Jatinder ji, you are in a make believe world
hitaya
Diplomat Who Guided India-U.S. Nuclear Deal But Is Critical of Modi Named CIA Chief
NEW YORK – U.S. President-elect Joe Biden Jan. 11 named William Burns, who guided the nuclear deal between India and the U.S. but is a strong critic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to be the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
A former deputy secretary of state and a senior director for Near East and South Asian affairs at the National Security Council, and now the president of the think tank Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Burns emphasized the importance of relations with India while criticizing Modi over Kashmir and the Citizenship Amendment Act.
But he has also acknowledged that “outsiders” cannot resolve these issues.
“I continue to believe strongly in the wisdom of the strategic investment that America and India have made in each other’s success over the past two decades,” Burns wrote last year in an article in The Atlantic magazine.
Recalling his role in bringing about the landmark agreement, he wrote: “I was the diplomat charged with completing the US-India civil-nuclear dealing the summer and fall of 2008.”
The agreement reached while Manmohan Singh was the prime minister and George W. Bush the U.S. president, enables the two countries to cooperate on civilian nuclear projects and India to have broader access to nuclear technology and materials.
Burns recalled strong-arming European allies to go along with the exemption for India from the Nuclear Supplier Group to enable it to get access to nuclear material and equipment.
“This was about power, and we were exercising it – hardly endearing ourselves to groggy (European) partners, but impressing our Indian counterparts with the strength of America’s commitment to get this done,” he wrote.
As the U.S. grapples with the rise of China and its hostility to Washington’s treaty allies in Asia, Burns will have to balance his nation’s strategic priorities with his personal attitude towards Modi and India that he expressed as the head of a liberal think tank.
The announcement of the appointment by Biden’s transition office mentioned the threat from China.
It said, “Whether it’s cyber attacks emanating from Moscow, the challenge China poses, or the threat we face from terrorists and other non-state actors, he has the experience and skill to marshal efforts across government and around the world to ensure the CIA is positioned to protect the American people.”
Drawing on his experience of working with New Delhi, he wrote in what could be his roadmap for relations between New Delhi and Washington, emphasizing continuity saying that it was bigger than the ties between President Donald Trump and Modi.
“For India and the U.S. to maximize the return on their investments, we must take a long view, keeping in mind why this strategic bet was made in the first place: our common democratic values, a long-term vision of economic openness, and a growing confidence in each other’s reliability,” he wrote in the Atlantic article published last year around Trump’s visit to India.
He criticized both Trump and Modi saying, “As intolerance and division in both societies erode their democracies, I fear that the leaders may reinforce each other’s worst instincts.”
But Trump will be soon be gone, and Biden will take over with resets of international and domestic issues.
“A battle for the idea of India is under way, between the tolerant constitutional convictions of its founders and the harsher Hindu majoritarianism that has lurked beneath the surface,” Burns said.
It is “testing India’s democratic guardrails in much the same way that the Trump era is testing America’s” but “either struggle will not be settled by outsiders – but both will shape the nature of the Indian American partnership in the years ahead,” he wrote.
In criticizing Modi and the BJP, he listed the revocation of Article 370 of the Indian constitution that gave a special status to Kashmir, the CAA that he asserted “discriminates against Muslims seeking refuge in India,” feeding “tensions over disputed religious sites” and “pressures against critical journalists and academics.”
He wrote that Modi, like Trump, is “skilled in the business of political showmanship, with a keen eye for the vulnerabilities of established elites, and for the dark art of stoking nativist fires.”
Burns was also executive secretary of the State Department, special assistant to then Secretaries of State Warren Christopher and Madeleine Albright, and minister-counselor for political affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow.
I hope that the new year will not only bring prosperity and happiness to you and your family, it will bring the end of the miseries caused by Pandemic. As I had mentioned in my last email, I had given about $30 K for the Covid-1victims, primarily for food to those having no money even for food in the USA, and also in India and a couple of other countries. I have already started giving money this year also. If you are involved with any food distribution activity, please advise me and I will contribute to such efforts.
I also wish all of you “Happy Republic Day”. I remember the first Republic Day parade held on January 26, 1950 in Delhi. We had moved to Delhi as refugees from Rawalpindi, Pakistan and we still did not have a permanent place to live at that time. But we were all happy and I, along with my father and a few others, went to India Gate in a horse driven carrier (thela and not a tanga) to watch the parade. After a fierce debate, in 1951, Jana Sangha, the predecessor of BJP, was formed by an RSS Pracharak Vasant Rao Oak. Shayama Prasad Mukharjee, an MP from Bengal, was invited to head Jana Sangha. Another Bengal MP, N.C. Chatterjee, one of the foremost Supreme Court attorneys, then the Head of Hindu Mahasabha, was also invited, but he refused to join Jana Sangha. Later his son S.C. Chatterjee, a famous Communist leader became the Speaker of Lok Sabha. In 1951, I met Vajpayeeji, an RSS Pracharak, who was deputed by RSS to Jana Sangha. Although I was very young and had just finished Primary School education, I had been interested in politics for a long time. Our friendship continued, and we maintained contact. When he visited the USA as the Opposition Leader, he stayed with us. When he became PM, he appointed me as one of his advisers and I used to meet him whenever I visited India.
Now the US elections are over and Mr. Joseph R. Biden is the new President. I had known him since 1975 when he first became the U.S. Senator. I may not agree with him on a number of issues, however, he is a decent and smart man. He will be good for the USA, India and the world. I am also proud that Kamala Harris, the daughter of a lady from India, is the new Vice President.
Finally, not to disappoint you, attaching my two latest articles posted on Times of India.
These are “U.S. Election Finale, Now What?” and “How to Kick Start India’s Economy in the New Year”. Would highly appreciate your comments, good or bad.
Thank you.
With best regards.
Jitendra