Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
one well-placed Indian analyst, they served to 'transform' the bilateral
relationship. The Americans were at last taking India seriously, recognizing its
role as an emerging great power.
6
Other developments in 1999 and 2000 helped override the sting of the Glenn
amendment sanctions. Indians viewed Clinton's role during the 1999 Kargil
crisis in persuading Pakistan to withdraw its troops from the Indian portion of
Kashmir as an important milestone, since the American president appeared to
have acknowledged the justice of India's Kashmir stance. That fall the US
Congress moved to ease some of the sanctions against India, following more
limited waivers enacted the previous year. A wildly successful Clinton visit to
India in March 2000, followed six months later by a more sedate but still
productive state visit to Washington by Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari
Vajpayee, underscored the new vitality in bilateral relations. Reciprocal visits by
lower level officials and the creation of joint working groups on counter-
terrorism, peacekeeping, and energy and the environment promised to provide an
institutional framework to complement the high-level summitry.
Yet, for all the warm glow surrounding US-India ties by the end of Clinton's
presidency, it remained in many respects a stunted relationship. Take, for
instance, the joint statement issued after the Clinton-Vajpayee summit in
September 2000. What was absent from this document is as telling as what it
contained. In celebrating a 'closer and qualitatively new relationship', the two
leaders 'reiterated their conviction that closer cooperation and stronger
partnership between the two countries will be a vital factor for shaping a future
of peace, prosperity, democracy, pluralism and freedom'.
The communiqué 'welcomed the progress' achieved by various joint
consultative and working groups; 'reaffirmed' the leaders' confidence that
economic dialogues and a coordinating group would strengthen economic links
between the two countries; 'noted the opening' of an American legal attaché's
office in New Delhi; 'welcomed the establishment' of a science and technology
forum; 'noted the contribution' of science and technology roundtables; and
'welcomed' recent initiatives in the health sector.
The statement also indicated that the two leaders had agreed that their
countries 'must build upon this new momentum in their relationship to further
enhance mutual understanding and deepen cooperation across the full spectrum'
of issue areas. In the security realm, the two leaders 'recalled the long history' of
Indo-American cooperation in United Nations peacekeeping; 'agreed to broaden
their cooperation in peacekeeping and other areas of UN activity'; and reiterated
'their common desire to work for stability in Asia and beyond.'
7
These were all admirable sentiments. But none of these expressions and re-
affirmations and agreements, by themselves or in combination, signified a shared
strategic purpose, or anything more than a routine bilateral relationship. Indeed,
their prominence in the joint statement demonstrated just how thin the
