Source:Asia Times
By M K Bhadrakumar
Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechen's visit to Washington this week is notable for three reasons. One, Yang is paying a return visit in a little over a fortnight of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to Beijing. The intensity of the US-China traffic is indeed extraordinary by diplomatic norms. China seems to have blithely overtaken the traditional allies of the US, such as Germany and Japan.
Two, Yang's visit coincides with the 50th anniversary of the uprising in Tibet. Washington doesn't seem to be bothered at the coincidence. It is actually underscoring its current priorities in the US's relations with China. Tibet is an issue that arouses some animated passion in certain American circles. The US Congress and State Department have paid heed to these public sentiments
while Beijing on its part has duly regretted the US statements, but both sides are confident that life must move on.
Clinton made it clear during her Asian tour last month that neither Tibet nor Taiwan can be allowed to impede the serious business of Sino-US relations in the current world scenario characterized by the economic crisis.
Three, Yang's visit has been envisaged as a significant input in the run-up to the Group of 20 (G-20) summit meeting on April 2 in London. True, the US is widely consulting other countries for opinions on solving the economic crisis. But, again, the criticality of Chinese input for the US is self-evident from the fact that Yang has a scheduled meeting with US President Barack Obama.
But viewed from New Delhi
, Yang's visit assumes an entirely different color. The intensity of US-China traffic is in sharp contrast with the virtual absence of high-level political exchanges between the Indian leadership and Obama. So much so that the former director for South Asia in the National Security Council in the George W Bush administration, Xenia Dormandy, penned an article on Wednesday in The Christian Science Monitor precisely focusing attention on the subject.
Dormandy played a key role in coordinating the July 2005 landmark visit of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to the US that led to the new US-India strategic relationship. Titled somewhat exaggeratedly - "India: America's indispensable ally" - her article made an impassioned plea that "Obama's team would be wise not to forget it [India]". Dormandy pointed out that in foreign policy, "[The] Obama administration has started with a full sprint. Between the financial crisis and events in Afghanistan, Iran and Russia, and elsewhere, it's had to. But in rushing ahead to confront one crisis after another, it risks forgetting a crucial friend: India."
India's first contact with the Obama administration has been in the nature of Foreign Office consultations, when the Indian foreign secretary visited Washington this week. Reading between the lines, the picture that emerges from the reports of the consultations in Washington is that the US-India relationship is entering a phase of lull..........
Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar was a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service. His assignments included the Soviet Union, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Germany, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Kuwait and Turkey.
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