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Trip to Moscow. Pakistan's relations with Red China had been cool and correct. But after Ayub Khan's recriminations against Washington, things grew warmer. Negotiations were begun to define the 200-mile border with Tibet; Peking proved generous, handing over to Pakistan about 750 sq. mi. of disputed territory. As the Pakistanis turned willing, the Chinese turned eager. Trade expanded; an agreement was reached for Pakistan International Airlines to make biweekly flights between Karachi and Canton; China advanced a $60 million credit to Pakistan.
Ayub Khan returned from a visit to Peking nearly as ecstatic as he had been about the U.S. Campaigns were launched to stamp out flies, a la China. Ayub Khan, a devout Moslem and a confirmed free enterpriser, praised the Red Chinese dedication to work.
Pakistan was making a serious reappraisal of all its international relationships. Close ties were knit with Turkey and Iran, two Moslem neighbors and fellow members of CENTO. A long and dreary border scuffle with Afghanistan was partially resolved, and Pakistan ended a two-year closing of the Afghan frontier.
Ayub Khan even went to Moscow to patch up long-dilapidated fences. The Soviet Union had for many years defended India in the U.N., even interposing its veto to prevent censure of New Delhi for its failure to hold the Kashmir plebiscite. Now Russia, as worried as the U.S. by China's cozying up to Pakistan, made a joint statement advocating "resolute support" of peoples struggling for national liberation, which Pakistan interpreted as backing its stand on Kashmir. Like many heads of state before him, Ayub Khan was learning that it is better to get aid from both sides than to be a taken-for-granted partner of just one.
But there was still no progress on the Kashmir problem. Though dear to the hearts of all Pakistanis, it was a crashing bore to the U.N. and the world. Even worse, India was moving fast to end the fiction that there was even anything left to discuss. Nehru had announced in 1954 that Kashmir was an integral part of India but had done nothing to implement his words. Prime Minister Shastri was saying less but doing more. Early this year, he quietly let it be known that Indian civil servants would take over the state administration of Kashmir. To Pakistanis, this meant that the Kashmir question had to be reopened before the world —now or never.
Closed Routes. The instrument used was the mujahid, or local warrior. Subsequent Indian interrogations of captured mujahids indicate that they are mostly inhabitants of Azad (Free) Kashmir, the Pakistan-occupied one-third of the state. As army veterans, they were given a brisk course of retraining, taught methods of sabotage. Last month they began crossing the porous cease-fire line with instructions to start an insurrection.
All in all, an estimated 3,000 mujahids made the trip. It seemed an obviously doomed operation. The Indian share of Kashmir is firmly held by 100,000 troops. Though most Kashmiri Moslems would undoubtedly vote to join Pakistan, few showed any inclination to die for the cause. The infiltrators were rounded up or slain with considerable ease, but the outcries from the Indian government often made it sound as if Kashmir were being invaded by hordes of warlike Huns.