POLITICS-INDIA: A Bush Administration Expected to Ease Anti-Nuke Sanctions

By Ranjit Devraj Reprint | | Print |

Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, Nov 9 2000 (IPS) - Officially, India has been careful not to be seen favouring either candidate for the U.S presidency, but political analysts say that a George W. Bush-led U.S. administration suits New Delhi better.

A Republican government in Washington is likely to be more accommodating on anti-nuclear sanctions imposed after India’s May 1998 nuclear tests, and less intrusive on Kashmir, they say.

“There would be no qualitative impact either way, but Bush might lift some sanctions especially those related to dual-use technologies,” says J.N. Dixit, India’s former foreign secretary.

Dixit’s optimism is shared by former U.S. Senator and attorney- at-law, Larry Pressler, who is now in India. “Bush favours free-trade and may lift the nuclear sanction but I see no change from the present positive policy,” he said.

According to Dixit, what makes a Bush win attractive for India’s policy-makers is the presence of a large number of people on his staff who have been dealing with India and understand this country.

Efforts by the Clinton administration to get India to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) weigh heavily against Vice President Al Gore. Gore is also credited with drafting the new South Asia orientation in U.S. foreign policy, which began badly for India.

New Delhi was horrified when U.S. President Bill Clinton dispensed with the Pressler Amendment, which prevented the sale of U.S. arms to Pakistan.

The new warmth in Indo-U.S. ties came about only toward the end of Clinton’s second term when he visited India earlier this year. Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee returned the visit a few months ago.

However, Gore, who was careful to throw a special lunch for Vajpayee and his delegation, is expected to pursue the Democrat party’s nuclear non-proliferation agenda on the sub-continent, if he makes it to the White House.

In contrast, the Republicans have been less interested in the CTBT. Democrat and U.S. Senator Harris Wofford, told television interviewers here that a Bush administration may also not pursue Clinton’s “strategic-partnership” policy with China, which is said to have caused uneasiness in New Delhi.

According to foreign policy analyst C. Raja Mohan, India might find it more comfortable to live with the “conservative internationalism” of Bush than with the “liberal internationalism” of Gore.

The Republican administration under the senior George Bush had shown little interest when the violent phase of Kashmiri separatism erupted in the late 1980s. However, the activist Kashmir policy of the Democrats then put New Delhi on the defensive.

This was believed to have encouraged Pakistan, which claims Kashmir, into a policy of ‘internationalising’ the Kashmir dispute. The two South Asian rivals, which have fought two wars over Kashmir, are bound by a bilateral treaty, signed in 1972, to tackle the dispute without third party intervention.

It was also believed to have led Islamabad to step up support for Kashmiri militant groups. Pakistan’s ‘proxy war’ in Kashmir reached a flash point last year in the form of the undeclared Kargil war on the Line of Control (LoC), which divides Kashmir.

The Kargil war ended with Clinton asking then Pakistani premier Nawaz Sharif to pull back the heavily armed Islamic radical cadres, who were backed by army regulars. This was perceived as an unmistakable sign of a pro-India tilt in Washington.

Political commentators in Pakistan attributed the ’tilt’ to India’s emergence as a major market for U.S. business.

However, Clinton’s policies are also said to have brought about a bipartisan consensus on the region, which should ensure a continuity in the new U.S. administration’s policy, irrespective of the final outcome of the presidential elections.

Both Democrats and Republicans agree that the tension over the LoC should be resolved by getting New Delhi and Islamabad to agree to the evolution of an international border — a prospect held out by Vajpayee during his historic visit to Pakistan last year.