The Counterror Coalitions

Shortly after the September 11, 2001, attacks, Air Force Chief of Staff General John Jumper asked RAND Project AIR FORCE to conduct a study entitled "Thinking Strategically About Combating Terrorism." This year-long project was divided into four research tasks, each tackling different but complementary aspects of the counterterrorism problem: (1) Threat assessment: identifying the character and boundaries of the threat; (2) The international dimension: assessing the impact of coalition and other international actors on U.S. options; (3) Strategy: designing an overarching counterterror strategy; and (4) Implications for the Air Force: identifying promising applications of air and space power. This report is part of a series on international counterterror cooperation, building on the research of the second project task. Other reports in this series will examine the different functional areas of international cooperation against terrorism, counterterror cooperation with Russia and the states of the former Soviet Union, and counterterror cooperation with the countries of Europe. Although these reports address a wide variety of subjects, they build on a common principle: counterterror cooperation occurs across numerous issue areas, including military, financial, law enforcement, and intelligence. An effective counterterror strategy will need to address each of these dimensions and account for some of the synergies and frictions among them. This report details the findings of building counterterrorism coalitions with two important states in South Asia: Pakistan and India. The partnerships with these states have been critical to U.S. operations in Afghanistan and beyond, albeit for very different reasons. Specifically, this report examines the following: Pakistan's historic and present cooperation with the United States, India's historic and present cooperation with the United States, and the potential of Kashmir to disrupt efforts to engage both India and Pakistan.