India-US Relations : News and Discussion

[shyams]

US action in 1971 couldn't have resulted in war. The president needs congressional approval to begin one, and none would have been given for one against India. Even the state department was against the actions of the duo of Kissinger and Nixon. Details of this are very much in the open if one wishes to read up on it.

Wrong! The US president has vast "Presidential Powers" including initiating major operations against a nation without Congressional approval . This is true in general. The restriction of powers of President that you talk about came in 1973 via the "War Powers Resolution". That means in 1971, the President was free to do what he wanted, and the intentions of sending US aircraft career was a clear message on what comes next.

Further on the resolution, it does not "stop" the President the way you are trying to misrepresent it. The resolution just states that the President has to notify the Congress in 48hrs and cannot commit armed forces for more than 60 days (30 more days for withdrawal) without Congressional authorization. Within those 60 days he can do plenty of damage. Remember Pakistan was wiped out from what is now Bangladesh in just under 2 weeks, by another third world country. So US President even under today's so called "restriction" has a lot of potential to do damage to other nations.

Also, this act appears to be just namesake with violations of this act committed again and again without any repercussion.

[Tuvaluan]

All from Magnificent Delusions. A pretty good book, if one wishes to open up their minds.

The problem with having too much of an open mind by trusting a single source, and ignoring other verifiable sources of contradicting info, is that the contents usually fall out. Just quoting a book by a paki, and claiming that every one who does not consider that as an authoritative source on the topic is being close-minded, is pretty lame.

The Kissinger/Nixon episode during the Bangladesh war is pretty well known, unless you know, one is close-minded and ignores those factoids.

[shyams]

Why not try to present what major think tanks in India think of the US. Is there any proof that the popular thinking is that the US wishes to contain India or has actively sponsored secession within the country ? That can easily be dismissed as handiwork of macaulayputras. Does the decidedly nationalist Modi government harbour such opinions perhaps ? Why bother with facts when one can resort to ranting against perceived grievances and cook up conspiracies to feed it ? Do continue to tilt most furiously at the windmills.

If you are even remotely aware of Geopolitics and contemporary history of South Asia, you would not even ask these juvenile questions and paint everything as CT when it does not fit your or perhaps your govt's interest.

There are plenty of links and forums posts with links that can help educate you on many topics. I am not going to take it upon myself to provide it to you. Feel free to click and explore.

[Gus]

us was not containing india because it was not at war with india because congress would not have given approval.

brilliant. how can one break this logic.

[Sagar G]

A bit sophisticated sepoys are being deployed now but with the hokum logic being dished out it isn't difficult to spot them. Come on Murica you can do better than this !!!

[svinayak]

Well trained to ignore history and create a new spin.
Keep picking the holes again and again

[KrishnaK]

All from Magnificent Delusions. A pretty good book, if one wishes to open up their minds.

The problem with having too much of an open mind by trusting a single source, and ignoring other verifiable sources of contradicting info, is that the contents usually fall out. Just quoting a book by a paki, and claiming that every one who does not consider that as an authoritative source on the topic is being close-minded, is pretty lame.

The Kissinger/Nixon episode during the Bangladesh war is pretty well known, unless you know, one is close-minded and ignores those factoids.

There's the blood telegram too, not to mention the de-classified documents they're based on. Nothing in that book shows that anyone except the Nixon/Kissinger pair was in anyway ill-disposed towards India or even that they were prepared to go to war. Surely they must've talked about it at some point if they had considered it. Egging the Chinese on was far more dangerous than the carrier incident. There is no proof of any necessity of containing India having been put out by any US administration, let alone multiple ones. They have done so openly against the Soviet Union and China. What would hold them back from publishing such thoughts against India ? Surely they would've felt free to do so where we were seen as practically being Soviet allies for decades. Anyways, the lack of any factoid on your part bar the 1971 incident is telling. What's confirms there nothing more to your side is the sepoy argument being trotted out (not by you). There's nothing more to discuss here.

