solid rock of cooperation. Nations therefore, cognizant of the imperatives of geo-economic compulsions, deemed it expedient to shun their narrow shell like national identities to coalesce into wider regional economic groupings. Gaining economic resilience required mustering of a collective force. The European countries got themselves interwoven into European Union (EU). They even went steps ahead to integrate themselves into a cohesive economic community with the glue of a common currency. Nations who develop an attitudinal predisposition to construct infrastructure of a network of communication and a facilitative climate of growth, hardly ever go to war with each other. Europe, ravaged through two horrendous world wars, learnt it a hard way, the futility of living atomized existence and breeding ethnocentric prejudices and hatred against each other. EU-idea is a strategic leap forward toward a new dimension of security - the economic deterrence.

As evil often tends to become contagious, positive and bright ideas have inherent propensity to produce snow-ball effects. Regionalization of nations was one such idea. It is a basic intermediary step towards globalization, which is the final destiny of humankind. The emergence of North American Free Trade Arrangement (NAFTA) is a regional bloc, comprising USA, Canada and Mexico. Attempts are in hand to bring in some Latin American countries within its fold and a wider western Hemisphere grouping is in the offing. Concurrently the US President Clinton, realizing the immense economic potential of the countries around the Pacific region comprising around two billion people, took a bold initiative to integrate America into partnership with the Pacific community, where over forty percent of the international trade occurs and is the lucrative abode half of the world's total production and services. Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) was thus a giant step towards economic integration. Atlantic and the Pacific regions had thus become the hub centres of economic bonanza. It was but inevitable that Indian Ocean countries would also seize the opportunity to bring into effect a collective bloc. The time for this idea had came, and the organization called the Indian Ocean Rim Association for Regional Cooperation (IORAC) ultimately came into being in 1995, but the idea was first mooted by South African Foreign Minister in 1993. Although it was a brilliant idea but crudely executed. In the first inter-governmental conference in March 1995, the seven countries participated and they became the Founder Members - Mauritius, Australia, South Africa, India, Oman, Kenya and Singapore. An exclusive club approach was adopted, which is grossly incongruent to a cooperative paradigm. The membership was extended to fourteen countries in the subsequent meeting at Mauritius in May 1996, and the new countries admitted were Indonesia, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mozambique, Sri Lanka, Tanzania and Yemen.

It is indeed revealing and also ironical that India did not recommend Pakistan from the South Asian conglomeration of nations. It opted for Sri Lanka, as every member among the seven Founders, had the right to select only one from its region. The inclusion of Sri Lanka was indeed a wise step, but to leave Pakistan, Iran, Bangladesh and the rest, was a strategic blunder, as it would contribute to misgivings and apprehensions and sow seeds of dissent. In the first place, the very modality of selecting or nominating a country is repugnant to democratic ethos and values. The propriety demanded that an 'inclusive' approach should have been adhered to from the very beginning to promote greater integration and forging a climate of trust, which is a basic pre-requisite to galvanizing nations into becoming a community of achievers. India's obsession for hegemony, and exhibiting a dominating posture, is the road-block to Indian Ocean Rim Countries' prosperity and progress, despite its vast potentials to be in step with the Atlantic and Pacific nations. A number of countries in the Indian Ocean Rim expressed their willingness to include Pakistan and other left over countries, but for India's authoritarian defiance and obduracy the expansion idea could not get through. It is time that India is made to realize that through its intransigent approach it will deprive the people of the region of the colossal dividends of economic cooperation. Just as non-governmental organizations - the academic and business networks - named the Indian Ocean Research Network (IORN) and the Indian Ocean Rim Consultative Business Network (IORCBN) in the Track Two sphere, are broad-based and inclusive the Track I should reflect the same spirit. The exclusive mind-set which is restricted only to fourteen members, living close to fifty littoral and land-locked countries is a retrogressive step and must be dispensed with the earliest.

The land-locked countries need special deal. The sea has so far dominated in determining the affluence of nations around its rim. It is reported that approximately 95% of global trade is carried out through the sea.8 The Great Game was essentially very selective in sharing affluence. It is time that the destiny of land locked countries be changed through constructing infrastructures like roads and railways and linking them with the rim countries. Relevant in this context is the idea of strategic linkage with Eurasian Continental Bridge, which has been elaborately spelt out in my monograph - China and the Post Cold War Paradigm in Asia by General Beg, during his address at 21st Century Forum at Beijing, China.9

In the end one would like to reiterate what