THAT terrorism is a political tool is obvious. Yet, engulfed by outrage at the terrorist`s inhumanity, it is easy to overlook the calculated use that is quite often made of terrorist acts by those at the receiving end.

Where terrorism is the recourse of the weak and dastardly it is also sometimes the pretext of the strong for aggression and appropriation in the now sadly familiar doctrine where attack is held the best form of anticipatory defence.

The global war on terror has had global repercussions, and the strongest impact is arguably on Muslims for its major war-theatres are Afghanistan and Iraq. But the Al Qaeda motif is not what first comes to mind in the context of the flourishing business of the Indo-Pak terrorist-trade threat. That has its own inglorious history.

The India-Pakistan semantic conflict when it comes to resistance/terrorism, freedom-fighters/insurgents, guerilla war/terrorist war, liberation/aggression is as old as the Kashmir dispute and as mature as Bangladesh. It has suited both countries to see the infrared hand of their secret services fanning unrest and facilitating saboteurs and subversion.

Traditionally the two states love to hate each other but recently they had begun to show signs of containing their congenital pique in mutual pragmatism about what actually serves self-interest. The commonalities that were being cited and eagerly romanticised are now showing up as less than skin-deep. Old antagonisms appear restored with a menacing vengeance post the terrorist strike at Mumbai`s Taj Hotel which India connects to Pakistan.

Will that irritant replace Kashmir which President Clinton saw as a flashpoint in a nuclear-armed region? And here anxious Pakistanis discern a sinister conjunction between the West`s war on terror and older Indo-Pak spats, skirmishes and short-lived wars.

Every Pakistani recognises that their country`s nuclear capacity riles and disturbs America; and India`s nuclear development has been nurtured as a reassuring democratic outpost. America has peremptorily, and Britain a trifle more courteously, endorsed India`s indictment of jihadist hothouses for terrorism in Pakistan that domestic authorities cannot or will not scotch. This dexterously shifts the terror-prism and accompanying modes of response from the internal and bilateral to the global — a perspective where, even though India has its fair share of restive citizens, it is, unlike Pakistan, exempt from western suspicion.

India`s religious intolerance and fanaticism escape the kind of censure Pakistan faces. India`s communal symptoms and treatment of minorities are excusable because its government is democratic and secular. Its administration and military not having had a background of CIA involvement with Mujahideen is squeaking clean. In any case RAW`s scrupulously independent current regional orientations would largely match with CIA. India`s mandarins are trusted as sacredly neutral.

As far as religious extremism and politics go Pakistan would be the first to cede the Sang Parivar sentiment is part of the Indian mainstream and not a clandestine hothouse bloom. But most Pakistanis feel the US and the UK should by now know through experience that there are no results-guaranteed instant formulae — whether methods employed are hard or soft — for eradicating the religious extremist turned violent be he underground jihadist-bred or a healthily manifest specimen such as the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh yields.

India has or has had political and security problems with its Sikhs, Kashmiris, Tamils, Maoists, ULFA, and rails on about sundry infiltrators perceived as aided across the Bengal border (never mind that India was Bangladesh`s midwife and fairy godmother). Yet the terror motive for mayhem at Mumbai`s Taj is surveyed almost exclusively in the Al Qaeda perspective with a fierce insistence on retired or serving personnel in Pakistan`s ISI (and other departments possibly) gone rogue. If Pakistan`s present high command is not a party to such activities the unavoidable inference is that it is not in total control. Either way would not the world breathe easier with a denuclearised Pakistan?

That last is probably true. But how realistic and safe is it to denuclearise Pakistan on a track and timeframe separate from denuclearising India? Is there more legitimacy to India`s right to nuclear defence? Or is there just an assumption that India`s nuclear material is better secured than Pakistan`s?

Pakistan is much more conflicted and politically unsettled than India. Its people`s passionate sense of Muslim-self slots into any clash of civilisations thesis. The actuality of Nato strikes into Pakistan on suspect terrorist safe havens makes an explicit statement. But none of this signifies nuclear material in Pakistan is more liable to unsanctioned access or security breaches than in any other country. The issue of terrorism and Pakistan as terrorist-hospitable has to be separated from Pakistan`s nuclear standing. There would be much wisdom in the international community giving India and Pakistan nuclear parity. For then India and Pakistan can turn to addressing international terrorism as well as cross-border terrorism in its specifics with better mutuality.

It has to be said that there is schizophrenia in the American attitude towards Pakistan. It sees it as an ally but also as the only Muslim state with nuclear power. America`s doubts about Pakistan`s nuclear controls and safeguards or will and ability to control in the context of the global war on terror, are an unacceptable slur on Pakistan`s army`s professionalism, Pakistan`s government and Pakistan`s people.

Interpreting any official discomfort and popular outcry at the insolence and inhumanity of air-strikes in Fata as indicative of support for terrorist-friendly infrastructure is simply stupid. No Pakistani deems America stupid. That is why — without being paranoid conspiracy theorists — Pakistanis ask what America`s intention really is. When the western alliance appears in cahoots with India about the Mumbai atrocity and Al Qaeda and Pakistan, Pakistanis are justified in thinking how convenient it is to simplify and generalise on terrorism for powers with agendas for regional hegemony.