[KrishnaK]

US action in 1971 couldn't have resulted in war. The president needs congressional approval to begin one, and none would have been given for one against India. Even the state department was against the actions of the duo of Kissinger and Nixon. Details of this are very much in the open if one wishes to read up on it.

Wrong! The US president has vast "Presidential Powers" including initiating major operations against a nation without Congressional approval . This is true in general. The restriction of powers of President that you talk about came in 1973 via the "War Powers Resolution". That means in 1971, the President was free to do what he wanted, and the intentions of sending US aircraft career was a clear message on what comes next.

Further on the resolution, it does not "stop" the President the way you are trying to misrepresent it. The resolution just states that the President has to notify the Congress in 48hrs and cannot commit armed forces for more than 60 days (30 more days for withdrawal) without Congressional authorization. Within those 60 days he can do plenty of damage. Remember Pakistan was wiped out from what is now Bangladesh in just under 2 weeks, by another third world country. So US President even under today's so called "restriction" has a lot of potential to do damage to other nations.

Also, this act appears to be just namesake with violations of this act committed again and again without any repercussion.

Fair enough, I might be wrong on the issue. That the president would've required congressional approval alone doesn't imply Nixon wouldn't have gone to war with India. There still is not a shred of evidence that they even considered it from any of the papers which candidly document everything else, including the most derogatory of remarks about India/Indians and the Indian PM. On the other hand everything points to the US frantically trying to ensure that India wouldn't carve up West Pakistan. This from Gary Bass' The Blood Telegram.

[arshyam]

Even the state department was against the actions of the duo of Kissinger and Nixon. Details of this are very much in the open if one wishes to read up on it. Neither the "The Blood Telegram", which takes a very dim view of Kissinger's actions, nor Magnificent Delusions both of which delve in that period show that Nixon and Kissinger were planning on taking military action against India. Their behaviour was certainly abominable and marked a low-point in our ties.

Yes yes, so Nixon and Kissinger were the bad guys, they went rogue. The SD and Congress were the ones who restrained them. Okay.

The argument that the US has something against India because it has undertaken unfriendly acts is specious. And of course depending on the person's own mindset, it gets portrayed as religious, racist or imperialist or whatever else.

Since you are asking us to broaden our rather narrow horizons and share factoids, here's a source for you: http://indiafacts.co.in/religious-crusades-cia/. Here the same SD you sort of held above blame is shown to be playing dirty games along with the US intel agencies. So SD and CIA are the rogue guys here then, not the political executive.

Armed Conflict Resolution and People’s Rights - Haas, Berkeley

The Project is currently focused on South Asia. Armed conflict and social violence are extensive in several parts there and India serves as a case in point. The regions of Manipur, Jammu & Kashmir, and Chhattisgarh are differently but persistently affected by internal conflict, with conflict-related issues intermittently occurring in Punjab. Areas such as Gujarat and Odisha have been impacted by social and sectarian violence on minority communities in recent history.

Such aggression has fractured social relations in postcolonial India with far-reaching human impact and a disruptive effect on national, regional, and global security. Such aggression is spurred by a myriad of issues including cultural and communal identity, religionization and minoritization, self-determination, and economic empowerment. These situations endanger people’s rights and pose humanitarian crises. They particularly affect civilian populations—especially children, youth, women, and minorities, and undercut the ethos of pluralism and openness to difference that defines Indian democracy. The National Human Rights Commission of India, in its submission to the UN Human Rights Council for India’s Second Universal Periodic Review (2008), stated: “There are inordinate delays in the provision of justice...There is still no national action plan for human rights.” This remains true today.

So now the universities are rogue, not the USG, right?

America seems to be afflicted by periodic infections of rogueness only, there is no over-arching connection across the rogueness. Right.

Incidentally, popular opinion in the US was against the partition of India and was supportive of Indian independence from Britain even during WWII.

So? Since when did the USG listen to popular opinion before undertaking any expedition? Vietnam was not popular, heck LBJ was elected on a 'peace' plank, yet he ended up ratcheting up the war.

