BEING in the US capital for the past week and that too in the company of scholars and academicians, the prospect of an attack on Iran does not appear as unlikely as it did from Islamabad where the conventional wisdom is that the Americans are much too wise to invite another disaster. This, however, is not the view of those whose job it is to monitor these developments.

There are those who point to the increasingly provocative statements of senior administration officials including President Bush and Vice-President Cheney. An incident in Karbala in which five American soldiers were kidnapped and killed by unidentified persons led to the charge that the operation was carried out by Iranian agents. Speaking to CBS, Bush warned that the Iranian behaviour was “unacceptable”. Subsequently, US forces raided an Iranian consular office in Erbil and arrested officials working there on the charge that they were somehow involved in the killing of the Americans.

The Iraqi foreign minister confirmed that the Iranians should have been released as they enjoyed diplomatic status. But Cheney accused Iran of “fishing in troubled waters”, while the National Security Council chief Stephen Hadley warned that “we are going to have to deal with what Iran is doing inside Iraq…it is supplying elements in Iraq that are attacking Iraqis and our forces.”

At the same time, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice repeated Washington’s charge that Iran was involved in the manufacture of high-explosive devices and warned “that’s going to be dealt with”. Cheney said that the US would not allow Iran to become a power in the Middle East, claiming that countries of the region, including Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Israel, were most “worried”. He characterised the Iranian threat as “growing” and called it “multi-dimensional”.

The truth is that the US has not forgotten the setback it suffered with the ouster of the Shah, nor has it forgiven the Islamic regime for the humiliation that it underwent when the US embassy was captured by students and its diplomats held hostage for well over a year. More importantly, the neo-cons have always looked at Iran as the villain in the region and advocated punitive measures against it, including the need for a regime change.

This attitude was reinforced with Tehran pursuing a nuclear programme, even though Iranian leaders have repeatedly said that it is for peaceful purposes. The West doubts these assurances and fears that Iran is pursuing the nuclear weapon option not only to deter any American adventure, but also to enhance its regional influence.

President Ahmadinejad and his intemperate and injudicious statements, especially in the context of Israel and the holocaust, have strengthened the impression that Iran is on a collision course with the West as well as with its neighbours.

Admittedly, many countries, including those in the West and among Iran’s neighbours are worried about what Iran may be up to in its nuclear programme, but others are increasingly concerned with the manner in which the US has been increasing pressure on Iran. Russia and China have publicly advocated negotiations, expressing the fear that Washington’s anxiety to “punish” Iran would be counter-productive.

But it was President Chirac who did the unexpected when he remarked that the world would have to learn to live with a nuclear Iran. Even though Paris immediately issued a clarification, Chirac’s remark reflected what some arms experts have been saying for some years. According to Hubert Vedrine, a former French foreign minister, Chirac was reflecting the view that “a country that possesses the bomb does not use it, but automatically enters the system of deterrence and doesn’t take absurd risks.”

Interestingly, some scholars in the US have acknowledged that Iran may eventually have a nuclear weapon or at least the technology and components to assemble one. Two US government-financed scholars at the National Defence University had warned last year in their report that “despite its rhetoric, it (the US) may have no choice” but to live with a nuclear Iran, because the cost of rolling back Tehran’s nuclear programme “may be higher than the costs of deterring and containing a nuclear Iran.”

The one exception to this has been Israel. Credible western journals are reporting that Israel has urged the US to undertake action against Iran warning that its failure to do so would force it to carry out the mission itself. According to Britain’s Sunday Times, Israel has drawn up plans to destroy Iran’s enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons on Natanz, using low-yield nuclear “bunker busters”. A heavy water plant at Arak and a uranium conversion plant at Isfahan would also be targeted with conventional bombs.

The question is: why would the Bush administration want to undertake an adventure against Iran when its forces are mired in Iraq and its policies in the region have created strong anti-US sentiments? First of all, Iran has become the new fall guy for US failure in Iraq. The new refrain is that the US is not winning in Iraq because of interference by Iran. There are also some neo-cons who believe that the administration can achieve victory in Iran on the “cheap”. This would be doubly advantageous to the US, which would thereafter be able to “bury” the defeat in Iraq in the shroud of a victory in Iran.

Regrettably, the conservative Arab regimes have been so frightened by US-inspired scenarios of disaster that they too want Iran to be cut down to size. Consequently, they have become enthusiastic advocates of a pre-emptive US strike on Iran. Saudi King Abdullah has issued a veiled warning to Iran to cease what he said were efforts to spread Shiaism in the Arab world. He indirectly accused Tehran of exploiting the Israeli-Palestinian issue, saying that Arabs alone should resolve the conflict. “We don’t want anyone to trade in our issues and become stronger through them,” he warned.

