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In the past, Iran has stood stolidly behind India at meetings of the Organization of Islamic countries when Pakistan raised the Kashmir issue in an effort to win support from fellow Islamic countries.
Now we all know how the military in Pakistan, whether forcibly in power or in their barracks during democratically elected governments, charted their own Kashmir policy through the Inter-Services Intelligence to provide logistic support to militants for fomenting trouble in India.
As for the Iran-India-Pakistan gas pipeline -- for which China was also vying but wanted to keep India out – U.S. "'vassal'' President Pervez Musharraf, who is despised by a majority of Pakistanis, also wanted China in to keep India out.
India's Congress coalition government too nearly morphed India into another security-alliance vassal of the United States by going ahead with the now failed Indo-U.S. nuclear deal. India, under U.S. pressure, voted against Iran at meetings of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Why did India change, and why did Iran decide to bury the past betrayal of friendship? This turnaround was evidenced in Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's quick stop in New Delhi Tuesday, where he said he wanted to get the pipeline deal, which was in limbo, done in 45 days.
Energy issues apart, Indian elections are scheduled for next year and the Congress Party will require another old ally, the leftist parties, to again prop it up in order to maintain its power in New Delhi. After a popular budget with a slew of sops to farmers in the form of loan waivers failed to cut through the support base owing to spiraling price rises, hopes of walking to power alone has all but vanished for the Congress Party.
With the possibility that the next U.S. presidency may also be an imperial one, and even traditional U.S. partners easing out of security alliances with Washington, India's foreign policy toward the United States looked much too accommodating.
That is why Ahmadinejad felt the need to go into diplomatic overdrive after U.S. presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton joined the chorus threatening to obliterate Iran if Israel was harmed. Whether she meant it or not doesn't matter. What matters is that belligerence toward Iran sells in U.S. electoral politics. Iran has approached the United Nations to protest Clinton's remarks, but the United Nations has already been made redundant by the George W. Bush presidency.
Barrack Obama's visionary change of policy if elected to the White House -- he has suggested he would meet Ahmadinejad -- was countered by Clinton's comments, proving that there are at least an equal number of U.S. votes for taking on Iran.
Iran knows it can do precious little if there is a repeat imperial U.S. presidency and it is decided in the White House, rather than the United Nations, whether or not Iran has put together nuclear weapons capable of striking U.S. targets.
So Iran needs to shore up support among traditional friends like India, where strong domestic political opposition will ultimately not allow a small group of politicians to link the nation's security interests with those of the United States.
There is support within the United States to clean up its hegemonic image, with Barrack Obama out in front. But his opponents keep ratcheting up fear, tinkering with the psyche and instincts of the blue-collar, red-states electorate who have unfortunately contributed to the present U.S. hegemonic image by voting for leaders clueless about the world beyond their own.
The appointment of U.S. Gen. David Petraeus, with his adverse briefs on Iran, ensures that Bush will not be blamed by history for tarnishing the U.S. founding fathers' lofty ideals. And the future president, however visionary or different he or she may be, will be straight jacketed in the Bush legacy for some time.
It would take a paradigm shift to address the issue of U.S. meddling in Iran -- from the CIA-engineered removal of democratically elected Mohammad Mossadegh and the foisting of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi onto the Iranian people, whose unpopular reign impoverished ordinary Iranians -- that is the main cause of religious radicalism, rabid anti-Americanism and nuclear ambitions to thwart U.S. interventionism.
The need of energy-hungry and economically emerging India for Iran's gas may have impacted its return to traditional friendship parameters with Tehran, while Iran's diplomatic overdrive has been forced by U.S. policies. Iran's future will depend on the situation in Iraq and the analytical skills of the next U.S. president who, for a change, may have to think out of the box.
India's best chance is to hold on to its own in strategic matters while building a bridge, step by step, to integrate Iran into the regional community, which would automatically render its threatening image redundant.
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(Susenjit Guha is a freelance writer living in Kolkata, India. He can be contacted at sguha60@yahoo.com. ©Copyright Susenjit Guha.)