Wanting to contain a country with a per capita of 1600 today, which incidentally gets most of the 50+% of it's GDP from the same country is only slightly less absurd. Especially so, when India has evinced no interest in changing boundaries, claiming parts of the world because it was vaguely indian a 1000 years ago or even picking up fights anywhere based on past grievances.

Again, so? Russia isn't interested in changing boundaries as well, yet see the sanctions against them over the Ukraine issue.

But then again none of you have to believe that position.

Once again, it is not a question of belief, but cold hard facts subject to geopolitical realities. An India with a $15T economy with an independent foreign policy not based on conflict is not in the US' interest, as such an India will inevitably challenge the US for mindspace around the world. So it is in the US' interest to keep India from growing to that point, or at least delay it as much as possible. Hence the various friendly, and perhaps fictional to you, interventions in various aspects to Indian life. And no, the $14T China is not the same as India, the US is happy with China as it is evolving into a duopoly with the US still calling the shots. The only outsiders to this cosy system are India, Russia and maybe Brazil.

Why bother with facts when one can resort to ranting against perceived grievances and cook up conspiracies to feed it ? Do continue to tilt most furiously at the windmills.

What to do saar, we all only perceived the carrier task force steaming into the BoB, which seemed to have come on a cruise to see the magnificent Chola temples and nothing more. Never mind the fact that, coincidentally, we were helping a people who were being systematically purged within their own country, and that we couldn't feed the growing tide of refugees. Quixotic, we are. Pragmatic and generous, Americans are.

[Cosmo_R]

^^^ Nixon tilt towards Pakistan 1971.
For you gents it is history. For me, it was news. From that perspective, I can tell you that there was no way Nixon was going to attack India—not because he might not have wished to but because he and Kissinger were almost completely isolated on the issue. If you Google effectively, you'll even find reference to the Enterprise commander being really upset at being ordered to 'intimidate' the Indians.

Nixon was far out in left field. The NYT under the aegis of Abe Rosenthal (good man) was in the forefront reporting 'West Pakistani' atrocities. Sidney Schanberg rode (as the first embedded correspondent) with the (?) 'Madras Regiment' as they penetrated into Bangladesh and called in SU-7 airstrikes on Paki machine gun nests. And, finally, the WSJ. One Peter Kann who, as Raja Ram might preface as 'gentle readers', went on to head Dow Jones, earned his spurs by reporting the horror of the atrocities visited by West Pakistanis on their Bengali 'bretheren'. He, Schanberg and Rosenthal absolutely swayed public opinion.

I also attended the 'Concert for Bangladesh' (look it up), it will give you and idea of the temper of the times. Truthfully, Nixon could not even have manufactured a Tonkin Gulf resolution in the face of the overwhelming support that India (and nascent Bangladesh) enjoyed at the time.

And, BTW, IG knew this and the only red line was "don't invade 'West Pakistan' because we need Yahya for our (secret) PRC initiative.

[MurthyB]

I also attended the 'Concert for Bangladesh' (look it up), it will give you and idea of the temper of the times. Truthfully, Nixon could not even have manufactured a Tonkin Gulf resolution in the face of the overwhelming support that India (and nascent Bangladesh) enjoyed at the time.

Not only that, but many groups in the 60's like CCR came out with songs like "fortunate son" and Bob Dylan etc, and Berkeley saw massive anti-war protests. Influentual Hollywood celebs like Jane Fonda were at the forefront of the peace movement. All of this ensured that the 2-3 people in the executive branch who wanted to wage war in Vietnam were defeated, and America never went to any such war.

[Kashi]

For you gents it is history. For me, it was news. From that perspective, I can tell you that there was no way Nixon was going to attack India—not because he might not have wished to but because he and Kissinger were almost completely isolated on the issue. If you Google effectively, you'll even find reference to the Enterprise commander being really upset at being ordered to 'intimidate' the Indians.

Yet the commander was happy to sail into the Bay of Bengal in what was hardly friendly port call. Now where have we heard something like this before- Oh yes. Kargil was Musharraf only, Badmash and other officers were kept in the dark.

