| শিরোনাম | সূত্র | তারিখ |
| ১০৩। যুদ্ধের সম্ভাবনা | বাল্টিমোর সান | ২৬ অক্টোবর, ১৯৭১ |
THE BALTIMORE SUN, OCTOBER 26, 1971
CHANCE OF WAR
The chance of war in South Asia arises from a great complexity of factors, two of which are particularly dangerous right now. One is an increased belligerence on the pan of some in India who apparently think war is bound to come at some lime, and so might as well come at a moment when Pakistan is strained, distraught and too weak to fight effectively. The other is that Pakistan, indeed strained, distraught and frustrated, and with its military attention and resources deeply committed to the effort of trying to maintain the suppression of East Pakistan, might resort to war in sheer desperation.
Prime Minister Gandhi is not among the Indian hawks. IIcr own position remains film, but reasonable. On the eve of her departure on her current trip to western Europe and the United States, to press the Indian case, she caned on her countrymen to keep on exercising the restraint with which so far they had faced, in her word, the “challenge” of the crisis that has developed since last March 25, when the West Pakistani army struck in East Bengal.
Her worries about the role of the United States are obvious. First and foremost is a sccming American attitude of cool impartiality, into which the continued shipment of American arms to Pakistan has somehow been rationalized in Washington. Then there is what India believes to be an underestimation in Washington of the economic and human burden the great wave of refugees from East Bengal has placed upon India; not to mention the political and communal perils the presence of the refugees presents. And it may be also that Mrs. Gandhi is troubled by Washington's gesture of amity toward China, which is Pakistan's principal supporter.
At the simplest. India's position is that the challenge,” and the crisis, stems directly from one thing, the refugees, and that the problem of the refugees is a direct result of the action of the Pakistan army in March. Without forgetting the complexitics of the background to March, this is 'undeniably' so; and it needs to be kept constantly in mind.