This is most unfortunate, because notwithstanding US propaganda, Tehran has been willing to accommodate genuine American interest in the region. It is now known that in early 2003, Iran sent the US a message offering to work together to catch terrorists, stabilise Iraq, resolve the nuclear stand-off, end support for Hamas and Hezbollah and to moderate its own policy on Israel. But this offer was reportedly spurned.

There is no doubt that US failure in Iraq and now its unbridled ambition to punish Iran has destroyed its main claim to respect i.e. the desire to promote democracy in the Middle East. That is at best a fading dream now, abandoned in the searing sands of Mesopotamia. A painful reminder of this was Secretary Rice’s recent trip through the region where the word “democracy” was avoided by her. Instead, it was all a throwback to the theme postulated by the practitioner of realpolitik, Dr Henry Kissinger.

Ms Rice’s mission was to build a new coalition of the region’s conservative monarchies and autocracies, the same states which only a couple of years ago were under pressure to open up their social and political systems to accommodate the US desire for a more democratic polity.

Gary Sick, an expert on Iran, has argued that the US return to the balance-of-power game of the earlier decades was designed to create an informal anti-Iran alliance of the US, Israel and conservative Arab regimes in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states.

This appears attractive to an administration that is wallowing in the failure of its Iraq policy because it provides a charade of legitimacy to whatever the US finally decides to do in Iran. It also allows Israel to enter the Arab mainstream, even if through the backdoor. It reduces pressure on the US to use its influence on Israel to honour the Palestinian “roadmap” and deflects attention from US failure in Iraq.

All these reasons appear to make a powerful case for maintaining a US policy of hostility towards Iran, but the reality is a little more complicated. True, Iran has been the main beneficiary of the ouster of Saddam regime, especially with the likelihood of Iraq gaining a strong Shia-oriented government. But this does not necessarily translate into a pro-Iran puppet regime in Baghdad. Even if many of Iraq’s current Shia leaders have old linkages with Iran, they are strong nationalists as well. Nor is there any evidence of Iran wanting to play “the Shia card” in the Arab countries. In fact, the strong and generous support being extended to Hamas clearly demonstrates Tehran’s willingness to support nationalist causes, irrespective of sectarian considerations.

What then are Washington’s real intentions? Some of the scholars that I met this week are reassured by the fact that the administration is divided on this issue. Cheney and the neo-cons are pushing for a surgical strike on Iran, for they are convinced that Iran represents a serious and growing threat to US interests in a critical part of the world.

They also believe that it is only they who have the will to undertake this mission and that the Democrats, who may occupy the White House two years from now, are incapable of strong action. These elements are looking at “history” to absolve them of the Iraq failure. They point to Israel’s 1981 strike on the nuclear reactor in Iraq, which was severely criticised when it did take place but is now credited with having saved the world from a much larger threat, as an encouraging precedent.

But all these reasons pale in comparison to what truly motivates the neo-cons. To them, the only thing that matters is Iran’s destruction, whatever the pretence. As former national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski suggested some time ago that Washington’s anti-Iranian claims are to prepare a case for a US military strike on Iran. He added the attack would be camouflaged as “defensive”.

However, the Iraq fiasco has made everyone far more cautious. Not only do the neo-cons stand discredited, but within the administration people like Defence Secretary Robert Gates are advocating restraint. The Democrats, too, are making it clear that they will not allow the White House to bludgeon them into submission.

It is incumbent on Pakistan to impress on both Washington and Tehran the need for a responsible and restrained approach. But it is on Washington that the Pakistani leadership must use its influence to warn of the horrible global consequences of such an attack. The blowback from such an attack could make life much more difficult for the US and its allies in the region and inflame sentiments in virtually all Muslim countries and increase anti-American sentiments globally. As President Chirac has argued Iran must not be humiliated and isolated but encouraged to become a positive regional player.

The writer is a former ambassador.

IT is not India's economy which is reportedly overheating; it is democracy as well. There is some election or the other and preparations for it going on practically all year round. Four states are going to the polls this month and in April.

It was more or less the same number last year and there will be an equal number in 2008. These elections are in addition to the ones for corporations, municipalities and panchayats. The biggest is the Lok Sabha poll due in two years' time.

In a way, the country is engaged in voting every six months. True, it indicates the people's participation in choosing their representatives at every tier of governance. But it also means that the nation does not settle down to work. Too many polls are becoming a constant digression, besides being an inordinate expense. On an average, a candidate spends one crore rupees in a state election. The Lok Sabha constituency may cost around seven to eight times more. Government expenditure on polls is separate.