Nixon was far out in left field. The NYT under the aegis of Abe Rosenthal (good man) was in the forefront reporting 'West Pakistani' atrocities. Sidney Schanberg rode (as the first embedded correspondent) with the (?) 'Madras Regiment' as they penetrated into Bangladesh and called in SU-7 airstrikes on Paki machine gun nests. And, finally, the WSJ. One Peter Kann who, as Raja Ram might preface as 'gentle readers', went on to head Dow Jones, earned his spurs by reporting the horror of the atrocities visited by West Pakistanis on their Bengali 'bretheren'. He, Schanberg and Rosenthal absolutely swayed public opinion.

And how many calls where there for their "allies" to be tried under a setup similar to the Nuremberg trials? Let e give you a hint- it's <1. Heck till recently a former US ambassador in Dhaka was batting for the Jamaatis and pro-Paki elements in Bangladesh. If your Congress and SD indeed leaned upon Nixon-Kissinger duo to brings the Pakis to justice and not come down on India if we made further inroads into West Pakistan, that's news to me.

I also attended the 'Concert for Bangladesh' (look it up), it will give you and idea of the temper of the times. Truthfully, Nixon could not even have manufactured a Tonkin Gulf resolution in the face of the overwhelming support that India (and nascent Bangladesh) enjoyed at the time.

The concert for Bangladesh was organised on August 1, 1971, The USS Enterprise led task force moved into Bay of Bengal in December 1971. So much for the overwhelming support forcing Nixon's hand.

And, BTW, IG knew this and the only red line was "don't invade 'West Pakistan' because we need Yahya for our (secret) PRC initiative.

And you do not see any problems with that? Who am I kidding, of course you don't. So you do admit that all that "overwhelming support" was merely lip service, and US was hardly going a sacrifice an "ally" even if they were responsible for one of the horrific crimes and genocide in the 21st century?

[KrishnaK]

Since you are asking us to broaden our rather narrow horizons and share factoids, here's a source for you: http://indiafacts.co.in/religious-crusades-cia/. Here the same SD you sort of held above blame is shown to be playing dirty games along with the US intel agencies. So SD and CIA are the rogue guys here then, not the political executive.

This is precisely what one would call a conspiracy theory.

After the creation of the CIA , Christian missionaries played a very important role in destabilizing various countries and in carrying out espionage activities on behalf of the CIA. The most recent high profile example of the US using religious missionaries as Trojan horses to cause disturbances in India was in the case of the agitation against the Kudankulam nuclear power plant. This agitation came after a cable to the CIA from the US Consulate in Mumbai (Wikileaks cable 06MUMBAI1803_a) informed the agency that “we feel that the USG must move forward to enable our companies to compete in the next stage of India’s nuclear future. Otherwise we may have to watch bitterly as third countries become the first to benefit commercially from the environment that our diplomacy has created.”

That the CIA might have used christian missionaries could well be true. Where is the connection from that to

The most recent high profile example of the US using religious missionaries as Trojan horses to cause disturbances in India was in the case of the agitation against the Kudankulam nuclear power plant.

Incidentally the wikileaks cable has nothing to do with the Christian missionaries being used as Trojan horses. That article's claim to connection between the CIA using christian missionaries are spies to the agitation against the Kudankulam power plant is the timing of the cable.

Armed Conflict Resolution and People’s Rights - Haas, Berkeley

The Project is currently focused on South Asia. Armed conflict and social violence are extensive in several parts there and India serves as a case in point. The regions of Manipur, Jammu & Kashmir, and Chhattisgarh are differently but persistently affected by internal conflict, with conflict-related issues intermittently occurring in Punjab. Areas such as Gujarat and Odisha have been impacted by social and sectarian violence on minority communities in recent history.

Such aggression has fractured social relations in postcolonial India with far-reaching human impact and a disruptive effect on national, regional, and global security. Such aggression is spurred by a myriad of issues including cultural and communal identity, religionization and minoritization, self-determination, and economic empowerment. These situations endanger people’s rights and pose humanitarian crises. They particularly affect civilian populations—especially children, youth, women, and minorities, and undercut the ethos of pluralism and openness to difference that defines Indian democracy. The National Human Rights Commission of India, in its submission to the UN Human Rights Council for India’s Second Universal Periodic Review (2008), stated: “There are inordinate delays in the provision of justice...There is still no national action plan for human rights.” This remains true today.

