AT THE BRINK

Indian troops are massed along the Kashmir frontier, ready for what Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee calls the “decisive battle.” Pakistani troops are massed along to other side of the frontier, abandoning for now the fight against al-Qaida. Both states are rattling their nukes; Pakistan is conducting highly publicized tests of its ballistic missiles.

This is brinkmanship of the highest degree. Neither side can want war, certainly neither can view nuclear war with anything other than horror. But human history is littered with wars not wanted but nonetheless stumbled into.

This conflict is rooted in the decades-old dispute over the territory of Kashmir, which is only theoretically under Indian control, but the current crisis is propelled by terrorism. India claims Kashmir is home base to Muslim extremists conducting terrorist attacks against its people, that Pakistan aids these extremists by allowing training camps within its borders and that Pakistani President Pervez Musharaff has reneged on his promise to crack down.

India’s strategy here is transparent. By talking war of the most unthinkable kind, it hopes the United States will pressure President Musharaff, America’s post-September 11 ally, into eradicating the terrorist camps. If not, India will believe it is entitled to launch raids against them.

This strategy assumes the United States can get quick action from President Musharaff and that, if not, India’s raids can be kept to surgical precision. The risks, given the way wars stumbled into can spiral out of control, are obvious.

President Musharaff counts upon his new stature as America’s friend to compel direct U.S. involvement in the Kashmir dispute. If this strategy fails and war erupts – even limited, non-nuclear war – the domestically shaky Musharaff regime, and perhaps Pakistan itself, will almost certainly be among the casualties.

The challenge to the Bush administration is daunting – with the Israeli-Palestinian crisis out of control and the war in Afghanistan still raging, another conflict with the Muslim world cannot be sustained. There are, however, glimmers of hope. Both sides have said they will not initiate war, but will only respond to aggression. India reacted to the Pakistani missile tests with a certain dismissive tone, characterizing them as mere showboating for public consumption.

America’s task is not to resolve the Kashmir dispute, but to get India and Pakistan to stand down long enough to resolve it themselves. President Musharaff has chosen before between civilization and terrorism – if handled diplomatically yet bluntly, he will make the right choice again. Prime Minister Vajpayee has indicated his willingness to accept visible progress against terrorism as the alternative to a knock-out blow. With steady guidance from the United States, surely both leaders can see that the brink is no place to be.