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WASHINGTON: President Bush is sending his new envoy to New Delhi this week with very clear instructions: Transform the relationship with India.
Robert Blackwell, the new US ambassador to India, was sworn in Monday, and in an Oval office meeting with the President, was told of the administration's strategic objective of transforming ties with India. "I am going to India to help the President do this," Blackwell said after he was administered the oath of office by National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice.
Blackwell will leave for India sometime later this week and will most likely be in New Delhi in time to re-energise Indo-US ties along with Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia Christina Rocca, who is also visiting the region on a familiarisation trip. The fervid action on the Indo-US front, which momentarily took a backseat due to Indo-Pak parleys, will slip into higher gear in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, most noticeably, Washington's reading and reaction to the Indo-Pak summit has been very very circumspect. The US has not joined the blame game, and has studiously kept out of the imbroglio by suggesting it is up to the parties involved to find a way out of the woods.
"While India and Pakistan did not reach agreement on a final joint statement, it is important to keep this meeting in perspective. The two sides were grappling with very difficult issues that have divided them for over 50 years," Assistant Secretary Rocca said on Tuesday at an Indian American Friendship Council banquet.
The serious and constructive atmosphere of these talks indicated that both sides are committed to resolving their differences even if this turns out to be a lengthy process, she added.
While there is general agreement in expert South Asian circles here that India and Pakistan were embarking on a very difficult exercise, there is also some dismay that Islamabad has chosen to raise the temperature with its laser-like intensity on Kashmir.
The feeling here is that it may end up burning Pakistan itself. Commentators most often point out that countries all over the world -- Japan and Russia, Britain and Argentina to name two - have territorial issues, but they do not hold ties hostage to them.
If Pakistan hoped to draw in international or US mediation by painting India as intransigent, that does not seem to be working either. Asked the perennial question about American mediation, senior state department official Gary Usury said India and Pakistan appeared to be doing fine without any mediation.
There is a tacit recognition in Washington of the merit in India's argument that any dialogue with Pakistan should be broad-based and not unidimensional, something that appears to have escaped the ruling elite in Islamabad. For instance, in her own remarks at the Indian-American Friendship Council, Secretary Rocca maintained that "non-proliferation remains an important goal of US policy...but we want to expand and transform our engagement on defence issues, talking more about potential areas of cooperation while continuing to narrow our remaining differences."
US officials say managing such differences
and contradictions while taking the long and high road to peace ought to
be the objective in the sub-continent. What is left unsaid is that one
side is upping the ante even as the other side is accused of dissembling.
Implicitly vesting India with greater responsibility, Rocca told the friendship
council gathering yesterday that "As the largest country in the region,
India has a role and a responsibility to play in helping secure stable,
peaceful conditions in South Asia and beyond."
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