So now the universities are rogue, not the USG, right?

What exactly is your point ? The page claims that there is a lot of social conflict in India and that is is caused by

a myriad of issues including cultural and communal identity, religionization and minoritization, self-determination, and economic empowerment .

and that it detracts from a pluralistic democracy. What's rogue in this ?

Again, so? Russia isn't interested in changing boundaries as well, yet see the sanctions against them over the Ukraine issue.

This must take the cake as the stupidest argument i've ever heard. Russia did change the borders w.r.t. Ukraine. You might be supportive of that, but to claim it did not - Thank you for making my day.

[Suraj]

Wanting to contain a country with a per capita of 1600 today, which incidentally gets most of the 50+% of it's GDP from the same country is only slightly less absurd.

50% of India's GDP comes from US ? In which parallel universe ?

[Tuvaluan]

There's the blood telegram too, not to mention the de-classified documents they're based on. Nothing in that book shows that anyone except the Nixon/Kissinger pair was in anyway ill-disposed towards India or even that they were prepared to go to war.

So if it is not in the book, it must be false, eh? That is just so shiny and brilliant, that I am going to have to write the rest of this post with my eyes closed.

The quote below is from the following link but it is the transcript of the nixon tapes, and you really have the gall to make statements like the bolded part above and pretend everyone else is ignoring evidence and buy your utterly worthless horsesh!t? Anyway, the ignore button was invented to stop wasting time with the likes of you. Time to stop feeding the troll.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/07/1 ... -Genocide#

Transcripts of Nixon in private also showed his deep racist hatred of Indians. "Indians are cunning, traitorous people," he said. “I don’t know why the hell anybody would reproduce in that damn country, but they do.” As for Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, Nixon referred to her as, “the old bitch.” Kissinger, while not showing bigotry, seemed very indifferent to the lives lost, very much the pattern for his entire career. Even the death of a former student of his in genocide left him unaffected.

Nixon also encouraged China to deploy its forces along the border with India. China chose not to do so, largely because eight divisions of Indian forces were already deployed and prepared to fight off attacks.

[Cosmo_R]

@Kashi ^^^. No I don't see any problems with 'that'. You are reviewing 'history' as adjusted by the JNU. I saw it as news.

You are kidding yourself if you only see it through the prism of your 'teachers' who have an axe to grind. An education is about learning the process of making your own decisions based on your own research not reciting Arundhati Roy.

The concert for Bangladesh indeed happened before the the 7th fleet appearance in December. It would not have been so dissuasive after the fact would it? Just sequence it.

"If your Congress and SD indeed leaned upon Nixon-Kissinger duo to brings the Pakis to justice and not come down on India if we made further inroads into West Pakistan, that's news to me."

I am an Indian citizen. So I could fire back equally irresponsibly by saying "your leftist Arundhati Roy/JNU masters etc. But I wont. You're welcome.

"And how many calls where there for their "allies" to be tried under a setup similar to the Nuremberg trials?"

From whom? Did GoI take up cudgels to rake up the issue? IG could have but why did she not? What did your (sorry, the) JNU crowd do about it? Zippo? Nada? Zilch?

"if we made further inroads into West Pakistan, that's news to me." OK it's news to you but history to the rest of us." Google is a useful tool to fill the blanks between news and history.

Finally, this priceless "Yet the commander was happy to sail into the Bay of Bengal". Jeez! Do you have any understanding at all of how any military works? As a starter, I recommend the "Charge of the Light Brigade". Salient quote " Ours not reason why, our but to do and die." You're welcome.

IG called Nixon's bluff and that all it was.

[Gus]

well its been a while since we had full blown mutu stuff.

this is stuff that's been picked apart piece by piece and thrown into trashcan.

nothing happened. oh that? that was not intentional..it just happened that way. u know, america..that's how we roll. too bad sh1t happened to you because of our policies. trust me, it was not our intention.

what else....

