US uses Indian 'threat' to force Pak support on Iraq 
Washington, March 5

Despite political constraints, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf will eventually fall in line with US demands to support the pending Security Council vote on Iraq, according to a situation report by a leading geopolitical analytical firm. 

Washington cannot tolerate a 'no' vote from Pakistan and given the expected narrow margin, an abstention will be no better. So the US is putting the pressure on Islamabad but is offering few sops to Musharraf, the report by Strategic Forecasting (Stratfor) said. 

At the same time, the General faces growing pressure from domestic forces opposed to cooperation with the United States and increasingly threatening remarks from India And to press its point, Washington is letting New Delhi make its own ''threats,'' and is refusing to do much to silence Pakistan's neighbour. 

''India and Pakistan have engaged in an intensified war of words for months, and Washington is, in effect, playing a game of bad cop/worse cop, giving Pakistan the choice of acceeding to US concerns or being left to deal with India on its own,'' the report pointed out. 

However, New Delhi is not entirely satisfied with Washington's ability to steer Pakistan in a direction amenable to India's interests it said. 

''New Delhi has leaked rumours of a possible Islamist coup in Pakistan in an attempt to urge the United States to take pre-emptive action and remove Musharraf itself,'' Stratfor said. 

More recently, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee told the Parliament that Washington's inability to convince Pakistan to end cross-border terrorism ''shows the US weakness'' and India would keep US ineffectiveness in mind when planning its future strategies, the report said. 

''This plays into Washington's hand: It can take this kind of correspondence back to Pakistan as an example of what Musharraf will have to deal with should he weaken his support for US actions,'' said Stratfor

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