Does India have a world-view?

When all the Big Boys in New Delhi will be watching Burns, Burn’s own bosses will be riveted on Saddam Hussein’s trial, the loopholes in the Iraqi referendum, the simulated lure of some low-hanging fruit in Damascus and the totally stuck mid-East peace process. These are only some of the issues Washington and the rest of the international community is watching. Are we, too? The evidence is not there. At least not in our media.

An elementary factor in friendships struck even in school dormitories is common interests.

The fault, I dare say, is all ours. We have painted ourselves into a South Asian corner by our sheer intellectual disinterest in the rest of the world. Never has the international system been in such chaos and we sit back like we have some insurance that the tremors will not reach us.

There is an almighty build-up on the referendum in Iraq. There, we have the flimsiest notice that there may have been some fraud. Then comes news that there ‘‘has been fraud’’ in the recent Afghan elections. Before we can decode it, Saddam Hussein is brought into focus as a defiant ex-president, thumbing his nose at the weak looking Kurd who is sitting in as the judge.

After Paul Bremer and Negroponte have demonstrated their tricks, what rabbit is Zalmay Khalilzad about to pull out of his hat? Now that the Shias and the Kurds are pretty close to achieving their objectives, the spectre of a defiant Saddam Hussein is being created to put fear in their hearts — then extract concessions on federalism and Kirkuk. Also, it could provide the Baathists with a rallying point, thereby isolating the suicide bombers.

One marvels at the perspicacity of the leadership in Najaf which had anticipated fairly early, the script as it is unfolding. In March 2004, an Ayatullah told me in Najaf: ‘‘We are not fools to celebrate before celebrations are due’’, he said. On the fingers of one hand, he began to count: ‘‘Saddam Hussein — mahfooz (still there), US troops — mahfooz. The Baathists — scattered but mahfooz. And Osama Bin Laden — mahfooz’’. What the Ayatullah was implying was this: all these elements are available and any or all can be used against any one of us at a time of America’s choosing.

With so much confusion in a country shattered at every level, the US neo cons, the New York Times informs us, are ‘‘now dreaming of overthrowing Assad by unilateral force’’.

After terminating Charles Taylor’s ghastly spell in Liberia and, by an agreement, sending him into exile in Nigeria, the US is breathing down the neck of Nigeria’s President Obasanjo to return him to Liberia to stand trial. Why? Because a Charles Taylor alive can still beam his influence in Liberia. It would be a good outcome if George Weah, the international soccer sensation or Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, formerly of the World Bank, win the presidential race. This is what the US wants. By why incur Obsanjo’s anger on an international agreement?

Pressure is now on Senegal to send former Chad dictator Hissene Habre to Belgium to stand trial for crimes against humanity committed after he was installed in Chad in 1982 with US help to checkmate Qadaffi in Libya!

The US is running around about 50 countries in Africa and Latin America seeking a ‘‘bilateral immunity agreement’’ which would prevent Americans from being prosecuted before the International Criminal Court to which all these countries are signatories. Nicolas D. Kristof writes in the New York Times: ‘‘So the Bush administration is cutting off certain military and economic support funds to a couple of dozen of these governments’’.

And what has been the result of pushing India into taking sides against Iran at IAEA? Indian influence on Tehran has declined.

Indian missions in SAARC countries have been embarrassed. Why would a wilful king in Nepal entertain the Indian Ambassador? He will talk to the American ambassador with whom we are yoked in what is cheerfully described as the tsunami model.

Real friends help us build our standing, not diminish it. And if friends don’t, we do it ourselves.