As the fragile peace process in the subcontinent begins to fray at the edges, Condoleezza Rice, the top diplomat in the Second Bush Administration, has promised to simultaneously expand relations with both India and Pakistan. Rice, a day before being confirmed as Secretary of State, told the US Senate that the Bush Administration would continue to defy the logic of the historical zero sum game in South Asia. ‘‘The United States is cooperating with India, the world’s largest democracy, across a range of economic and security issues. This, even as we embrace Pakistan as a vital ally in the war on terror, and a state in transition towards a more moderate and democratic future,’’ Rice said. Arguing that this unprecedented situation holds true for the whole of Asia, Rice declared, ‘‘In Asia, we have moved beyond the false assumption that it is impossible to have good relations with all of Asia’s powers.’’ As she pointed to the enduring American alliances with Japan, Australia and South Korea, Rice committed the Bush Administration to build ‘‘a candid, cooperative and constructive relationship with China that embraces our common interests but still recognises our considerable differences about values.’’ In dealing with the Second Bush Administration, India and Pakistan will have to come to terms with this new strategic reality in Asia—peace and cooperation among all the major powers. As they squabble over many issues small and big—from the Baglihar project to the nature of the final settlement in Jammu and Kashmir—New Delhi and Islamabad might want to leverage their growing relationship with Washington against the other. They will find it very difficult. The short-term American interests in Pakistan might occasionally overwhelm the long-term imperatives in relation to India. At the same time, Islamabad’s tactical leverage in Washington has never been too strong to force India to do what it does not want to. In his first term, Bush has refused to put pressure on New Delhi on the question of Jammu and Kashmir. Nor has he stopped rewarding Gen Pervez Musharraf and his Army in Pakistan for cooperating in Afghanistan and the war against the Al Qaeda. Unlike his predecessor Bill Clinton, Bush has not made a fetish of non-proliferation in South Asia. If the Indo-Pak peace process collapses and military temperature rises in South Asia, the Bush Administration will certainly intervene to prevent a war between the nuclear rivals in the subcontinent. That precisely is what Washington did in the summer of 2002. Rice, like her predecessor, Colin Powell, will continue to urge Pakistan to give up cross-border terrorism and encourage India to stay with the dialogue and express support to the peace process. But in its first term, the Bush Administration refused to be dragged into the Indo-Pak wrangling over Jammu and Kashmir. That pragmatic approach to the Subcontinent must be expected to continue. In addition, America has many big fish—Iraq, Iran and North Korea and the Middle East Peace process—to fry. It will be too preoccupied to devote significant diplomatic energy to the peace process in South Asia. For India, the greatest opportunity lies in the fact that it no longer needs to look over its shoulder on Kashmir and nuclear weapons, two issues that have dominated Indo-US relations in recent decades. India now has the time and space to shape the political future of the subcontinent through its own initiatives. If India can stop complaining about US-Pak relations, it will find that there is much to be done on the bilateral relations with the US as well as wider regional security beyond the subcontinent.
