While Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made light of the Indo-U.S. wrangling on Iran on the eve of his departure today, there are growing concerns in the Indian establishment at what many call an orchestrated campaign here against India’s position on Tehran’s nuclear proliferation. Denying any “crisis” in Indo-US relations on Iran at a press conference here, Singh pointed to the shared Indo-US interests in preventing further proliferation of nuclear weapons in “India’s neighbourhood”. He also emphasised that “diplomacy must be given a chance to succeed”. Singh and his aides had come here to dispel what they thought were “misperceptions” about India’s constructive position on dealing with the non-proliferation challenge in Iran. Despite the clarification of India’s position at the highest levels, there has been no let-up in a relentless campaign here to corner India on Iran, PM’s delegation finds. While Singh and President George W. Bush have laid out a powerful vision for Indo-US relations and are committed to implementing the historic nuclear pact, sections of Washington bureacracy seem bent on pushing India for short-term gains. Despite India’s constructive approach to the Iran crisis at the IAEA, which the Administration officials acknowledge in private, there has been no real effort to either inform influential American opinion or adequately defend India’s position against the critics of the nuclear pact in Washington. The Indian delegation is also surprised at the flak that external affairs minister Natwar Singh’s visit to Iran has drawn in Washington. The Bush Administration was surely aware that Singh had gone to Tehran, in part, to pass on a message from the European powers who are leading the negotiations with Iran. Strangely, those in the American establishment who are demanding that Delhi choose between Tehran and Washington have refused to acknowledge the unambiguous Indian support to the EU initiative on Iran and its positive diplomacy at the IAEA. India is also troubled by a larger political irony. It is Pakistan which provided enrichment technology to Iran and is now actively encouraging Iran’s defiance at the IAEA. However, it is India which is being rapped on the knuckles in Washington. Congressman Tom Lantos, who thundered against India at the first Congressional hearings last week on the nuclear pact, has not found time to ask which side Pakistan was in the current nuclear confrontation between the U.S. and Iran. Instead in a formal statement made earlier this week in the House of Representatives, Lantos sang praises of Musharraf. Calling him the “Indispensable Man”, Lantos said Musharraf is “one of the most significant and pivotal figures in Pakistan’s history”. Not a word from Lantos, who is known to work with the Administration on key foreign policy issues, on A Q Khan’s smuggling racket or Pakistan’s nuclear connection with Iran. Of equal concern to Delhi is that the growing enthusiasm for Musharraf in Washington might have encouraged, if only inadvertently, Pakistan’s President to up the ante in his talks with Singh on Wednesday. Musharraf’s hard ball tactics this week, both in his remarks on Kashmir at the United Nations and on Indian troop withdrawal, could be part a new sense of overconfidence in Islamabad. The decision by the Bush Administration in recent weeks to significantly increase the number of F-16s to be sold to Pakistan might also have allowed Musharraf to over-reach in his talks with Singh on Wednesday. If Musharraf misinterprets the nature of American support to him and queers the pitch for India, the peace process could well begin to stall. Amidst these new uncertainties, American pressure on India to open a new political front against Tehran could well boomerang. In believing that it could squeeze India on Iran amidst the current American legislative debate on the Indo-U.S. nuclear pact, the Bush Administration might be badly miscalculating India’s potential reaction.
