Copyright by Patrick Dean Bunch 2012
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Copyright by Patrick Dean Bunch 2012 The Thesis Committee for Patrick Dean Bunch Certifies that this is the approved version of the following thesis: DELIBERATE UNCERTAINTY: The South Asian Crisis of 1971, the Nixon White House, and the U.S. State Department. APPROVED BY SUPERVISING COMMITTEE: Supervisor: GAIL MINAULT JEREMI SURI DELIBERATE UNCERTAINTY: The South Asian Crisis of 1971, the Nixon White House, and the U.S. State Department. by Patrick Dean Bunch, B.A. Thesis Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Masters of Arts The University of Texas at Austin August 2012 Abstract DELIBERATE UNCERTAINTY: The South Asian Crisis of 1971, the Nixon White House, and the U.S. State Department. Patrick Dean Bunch, M.A. The University of Texas at Austin, 2012 Supervisor: Gail Minault This thesis focuses on the events surrounding the South Asia Crisis of 1971, beginning in when the Pakistani government launched its military crack-down in East Pakistan in the spring and extending to the conclusion of the Indo-Pak War by the year’s end. It examines how President Nixon’s administration and the US State Department viewed the events in South Asia, what they saw as being the appropriate response, and the differences in what they thought the US should do in response to what was happening on the other side of the globe. The analysis will reveal that the President and his primary foreign policy advisor, Dr. Kissinger, deliberately misled and misinformed the US State Department and its Ambassadors abroad in Pakistan and India in an effort to keep secret from them and the American public, the President’s desire to support Pakistan and to blame India as the source of the conflict. The resulting confusion and iv misunderstanding by the diplomatic community raised tensions in the region, lengthened the conflict, and weakened America’s credibility in the sub-continent. v Table of Contents Chapter 1 Introduction………………………………………………………… 1 Chapter 2 Background………………………………………………………….4 Chapter 3 President Nixon vs. the State Department…………………………..9 Chapter 4 The "Dissident Cables"……………………………………………..18 Chapter 5 Nixon's Tilt toward Pakistan………………………………………..25 Chapter 6 Blame India………………………………………………………….34 Chapter 7 USS Enterprise and Task Force 74…………………………………40 Chapter 8 Analysis…………………………………………………………….53 Appendix A: Chronology of Events……………………………………………..61 Appendix B: Historical Figures…………………………………………………..62 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………...63 Chapter 1 Introduction This thesis focuses on the events surrounding the South Asia Crisis of 1971, beginning in when the Pakistani government launched its military crack-down in East Pakistan in March of 1971 and extending to the conclusion of the Indo-Pak War by the year’s end. Specifically, examining how President Nixon’s administration and the members of the US State Department viewed the events in South Asia, what they saw as being the appropriate response to those events, and how they differed in what they thought the US should do in response to what was happening on the other side of the globe. My analysis will reveal that the President and his primary foreign policy advisor, Dr. Kissinger, deliberately misled and misinformed the US State Department and its Ambassadors abroad in Pakistan and India. All in an effort to keep secret from the public President Nixon’s preference for supporting Pakistan, who was assisting the President’s efforts to re-establish relations with China, and his desire to blame India, with whom the President had a long history of animosity, as the source of the conflict. The resulting confusion and misunderstanding by the diplomatic community raised tensions in the region, lengthened the conflict, and weakened America’s credibility in the sub-continent. Foreign Policy making is one of the primary responsibilities of the Chief Executive officer of the United States government, the President. The American President as both the Head of State and Chief Executive is charged by the Constitution as the primary diplomat for US foreign relations with other nations. But the modern Presidency is assisted in conducting foreign affairs by the professional diplomatic corps serving with the US State Department. These Ambassadors, Consul-Generals, and Foreign Service Officers assist and carryout numerous diplomatic and administrative functions for the US government, it’s citizens abroad, and foreign nationals seeking to study, work, and visit the United States. 