India, apart from its very carefully curated glitzy and 'shining' image, has been quietly sulking at the loss of its status internationally, consequent to its brief but humiliating skirmish with Pakistan recently, and the dawning of Indian reality on a pro-Indian American establishment. The US has undoubtedly helped New Delhi in its great power aspirations, ostensibly as a bulwark against a rising China. Whether India ever was and ever will to do the US bidding is another story, the fact remains that Chanakya Kotelia (375 BCE-283 BCE), the Brahmin Hindu sage's cunning writings on statecraft, to this day guide Indian policy formulation,

Ashley J Tellis, currently fellow at the Tata Chair for Strategic Affairs at the Carnegie Endowment, and former Under Secretary of State in the Bush senior's administration, in his recent article in the July/August issue of Foreign Affairs, details India's delusions and shortcomings to rise as a great power. This article is an adaptation of his writing with opinions.

The premise by George W Bush, the 41st US President (1989-1993), to make India a great power stood on the rationale that with the demise of the USSR in 1989, the US and India, a friend of the Russia, had no reason to be on the opposite sides. However, the US infatuation with India runs deeper, as clearly articulated by Henry Kissinger in his seminal work, The White House Years (1979). Kissinger, while mentioning the US role in the 1971 Indo-Pakistan War (Chapter titled The Tilt), laments that State Department would drag its feet on admonitory communiques to India, while dispatching the same without loss........

© The Express Tribune