[Kashi]

I am an Indian citizen. So I could fire back equally irresponsibly by saying "your leftist Arundhati Roy/JNU masters etc. But I wont. You're welcome.

I stand corrected. But then by saying "your leftist Arundhati Roy/JNU masters etc.?", aren't you guilty of assuming the same about your fellow posters, that whoever disagrees with your point of view must automatically be a JNU waala or consider them as "masters"?

It seems although you did not wish to fire back "irresponsibly", you appear to have done so and spectacularly so.

[Cosmo_R]

I am an Indian citizen. So I could fire back equally irresponsibly by saying "your leftist Arundhati Roy/JNU masters etc. But I wont. You're welcome.

I stand corrected. But then by saying "your leftist Arundhati Roy/JNU masters etc.?", aren't you guilty of assuming the same about your fellow posters, that whoever disagrees with your point of view must automatically be a JNU waala or consider them as "masters"?

It seems although you did not wish to fire back "irresponsibly", you appear to have done so and spectacularly so.

You reap what you sow. The harvest has to be 'spectacular' in its reaping. Not guilty.

[Kashi]

You reap what you sow. The harvest has to be 'spectacular' in its reaping.

Whatever that means...

Not guilty.

Are you ever?

[Cosmo_R]

You reap what you sow. The harvest has to be 'spectacular' in its reaping.

Whatever that means...

Not guilty.

Are you ever?

You are forever whatever that means.

[KLNMurthy]

...

All from Magnificent Delusions. A pretty good book, if one wishes to open up their minds.

So, you read a book by a an author who is a slimeball even by RAPE standards, a light bulb turned on in your brain, and you decided to enlighten the natives on this form. Good show.

[sanjaykumar]

I also attended the 'Concert for Bangladesh' (look it up), it will give you and idea of the temper of the times.


Ah Dylan, Clapton, George, Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar...the giants, to say nothing of Ringo. Sigh.

[Cosmo_R]

I also attended the 'Concert for Bangladesh' (look it up), it will give you and idea of the temper of the times.


Ah Dylan, Clapton, George, Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar...the giants, to say nothing of Ringo. Sigh.

Sigh indeed.

Mais où sont les neiges d'antan!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballade_de ... emps_jadis

[putnanja]

When did the US govt ever care for popular opinion in its foreign policy or interventions? Perhaps Vietnam was the only one where the govt was forced to listen. Even in gulf war, the opinion was pretty evenly divided between republicans and democrats.

The US govt has used USAID and the missionaries to do its dirty work. Even recently, wasn't Rajiv Shah(?) caught with his pants down on his involvement with CIA in Cuba?

No one here is saying that India should cut off relations with US. All they are saying is that US cannot be trusted and to be on guard, and not go overboard in relations with US. Don't see anything wrong with it. And yes, US is actively trying to contain India. Does that mean India need to cut off all relations with US? Even China which US has a cold relationship with is utilizing US demand to improve its economy.

[devesh]

Wanting to contain a country with a per capita of 1600 today, which incidentally gets most of the 50+% of it's GDP from the same country is only slightly less absurd.

50% of India's GDP comes from US ? In which parallel universe ?

this KrishnaK is the same person who once said that "India rolled off my tongue easily", as opposed to "Bharat," which is more "troublesome" to say. this level of arrogance I have not seen in even the most deracinated individuals.

USA has repeatedly tried to reduce India to a leashed pet or treat with outright hostility, like sending a CBG in '71, "misplacing" evidence of '93 bomb blasts, continuously ignoring Paki Jihad on India, and pretending to not notice PRC transfer of nukes to Pak. those are merely some of the highlights of USA's hostile actions against India.

in '71, had there not been an Indo-Soviet pact, there would have been at least a "surgical" strike on Indian Naval assets to reduce naval amphib capabilities. and to top it off, if that had happened, India could have done nothing militarily against USA. neither our AF nor Navy would have been a match to the CBG and other associated assets that US would have brought to bear. we would have literally been left holding our collective d**** in our hands.

and the above forumer's tactics should be quite familiar by now. simply painting everything as "conspiracy theory" is a great Goebbelsian technique.

and the absurd claim that India owes 1/2 its GDP to USA is beyond ridiculous.

