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Laying the Bush-era ghost to restINSIGHT: MK Bhadrakumar
  The African thinker Theophile Obenga has a thesis that it is only through a profound‘intellectual mutation’ that the present, with its attendant modes of cognition andperception, can be truly understood -- which in turn involves a revalorization of one’sintellectual legacy. India is on one such root expansion of thought, breaking out of acognitive closure.Obenga argued that by way of its ‘intellectual mutation’, Africa should travel all the wayto the flowering of hominization in Ancient Egypt – via the rock paintings of the Grotto-Apollo in Namibia dating back to 28000 BC. Fortunately for India, the perceptual matrixinvolves far less reaching back – a mere eight years encompassing the George W Bushera.However much New Delhi tried to convince Washington in recent months that the UnitedStates still had spunk as the lone superpower, Americans remain unconvinced.Unsurprisingly, the most bizarre statement from the American side during Indian PrimeMinister Manmohan Singh’s visit to the US came from President Barack Obama’s ‘Af-Pak’aide Richard Holbrooke.While Obama kept harping on the special importance of according to Dr Singh the honorof being the first foreign dignitary to Washington on a state visit during his presidency,Holbrooke took the opposite direction to plead with the Pakistanis not to take it to heart.Holbrooke held a two-hour press briefing to massage the Pakistani ego. He had this tosay: ‘And no one in Pakistan, and no one in any other country, should read this [DrSingh’s state visit] as a diminution of the importance we attach to them. It’s entirelyappropriate that someone has to have the first trip. And – it usually used to be in thepast, a European ally, but they come over in informal trips…. It [Singh’s visit] in no wayshould be read as a diminution.’New Delhi has repeatedly ignored Holbrooke’s urge to visit India, and seems to think heis an adventurous climber in a pack of high-flying officials dealing with the Afghanproblem in Washington, but on Monday he settled scores.Ironically, though, he ended up highlighting Obama’s Achilles’ heel. Holbrooke virtuallyconfirmed media reports that the Saudi intelligence service is engaging hardcore Talibanleader Mullah Omar. ‘We would be supportive of anything that the kingdom chose to doin this regard’, he said. The US has fought not less than one hundred wars. But this is the first time that SaudiArabia works out the US’ exit strategy. To be sure, Dr Singh’s main problem also, as hearrived in Washington on Monday, was that compared to his previous visit in 2005, hewas dealing with a US vastly denuded of its global influence. The joint statement issued after the talks reaffirmed the US-India ‘global strategicpartnership’ and ‘the deepening bilateral cooperation between the world’s two largestdemocracies across a broad spectrum of human endeavors’, the ‘common ideals andcomplementary strengths’, the ‘shared values cherished by their peoples and espousedby their founders’. No reason to disbelieve any of this. Yet Dr Singh failed to realize the singular objective of his visit, which is, theoperationalization of the controversial US-India nuclear deal concluded in the Bush era. Agnawing worry remains as regards Obama’s grit to implement the deal.
 
 The deal was a leap in faith, promising India access to advanced ENR [Enrichment andReprocessing] technologies. But negotiations are proving difficult. Delhi did everything to‘incentivize’ the American side by offering two sites where nuclear power plants importedfrom the US will be set up, and showing willingness to legislate that the liability of the UScompanies will be limited in case of accidents involving imported American reactors.But the US side is just not ready to conclude an agreement on ENR. It is not that Obamais retracting. The US compulsions are twofold: any ENR agreement needs to be situatedwithin the new nuclear non-proliferation architecture that the world community mayagree on, and secondly, it may complicate Obama’s strategy vis-à-vis the analogousissue of Iran’s right to have reprocessing technology.On balance, Washington lacks the strength to assert it shall have an ENR with India andwill still enforce its writ on the non-proliferation regime.Overarching this, Delhi harbors disquiet about Obama’s reset of regional policies. The US’Afghan strategy remains predicated on Pakistan’s cooperation. Washington needs acollegiate Beijing to cope with the crisis in the US economy, which precludes the scopefor a ‘containment strategy’ towards China. In sum, Delhi feels disheartened that from atall pedestal as an Asian ‘balancer’ where Bush had installed India, Obama brings it downas a sub-regional power.However, Dr Singh’s visit has been a creditable success. India and the US launched awide-ranging Counterterrorism Cooperation Initiative and agreed on the ‘absoluteimperative’ to bring to justice the perpetrators of the Mumbai terrorist strikes last year.Equally, the Obama-Singh joint statement echoes the Indian charge about Pakistanidoublespeak on terrorism. It expressed ‘grave concern’ about the continuing terroristthreat ‘emanating from India’s neighborhood’ and agreed that ‘resolute and crediblesteps must be taken to eliminate safe havens and sanctuaries that provide shelter toterrorists and their activities…[which] undermine security and stability in the region andaround the world.’Again, the US ‘appreciated’ India’s role in Afghanistan and ‘agreed to enhance theirrespective efforts’, whereas Pakistan clamors for a roll back of the Indian presence inAfghanistan. Obama skirted the India-Pakistan relationship, whereas Islamabadalternatively beseeches and threatens that unless the US mediates on the Kashmirproblem, Pakistan won’t cooperate. Dr Singh would have the double satisfaction that theUS-China joint statement calling for mediation in India-Pakistan relations has beennullified.An innocuous-looking reference in the joint statement may hold a vital clue, where thetwo leaders committed to ‘continue to pursue mutually beneficial defense cooperation’including ‘trade and technology transfer and collaboration’. In a broader context, the USagreed to strengthen high technology trade ‘in the spirit of their strategic dialogue andpartnership’. Evidently, the US seriously intends to participate in India’s massive armsprocurement program. Secretary of Defence Robert Gates called on Dr Singh. To quote Dr Singh, ‘We have an expanding area of defence collaboration including thepossibility of procurement of defence equipment from the US. Our domestic privatesector defence suppliers are now allowed to have up to 26 percent foreign investment,opening a new avenue for Indo-US collaboration in defence related activities.’Delhi can be trusted to undertake a thorough stocktaking of the US-India relationshipafter Dr Singh’s return. The compulsion to recalibrate India’s single most important
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