1 How each President has conducted his administration’s foreign affairs has varied based on personal preference, natural inclinations, and political accommodations. One of the most controversial Presidents in recent history was Richard M. Nixon. Although best-known for abdicating the Presidency following the Watergate investigation in 1973, President Nixon’s term in office was actually very successful in terms of foreign policy advancements. Those included the ending of American involvement in the war in Vietnam, the opening of diplomatic relations with Communist China, and the beginning of strategic arms talks with the Soviet Union. Most of these successes were conducted primarily by the President and his closest advisor, Dr. Henry Kissinger. The State Department’s diplomatic corps generally played only a minor role during these negotiations. President Nixon, having served as Vice President under President Eisenhower, had a long and established distrust of the State Department’s professional corps of academic and intellectual experts. Preferring direct talks and personal contact over the traditional diplomatic negotiation techniques, the President ignored the established Foreign Service officer corps. The resulting conduct of foreign policy during his administration left the State Department largely out of the loop. The resulting lack of communication and direction presented difficulties and confusion for both the American diplomats serving abroad and within the foreign nations where they were serving. One of the most glaring examples of this was during the first Nixon administration dealing with the South Asian Crisis of 1971. Also known as the Bangladesh Liberation War, the Bengali-dominated eastern province of Pakistan broke away from the control of the central Pakistan government with the assistance of India. Faced with the threat to the stability of one of America’s primary allies in South Asia, President Nixon worked hard to ensure that the official US policy was to support Pakistan. Unfortunately, the world press was largely sympathetic 2 toward the Bengalis’ efforts to gain their independence. The result was an American administration that publicly supported the non-democratic Pakistani government, as it sought to crush their own Bengali citizens. The wealth of transcripts and official State Department cables reveal a Foreign Service that was deliberately kept in the dark concerning the administration’s policy during the crisis, and a White House determined to ‘Tilt’ America’s support toward Pakistan regardless of the cost in public or international credibility. 3 Chapter 2 Background to the South Asian Crisis If the story of the birth of Bangladesh has to start somewhere, then it should be the year 1947, when India was formally granted independence from London and partitioned into the nations of India and Pakistan. Unfortunately for Pakistan, its territory consisted of two widely separated eastern and western sections, split by over a thousand miles of India between them. The people of these two halves had very little in common aside from sharing the Muslim faith. Both wings of the country were made up of distinct cultures and spoke distinct and separate languages. The founder of Pakistan, the ‘Great Leader’ Mohammad Ali Jinnah sought to use one single language for the state as a means to link the divided halves of his new nation together. But let me make it very clear to you that the language of Pak is going to be Urdu and no other language. Anyone who tries to mislead you is really the enemy of Pak. Without one state language, no nation can remain tied up solidly together and function.1 He was not successful, and the imposition of a foreign language on the Bengali-speaking Eastern Pakistanis was not well received. Within four years the first clashes between West and East would result in the first deaths between these countrymen, as the Bengalis protested against the perceived cultural domination by the western Punjabi-lead government in West Pakistan. Over the next two decades, tension continued to grow between the two halves of the nation, formally called East Pakistan with its capital in Dhaka, and West Pakistan which built a new national capital in Islamabad. Eventually, political tensions enabled a military junta led by General Ayub Khan to overthrow the weak civilian leadership and establish Martial Law. General Yahya Khan, the second soldier to hold the title and post of Chief Marital Law 1 Husain, Syed S. What was once East Pakistan. (Karachi, Pakistan: Oxford University Press,2010), 78. 4 Administrator, was not warmly welcomed by his eastern countrymen and failed to manage the growing political split between the two halves of the nation. Troubles for the nation peaked following the disaster of the Bhola Cyclone which slammed into East Pakistan in November of 1970. Estimated casualties ranged from three hundred thousand to half a million, with many more suffering from Islamabad’s ineffective and desultory