[Austin]

US pushes India to ink contentious defence pacts

[KrishnaK]

Wanting to contain a country with a per capita of 1600 today, which incidentally gets most of the 50+% of it's GDP from the same country is only slightly less absurd.

50% of India's GDP comes from US ? In which parallel universe ?

Suraj, it should read 50% of our trade surplus. I started with an idea of american contribution to our gdp, decided it made more sense to change tack and mis-edited that line. my apologies.

[KrishnaK]

There's the blood telegram too, not to mention the de-classified documents they're based on. Nothing in that book shows that anyone except the Nixon/Kissinger pair was in anyway ill-disposed towards India or even that they were prepared to go to war.

So if it is not in the book, it must be false, eh? That is just so shiny and brilliant, that I am going to have to write the rest of this post with my eyes closed.

Both those incidents have been described in detail in The Blood Telegram. If you would drop your hostility and actually read it up, you might be capable of apportioning where blame is due. That book incidentally has been authored by an american.

[Vayutuvan]

Several times in the history of the US presidents have gone to war without congressional approval.

[Vayutuvan]

It might be news to some and tilting at the windmills for some but for some of us who were Tweens it was as if winds of war were blowing what with periodic blackouts just about when we would be finishing our dinners sitting on the floors and have to cower under our charpais in the dark whenever the blackout sirens sounded. Who can wipe out the fear of seventh fleet from the minds of those who were deadly afraid that bombs might fall and wipe out our small world?

[Vayutuvan]

... Berkeley saw massive anti-war protests. Influentual Hollywood celebs like Jane Fonda were at the forefront of the peace movement. All of this ensured that the 2-3 people in the executive branch who wanted to wage war in Vietnam were defeated, and America never went to any such war.

Nice

[arun]

Feb. 26, 2015 statement of US’s Director of National Intelligence, James R Clapper, to the US Senate Armed Services Committee titled “Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community” regards India-US relations and India's other concerns as perceived by the US:

India

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's decisive leadership style, corntined with the 2014 election of an absolute majority in the lower house of Parliament of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), will enable more decisive Indian decisionmaking on domestic and foreign policy. Although lndia has a long-standing position that it maintain an independent policy, Modi will probably seek to work more closely with the United States on security, terrorism, and economic issues.

lndia wants to maintain a stable peace with Pakistan but views Pakistan as a direct terrorism threat and a regional source of instability.

lndia is concerned about the stability of Afghanistan and its own presence there following the drawdown of international forces and is looking for options to blunt the influence of Pakistani-supported groups and ensure that Afghanistan does not revert to a haven for anti-lndian militants.

Indian leaders will almost certainly pursue stronger economic ties with China that support the government's economic agenda of closing the trade gap and attracting investment in infrastructure.
New Delhi's concern over perceived Chinese aggressiveness along .he disputed border and in the Indian Ocean is probably growing in light of border incidents and the v sit of a Chinese submarine to Sri Lanka in 2014.

From here:

Clicky

[KrishnaK]

IG called Nixon's bluff and that all it was.

+1

At this point Nixon ordered the deployment of an aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise, to the Bay of Bengal. The maneuver was aimed at India, but Indira Gandhi was not intimidated. In response, she directed the Indian navy, if they encountered US vessels, to invite American officers for tea aboard their ships. Further, Nixon’s decision disturbed several Western allies. Canada and Britain considered it an unnecessary escalation of a local conflict.

This particular document should be pretty entertaining for those of you who choose to rant on about the enterprise carrier task force

Kissinger: Secondly, we should move the helicopter ship. I'm not so much in favor of moving the carrier. We'd have to do a helicopter ship and some escorts into the Bay of Bengal. And claim that they're for evacuation. Thirdly, on the Jordanian—

Nixon: [unclear]

Kissinger: Well, it shows we are—not on the Indians but on the Russians—

Nixon: Why the carrier?

