The bottom-line of what PM Shaukat Aziz said to his Indian counterpart is tantamount to a return to the well-worn position of Kashmir being the core issue: unless progress is made on it, other seven issues cannot be resolved. It was a position that had been specifically given up in order to get Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee to agree to restart the Composite Dialogue. Can this reversion to the long held but barren stance deliver the desired goodies? One of the more dangerous implications of the policy of staking everything on the aim of somehow wresting Kashmir from India can only be on the basis of threat of war by Pak Army. Can war achieve the desired result? The answer is no. Long before such a war, non-stop arms races with India remain the outstanding reality. It has given Pakistan a skewed Budget structure that crowds out not only development, but reduces social sectors' current spending also. It has made the society military-dominated and prevented democracy from taking roots. It perpetuates Pakistan's all-round backwardness. It is now increasing poverty. Despite this huge cost, Kashmiris have not come an inch closer to their Azadi. More of it can lead to Pakistan's destruction.

It is time we saw the limits of actual possibilities on Kashmir clearly. If Pakistan would become more obstreperous on Kashmir, India will invade Pakistan and the much tom-tommed atomic weapons will not come into play, as they did not in 2002 and for the same reason of not being deterrent enough to a nuclear India. Kashmiris, by their own exertions, might achieve something, provided they struggle non-violently. But if they continued to employ guns, they run the risk of their own decimation: by using violence they are permitting India to employ its superior violence-making machine and they have shown they shrink not from employing overwhelming force against a largely unarmed populace. Use of violent means either by Pakistanis or Kashmiris now look like inviting a war between India and Pakistan. War and violence has now to be eschewed completely as futile and dangerous.

Anyway the form the policy carrying the germs of war took the form of demanding a UN-supervised plebiscite to decide the future status of J & K State so that its people can exercise their inherent right to determine their own future. President Musharraf had given it a more than merely implied good by to this stance. Once he recommended the solution-seeking method of removing a possible solution from the agenda that India found unacceptable, he was giving India a virtual veto. Then, asking the people to debate possible alternatives to Pakistan's traditional stance on Kashmir was tantamount to throwing the plebiscite idea out of the window. When the head of a state offers to give up a stand in public he kills it. Its revival will not be taken seriously and will lack credibility.

If war is out of the question on, and about, Kashmir -- as indeed it is -- an alternative relationship with India becomes a must. There will then be no point in staying distant or isolating Pakistan from other friends of India. Now that Pakistan is forced to change stance for many reasons, it will be far more logical and politic to cultivate good relations with India. Let's gain what we can in free trade and economic cooperation with it. It will make eminent sense to make India committed to as many schemes of economic and cultural cooperation as possible. The closer Pakistan gets to India, the less likelihood there will be of India's hardliners spitting fire and brimstone against minorities; India's secularism and democracy will be strengthened. That is in Pakistan's enlightened self-interest. It will also discourage more than merely incipient fascist forces in both countries.

Anyway, it is basically a new situation. Pakistan has inexorably and increasingly to withdraw from the earlier full support to Kashmiris' right of self-determination -- through the plebiscite way. Now, obviously and as the President says, the only likely solution that can be arrived at is the one that India willingly accepts. For, that to happen, the Kashmiris, rather than Pakistanis, should propose one or more possible solutions. The Indians will only accept a solution if it does not militate against their basic interests and even stances.

But it is also important that Pakistan's basic interests should not suffer. Just as the quest for a political solution is required to be of a win-win kind, if possible, the new relationship with India too should be equally beneficial to both sides. Moreover, both Pakistan and India need to ensure that Kashmiri people's interests do not suffer. Anyhow, Pakistan needs to keep in view its own domestic situation sharply in focus, both political and economic. The new relations with India must be of a kind and so pursued as to be compatible with solutions of all its domestic problems. These problems, on their own, require new policies.

Primacy goes to economic hardships being borne by people because unemployment and poverty are growing at an accelerating rate. Inflation, combined with growth of poverty, creates an intolerable situation. Crimes of all kinds are growing in number as well as extent. Hopes of a better tomorrow are diminishing in common folks. These are clearly the results of the budget structure that has evolved over 57 years which allocates maximum resources for national security, firmly subordinating human security. Life for the common Pakistani was never so hard.

The policies hitherto pursued have had a baleful effect. Politically aware Pakistanis realise that their polity's troubles arise from the unending arms spending. If we, the people of Pakistan, want a better future, we have to end these arms races and develop the economy in a manner that increases employment and actually ameliorates the conditions in which common people live. That is a decision we must take for its own sake and now there is an opportunity presented by the experience of the year-long negotiations with India.

The net outcome of the talks so far is that no Kashmir solution is available that replaces India's sovereignty over the Kashmir territories with something better. Pakistan cannot go out and conquer Kashmir; that makes war out of the question. If war is out of account, all that remains is to choose between two possible policy options: live without any settlement on Kashmir that will involve on present indications, continuation of arms races, despite India being able anyhow to increase the disparity in military strength while bilateral relations remain strained. This will involve frequent crises and tensions and exigencies of Kashmir situation may propel the countries into conflict. This will mean war remaining built into the situation the way it is today.

The second option is to change the nature of Indo-Pakistan relationship after making a settlement on Kashmir on terms that are acceptable to India. MQM Chief Altaf Hussain's proposal to accept the LOC as the border may be painful if stated baldly. But it is realistic and is based on the only basis that will be acceptable to India. His "for the time being" makes no sense. Once a border has been made a border, it will have to remain a border. Any attempt to change it will become aggression -- and pointless if war is to be avoided.

In the context, the Manmohan Singh formula, if one can call it that -- India and Pakistan simultaneously giving maximum autonomy to their respective Kashmir, everything to be delegated to them except a few subjects, and making all borders (LOC included) soft -- is a better version; it is Altaf Hussain's basic idea clothed with attractive raiment. This formula too will entail a lot of negotiations. The raiment will need to be strengthened with policies pledged by both countries to be watched over by each other and the civil society in either country.

But the formula will go nowhere unless both countries agree to change their relationship radically from being inveterate enemies to close friends of the kind France and Germany now are. Just as the latter two did, these two will also need to implement a thoroughgoing programme of reconciliation between the peoples, the armies, bureaucracies and academia; it will have to travel from grassroots up to the highest echelons in all fields. Close bilateral economic cooperation, with a view to mutual enrichment -- far more than free and preferential trade -- should extend to the whole region. The SAARC can be the instrument. The two should perfect a partnership that may drive the regional integration which may eventually become a cognisable international entity.

All this is not meant to be an exercise to make Pakistan an awe-inspiring great power. The main objective is to resolve domestic polarisations and to improve the material standards of living of peasants, workers, the salariate and the lumpen proletariat.

'Greatness of a nation' is an airy-fairy concept when it does not hide the ugly face of imperialistic militarism. Although material improvement in living standards are very valuable and desirable for their own sake, they are not the final destination. The ultimate purpose is lift human beings to a phase where they, free of the worry of where their next meal come from, can meaningfully exercise their freedoms and live a richer and hopefully creative cultural existence.

MB Naqvi is a leading columist in Pakistan.