What's Brewing Between India, Pakistan?

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Dec. 17, 2008 — -- Three weeks after one of the most notorious terrorist attacks on Indian soil, Indian and Pakistani diplomats are expressing doubt about each others' intentions and have almost completely cut off ties with each other.

Both countries have asked the other for significant concessions and neither has received anything it's asked for, diplomats say. And while both sides have mostly shown patience, India, the United States and the international community are showing no signs of relieving the tremendous pressure they have put on Pakistan since last month's attack in Mumbai.

"I think it's fairly obvious that the attack was based on Pakistani soil," Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said twice today while standing next to an unhappy-looking Pakistani foreign minister. "That places special responsibility on Pakistan to act."

It is a message that the Pakistani government rejects, but one that it has received from a steady stream of American visitors as well: from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Adm. Michael Mullen immediately after the Mumbai attacks, as well as Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., Tuesday.

Kerry arrived here, according to U.S. diplomats, with a conditional promise: to push a bill first co-sponsored by Vice President-elect Joe Biden that would flood Pakistan's troubled tribal areas with billions of dollars in economic aid, but only on the condition that Pakistan act as the United States wants it to in the war on terror.

That, most recently, has meant cracking down on terrorist groups that India and the United States blame for launching the Mumbai attacks.

Pakistani officials have all stressed in the last week that Pakistan is cracking down on Jamaat-ud-Dawa, which the U.N. Security Council labeled a terrorist organization last week.

"Pakistan is a responsible country and Pakistan is complying with its international obligations," Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said today.

Some Jamaat-ud-Dawa offices have been shut and Hafiz Saeed, the group's leader, is under house arrest.

Mumbai Fallout: Peace Talks With Pakistan and India 'Paused'

But in order to move forward, Pakistani officials say, they need specific proof from India about who was responsible for the Mumbai attack.

"We are still awaiting concrete evidence from India," Qureshi said today.

But that does not sit well with Indian officials who say they are waiting for official word from Pakistan about the specific steps it has taken against Jamaat-ud-Dawa and about 22 people India has specifically asked Pakistan to act against.

One Indian official expressed serious doubt about Pakistan's intentions today, saying all he knows is what he reads in the media, "which appears to be reel action and not real action to me."

Indeed, diplomats from India, Pakistan and the United States say the two countries are almost completely communicating through their media.

Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said Tuesday what Indian diplomats have been privately saying for some time now: The peace process is on "pause." Diplomats say pretty much all direct communications have ceased.

"There's not a lot of communication between India and Pakistan," a U.S. official said. "We're trying to change that."

The official urged Pakistan to act on evidence it could collect on its own, instead of waiting for the Indian government to supply it.

But that is not something the Pakistanis have expressed a willingness to do, at least not without help.

Speaking about the international community, Qureshi said today that "they have to strengthen our hand. They can strengthen our hand by enhancing Pakistan's ability to fight terrorism."

A senior military official tells ABC News that the army, the Frontier Corps -- based in the Northwest Frontier Province -- and the police have a long list of demands from the United States.

It includes expensive, technologically advanced items such as Cobra helicopters, but it also includes something as seemingly basic as bulletproof vests.

"There are inordinate delays" in the supply, the official said. "One would like for this to be done on a war footing, because there is a war that is on. Every day counts."

But the United States and India insist the ball is in Pakistan's court right now. That is partially because India does not want to go to war and has few options at its disposal to pressure Pakistan to once and for all crack down on terrorist groups that operate within its borders.

"We do not have the capacities to impose any decision on Pakistan… to exercise even a small measure of coercion on Pakistan, except to keep running to the international community and do something about this problem," said Indian analyst Dr. Ajai Sahni, the executive director of New Delhi's Institute for Conflict Management.

Pressuring Pakistan carries its risks, U.S. diplomats acknowledge. The government is on a weak footing and risks angering the military and intelligence establishment if it cracks down too hard on terror groups once nurtured by intelligence agencies. That could, officials fear, threaten the stability of the government.

And the pressure has led some Pakistanis to become particularly worried about their future, complaining in parlor room discussions about how India is pressuring them from the east and the United States is pressuring them from the west.

That all leads to Pakistan and the United States both walking a tight rope, diplomats say, trying not to anger the other.

As one U.S. official put it today: "We're the country that most wants Pakistan's democracy to succeed."