Current Affairs

President Bush and India – Views of CinemaRasik and New York Times

Posted on by MV

As we watched President Bush give his final press conference on Thursday, January 15, 2009, we recalled our prior articles on his foreign policy accomplishments. We realize that some of our readers would heap scorn on our use of the word accomplishments. They should recall that Fareed Zakaria, a darling of the Indo-American left wing and Richard Haass of Council of Foreign Relations have both acknowledged what we wrote in September 2008 that the second term of President Bush has been remarkable in its accomplishments. 

For those who are interested, our prior articles on President Bush’s Foreign policy are:


“The world looked at India very differently in 2000, when George W. Bush became the 43rd President of the USA. Not many people realize that, even at that time, one of the main goals of President Bush and his Brain Trust was to build a strategic relationship with India. This goal was not based on any particular admiration for Indian culture or on any prior affinity or warm feelings. It was a necessary part of their vision of the 21st century world and the desire to build a long term strategic framework for that vision.”, we wrote in our article on President Bush and India.

We argued in that article that President Bush was intellectually far ahead of his time  when he decided to focus his foreign policy efforts on building a strategic relationship with India. The article covered  the following areas:


  • Need (for America) for a Strategic Partnership with India
  • USA and India – Congruent Interests
  • USA and India – Common Economic Approaches
  • Pakistan & Afghanistan – The immediate crisis for USA and India
  • Benefits of the Strategic Partnership to America and India
  • Indian Society and Presidents Kennedy, Clinton and Bush

However, this has been a lonely position. So, we were very happy to read the article by Anand Giridharidas  in the New York Times on  January 10, 2009, titled  “India Has a Soft Spot for Bush”. That is the India we know and love, the true India that is so far and different than the image portrayed by the Indian English language media.



(September 2006, just before Bush’s validation of India as an ally – source New York Times)


We encourage every reader to read this article (click on www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/weekinreview/11giridharadas.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&em ). We shall leave readers with some key quotes from this article (bold emphasis ours):


  • ““The relationship with India is one of the few success stories of the Bush administration’s foreign policy,” said Teresita C. Schaffer, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, who ran the State Department’s South Asia desk under the first President Bush.”
  • “Gautam Adhikari, the editorial page editor of The Times of India, said the turnaround (of Indo-American relations under Bush) was “on par with the turnaround in U.S.-China ties brought about by Nixon starting in 1972.”“
  • ” R. Nicholas Burns, who retired last year as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s right-hand man: “Within 20 years, the rise of the new U.S.-India partnership will be considered among the most important developments in U.S. foreign policy in our time.”“

We believe that President Bush has done more for India than any other US President, including President Clinton and President Kennedy. This is the unanimous conclusion of every official in the Foreign Policy establishment in India. Yet, the Indian English language media continues to ape their European mentors and heap scorn on him.

As were wrote in September 13, 2008, the legacy of President Bush will be a strong, mutually beneficial Indo-US partnership that will a positive influence for the entire world. We are willing to bet that history will judge him warmly and positively.

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MV