Chapter 6 >The Changing Geopolitical Landscape > South Asia—Afghanistan, Pakistan, India

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South Asia—Afghanistan, Pakistan, India

In the past year the terrorist threat from Afghanistan and Pakistan, the conflict between nuclear-armed Pakistan and India, and India’s emerging power status have thrust South Asia into new prominence in American thinking about the world.

Afghanistan

Afghanistan, the ultimate breeding ground for the September 11 attacks and initial target for the war on al Qaeda, has jumped 28 points in perceived vital interest to 73%. Problems related to “the situation in Afghanistan,” not mentioned at all in previous surveys, are mentioned by 3% of the public as one of the two or three biggest foreign policy problems facing the country, in addition to the related items of terrorism and war that are much higher on the list. Despite the defeat of the Taliban and the successful change of government in Afghanistan, however, the country rates a very cold 29 degrees on the feeling thermometer.

Consistent with their view of Afghanistan as a vital interest, a majority of Americans (57%) favor having long-term military bases there. Seventy-six percent favor committing U.S. troops to an international peacekeeping force in Afghanistan. But American sentiment about economic aid to Afghanistan tends toward decreasing it. While 22% want to increase aid and 29% want to keep it the same, 22% want to decrease aid and 23% want to stop it altogether (see Figure 4-9).

Pakistan

Pakistan—once a supporter of the Taliban, now a front-line state in the war against terrorism and itself threatened by Islamic radicalism—has also leapt to the forefront of American concern. Asked for the first time whether Pakistan is a vital interest of the United States, 76% say yes. But Americans are at best divided over how much to expect of Pakistan. Feelings toward Pakistan have grown distinctly colder, dropping from 42 to 31 degrees on the thermometer. Fifty percent of respondents think Pakistan is an unreliable ally in the war on terrorism, while 43% think it is reliable (only Saudi Arabia and China are seen as less reliable among the countries mentioned, see Figure 6-7).

Nevertheless, 61% favor using U.S. troops to help the government of Pakistan against a radical Islamic rev-olution (see Figure 6-10), more than would use troops to defend the government of Saudi Arabia against an attempt to overthrow it (see Figure 3-3). Fifty-two per-cent think the United States should have military bases in Pakistan. Yet only 12% think economic aid to Pakistan should be increased, while 51% think it should be decreased (28%) or stopped altogether (23%), and 32% want to keep it the same (see Figure 4-9).

India

For the first time ever in Chicago Council surveys, ten-sions between India and Pakistan have surfaced as a major concern, not surprising, perhaps, given the pro-longed and dangerous standoff between the two nuclear-armed countries during the first half of 2002. Fifty-four percent think these tensions are a critical threat, and India-Pakistan issues are mentioned among the top 15 biggest foreign policy problems.

As a result, India is seen in a new light in the 2002 survey. The percentage of respondents saying the United States has a vital interest in India has increased by 29 percentage points to 65% since 1998—the largest increase for any country. While India is seen as having the least influence in the world today of nine countries asked about (with a mean score of 4.7 on a 1-10 scale, see Figure 6-2), the percentage of respondents who see it as playing a greater role in the next 10 years has jumped from 26% in 1998 to 40% in 2002, the largest increase for any country asked about (see Figure 6-13). All this has not led, however, to Americans feeling more warmly toward India—it rates an unchanged, somewhat cool 46 degrees on the thermometer.