Why Pakistani Army surrendered in 1971?
India too knew that the amercians would intervene unless it can get russia to back india
I. K. Gujral, the prime minister of india, speaking in 97-98
1971 for the first time proved(to india) what we were suspecting earlier. We were suspecting that there were certain commitments on the part of Americans with Pakistan's defense. We were also feeling that the arms being given to Pakistan were necessarily meant for in, against India and not for anything else. 1971 proved both the things.
It(bangla genocide) was not a sudden development. And we had at our hand ten million refugees in India. And Mrs. Gandhi was going from one capital of the world to the other trying to persuade to tell them, "Please do something now. It'll be difficult otherwise." But it was happening. And...was in a very benevolent, I'm sorry. Very belligerent mood. Also we were seeing that the American strategy was adverse to us. And now we were trying to find, trying to see that not only that the Americans were giving arms to Pakistan, that if need be they were willing to confront India. Threats there had been given to us by Kissinger and others. And I can tell you in retrospect because I'm privy of this information that we really went into negotiation for a treaty with Soviet Union after we were convinced of the belligerency of the other super power. '71 proved it conclusively when we got a direct threat of seventh fleet intervention.
You will recall that when the Bangladesh crisis was at its height Kissinger came here and we tried to explain to him what we were faced with. Kissinger went from here to Pakistan. And a day later we learned that he had gone to Pakistan to fly over to China secretly. Because all the time via...they were negotiating with China. So therefore that explained how strategically Pakistan was important to Washington despite whatever was happening in Bangladesh. Now we were faced with a new reality. We saw that a new alliance growing between the three once again. We also knew of the threats that were being given to us. And that really activated our talks for signing a treaty of friendship with Soviet Union. I think it helped our security at that critical moment.
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