How good bad music and bad reasons sound when we march against an enemy,' said Friedrich W Nietzsche. But sooner or later one must confront reality. The post-war mess in Iraq has made it clear that military power in a unipolar world has limitations, even for the sole superpower. The neo-conservatives in the US may still speak of pre-ėmptive action, but this is merely to get hurrahs from their arch-nationalist constituency for electoral purposes. The biggest lesson of Iraq is the importance of building partnerships in pursuit of strategic interests.

Given this, economic power becomes more important than ever in international relations and diplomacy. The future in the post-modern world is about industry and education, and in the American strategic vision of it, partnership with India is essential for several reasons.

There is an unfolding contest between nations for leadership of technology. The US is weakened due to its monumental annual trade deficit of $500 billion, and an equally large federal budget deficit. Right now, the rest of the world is paying for the good life in America, but as the effects of the twin deficits come into play, America's power to control technology will wane, and it will need strategic partners to offset the increasing power of China, its presumptive challenger.

In this transition period, one battleground is the standards for new products in information technology. For example, future discs will hold four to five times the data of those currently on the market. If most of them will be sold in China, will the Chinese decide on the technology that becomes the industry standard?

Pursuing its own national vision, China, while taking advantage of its access to Western markets, is developing its own software standards for wireless computers, and introducing exclusive technology formats for future generations of cellphones and DVD players. It is also developing a tax regime that favours computer chips made in China and sold within the country.

China has also an ambitious agenda for space exploration, including landing an unmanned vehicle on the moon by 2010. China's manned space program is under the control of its army, and it is partly driven by a desire to catch up with the US in 'information warfare' of the kind that was used in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The American difficulty with China is particularly acute because of an ever-widening bilateral trade deficit that is currently $100 billion. But since China has become the manufacturing and assembly hub for consumer goods for Western companies, America can little but complain. The deficit has been sometimes blamed on China fixing its currency in relation to the dollar, but that is not entirely true. If the Chinese were to raise the prices of their products, it would disrupt the American economy, perhaps sending it into recession.

The Chinese, wishing to reduce the tightness of their economic embrace with America, are expanding their trade with other nations. During the last year, when the euro gained about fifty percent in value against the dollar, the European imports into China went up substantially, while American imports remained stagnant.