India and President Bush

It has appeared to me, and now The New York Times confirms it, one of the bright spots in President George Bush's watch has been our relationship with idea. In a Sunday opinion piece ("Week in Review" Section), Commentator Anand Giridharadas tells us that "India Has a Soft Spot for Bush."

I am sure that the experts in academia will tell me that China is much more important that India, but I am not convinced of that. India is the largest democracy and is a nuclear power. She does not have ICBMs yet, which China does have, but she does have a space program. And, she is an important trading partner of the US. How else do we get help with our computers by a mere phone call at 11:30 in the evening?

The fairly long item, located here, tells us that it was President Bush's openness to India that helped India move away from its long association with neutrality and begin to associate with the United States. However, this is not to suggest that we have never worked with India in the past. My recollection is folks telling me that we had flown supply missions in support of India in its fight with China back in 1962.

Recently, with the attacks in Mumbai, we have seen that India is in the same fight against terrorism that we are.

I think the "take away" paragraph is:

George W. Bush’s critics often link his idiosyncratic temperament to his administration’s diplomatic misadventures. But among Indians, who in the main have no love for his ideology, even his critics say the traits for which Mr. Bush is so often condemned were, in India’s case, benignly applied: his penchant for unilateral deeds, and his moral conviction that democracies are simply better than non-democracies.

This was an interesting read. I commend it to all and especially to those who have come to think that China is the only Asian nation of consequence.

Regards -- Cliff