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| India-Pakistan |
| Bush and India |
| 2006-02-26 |
| In early 1999, George W. Bush met with eight foreign policy advisors, collectively known as the Vulcans, in his ranch at Crawford, Texas. He was preparing for his White House bid. They were there to tell him about the world. Well into the briefing, Bush interrupted: “Wait a minute. Why aren’t we talking about India?” The Vulcans — who included Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz — looked at each other. India didn’t matter, they explained. Bush’s response: “You’re wrong.” He gave three reasons. One, India was a democracy of one billion people and that was “just incredible.” It is a mantra he still chants with near reverence at the mention of India. Two, Indians were geniuses with software. No Vulcan knew what he was talking about. Three, “You all are going on about the need to balance China. You can’t do that without India.” Bush later took aside two Vulcans, the present National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley and Bush’s first ambassador to India, Robert Blackwill. “If I am elected, I want a paper on how to transform the US-India relationship on my table before inauguration.” In December 2000 Bush became US president-elect. He called in Hadley and Blackwill and demanded, “Where’s my paper on India?” They had forgotten. They spent Christmas in the White House reading up on this faraway country that the most powerful man in the world was so fixated on. Bush’s first term was tumultuous for much of the world but advantageous to India. Funnily, these apposite experiences were for the same reason: Dubya was, as Rice once put it, “convinced that he hadn’t come here to leave the world the same way he found it.” Echoing the Vulcans, Bush saw the world unprepared for new threats like rogue states and rogue nukes. So he worked to change the international order. Europe feared the loss of privilege. But an aspiring India saw an opportunity to move up the ladder. The sole superpower was rewriting the global rules; India worked hard to influence the writing in its favour. It helped that large chunks of Bush’s worldview fitted neatly with Indian objectives: missile defence, use of force against terrorism and, finally, reworking the nuclear regime. In each case, India manoeuvred to be inside the tent rather than out. Nukes were the Big Shift . Ashley Tellis, an author of the US policy, explained that Bush “chose to turn Washington’s long-standing approach to New Delhi on its head.” His administration “embarked on a course of action that would permit India more — not less — access to controlled technologies”. Bill Clinton had offered the same — but only if India gave up its nukes. The new approach was labelled Next Steps in Strategic Partnership. Hadley later admitted the state department couldn’t have come up with a duller name. It was a symptom of what bedeviled the India policy of Bush’s first term. NSSP was designed to liberate US technology policy in every sphere that did not require actual US legislation. But there was stiff resistance from mid-level bureaucrats in almost every US agency involved. As one US official said, “Every time the various departments would meet, the question everyone would ask is ‘Why should we do this for India?’” Bush may have had a vision. But for most US officials, India was an ex-Soviet ally, prone to “whining and moralising”. The personification of all this was US Secretary of State Colin Powell. A hero in Europe, he was a villain in India. Powell rarely questioned the conclusions of his subordinates about South Asia. When he was told to trust Pakistan, not India, on the Taliban, he believed it. When he was told India was a proliferation threat, he believed it. “He was an example of how the obstacle to Indo-US relations is not anti-Indianism, but bureaucrats without imagination,” says an Indian official. Reelection in 2004 allowed Bush to put a more personal stamp on his foreign policy. Rice took over from Powell. Her number three, Nicholas Burns, was put in charge of the India file. The second Bush administration basically asked New Delhi: What should we do to make you believe in us? India asked for a nuclear deal. New Delhi was torn: Should it ask for just a supply of nuclear fuel or should it go the whole hog and ask for de facto nuclear power status? It was the Americans who said, “Ask for more, our president really wants to do something for you.”’ From this was born the July 18th statement and the present negotiations on separating India’s civilian and nuclear programme, a necessary first step to entering the nuclear club. What Bush sees in India baffles his countrymen. Almost the entire US mainstream has editorialised against his India policy. Even those who implement his policy seem puzzled. Ambassador David Mulford, during a speech last year underlining how Bush was personally driving the India policy, paused, and in obvious puzzlement added, “And he’s never even been to this country.” Indian Embassy officials in Washington fret the scales will fall from Bush’s eyes when he actually arrives here. After all, his only real experience of Indians is the 8,000-strong — and wholly unrepresentative — community that runs the hi-tech corridor outside Austin, Texas. Here are two guesses as to why an ex-alcoholic Texan oilman should be toiling so hard for India. First, Bush’s opinions are driven by instinct rather than intellect. Once his opinion forms, it is impervious to even political calculation. Bush once said he “loathed” Kim Jong-Il. Ditto for Saddam Hussein. When political advisor Karl Rove urged him against invading Iraq until his second term, Bush responded, “I am prepared to be a one-term president.” Bush seems to have a gut feeling about India -- a good one. Bush’s desire for India to succeed is close to religious; geopolitical explanations are post facto and come from others. During the 2003 campaign Rove urged Bush to bash outsourcing. Bush knew outsourcing meant India and refused. Second, for Bush India’s democracy means it can never be hostile to the US; it is a “natural partner”. To believe otherwise is to deny his instinct about his own country. These days Bush lectures Arab leaders to look at India as a model. When he introduced Manmohan Singh to Laura, he couldn’t help but gush, “Not one Indian Muslim has joined al Qaeda.” What better evidence for Dubya that the axiom of the Bush Doctrine — democracy cures militancy — is true? Future historians will probably argue Washington was ready for a new policy on India. India’s sun was so clearly rising. Too many Americans had soured on Europe. China’s mix of dictatorship and capitalism was worrisome. Wonks like Walter Russell Mead have already cubbyholed Bush as a president of the “Wilsonian” school — idealistic world-changers that don’t shirk from the use of arms. But right here and now it is about one man, a plan and a faith in two democracies. They always assume that Bush is a dumb guy, but one with incredible luck, a tremendous ability to make the right guesses, and "instinct" that each and every time turns out to be right. They never heard that Bush has a deep animosity to any form of "self-promotion", and if someone ever tried it with him, that was the end of their job interview. |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #10 One item that most forget about Bush... he worked in his Dad's White House... he's had experience with Dad as CIA director, then VP and as US President. There was lots he saw about foreign policy from his view in his Dad's White House, that began to formulate some thoughts. Folks forget, he does have an MBA. That's business and management. These are the folks that are paid to have "the vision," not the day to day operations. |
| Posted by: Sherry 2006-02-26 23:39 |
| #9 Vinkat Bala Subrumanian: I do see a future alliance between India and the US, but I'm afraid that I also foresee a horrific, apocalyptic, knock-down-drag-out fight between India and China. With both nations keeping their professional militaries in the rear as second eschelons, and throwing astouding numbers of lightly armed infantry at each other, as in World War I, and to much the same effect, but on a far more grotesque scale. More than anything else, this would be a demographic war, the cause of which is based on more young men than there are women, or jobs. Men sent to die because they are excess. It would be a war of senseless slaughter, for slaughters' sake. I do not know how such an eventual war could be averted. The demographic pressure continues to build. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-02-26 23:29 |
| #8 Fuck off. You're a thoughtless fuckwit - "saner minds" - LOL - that's no stretch. Truth is, you haven't read or comprehended the facts on the ports issue. It sounds as though you expect everyone who fears or hates or sees Islam for what it is to just fall in line cuz you're a tough-guy anti-jihadist or some such blather. I'll wager you don't have the first clue what to do, when or where, much less how. I'll wager the toughest thing you've ever personally faced is someone dissing your threads. You have opinions. Fine. When the facts are revealed, and it has been glacial on the ports thingy, then you should be man enough to change your opinion to keep synched with them. That you've failed, as Zenster has failed, you invite ridicule. That was, and still is, my point. Many people, far "saner" than you have illuminated the rest of us with facts that make it singularly foolish to continue in your position. Now you've escalated. If you have been around awhile, you'll know that lecturing me about the dangers of Islam is, at the very least, tantamount to preaching to the choir. You can't teach me dick about Islam in practice. So unless you're a world-renowned fucking expert on their texts, then you're sorta shit out of luck. Save the bandwidth. Your posts don't impress - we've heard this shit so many times before it's boring. In fact, I'll bet serious money you've been here under other nyms, spouting the same half-baked views. Your inability to adapt makes all of your commentary suspect - or aren't you smart enough to grasp that? Are you our moron from San Jose? Or a different moron? Tough guy. Right. I've killed more people than you've had fist-fights with, sonny. Get a grip, and get constructive or get fucked. I won't be around much longer, but I'll be happy to make fun of you every time I see you post more butter-bar wannabee nonsense. |
