I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU AXIS OF GOOD

US plays matchmaker to India, Israel (Ninan Koshy, 6/09/03, Asia Times)

Close on the heels of Indian National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra's call for an India-United States-Israel strategic alliance, comes the confirmation that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will visit India within the next few weeks. Some observers in New Delhi consider Mishra's call, made at the annual dinner of the American Jewish Committee, as a curtain raiser for the Sharon visit. What they seem to ignore is that the India-US-Israel strategic alliance has moved beyond last call to center stage and that the plan for Sharon's visit is some 15 months old. [...]

Mishra drummed up US support for the plan, finding a responsive audience for his skewed and cynical views on terrorism in the American Jewish Committee. Only a "core" consisting of democracies such as India, Israel and the US can deal with terrorism, he maintained. The alliance of the three would have the political and moral authority to make bold decisions in extreme cases of terrorist provocation, he claimed, adding that they would not waste time in defining terrorism or arguing about its causes. "Distinctions sought to be made between freedom fighters and terrorists propagate a bizarre logic," he spouted. "Another fallacy propagated is that terrorism can only be eradicated by addressing the root causes." He repeated the pet themes of India, the US and Israel being "prime targets of terrorism", having a "common enemy" and requiring "joint action".

His comments were underpinned by those of India's Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishan Advani, who, in an interview given to Fox News on July 9, 2002, said, "Terrorism in so far we have seen it on September 11 or December 13 has a common source and that common source has described the US, Israel and India as its three main enemies." December 13, 2001 was the date on which the Indian parliament was attacked by terrorists. Advani implied that the three countries therefore have a common cause and could forge a common front against terrorism.

The India-Israeli alliance strengthens US strategic designs for India and the region. India holds a very prominent place in the September 20, 2002 National Security Strategy of the US, "a policy document that bears the personal stamp of President [George W] Bush," according to Robert D Blackwill, outgoing US ambassador to India. The document states, "The United States has undertaken a transformation in its bilateral relationship with India. We are the two largest democracies. We share an interest in fighting terrorism and in creating a strategically stable Asia. We start with a view of India as a growing world power with which we have common strategic interests."

Healthy democracies must always have an advantage over totalitarian regimes anyway, but American control of the air and seas and the strategic placement of democratic allies like Israel and India means that the Islamic Middle East is competely flanked, and by nuclear powers at that, just in case push ever does come to shove. Posted by Orrin Judd at June 9, 2003 1:56 PM