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'Just say No!' to Clinton

The Indian media are all agog about the putative Clinton visit to India "some time in March". I have been bemused by this circus, for it's not entirely clear to me why this is such a big deal. Maybe I'm missing something obvious, or maybe I am just in my cantankerous winter mood.

I have been watching the American election megillah with less-than-great interest. It's plain boring. As far as I can tell, Vice President Al Gore is within catchable distance of Democratic rival Bill Bradley. On the Republican side, Governor Bush seems miles ahead of everyone with his war-chest, but he does seem handicapped by his dumb-rich-guy image.

I am partly less than enthralled because it doesn't make any difference whatsoever to India who wins -- in the American scheme of things, India is a small concern, a minor irritant, to Republican and Democrat alike. As far as I can see, the only election of any interest to the Indian cause is that of that annoying Dan Burton: see my earlier column on him.

To digress for a moment, according to Salon magazine, Dan Burton gets far more of his campaign contributions from out-of-state people than from his home state of Indiana. His main supporters are: Cubans, Pakistanis and 'Khalistan' supporters. Burton is vulnerable to a determined and focused attack -- I wish Indian-Americans would concentrate on scaring the daylights out of this odious person. To all those people who ask me, what can we do, I say -- here's an excellent cause, why don't you organize and target Burton in 2000?

Anyway, where does this leave President Clinton? Lame duck, that's where. He is increasingly irrelevant, as his role becomes merely that of bench-warmer until the elections are over. Even his wife has struck out on her own, attempting to become New York's Senator. Clinton is essentially unemployed; he will not be making any major policy decisions in 2000. In the political-appointee scheme of things in the US, most of the top officials will also depart from office in 2000.

Therefore, I fail to see exactly what benefit India gets from rolling out the red carpet for Clinton: there is not even going to be any continuity amongst the contacts made: for instance much has been made of Jaswant Singh's personal equation with Strobe Talbott. Nothing of any benefit to India has materialized so far from this alleged 'rapport'; furthermore, Talbott will be busy looking for a job most of this year.

Trade and foreign direct investment in the wake of a presidential visit could be a potential positive fallout; I don't deny that. However, most of the high-profile deals inked with a flourish during a Clinton visit to India would be announcements of things that had been in the works for some time -- it would primarily be theater.

The attention given to India by a delegation of business leaders useful. Given the abysmally poor media coverage India gets in the US -- downright dismissive and contemptuous -- CEOs of major companies are pleasantly surprised when they come to India. It ain't Kansas, but it ain't that bad, they conclude. I have seen this happen; said CEOs are more apt to look kindly on investment proposals in India. Especially if they can be paraded in front of that super-salesman Chandrababu Naidu -- he is a wonder to behold in action!

Other than this, I fail to see any major benefit to India from the much-awaited Clinton visit. It has been 21 years since an American President visited India; somehow, India managed to pull through nevertheless. So why this big fuss about lame-duck Clinton visiting now?

It is a bad idea to bring in someone in their sunset years, so to speak. If Clinton comes to India this year, the next few Presidents will use that as a reason to not come to India for a while. So why not wait until a new person is on board? I mean, what is the big hurry?

In truth, it is Clinton who needs this visit more than India, if you ask me. After all, his legacy is in tatters -- he has dishonoured the office of the presidency, shown himself to have no ethics whatsoever, has made no earth-shaking domestic policy, and has no major foreign policy successes. All he has done is to preside over a booming economy, which is now in the ninth year of a bull market, for reasons that had little, if anything, to do with his stewardship.

In foreign policy, what has Clinton accomplished? Yes, he did beat up the Iraqis again. But all of the other things he poked his nose into have been inconclusive or worse: 1. No real progress in West Asia; things are still deadlocked
2. The Irish 'troubles' continue
3. Bosnia and Kosovo have been temporarily shelved, and yes, the Serbs have been cowed down, but now the Kosovars are doing unto Serbs what the Serbs did unto them; so despite all that huffing and puffing things are back to normal Balkan savagery there
4. Indonesia, formerly a staunch US ally, is now worryingly unstable
5. China continues to saber-rattle against Taiwan
6. Big and continuing problems in Russia -- maybe this is a win for Clinton, in a way
7. The CTBT has been rejected by his own Senate in no uncertain terms.

I maybe missing something, but I really don't know what Clinton foreign policy has achieved. And now Clinton wants to "take a personal interest" in resolving things between India and Pakistan! Maybe he hopes he can have at least one thing on his resume. But this is an unlikely outcome -- US influence over its client state Pakistan is so minimal that they couldn't even get its terrorists to release an American taken hostage in 1994 and murdered.

