It Takes Two

For anyone who believes that America does not have the answers to all our problems, this book should provide a crash course on how there is ...

For anyone who believes that America does not have the answers to all our problems, this book should provide a crash course on how there is a section of people who believe they are completely wrong. Datta-Ray represents that section in an almost 500-page volume. He is encouraged by the events after 9/11 but he also draws on a 50-year history to illustrate the many moments when the US spurned Indian overtures.

Yet, he is clearly waiting for America to make a decision on whether President George W. Bush turns the screws on General Pervez Musharraf or persists with the notion 8212; a relic of the Cold War 8212; that Western interests are best served by succouring Pakistan, no matter how obscurantist, repressive and militaristic it might be. By implication, according to Datta-Ray, the US accepted Islamabad8217;s definition that terrorism in Kashmir is actually a fight for freedom, presumably because Americans also agree with the expedient and dangerous thesis that Kashmir is of crucial importance to Pakistan8217;s identity and existence.

Waiting for America: India and the US in the New Millennium
By Sunanda K.
Datta-Ray
HarperCollins
Price: Rs 595

And unless Washington can make the adjustment, it will be pointless for Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to tell us that the world8217;s oldest and biggest democracies must unite in the face of the common enemy.

Through a maze of history and sundry name-droppings 8212; Finance Minister Jaswant Singh figures in a rather familiar avatar as just Jaswant, and Rajiv Gandhi is always Rajiv 8212; the author8217;s final submission is that, 8216;8216;It has fallen to the Republican administration to be in a position to discipline the Pakistanis, defuse the threat of Indian retaliation and avert the peril of a fourth and far more devastating conflict that might leave no survivors.8217;8217; This must be the most unpoetic vision of a nuclear holocaust. But that8217;s what he wants the US to avert.

If the new millennium is an opportunity for India to get out of a foreign policy rut, it is no less an opportunity for the US finally to shed the blinkers of the Cold War. All this the US must do because Pax Americana implies involvement, ambition and a benign commitment to human welfare. This is Datta-Ray8217;s thesis.

It also reads like the script of Independence Day. This theory is disputable but perhaps admissible. What will surprise even the most committed followers of the US-for-India theory is what Datta-Ray believes the Indians can do for the world8217;s Lone Superpower. India which has problems negotiating with its own dissident Kashmiri groups, according to Datta-Ray, can be a 8216;8216;mediator between the US and radical forces in the Persian Gulf8217;8217;. The US, Datta-Ray omits to mention, has more leverage in the Middle East than any other country in the world.

Apart from these exaggerated notions of India8217;s importance, Waiting for America has some anecdotal value from the Rajiv-Reagan era, of Clinton8217;s switch in policy during the Kargil conflict, of India8217;s role in Operation Desert Storm, even some stories from Indira Gandhi8217;s early engagement in 1982 with the US and of Nehru being spurned even before India8217;s independence.

All of which could have been said in a book half its size. But that8217;s a fault that should not lie with the author but with his editor. As it is, the book reads like a rambling recollection of history with a very personal idea that the US must do all and 8216;8216;India is waiting8217;8217;.