US-Iran ceasefire: Why India should not envy Pakistan's moment in the Sun

There has been a verbal war going on between two groups, one broadly supporting the Modi government and the other not, about whether or not our arch enemy Pakistan gained some global diplomatic recognition for its go-between role in the US-Iran ceasefire.

We should just chill. There is no need for India to envy Pakistan’s day in the sun, just as it not necessary to gloat over its various failures. What we should always be doing is to be on guard, and do what is in our best interests. Pakistan has not suddenly become the world’s peacenik, and will revert to its true colours again a bit later. A leopard does not change its spots.

But let us examine the question anyway: did Pakistan truly mediate a truce between US and Iran, or was it just a messenger boy? Just as the US may have played the role of go-between in ending the four-day Operation Sindoor conflict – a role which was never tantamount to actual mediation - this is exactly what Pakistan has been doing in the US-Iran conflict.

Let us also acknowledge that Pakistan holds a special position in Asian geopolitics and geography which makes it a logical choice for the US and China to use it where it suits them. They will use Pakistan to get something done that both want to some degree. It could be about getting the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan, or providing an initial opening to China in the 1970s for the Nixon administration. Pakistan, by simply being what it is and where it is, can do things India cannot do. Moreover, in an era where both China and the US want to slow down India’s rise, Pakistan will occasionally be wined and dined by both to keep India on the edge.

Coming to the Iran ceasefire, assuming it holds for the long term, here is what made Pakistan a key middleman between Iran and the US.

First, Pakistan’s own compulsions were key. The Saudis, which whom Pakistan has a mutual defence pact, wanted Pakistan to do something about it when Iran attacked its infrastructure, but Pakistan did not want to honour its pact. It needed to bring peace in order to wriggle out of this commitment to the Saudis.

Second, as a Chinese vassal state and also with some connections to the Trump administration, it was vital to the off-ramp process with Iran. Here is how it may have played a role in the Iran conflict. Only China and Russia have some leverage with Iran, and the US could not openly ask them to intervene on their behalf to get the Iranians to agree to an acceptable truce. Once the US realised that it cannot bring Iran to its knees with just aerial attacks, it needed an off-ramp. Pakistan was a logical conduit to get the Chinese into the picture, especially when China too has a lot to lose by a closure of the Strait of Hormuz. So, the chances are the Iranians agreed to some kind of ceasefire because China too wanted it.

Third, it is generally not possible for India to play peacemaker between warring sides in almost any conflict because it is a rising power of which other powers may be wary. Also, and this fact will never be stated upfront, as the only non-Abrahamic power in Asia outside China, Japan and South-East Asia, its leverage in an intra-Abrahamic conflict is minimal. It is worth noting that some years back, China mediated the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between the Saudis and Iran in 2023, but that didn’t not hold. There were previous attempts too, after ruptures between Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia, to restore relations in 1946 and again in 1991 after earlier ruptures. The Shia-Sunni conflict did not begin in the last century, and it will not end in this one. Peace is temporary at best.

Fourth, under US stewardship in the previous Trump administration, we saw Israel signing the Abraham Accords with UAE, Bahrain and Morocco, which was to be followed by many other Muslim-majority countries signing them to normalise relations with the Jewish state, but most are still in the works.

The point one is making is that India does not quite have a role to play in making peace between Jew and Muslim, between Shia and Sunni, or even between Sunni and Sunni. As an Islamist state, Pakistan can always insert itself into a diplomatic process in the name of maintaining peace in the Ummah. India can, at best, ensure that it maintains cordial and mutually-beneficial relations with all Muslim-majority countries. There is no scope for its mediation anywhere in intra-Islamic conflicts.

In any case, peace in West Asia is always fragile, as we noted in the above examples of the Abraham Accords and the one brokered by China in 2023. China is a superpower, and has more leverage, both as a large buyer of crude, and as the world’s second greatest military power, to insert itself in some peace processes. India cannot easily do so unless both sides to a conflict agree that India can do something to ease tensions.

India can, and will play, a bigger role in world affairs, but that will happen once we become a $10 trillion economy and the third largest in the world, with a military commensurate with that power. That day is at least 10 years away.

Till then, we should allow Pakistan its own moment in the sun. It is unlikely to last.