| Posted by: .com 2006-02-26 23:21 |
| #7 "The government and businesses of India are looking after their own people. That's the way it should be. Too bad the US govt. (and business community) doesn't feel the same way." You will get no argument from me on this point! My position is, jobs have been sold overseas for long before Bush. I think in the interests of disclosure, I'm an American, born and raised. Don't much like outsourcing, as I have benn impacted by it. But it cannot be blamed on Bush. Importing Muslims! Bad idea. My wife, (Hindu from pre-partition Pakistan) can tell you, Muslims are BAD NEWS, all the way around. I agree. There are those that will say that allowing an Islamic country to manage our ports is no big deal, because the security is controled by us. To them I say, you are idiots. I will not itemize all the reasons why it is bad, saner minds than me have already done so. We are under a full scale invasion, economicaly and psychologically. Our enemies have discovered what paralizes our political aparatus, and our instinctual resolve. In essence we have been infected with a pathogen that uses our own system against us. How the .com's of the world can juxtapose "hunter/killer teams" with lets let them manage our ports amazes me. Zenster has been a voice calling for HARD action, I have called for genocide against our enemies. Numerous voices have enumerated the same but with different language. I don't quibble. Islam MUST be DESTROYED. This is for all the marbles, we are already WAY behind the 8Ball. In reality, I will be dead as most of you will be if Islam is allowed to play out its game. I'ts what we leave for our children and grand-children...and maybe our great-grand-children that I worry about. As horrible as it may sound, the cost of exterminating Islam and its adherents today, is a small price to pay for what the cost of not doing it might bring tomorrow. If no one else is prepared to harden their resolve and sacrifice their soul, I, and others are. ISLAM must be stopped. If it it means killing 1.7 billion people to save the other 5 or so billion, so BE IT! This could all be obviated by seizing their only source of income. We must inject ourselves as stewards of their future, Without Petro-Dollars they are nothing, we must moderate, or destroy. I am willing, are you? If so, then write you reps, they don't respond vote them out. Also, buy weapons and ammunition, prepare for the conflict ahead. Premption: (.com, Frank Git, et al now is the time to stop waffling on both sides of the fence.). NO MORE MUSLIMS in THE USA! |
| Posted by: Vinkat Bala Subrumanian 2006-02-26 23:02 |
| #6 Vinkat - got nothing against India. The government and businesses of India are looking after their own people. That's the way it should be. Too bad the US govt. (and business community) doesn't feel the same way. |
| Posted by: DMFD 2006-02-26 21:56 |
| #5 American business has helped send a lot of jobs there, and to a whole host of other countries as well. This was a process that started long before Bush became President. I find the Indian people fascinating, hell...I married an Indian woman, she's been a damn site better wife than my first two spoiled American wives. When the showdown with China comes, if ever, India will be key to our success. |
| Posted by: Vinkat Bala Subrumanian 2006-02-26 19:40 |
| #4 Edward Yee: That's the one thing you could have done at a Bush interview that was a killer. It came out right when he was elected and he had to interview all sorts of people. Bam! Dossier closed, have a nice day. You could talk up other people all day, but if you puffed yourself, the door is over there and there will be no phone call. It was no great secret, as the few who screwed up later learned to their horror. Other than that, Bush preferred the friendly and folksy approach, punctuated with killer questions, for which the interviewee had unlimited time, and had better use a significant amount of it. The best part was that if Bush accepts you and knows what you offer, you are in his tight circle of intense mutual loyalty. He also has a down about leaks, which was evidenced by classes being given by the administration to incoming personnel about how not to get trapped or blackmailed into leaking, what to do if you accidently leak, and what will happen to you if you leak. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-02-26 19:33 |
| #3 They never heard that Bush has a deep animosity to any form of "self-promotion", and if someone ever tried it with him, that was the end of their job interview. Neither did I, anonymoose. |
| Posted by: Edward Yee 2006-02-26 18:17 |
| #2 He should get a warm welcome there - he's helped send a lot of US jobs their way. |
| Posted by: DMFD 2006-02-26 14:33 |
| #1 The release of this story, just ahead of the planned Bush visit to Pakistan, is no coincidence. The story may not even be true, but that is not the point. The point is to make sure both India and Pakistan know India has a friend in the White House - a BIG friend. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2006-02-26 11:14 |