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| India-Pakistan |
| India, U.S.: Washington Grooms New Delhi |
| 2006-06-07 |
| Summary India's June 6 announcement that it will test-fire its Agni-III missile sometime in August came just a day after U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Peter Pace said such a firing would not affect the pending U.S.-Indian civilian nuclear deal. Pace also indicated that the United States would like India to assume a much greater role in patrolling the Strait of Malacca. Pace's four-day visit to New Delhi and his comments have a geopolitical undercurrent: The United States is developing India into a junior partner in the Indian Ocean region. Analysis U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Peter Pace wrapped up his four-day visit to India on June 7. Pace indicated June 5 that Washington would accept India's test-firing of the Agni-III missile; the next day, New Delhi announced that the test-firing would take place in August. Pace also said the United States looks forward to India assuming greater responsibility in patrolling the Strait of Malacca. Pace's trip to India marks the first time the highest-ranking U.S. military commander visited since Washington and New Delhi signed a 10-year defense cooperation agreement in 2005. That agreement set in motion negotiations of a U.S.-Indian civilian nuclear deal that involved the United States giving significant help in India's development of a nuclear power infrastructure in exchange for India's putting some restrictions on its military nuclear program. The nuclear deal has been stalled in the U.S. Congress; U.S. President George W. Bush has found it increasingly difficult to push his international agenda forward because of his precipitous decline in popularity in opinion polls. India knows that Bush has faced much opposition to the nuclear deal, and so put off testing its Agni-III missile for fear of further endangering the agreement. This is why India did not respond in kind, as it typically does, when Pakistan tested a missile -- the ShaheenII/HatfVI ballistic missile -- May 7. Pace's June 5 announcement that Washington would not see the missile test as a nuclear-proliferation concern changed New Delhi's reasoning. India, realizing that the United States likely would not approve the civilian nuclear deal until at least autumn, was happy to get the go-ahead from at least the U.S. executive branch. India's attention to -- and desire for -- U.S. approval suggests that India is playing its role in the development of a strategic partnership between Washington and New Delhi. The relationship is a potentially deep one: the United States will provide India with nuclear technology, development capital, and military hardware and training; in return, India will help safeguard U.S. interests in the Indian Ocean region. The partnership could also powerfully demonstrate to Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf that the United States would not act to block a resurgent India from attacking Pakistan (not that such a scenario is likely) and also help take New Delhi out of Iran's orbit. A formal alliance it is not; India does not want to be seen as being anti-Moscow or anti-Beijing, even as it develops stronger ties with the United States. Geopolitically, China and India have been off of each other's radar screens (despite a piddling border skirmish in 1962), as they are geographically sealed from each other by the natural wall of the Himalayas and jungle. India wants to continue to buy arms from Russia, such as parts for the MiG-29Ks that will be flying off the deck of the INS Vikramaditya aircraft carrier, which is to be handed over after a Russian refit in 2008. New Delhi wants the United States to continue to train the pilots of those MiGs for carrier operations. The United States has also agreed in principle to sell India an Austin-class Landing Platform Dock, the USS Trenton, significantly enhancing New Delhi's maritime power-projection capabilities. In return, Washington would like India to do exactly what it wants to anyway: shoulder responsibility and become a powerhouse in the Indian Ocean, second only to the U.S. Navy. The United States hopes that an India more involved in the Malacca Strait and with an improved navy will make China nervous. As Malacca is a chokepoint for Chinese trade and energy supplies, the naval frontier is essentially the only potential conflict point between New Delhi and Beijing, which otherwise are for all intents and purposes a continent away from one another. Pace's visit merely formalized what has already been occurring: a coming together of Indian and American interests in a confederation of convenience. Washington would like New Delhi to break out of its shell and exert enough influence in the region to at least annoy China and a recalcitrant Pakistan. India would like to get whatever it can from its latest patron, the United States, in order to help alleviate its massive infrastructure problems, which are preventing India from becoming a major world power. |
| Posted by:john |
| #2 Blood vessels popping in Islamabad and Beijing? |
| Posted by: john 2006-06-07 17:28 |
| #1 A top American general Monday painted a rosy roadmap of India-US military ties to "send a strong message to our potential enemies" and contribute to bringing "peace and stability" in the region. "Our engagement will send a strong message to our potential enemies that we are capable of defending ourselves and that India and the US are going to protect their citizens against harm. That would be very stabilising (for the region)," US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, Gen. Peter Pace, declared at a media briefing on the first day of a two-day visit to India. |
| Posted by: john 2006-06-07 17:27 |