India Pushes Iran on Chahbar Port

Since Karzai looks to be making eyes at Taliban, India is now pushing Iran to accelerate development of transit capacity at its Chahbar port, which India helped Iran to develop during the previous round of Afghan conflict, for resupplying Northern Alliance.

It looks like everyone's racing to the exits in preparation for the Afghan endgame, since the American presence looks to be increasingly shaky.

When the war re-starts, Pakistan will immediately set J&K on fire again, with a full-blown terror campaign. Once hostilities get fully underway again, India should be willing to take the war directly to Pak, via the Afghan route. Since India has an overwhelming advantage in air power, it should be willing to use its airbase in Tajikistan to run combat sorties against PAF warplanes near the Durand Line. If Haqqani & Co participate in launching terror attacks against Kashmir, then IAF should strike at them across the Durand Line.

We should lobby the Americans for their support rather than their interference on this, as a way of teaching Pak a lesson for their clandestine support for attacks on US troops. Once America is out of Afghanistan, then they are no longer vulnerable to Pak blackmail. If India takes revenge against Pak on behalf of the US, then Americans can feel vindicated - certainly, there is no love lost between them and Haqqani. We don't have to own upto any cross-border attacks, of course. If Pak accuses, we can ask them to SHOW PROOF - to borrow their favorite phrase. ;)

Pak's defenses are all along the border with India. They have no defense arrayed against the Afghan border. India should exploit this to the hilt and put them heat on them from that side.