06-15-2005, 03:09 AM
<b>A non-government </b>
Ministers like Mani Shankar Aiyar are making the PM redundant.
14 June 2005: Does the left hand know what the right is doing? This must be asked in respect of petroleum minister Mani Shankar Aiyerâs grandiose plans to pipe to India Iranian gas via Pakistan, which is now threatened with US sanctions for going ahead with the $4 billion project.
The bare essentials of the controversial deal are this. Because of Iranâs clandestine weaponsâ programme, the US is ready to go to war with it anytime after certain crucial debates in the Congress (Intelligence, âUS prepared for Iran war with split Nato,â 8 June 2005). The US is willing to go so far as to split Nato for it, and bring in a Britain-led Nato as its ally in the war, a task made easier by the imminent destruction of the European Union.
Iran believes that if it is economically linked to India, India will be bound to try to bail it out with the United States, an impossible expectation for anyone who knows the US. China is alone the only country willing to go out on a limb to upgrade Iranâs C4ISR systems, something both India and Russia have refused, in return for which Iran has promised China rich oilfields.
<b>On the other hand, it is not even clear that India is getting a good deal through piped gas from Iran, because at the point of entry, very likely Rajasthan, the cost of the piped gas would be at a price that the market cannot support. We have also previously reported that the Indian mission in Iran is dead opposed to the project, arguing in communications to the foreign office that investments are no longer safe in Iran with a regime under threat of change. </b>
<b>However pressing our oil and gas needs be, do we invest in a country that is threatened with war, and with a hardline regime that is totally undependable about foreign investments? Does it make the crudest horse sense?</b> On her visit here, the US secretary of state, Condoleeza Rice, said loud and clear in public that she was opposed to the pipeline deal, whereupon the Indian government changed track and sought nuclear power assistance from America, which was also promised.
There is nothing to suggest that the US will not export civilian nuclear technology, but it needs to be convinced of Indiaâs non-proliferation record, which is pretty strong, and we have now passed legislation backing it. Besides the US, Russia is keen to export civilian nuclear technology, and others would be too. Non-proliferation is a major concern, and India would eventually overcome it.
<b>Remains the gap in our energy needs to plug, and Mani Aiyer is quite right to explore it, but you donât dip into the most controversial deal of all, one which the Indian market will not support, and which can collapse with the first bomb dropped on Iran. The point is not whether the US is right or wrong to wage a war against Iran, and you can debate about it till the cows come home, but it is about protecting your investments. Money does not come cheap to India that Mani Aiyer decides to throw it away.</b>
<b>The second issue is relations with the United States. Manmohan Singh meets George W.Bush shortly, and a host of issues will be discussed under the broad rubric of strategic relations. Does it make sense for Mani Aiyar to spoil the picture by charting an independent course in oil diplomacy, and one that threatens to bring India on the wrong side of the fence with the US?</b> It is one thing to push a bargain with the US, and that is possible when all sides of the government are in sync, <b>but the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline deal increasingly looks a personal fancy of Mani Aiyar, his attempt at glory hunting. But at what cost? </b>
India is presently engaged in perilous diplomacy with regard to getting a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. The G4 of which India is a part has set the cat among the pigeons, so to say, by circulating a draft resolution that says it will hold off its demand for veto power for fifteen years, after which it will seek it on the basis of its performance. Both China and Pakistan are hell-bent on keeping out India, and China also wants Japan out as its rival in the Asia-Pacific region and for its past imperial atrocities.
All this is well known. It is also known that the US has considerable weight in these matters. <b>The US is absolutely clear about backing Japanâs entry into the Council, and it needs very strong reason to push Indiaâs case, because it would naturally prefer Germany so that it can be turned against France, and put the European allies on a collision course. It is a proper Mahabharata out there, and here we have Mani Aiyar going off like an unguided missile. To answer the question in the beginning, does the right hand know what the left is doing, very likely not. </b>
In a different context, a published intelligence yesterday (âPM angry at being ignored by ministersâ) tells of the uncontrollable state of the UPA government, in which Manmohan Singh is fighting a losing battle to take charge of policy-making. On 27 September 2004 and 31 March this year, the cabinet secretary, B.K.Chaturvedi, sent instructions on behalf of the PM to all ministers to forward copies of draft cabinet notes to the prime ministerâs office.
Officials said the PM came to know of several policy changes and decisions awaiting cabinet clearance from the newspapers, which made cabinet clearance a token formality, and his own approval a fait accompli. Chaturvedi also instructed that the PMOâs comments be awaited for fifteen days before any action was taken on the draft cabinet note. The cabinet secretary wrote too for all final cabinet notes to be previously submitted to the PMO.
Both the earlier instructions were ignored, leading to a third letter from the cabinet secretariat, signed by the secretary, coordination, P.C.Rawal, dated 12 May, which we reproduced yesterday. One sentence in the letter tells it all. âThe prime minister has observed,â it says, âthat instructions regarding forwarding a copy of the draft note to PMO at the time of inter-ministerial consultations are at times not being followed by ministries and departments.â
No explanations are required. The letter says it all. <b>What Mani Aiyar is now embarked upon is also policy change, with or without the PMâs entire consent, with its potential to tectonically impact on our foreign relations. Even if Mani Aiyar knows the impact of the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline deal on relations with the US, does he care? Not likely, from the looks of it. What the UPA has become, a non-government, takes your breath away. </b>
http://www.indiareacts.com/archivedebates/....asp?recno=1162
Ministers like Mani Shankar Aiyar are making the PM redundant.
