Rajpal's Column

31st May 1998

Nuclear bomb and unclear conscience

By Rajpal Abeynayake

The world reac tion to India's nuclear ambitions will no doubt be analysed until the cows come home. Its the Sri Lankan reaction that seems under- analysed. Sri Lanka's foreign policy, according to South bloc pundits, can be summed up in one sentence: Sri Lanka's foreign policy is Sri Lanka's India stand . The state of our relations with India at a given time defines the state of our foreign relations.

Foreign Minister Kadirgamar's reaction to India's bombshell nuclear test, now probably more than ever underlines that pragmatism drives Sri Lanka's contemporary foreign policy juggernaut.

Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar may not like the idea that his foreign policy is defined as one of pragmatism, or better still, one of expediency. Expediency is usually a dirty word. Former Prime Minister S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike was described in a book written by a foreign biographer ( if memory serves me right ) as the expedient democrat. That was the time when the word expediency was meant as the most damning put down; when the word was almost always used in that terrible pejorative sense.

In the realpolitik of today, expediency is not such a dirty word after all. In these times, politicians sometimes earn merit, and real praise, for being expedient.

For instance, Yasser Arafat was certainly judged to be expedient when he backtracked from his hardline stance on Palestinian demands, when he found that the backing he got from the USSR for his cause disappeared with the demise of the Soviet Union. So, he got smart, and reached a compromise with the Israelis transmogrifying himself from terrorist to non- terrorist instantly, because the funds for his fight had dried up. But, for that transformation, he earned himself the Nobel Prize for peace.

Expediency was pejoratively defined as a lack of principles, but in today's pragmatic scheme of reaching political consensus, expediency is IN, and being principled for its own sake is defined as being stubborn and definitely OUT.

That's why crusaders like Clinton have got away with saying that America went into the Gulf crisis much quicker than it went into into Bosnia, because "the moral imperative coincided in the Gulf with American interests."'

In this scheme of setting the Foreign Policy agenda, Sri Lanka too has produced some later day gems.

For instance, it was the same Foreign Minister, the dapper Mr Lakshman Kadirgamar himself who sometime ago was making a call on Western nations to ban the LTTE. When some of the LTTE's Western hosts replied that banning the LTTE could not be done, Mr. Kadirgamar sent out the message in his own way that Sri Lanka had not banned the LTTE because "we were keeping the door open for talks.''That would have been expedient -international politics at its most suave.

Though the contradiction in the Foreign Minister's position was self-evident, it was, indeed, a foreign policy plus ( at least once upon a time ) to indicate to the West that Sri Lanka was genuinely interested and was going out of its way for a negotiated settlement with the LTTE. Therefore, even at the risk of sounding stupid, expediency was in this instance, seen as being totally astute.

As far as India's nuke acrobatics go, the Sri Lankan reaction is very transparently expedient in that same calculating sort of way.

Keeping a gung-ho BJP friendly when there are belligerent Tamilnadu ministers in the cabinet is now considered a foreign policy must for Sri Lanka in a war context. Indian intervention on behalf of the LTTE is the ( as cliché would have it ) worse case scenario for Sri Lanka's current political reality.

With that in mind, American sensibilities and all of that has taken a second place, even though Sri Lanka, ( which incidentally pioneered the concept of retaining the Indian ocean as a zone of peace during the Cold War time ) would normally almost undoubtedly feel morally impelled to call for restraint when India keeps flexing its nuclear muscles.

Even though Sri Lanka has a case in saying that the nuclear club need not necessarily be confined to uncle Sam and a few friends, moral imperatives and long term principles of circumspection should almost make it absolutely imperative that Sri Lanka take a firm stand against India's nuclear ambitions.

But then, the problem with short term political expediency is that it is not built on a solid foundation or base that is generally called principled politics. On the short term, this kind of foreign policy is seen to be smart. But it's a calculation, a wager that nothing goes wrong, godwilling, and that therefore, the moral imperative can be safely ignored in an exercise of calculated risk. But if something does go wrong, like it did when the LTTE bombed the Dalada Maligawa, and therefore had to be banned negotiations or not, the moral nudity of such foreign policy is almost instantly seen.

Any argument that's not built upon a solid base principle can crash if the political weather is too bad. If the base is solid, there may be no crash, but in the short term, there may be some sacrifices.

Like the sacrifices that Sri Lanka may have to make regards the war, if it takes a strong stand on India's nuclear ambitions. But, maybe making the calculation between what's the better course of action, expediency or principle, is also a calculation of being smart?

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