India not sold on closer military ties with U.S.

LA Times ^ | June 6, 2012, 6:27 p.m. | David S. Cloud and Mark Magnier

[Olog-hai]

Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta urged India on Wednesday to build a closer military relationship with the United States, but Indian leaders appeared more interested in buying U.S. weapons than in aligning strategically with Washington.

Senior Indian officials made it clear in two days of talks that they will continue to set their own course on U.S. national security priorities, including isolating Iran and building up Afghanistan's military forces, sometimes in tandem with Washington and sometimes not.

Panetta is visiting Asia this week to bolster military ties as the Obama administration, wary ofChina's growing clout in the region, seeks to reassert America's presence in the Pacific after a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Pentagon chief described enhanced defense cooperation with India as "a linchpin" of the new strategy. But India has charted an independent foreign policy for decades, and its response was decidedly cool.

Panetta held meetings with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Defense Minister A.K. Antony, National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon and other government officials. But he did not hold a joint news conference with his Indian counterpart, as he usually does when he visits friendly countries.

"We'll never be an alliance partner with the U.S.," said Lalit Mansingh, an analyst and a former Indian ambassador to Washington. "The limit is a partnership." …

[Salt]

Judging by how loudly Washington keeps proclaiming they want Dehli to join them strategically coupled with Dehli’s proclamations of autonamy—the Strategic patnership between the US and India seems to be in deep full swing.

Such a simple tactic of diversion....

You know, the older I get the more it seems clear, politicians, all politicians, really do believe we’re all idiots. I wonder when they will learn that ‘çleverness’ usually gets ahead of ones goals.