Opinion A rough landing

At the start of 1960s,the Cold War was its height. A four-power East-West summit in Paris had just fallen flat because of the flight over the Soviet Union by America’s U-2 super-spy plane,which was shot down. Both the United States and Britain,therefore,strained every nerve to dissuade India from going in for the MiG-21 or any other Soviet weaponry. American effrontery was unbelievable. Having supplied Pakistan with Sabre fighters already,the US had also started gifting it the more sophisticated F-104s,also called Starfighters. In no mood to offer India any lethal military equipment (even though it had given us three squadrons of C-119 transport aircraft in 1954-55),Washington “urged” New Delhi to buy British Lightning aircraft,wrongly claiming that it was better than anything the Soviet Union could offer. Britain was,of course,very keen to sell Lightning fighters to India,but wanted payment in cash. This country had no foreign exchange and was,in fact,busy pruning the Second Five-Year Plan to slash expenditures in foreign currency.

John Kenneth Galbraith,then the US ambassador to India,recorded later that he and some others had then advised President John F. Kennedy to pay the British for the aircraft and recover the amount from India in relatively small instalments. JFK’s reply was: “Why should we be so foolish as to pay millions of dollars to save the Indians from their folly?” There was no such problem vis-à-vis the MiGs. The Indo-Soviet trade was in rupees and was basically barter. So we paid for fighter aircraft in “shoe-uppers,bananas and tea”.

On a bright and balmy day in August 1961,the Soviet capital became the venue of two extremely significant events. One was the arrival of Fidel Castro,obviously to discuss in utmost secrecy the installation of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba. The reception he was given was so huge and so tumultuous as to be breathtaking. It almost completely eclipsed the second event: the agreement between India and the USSR,not only on the supply of MiG-21s,but also on their production under licence in India. Incidentally,it must be underscored that the Cuban missile crisis erupted during the brief and brutal India-China border war of October 1962,which was a debacle for India. There is considerable evidence to show that,because of their superior intelligence in Havana,the Chinese had a reasonable idea of when the two superpowers were likely to be engrossed in the missile crisis,and they timed their invasion and unilateral ceasefire accordingly.

As every student of the 1962 war knows,for a brief period,until the resolution of the Cuban confrontation,the Soviet Union chose not to annoy China. It spoke of “our Chinese brothers and Indian friends”. A Pravda editorial even advocated that India accept a ceasefire on Chinese terms. It was during this short period that work on sending MiG-21s to India was also slowed down. However,Moscow reverted to its pro-India policy as soon as the Cuban missile crisis was over.

After the 1962 war,the US offered India the F-4,a two-seater fighter aircraft of high quality,but later reneged on its promise. In the meantime,we had trained a large number of pilots and navigators for the F-4,which created a major problem. As for the F-104 Starfighter,which later earned the moniker “widow-maker” because it crashed all too frequently,the story is even worse. After a joint exercise with the US air force at Palam,the IAF declared the Starfighter to be a superior aircraft and was eager to acquire it. The Americans refused to give it,which was a stroke of good luck for India.

For long before the dawn of the global age,it was discovered that the big sales of Starfighters were a global racket. A powerful prime minister of Japan and a prince in Western Europe were among a large number of middlemen who went to jail for accepting heavy bribes. The flames of accusation reached even West Germany’s famous defence minister,J. Strauss,but did not singe him. However,he was heard reciting: “The fault is not in our stars but our Starfighters”.

The writer is a Delhi-based political commentator

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