Kissinger: Well because I think once the news of that hits there'll be so many people screaming we're [there] for intervention. And then we have to explain what we will never do.

Nixon: [unclear] we did—you know that we did the whole damn Turkey thing [unclear] for the purposes of being able to evacuate Americans. You remember?

Kissinger: Yeah, but in—

Nixon: Can't play this game here. Is that correct?

Kissinger: I would be reluctant—you know you should [unclear—consider?] both courses. From the Chinese angle I'd like to move the carrier. From the public opinion angle, what the press and television would do to us if an American carrier showed up there I—

Nixon: What, why—can't the carrier be there for the purpose of evacuation?

Kissinger: Yeah, but against whom are we going to use the planes? Against whom are we going to use the planes? Are we going to shoot our way in?

Nixon: So what do we move? Move a little helicopter ship in there? What good does that do? And why do it?

Kissinger: Well it's a token that something else will come afterward. Gets our presence established there.

Nixon: All right. That way—

I'm in no way denying that it was an act of hostility. To claim that it meant war is fiction. They were in no position to escalate to a war.

[Vayutuvan]

Both those incidents have been described in detail in The Blood Telegram. If you would drop your hostility and actually read it up, you might be capable of apportioning where the blame is due. That book incidentally has been authored by an american.

On the day the author died, a professor who is a perennial favorite! of brf came on NPR and started to repeat the lie that Pakistan (the then west Pakistan) never committed genocide. Yours truly tried to argue with him after calling in and the said professor wriggled out by saying he was decalred a PNG by Pakistan.

[KrishnaK]

FOREIGN RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES, 1969–1976, VOLUME E–7, DOCUMENTS ON SOUTH ASIA, 1969–1972 - Very entertaining, I assure you.

[Suraj]

Suraj, it should read 50% of our trade surplus. I started with an idea of american contribution to our gdp, decided it made more sense to change tack and mis-edited that line. my apologies.

We do not run a trade surplus in the first place. We run a massive current account deficit. We may run a surplus against the US itself, but we spend a lot more dollars buying oil, which is priced in dollars. Further, our trade surplus against the US isn't an act of benevolence on the part of the US, anymore than the Chinese surplus in trade with the US is.

[KrishnaK]

We run a massive current account deficit. We may run a surplus against the US itself, but we spend a lot more dollars buying oil, which is priced in dollars. Further, our trade surplus against the US isn't an act of benevolence on the part of the US, anymore than the Chinese surplus in trade with the US is.

I never claimed that our trade surplus against the US is an act of benevolence, only that it is not an act of sustained malevolence either. That is where this argument began.

[KrishnaK]

enjoi maadi

[Suraj]

We run a massive current account deficit. We may run a surplus against the US itself, but we spend a lot more dollars buying oil, which is priced in dollars. Further, our trade surplus against the US isn't an act of benevolence on the part of the US, anymore than the Chinese surplus in trade with the US is.

I never claimed that our trade surplus against the US is an act of benevolence, only that it is not an act of sustained malevolence either. That is where this argument began.

Look, you're clearly tying yourself into knots here. First you confused GDP and trade balance. Then you demonstrated you don't even know what the trade balance is. Then you ascribe any sort of qualitative basis for a trade balance in either direction. Nobody ever associated a positive or negative trade balance between two nations as any sort of 'they like us' or 'they hate us' qualitative position. If you really wish to do that, I've an exercise for you: we run an official trade surplus and an equally large or larger unofficial surplus (via UAE trade) with TSP. It's increased from about $3 billion total surplus a year to over $6 billion now. Do they like us or hate us ? Why ? When you're done, I'll give you trade balance data against several other nations so you can apply qualitative 'like' or 'dislike' views of each. Then finally I'll ask you to resolve all those positions mutually. See where this is going ? '50% of GDP/trade balance/whatever' with the US means nothing as far as foreign policy dynamics go. The Chinese are busy using their substantial surpluses to build their own armament base with the explicit goal of kicking the US out of its East Asian sphere of influence, and subjugating Japan.