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Kashmir: The First Test of the Bush Doctrine?

TOM ASHBROOK: Dr. Navnita Chadha Behera joins us now from Washington D.C. She’s a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution and has worked for the Ford Foundation on their program for Regional Security, Peace and Cooperation in South Asia. She’s also author of the recent book, State Identity and Violence: Janu, Kashmir and Ladac. Good evening Dr. Navnita Chadha Behera. Thanks for joining us. Navnita Behera, make the case for us. You’ve written that 9/11 and its aftermath has changed the game in South Asia’s Kashmir dispute. How so?

NAVNITA BEHERA: See 9/11 what it did was it brought terrorism on the world map, so to say, in a way that is unprecedented in contemporary history. What it has done is effectively said that terrorism is a global threat. The ground rules being not only the terrorists would be treated as enemies, but the countries that are harboring the terrorists would also be treated as a hostile regime. And I believe the ground rules of this new war against terrorism were set by none other than U.S. President George W. Bush. In his speech to the United Nations when he said that we must unite against terrorists, and we must not pick and choose our terrorist friends. No matter what the grounds of the war are, no matter what political or sacred cause, basically organized political violence as an instrument of policy is not going to be acceptable.

Complete RealAudio Interview available at wbur.org