Keep the Relationship between US & India Going

Fire of Liberty

As you know, I'm a big fan of the US and India forming a greater economic and strategic relationship with each other. Well it seems that columnist John O'Sullivan also offers some accolades for this relationship as well in his current column in yesterday's edition of the Chicago Sun-Times. O'Sullivan points out in his column that our budding relationship with India is wonderful and important but as a dyed-in-the-wool conservative(Follows a little bit of Burke's philosophy of approaching things with some sense of moderation)he notes that we have to nurture the partnership to ensure that certain groups within India and outside entities don't derail our current relationship. I highly recommend the column but figured I'd share with you my favorite paragraphs from the piece:

India is not a neurotic superpower but it is still an ambivalent one. Almost all the economic and political developments cited above point the country toward adopting an economy strategy of free market globalization and a political one of alliance with the United States. The two countries share a common language, common liberal democratic values, similar legal and political institutions (inherited in both cases from the British), a common strategic rival in China, and a common enemy in al-Qaida. These similarities help to explain the growing Indian diaspora in America, the boom in U.S. companies outsourcing to India's own Silicon Valleys, the ease of military cooperation between Indian and U.S. military forces, and the fact that America is more popular in India than in any other country.

Altogether, India's progress is bottom-up rather than top-down. It is also bipartisan. Both government and opposition have advanced the economic reform agenda in the last 14 years. So a change of government would probably not mean a drastic change of policy. It is likely to last.

Yet there are powerful groups that for various reasons dislike the switch of policy from socialism and neutralism to globalization and a pro-American diplomatic stance. India's "Regulation Ra" is naturally opposed to losing its control over economic life. Traditional industries would like to keep their protective subsidies. Influential left-wing intellectuals dislike the new official embrace of free market capitalism and globalization. Factions in the Congress government hanker for India's former role as the morally upright leader of the Third World sympathetic to global socialism. And some Indians are simply nervous about getting into bed with a partner as large and overwhelming as the United States.

Bush should therefore go carefully in wooing New Delhi. Rather than stress the exclusive nature of the Indo-U.S. partnership -- which frightens as well as flatters -- he might want to point out that other friends of India are also linking themselves more closely to the United States in the post-Cold War world. Howard's Australia is one. Tony Blair's Britain another. After the recent election in Canada, Stephen Harper's new government is likely to move closer to the United States. In fact the English-speaking world, plus Japan, is gradually emerging as an informal U.S. alliance. And in that alliance India would be a junior partner to nobody except the United States.

We need more folks like John O'Sullivan in this world to share such words of wisdom.