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In-Depth Information
and thriving and growing'. The American then pledged that the United States
would do 'everything we can' to help improve relations between New Delhi and
Islamabad and to resolve 'the difficult outstanding issues, whether it is Kashmir
or nuclear issues'. 'So you will see us', he concluded, 'deeply engaged in the
region and trying to have balanced and strong relations with both countries'.
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Thoroughly innocuous as these words were to most Americans, they must
have unsettled readers in South Block, who for many years had resisted an
American policy of lumping India and Pakistan together in pursuit of a
'balanced' US approach. The easy manner in which Powell expressed a
willingness to help on Kashmir and nuclear tensions—issues where New Delhi
had no interest in seeing an American involvement, especially not a 'balanced'
one—was equally unwelcome.
A closer reading of the Indian response to Bush's missile defense speech might
have dampened enthusiasm in Washington as well. The more skeptical noted
that India had reasons of its own to encourage Bush's perception of threats
arising from rogue nations driven by Islamic fundamentalism. Some
commentators wondered if New Delhi's apparent BMD endorsement reflected
anything more than an Indian desire to gain access to American nuclear energy
technology, especially reactors. These more cautious interpretations were
strengthened when Jaswant Singh, visiting Moscow in June, publicly insisted
that Indian and Russian views on BMD were identical, and that New Delhi
opposed any unilateral abrogation of the ABM treaty. In conveying two starkly
contradictory messages on missile defense to the Americans and the Russians,
Singh, acute observers concluded, had played the Americans like a virtuoso
musician.
Other disquieting developments were visible for those who wished to see them.
Notwithstanding Bush's telephoned pledge of assistance to Prime Minister
Vajpayee, and grandiose promises from Capitol Hill of a liberal American
response, the actual levels of US aid to earthquake-hit Gujarat were quite modest.
Worse yet were hints that the administration had actually discouraged a more
generous package of aid for fear of complicating congressional adoption of a tax
cut, the White House's top domestic priority.
The administration was also slow in moving to lift the Glenn amendment
sanctions imposed on India in 1998. The United States would determine the
future of sanctions, Washington explained, only after completing a general
review of sanctions policy. Not until mid-August did senior Bush officials
explicitly state the sanctions would be removed, and even then they spoke of the
need to consult first with a Congress currently in recess.
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Few doubted that a
way would ultimately be found to get rid of the sanctions, but the
administration's failure to move in this regard with even moderate speed raised
eyebrows in New Delhi. And of course the Glenn sanctions represented the least
difficult of several types of American restrictions that limited the sale or transfer
