By M D Nalapat
India-US
joint intervention in the Maldivian crisis would enhance the
credibility of the two militaries as the lead force for stability and
justice in the entire Indo-Pacific.
From
the start of his misrule, it was obvious that Maldivian head of state
Abdulla Yameen cared not a whit for democracy. Using the power of the
executive, he managed through complicit officials to cobble together a
majority in Parliament through expelling several members.
Subsequently, Yameen has steadily and
stealthily been seeking to promote radicals in their effort to Wahhabize
the Maldives, the way President R.T. Erdogan is doing in the Turkey by
overturning the moderate ethos of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, slowly
replacing it with a system infused with Wahhabi ideology dressed up in
camouflage. Mohamed Nasheed, who was removed from office as President of
the Maldives by Yameen and a group of Wahhabi camp followers in the
police and military, is opposed to religious extremism, and this is the
“crime”
for
which he was punished with prison and exile. Chief Justice Abdulla
Saeed of the Supreme Court showed unusual spine in declaring the
obvious, that the disqualification of several anti-Yameen legislators
was mala fide. Instead of accepting the Rule of Law, Yameen has used the
Law of the Jungle to imprison CJM Saeed. Shamefully for the
institution, his terrified brother justices have overturned his
judgement, “because President Yameen asked for it”. The “law” in the
Maldives is clearly what Wahabbist Abdulla Yameen wants it to be. Even
former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom has been jailed. Given the deep
pockets of the Wahhabi International, it is no surprise that the
radicalising military and police forces on the Indian Ocean nation are
backing the Wahhabist Yameen, rather than the Rule of Law as represented
by the verdict of the Chief Justice of the Maldivian Supreme Court.
It is clear that the individual legally
entitled to remain the President of the Maldives is Nasheed, rather than
the usurper Yameen. That being so, the call by Actual President Nasheed
for India to assist in removing Usurper President Yameen from power is
legal and within the full ambit of international law read in a
democratic manner. China, of course, has called for “restraint”, not on
the part of Yameen, but on the part of those powers alarmed at the
destruction of democracy in the Maldives. Were India to accept Beijing’s
advice and not act, it would be clear to all the countries of the
Indo-Pacific that Modi-led India’s backing for full sea and air access
and sovereignty of all the powers within the Indo-Pacific is worth
tuppence. Just as in 1988, there needs to be kinetic assistance given to
those in the Maldives who are battling to retrieve the moderation and
democracy that the island nation was for so long known. If police and
military units on the island remain captive to the Wahhabi International
and oppose India’s “Responsibility to Protect” intervention, they need
to be dealt with ruthlessly. Some NATO member states may look askance at
a Third World country doing what they believe is the exclusive
prerogative of the “Herrenvolk” (i.e. themselves). President Donald J.
Trump is however likely to prevail over the Clinton holdovers within the
US bureaucracy and back democracy in Male by ensuring that US forces in
the Indian Ocean join hands with their Indian counterparts in
Operation “Restore Democracy” in the Maldives. The exigencies of
geopolitics has made both India and the US military allies, and joint
intervention in the Maldivian crisis
on the basis of the request for such
action by Actual President Nasheed would be a useful spur to greater
cooperation between the two militaries in the future. Such an operation
would enhance the credibility of the two militaries as the lead force
for stability and justice in the entire Indo-Pacific. Once the Usurper
President gets replaced in the seat of power by the Actual President,
the latter could hold elections within 18 months, thereby giving the
people of the Maldives an opportunity to vote for either Wahhabism or
the moderate ethos of genuine Islam, vote for either the freedoms of a
moderate democracy or the straitjacket of a Wahabbi autocracy. On
retaking office, President Nasheed must remove the police and military
officials, who have subverted the Rule of Law by disobeying the Chief
Justice of the Supreme Court, and send them to exile rather than to
prison. As for China, the country’s Communist Party is nothing if not
pragmatic, and a return of the ousted leader is certain to be followed
by overtures to him from Beijing.
The Indo-Pacific has by now far
outstripped the Atlantic Ocean as the primary pivot of the 21st century,
despite efforts by the East Coast establishment in the US together with
some NATO member states to pretend the opposite, that the Atlantic
Ocean is still as dominant in global commerce and diplomacy as was the
case in the half-century after 1945. To fulfil its natural role as the
lead actor in the coalition ensuring security and access within the
eastern side of the Indo-Pacific the way the US still is in the western
reaches, there needs to be effective action besides verbal protestations
of intent and capability. The Lutyens Zone ensured that India took a
pass in the global war on ISIS from 2014 to the present by refusing to
kinetically join either of the coalitions battling the terror group,
that led by the US or the other led by Russia and Iran. Ideally, India
should have joined both the Moscow-Tehran-Damascus forces (in Syria) and
the
Washington-Baghdad partnership (in Iraq),
thereby preserving strategic independence from what may be called “New
Cold War” considerations.
This New Cold War is yet another
consequence of Atlanticist logic, and has the US and some of its allies
facing off against Russia and China in multiple theatres. In 1988, the
Lutyens Zone warned Rajiv Gandhi against intervention in the Maldives,
but the then Prime Minister went ahead, thereby boosting India’s
reliability as a partner. Now that another call for intervention from
the elected authority of the Maldives has come, Narendra Modi needs to
show the same resolve as Rajiv Gandhi did, by ensuring that Yameen-led
Wahhabis are stopped from blocking the democratic rights and freedoms of
the Maldivian people, more than 95% of whom share with 98% of their
Muslim counterparts in India the divine qualities of modernity and
moderation. Should the Modi government fail this test of will, none in
the Indo-Pacific will take seriously India’s boast of being an effective
and reliable partner.
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