14 June 2005: Does the left hand know what the right is doing? This must be asked in respect of petroleum minister Mani Shankar Aiyerâs grandiose plans to pipe to India Iranian gas via Pakistan, which is now threatened with US sanctions for going ahead with the $4 billion project.
The bare essentials of the controversial deal are this. Because of Iranâs clandestine weaponsâ programme, the US is ready to go to war with it anytime after certain crucial debates in the Congress (Intelligence, âUS prepared for Iran war with split Nato,â 8 June 2005). The US is willing to go so far as to split Nato for it, and bring in a Britain-led Nato as its ally in the war, a task made easier by the imminent destruction of the European Union.
Iran believes that if it is economically linked to India, India will be bound to try to bail it out with the United States, an impossible expectation for anyone who knows the US. China is alone the only country willing to go out on a limb to upgrade Iranâs C4ISR systems, something both India and Russia have refused, in return for which Iran has promised China rich oilfields.
<b>On the other hand, it is not even clear that India is getting a good deal through piped gas from Iran, because at the point of entry, very likely Rajasthan, the cost of the piped gas would be at a price that the market cannot support. We have also previously reported that the Indian mission in Iran is dead opposed to the project, arguing in communications to the foreign office that investments are no longer safe in Iran with a regime under threat of change. </b>
<b>However pressing our oil and gas needs be, do we invest in a country that is threatened with war, and with a hardline regime that is totally undependable about foreign investments? Does it make the crudest horse sense?</b> On her visit here, the US secretary of state, Condoleeza Rice, said loud and clear in public that she was opposed to the pipeline deal, whereupon the Indian government changed track and sought nuclear power assistance from America, which was also promised.
There is nothing to suggest that the US will not export civilian nuclear technology, but it needs to be convinced of Indiaâs non-proliferation record, which is pretty strong, and we have now passed legislation backing it. Besides the US, Russia is keen to export civilian nuclear technology, and others would be too. Non-proliferation is a major concern, and India would eventually overcome it.
<b>Remains the gap in our energy needs to plug, and Mani Aiyer is quite right to explore it, but you donât dip into the most controversial deal of all, one which the Indian market will not support, and which can collapse with the first bomb dropped on Iran. The point is not whether the US is right or wrong to wage a war against Iran, and you can debate about it till the cows come home, but it is about protecting your investments. Money does not come cheap to India that Mani Aiyer decides to throw it away.</b>
<b>The second issue is relations with the United States. Manmohan Singh meets George W.Bush shortly, and a host of issues will be discussed under the broad rubric of strategic relations. Does it make sense for Mani Aiyar to spoil the picture by charting an independent course in oil diplomacy, and one that threatens to bring India on the wrong side of the fence with the US?</b> It is one thing to push a bargain with the US, and that is possible when all sides of the government are in sync, <b>but the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline deal increasingly looks a personal fancy of Mani Aiyar, his attempt at glory hunting. But at what cost? </b>
India is presently engaged in perilous diplomacy with regard to getting a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. The G4 of which India is a part has set the cat among the pigeons, so to say, by circulating a draft resolution that says it will hold off its demand for veto power for fifteen years, after which it will seek it on the basis of its performance. Both China and Pakistan are hell-bent on keeping out India, and China also wants Japan out as its rival in the Asia-Pacific region and for its past imperial atrocities.
All this is well known. It is also known that the US has considerable weight in these matters. <b>The US is absolutely clear about backing Japanâs entry into the Council, and it needs very strong reason to push Indiaâs case, because it would naturally prefer Germany so that it can be turned against France, and put the European allies on a collision course. It is a proper Mahabharata out there, and here we have Mani Aiyar going off like an unguided missile. To answer the question in the beginning, does the right hand know what the left is doing, very likely not. </b>
In a different context, a published intelligence yesterday (âPM angry at being ignored by ministersâ) tells of the uncontrollable state of the UPA government, in which Manmohan Singh is fighting a losing battle to take charge of policy-making. On 27 September 2004 and 31 March this year, the cabinet secretary, B.K.Chaturvedi, sent instructions on behalf of the PM to all ministers to forward copies of draft cabinet notes to the prime ministerâs office.
Officials said the PM came to know of several policy changes and decisions awaiting cabinet clearance from the newspapers, which made cabinet clearance a token formality, and his own approval a fait accompli. Chaturvedi also instructed that the PMOâs comments be awaited for fifteen days before any action was taken on the draft cabinet note. The cabinet secretary wrote too for all final cabinet notes to be previously submitted to the PMO.
Both the earlier instructions were ignored, leading to a third letter from the cabinet secretariat, signed by the secretary, coordination, P.C.Rawal, dated 12 May, which we reproduced yesterday. One sentence in the letter tells it all. âThe prime minister has observed,â it says, âthat instructions regarding forwarding a copy of the draft note to PMO at the time of inter-ministerial consultations are at times not being followed by ministries and departments.â
No explanations are required. The letter says it all. <b>What Mani Aiyar is now embarked upon is also policy change, with or without the PMâs entire consent, with its potential to tectonically impact on our foreign relations. Even if Mani Aiyar knows the impact of the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline deal on relations with the US, does he care? Not likely, from the looks of it. What the UPA has become, a non-government, takes your breath away. </b>
http://www.indiareacts.com/archivedebates/....asp?recno=1162