Diplomacy: The Judgment of Rann

In April, after 18 years of diplomatic bickering over coveted Kashmir (pop. 4,000,000), India and Pakistan came within a hairbreadth of an all-out shooting war over the uninhabited waste of salt flats and pink sand called the Rann of Kutch. Last week, as abruptly as the conflict had flared, both sides signed a cautious cease-fire agreement by which the two countries are to withdraw their troops over a seven-day period from the 8,000 sq. mi. of disputed territory on the Arabian Sea.

The pact was patiently worked out by British Prime Minister Harold Wilson and finally accepted as binding by Pakistan's Mohammed Ayub Khan and India's Lai Bahadur Shastri at the Commonwealth Conference in London last month. It calls for police patrols of the area until its rightful borders are permanently agreed upon either by India and Pakistan or by a three-man international tribunal that will have to be chosen within four months. If the judgment of Rann unduly favors Pakistan, it will threaten Shastri's tenure; critics of all stripes, including some in the Prime Minister's own Congress Party, are already crying "sellout" over the treaty clause giving Pakistan the right to patrol the area in dispute.

Nonetheless, the cease-fire seems likely to stick. The monsoons by last week had turned the Rann into an impassable quagmire. It will not be dry enough for anyone to fight over before November.