The country must ponder the suggestion made by Vice-President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat that elections to parliament and the state assemblies should be held simultaneously. This was the general practice three decades ago. Then politics crept in. The Congress-led centre dismissed the first communist government in Kerala. Under the constitution, an assembly has to meet every six months. This necessitated an election. A combination of opposition parties brought down the government in some other states. The Lok Sabha faced a similar situation less than a decade ago when the BJP government failed to get a vote of confidence.

Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's Principal Secretary, P.N. Haksar, a political person, claimed to have separated the state and parliamentary elections. His argument was that central issues should be discussed at the national level and state ones at the state level. But this did not happen as political parties did not want to do so. Political parties have their own set of prejudices and preferences which they articulate -- that is what they call the election plank.

The experience shows that local issues have come to dominate in one form or the other. The calibre of the candidates is increasingly coming into the picture. Yet caste and money are becoming big factors. The BJP is also playing the religious card. An appeal to Hindutva sentiments has won them municipalities in 10 cities, including the prestigious one in Mumbai. The UP, the biggest battleground, is already witnessing the role of religion. What has happened in Gorakhpur, a fairly big town in the state, is probably a curtain-raiser of what may take place until the state goes to the polls in April.

Still, India is a fascinating study in contrasts, not only in the field of economics but also in the social arena. Pluralism and parochialism live side by side in a society where tolerance is a way of life, but which is also marred by disturbances of a gruesome nature and along religious lines.

Only recently a Hindu priest got his 20-year-old adopted Muslim daughter to marry at a temple in the heart of Ahmedabad where hundreds of Muslims had been killed under a government-supported plan a few years ago. The wedding took place according to Muslim rites and there was namaz inside the temple. The bridegroom's father was so impressed that he asked the priest to look for spouses for his two daughters.

Yet India's pluralistic image is shattered every now and then. In the last few months, there has been a recurrence of communal violence at places like Jabalpur, Bangalore, Thrissur in Kerala and Mandsur in Madhya Pradesh. There is no doubt that the RSS is reviving its policy of dividing the country into Hindus and Muslims during the birth centenary of its fundamentalist leader Golwalkar. For example, the bomb attacks outside mosques, like the one at Nanded, are given out as “the only way of safeguarding Hindutva”. But to add to India's woes, Muslim fundamentalists have also begun emerging and indulging in violence, as was seen in Bangalore.

The purpose of the RSS-BJP combine is understandable. What Muslim fundamentalists are doing is beyond me. The vandalism at Bangalore to voice protest against the execution of Saddam Hussein was senseless. Such incidents indicate extra-territorial sentiments. They revive the sterile debate of whether a Muslim is first a Muslim and then an Indian or the other way round. So dangerous is this trend that its repercussions can be too terrible to comprehend.

India's claim that it has no indigenous terrorists has already been falsified. Whether the Mumbai blasts are responsible for this situation or whether the Gujarat killings have made some elements of Muslim youth desperate is not as relevant as the fact that a crop of local militants has come up. If this kind of militancy is going to seek connections abroad it would only play into the hands of the RSS and similar communal organisataions. It would kill the very spirit of nationalism and unity.

That Muslims face discrimination in employment, education and economic development is a reality as the Sachar Commission brought out in great detail. Despite bureaucratic opposition, some of the commission's recommendations are bound to be implemented, particularly when the ministry for minorities is headed by a Muslim. The dangerous development is that the prejudice of some Hindus is giving birth to a pernicious theory about Muslim identity. Once that takes root, the thesis of separation begins to gain credence. India has already paid the price in the shape of the killing of hundreds of thousands of Hindus and Muslims during partition and hatred continues to smoulder.

The Muslims should remember that the sufferings and indignities which they have undergone or are still undergoing have something to do with the government's acts of omission or commission. But to confuse the government with the country is suicidal. The government can be thrown out through the ballot box. But the harm done to the country is irretrievable.

Twelve centuries have passed since Islam came to India. It has as much claim on the soil of India as Hinduism. If Hinduism has been the religion of the people here for several thousands of years, Islam has also been there for more than 1,000 years. Hindus and Muslims are Indians who share deep bonds of brotherhood and nationhood. There is no other identity than being an Indian.

Tailpiece: The wife of an Indian diplomat posted in Pakistan during the days of the demolition of the Babri Masjid was requested by her gardener to bring him a small replica of the Taj Mahal when she next visited India. She was curious to know why he had made the request all of a sudden. The gardener said: “Who knows, you people may one day demolish even the Taj Mahal!”

The writer is a leading columnist based in New Delhi.