Al-Qaeda Seeks to Heighten South Asian Tensions, Gates Warns

Asian Defense News: An al-Qaeda-linked terrorist strike in South Asia could lead to another military conflict between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned today (see GSN, Dec. 17, 2009).

A handful of organizations within a regional al-Qaeda "syndicate" aim "to destabilize not just Afghanistan, not just Pakistan, but potentially the whole region by provoking a conflict perhaps between India and Pakistan through some provocative act," Gates told reporters in New Delhi, according to Agence France-Presse.
"It's important to recognize the magnitude of the threat that the entire region faces," he added, saying the al-Qaeda "umbrella" included the Taliban groups in Pakistan and Afghanistan was well as the Pakistani-based extremist organization Lashkar-e-Taiba, which is believed to have masterminded the 2008 terror attack on the Indian city of Mumbai (Agence France-Presse/Sydney Morning Herald, Jan. 20).
"It's dangerous to single out any one of these groups and say, 'If we can beat that group, that will solve the problem,' because they are in effect a syndicate of terrorist operators intended to destabilize this entire region," Gates said. He argued that "a victory for one" of the organizations "is a victory for all," the Associated Press reported.
New Delhi and Islamabad have already gone to war three times. While they successfully avoided additional violence following the Mumbai strike, another such incident could stretch New Delhi's tolerance over militant groups based in Pakistan, Gates cautioned: "It is not unreasonable to assume that Indian patience would be limited were there another attack."
Gates' stop in New Delhi included talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other senior leaders (see GSN, Dec. 10, 2009; Anne Gearan, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, Jan. 20).
Washington is "pretty confident of our intelligence-sharing relationship," one high-level U.S. official told the Washington Post, adding it was going to take a collective effort to dismantle and defeat" the terrorist groups (Craig Whitlock, Washington Post, Jan. 19).

Taiwan Needs F-16s

Asian Defense News: (By Michael Mazza) The recent announcement that the United States will sell PAC-3s to Taiwan was good news for Taipei. Taiwan continues to face an ever-growing ballistic missile threat from the mainland and the PAC-3 anti-ballistic missile system is an important component of Taiwan’s air defenses. Though the Obama administration should be applauded for including PAC-3 batteries in upcoming arms sales to the island, the arms sales package is not as robust as it should be.
In particular, F-16s, which Taiwan has requested, are missing from the mix. It is not only with missiles that China poses a threat to Taiwan, but with fighter aircraft as well. According to DOD’s 2009 report to Congress on China’s military power, Taiwan no longer enjoys the ability to achieve air dominance over the Taiwan Strait, as it did at the beginning of this century.
Faced with the dual threat of growing numbers of SRBMs and increasingly sophisticated fighter aircraft, Taiwan risks becoming more susceptible to coercion by force even as it tightens ties to the mainland. The Taiwan Relations Act requires the United States to provide Taiwan with the means to defend itself; in order to fulfill that legal obligation, the administration should authorize the sale of F-16s to Taiwan.
China would of course react unfavorably, but we cannot let fears of Chinese temper tantrums drive U.S. policy. Indeed, history shows that such arms sales would not do irreparable or lasting damage to Sino-U.S. relations. The sale of F-16s to Taiwan would, however, help to ensure the island’s continued de facto independence and would demonstrate American resolve and dependability to allies in the region. Some Chinese blustering would be a small price to pay in the pursuit of these important U.S. interests.
Michael Mazza is a research assistant at the American Enterprise Institute.