America's South Asia policy since September 11 has often left me bewildered. I have attributed this to my inability to see the bigger picture from Delhi. So it came as something of a shock when I saw it last week from New York and discovered that if American foreign policy seems only puzzling from Delhi it seems surreal when seen from New York. It was to attend the World Economic Forum's annual meeting that I came to this city, which has seen the single worst act of terrorism in history and because September 11 dominated the conference, I was drawn to sessions that discussed issues related to it.

I found myself one afternoon in one of the Waldorf Astoria's gilded halls amidst a group that was discussing security and terrorism and among the panelists was Pakistan's Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz. At some point in the discourse, a speaker announced that the US needed to learn from countries that had been "victims" of terrorism, like England and, believe it or not, Pakistan. Someone then announced that Aziz would now tell us how terrorism could be fought. There were Indians in the audience and a sort of collective gasp went up but nobody said anything perhaps because there really is nothing to say. Clearly, in America's current view of the world the "evil axis" does not and will not include Pakistan.

Our boys in the Ministry of External Affairs have tried their best. Let us not blame them. They have pointed out-not once but many times-to the American State Department that Pakistan has been responsible not just for giving birth to the Taliban and equally malevolent groups like the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammed, but for nurturing those responsible for terrorism in the US. The Americans already know this since they once sent a spy plane into Pakistan to bring Ramzi Yusuf (the first bomber of the WTC) to justice. They also know Pakistan is a military dictatorship and that the Pakistani Army cannot be absolved of terrorist activity. But right now they just do not want to listen.

A decision appears to have been taken in Washington that Pakistan is needed as an ally now just as much as it was needed 20 years ago to trap the former Soviet Union in the quagmire of Afghanistan. The US State Department appears not to be alone with this view. The latest issue of Foreign Affairs, the world's most revered foreign policy journal, has an article titled "Preserving Pakistan". The first paragraph spells it out. "The survival of Pakistan in its existing form is a vital US security interest, one that trumps all other American interests in the country. A collapse of Pakistan-into internal anarchy or an Islamist revolution-would cripple the global campaign against Islamist terrorism. Strengthening the Pakistani state and cementing its cooperation with the West have thus become immensely important to Washington."

So, what should India do? We know that strengthening the Pakistani state-in terminal decline before September 11-will have a direct effect on India. The more money Pakistan gets the more it will spend on training "freedom fighters" in Kashmir. Of late, these freedom fighters have taken their fight outside the boundaries of Kashmir right up to Parliament House and we have no means of talking to Pakistan's General because all he wants to talk about is Kashmir. What he means by talking about Kashmir is that India find some way of handing it over to him. What should we do then?

Well, we may as well stop hoping that America is going to help us by persuading Pervez Musharraf to become more broadminded in his approach to dialogue. We need to also give up the illusion that America's war against terrorism includes our own fight against it. Our fight is one that we will have to continue fighting alone. But while doing this we need to remember that there is a political dimension to our Kashmir problem and that it has been almost forgotten in all this talk of terrorism.

We must start dealing with it urgently now. It is time Atal Bihari Vajpayee woke up to the reality that putting K.C. Pant in charge of talking to militant groups in Kashmir does not constitute a policy. In any case, choosing someone like Pant makes the idea of dialogue seem non-serious.

We must then get on with reforming the Indian economy at top speed. We must muster the political will to ensure that India becomes at least as developed as Thailand in the next 10 years. If the Indian economy booms, Pakistan's ability to continue being a terrorist thorn in our side automatically diminishes. When we talk of speeding up economic reforms these days, the finance minister gives us the glib answer that he has done what he could and it is now for the states to do their bit. This is not good enough and not entirely true. Meanwhile, let us forget about the "evil axis" between America and Pakistan since we can do nothing about it.