To sum it up, I think Clinton needs this visit to India more than India needs it. We should take advantage of this and make a series of demands. Instead, we are trying to appease the cold warriors in the Pentagon and the CIA by doing things to 'help pave the way' for the Clinton visit. Of course I admit I have no idea what other wheels within wheels exist -- for instance, did US spy satellites help India in Kargil? Are there other IOUs they are now calling in? Who knows?

But looking at it based strictly as a layman, India appears to be selling herself short on this much-bally-hooed Clinton visit. What exactly would happen if India took a slightly different tack? What if India extracted her own pound of flesh and made some demands?

For instance, I am not sure there is a formal invitation from India to Clinton to visit. In fact, I was incensed during the previous threatened Clinton visit -- when was it, mid-1999 or so -- when the Americans kept saying, "We'll let you know when and if Clinton is coming." As though India were just waiting by the telephone, just waiting for the Clinton visit. And finally he didn't bother to come -- India should have said, "We have withdrawn the invitation to Clinton, for internal reasons -- we are in the middle of a war, and cannot entertain foreign grand pooh-bahs right now."

Indians are constantly and endlessly debating everything. Why is there no debate as to whether Clinton should be invited to India now? This should be done in the media and in Parliament. And I mean a useful debate, not JNU Marxists jumping up and down with juvenile "Down with America" slogans.

Why shouldn't India now say, "Okay, we have invited Clinton to come to India some time in the month of March, or April or whenever, if he satisfies the following conditions. If not, we don't think he should come, sorry. We'll deal with the next guy." I guess it's a good thing I am not a diplomat, but if I were the Indian foreign office, I'd negotiate. Nothing like a good give and take to increase the bonhomie all around.

And some conditions could be:
1. No messing around with visits to Pakistan, Bangladesh etc on the same trip. If you want to come to India just come to India. If you want to go to Pakistan, make another trip. Otherwise, we are not interested. The Chinese told him this on Clinton's last visit there, and he dropped plans to go to Japan! (And can you imagine the Chinese hissy fit if he had wanted to go to Taiwan as well?)
2. You want India to sign the CTBT? Fine, just bring your copy of the ratification by the US Senate, and we will consider it. This is a basic requirement. Oh, did you say your Senate didn't ratify it? Very sorry, then Come back when you can convince your own people.
3. Declare Pakistan a terrorist state. Otherwise, very sorry, we cannot guarantee your security as there are plenty of Pakistani terrorists running around in India.
4. Support India for the Security Council seat.
5. Withdraw all sanctions imposed on India for Pokhran II
6. Enter into technology sharing agreements with Indian universities and industry
7. Leave that obnoxious Madeleine Albright in Washington. We don't want her coming here. Make whatever excuses you want, but she's persona non grata here. And maybe her mouthpiece James Rubin too.

If you thought about it for about five minutes, you could come up with other conditions too. I think India should present a list of conditions to Clinton, and if you ask for fifteen things, maybe you'll get five. These should be prioritized. Some are serious -- like the CTBT; some we are prepared to give way on -- like the bit about Albright. US diplomats understand negotiation; they are trained to be quite good at it. Indian foreign service types tend to cave in, so a show of resolve will surprise the Americans, as I said in my column "SWOTting the CTBT".

By the way, regarding the CTBT, there was a very fine article by Arundhati Ghose and Prakash Shah, in The Times of India on January 24. Thanks to reader Srikanth for bringing this to my attention. Ghose, who negotiated the previous CTBT round and saw first-hand the shenanigans by China and Australia and the US to shove the thing down India's throat, and Shah, who was the UN mediator in Iraq, are old hands at the diplomatic game, and their opinions are very valid.

Incidentally, I don't buy the rationale behind not declaring Pakistan a terrorist state -- which would cost it dearly in IMF, World Bank funds. The alleged rationale is that it would hurt Pakistan too much. But then, that is the point -- if you are naughty, you get punished. Pain is good, as the Americans keep lecturing us all regarding Iraq, Serbia, North Korea, Iran, Cuba, Libya, Panama, Somalia, etc, etc. (Incidentally, the media feeding frenzy about that poor Cuban boy in Florida is amazing -- enough already with this crap!)

The real reasons for American tenderness towards Pakistan are the CIA and the Pentagon and their dirty little secrets, perhaps in regards to the Taleban, and that famous planned Amoco pipeline from Central Asia to Karachi through Afghanistan. And good friends of Pakistan like Robin Raphel beavering away at Foggy Bottom.

The Clinton visit could be turned into something useful for India. And this is not reflexive anti-American posturing, intended just to irritate: I just think the cost-benefit tradeoff has not been analyzed properly. I like and admire the Americans and their single-minded focus on the national interest. The idea is to ensure that this Clinton lovefest helps India's national interest, too.

Rajeev Srinivasan