New Delhi: India Research Press, 2006. 311 p.*

Raja Mohan is one of India's leading analysts and political scientists. University named after him. Jawaharlal Nehru is a journalist for several major Indian newspapers, a member of the Indian Public Council for National Security, and the author of several books on Indian foreign policy.

The reviewed work of R. Mohan is a detailed, in-depth analysis of the development of Indian-American cooperation at the beginning of the XXI century, more precisely, during the Republican administration headed by George W. Bush from 2001 to the beginning of 2006. The author's choice of time was not accidental: it was then that the most important events related to radical changes in the world economy took place. relations between India and the United States. This was a sharp turn in Washington's policy, from sharply condemning India and Pakistan for their nuclear weapons tests in May 1998 to de facto recognizing Delhi's possession of such weapons in 2005. After these tests, during a visit to China in June 1998, US President B. Clinton strongly condemned the proliferation of nuclear weapons in South Asia and announced America's strategic partnership with China. Following the US, Japan and a number of other countries have resorted to sanctions against India. At the same time, the UN Security Council, at the initiative of the United States, unanimously condemned India for the tests and demanded that it and Pakistan fulfill a number of conditions, such as signing the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons( NPT), joining negotiations on a treaty on the Reduction of fissile Materials, strengthening export controls on "sensitive" technologies and goods, taking measures to limiting the threat of use of nuclear weapons, as well as efforts to resolve the Kashmir issue.

For India, the apparent confluence of US and Chinese interests on the issue of nuclear weapons has become an important incentive to find ways to improve relations with the United States. He describes in detail the process of forming these relationships. The Americans came to the conclusion that the key problem in the entire complex of US-Indian relations is the following:

* C. Raja Mohan. Incredible allies. Nuclear India, the United States, and the global order. New Delhi. 2006, 311 p.

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nuclear problems, the solution of which will help create conditions for progress in other areas.

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 led the Bush administration to shift its political, military, and other resources to the fight against terror and to the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. The problems of relations with India were relegated to the background, despite the fact that it offered the United States its cooperation in the fight against terrorism. But then, for Washington, Pakistan turned out to be a more important ally in this issue.

The central theme of the study is US-Indian cooperation on nuclear issues, which was initiated during the negotiations between Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and George W. Bush in 2001-2004. It culminated in an agreement between the United States and India in Washington in July 2005 and subsequent agreements in March 2006 between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and George W. Bush during the latter's visit to India. These agreements were aimed at achieving a breakthrough in US-Indian relations in the radically changed world situation after the end of the Cold War. They meant America's de facto recognition of India's nuclear status.

The development of events in this direction took place very quickly. In May 2003, Brajesh Mishra, an aide to Indian Prime Minister Vajpayee, said in New York: "We had differences, including on nuclear issues, but a steady bilateral dialogue, accompanied by a frank exchange of views, led to a better understanding on these issues... Addressing three issues - high-tech trade, civil nuclear energy cooperation, and space - can take India-US relations to a whole new level of partnership... The obstacles on this path are related to the remnants of cold War thinking and do not correspond to our mutual interests " (p. 24).

In turn, the United States came to the conclusion that it was necessary to change its approach to India, which has nuclear capabilities. The main arguments underlying this were as follows: India will not give up nuclear weapons as long as its regional opponents (China and Pakistan) maintain comparable nuclear capabilities; Indian nuclear weapons do not threaten the security of the United States and its geopolitical interests; Indian technologies related to weapons of mass destruction represent a significant threat to the United States. a greater threat to American security if they are deliberately or unintentionally "leaked" to hostile US regimes or non-State forces than India's very possession of these capabilities.

The process of rapprochement between the two countries accelerated dramatically after Bush was elected president for a second term in November 2004. Already in March 2005, during the visit of US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to India, deep preparations were made for a breakthrough in US-Indian relations. The main goal of such a breakthrough, Rice said, was "to help India become a major world power in the twenty-first century" (p. 62). But as soon as she left India, the United States announced the sale of F-16 military aircraft to Pakistan. This caused an extremely negative reaction in Indian public circles. Some experts and politicians spoke about a" new betrayal " of Washington, others - about American plans to destabilize the situation in South Asia, etc. There were other, more benevolent comments towards the United States.

Nevertheless, the Indian government has "stepped over" this problem on the way to establishing a new relationship with America. This raised an important question: why does the United States need to help India build up its power? According to the author, the initiative to radically improve US-Indian relations belonged to the Bush administration. The Indian leadership, led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, has made such a drastic change in relations with the United States and the risks associated with it, despite serious opposition from both a number of political parties and influential scientific circles involved in the development of nuclear energy and nuclear weapons.

R. Mohan gives a generally objective analysis of the events and steps that were aimed at radically improving relations between India and the United States, as well as the motives that contributed to the accelerated rapprochement of both countries. He explores the problems that have arisen in this regard in Delhi and Washington and between them. America's plans to draw India into the orbit of its influence were connected with an attempt not only to resolve long-standing issues on the nuclear issue, but also to start a new dialogue with India on strategic cooperation in the context of a new balance of power.

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the international arena, where China and other Asian countries are playing an increasingly important role. On the way to such cooperation, India and the United States faced internal and external problems. In New Delhi, a number of political forces, especially those on the left, and the Indian intellectual elite, who were not ready to accept "risky" cooperation with the United States, which blocked the supply of high technologies and nuclear fuel to the country over the past three decades, opposed the dramatic changes in Indian-American relations. In turn, critics in America said that recognition of India as a nuclear power would destroy the process of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons in the world.

Drawing on a wealth of material in favor of a breakthrough in relations between India and the United States, the author at the same time widely presents the positions of opponents of such a development of events. Yet it is clear that he supports Bush and Singh's efforts to build a new relationship that is designed to " change the world." The drama of the situation lies in the fact that with such rapid progress towards each other, countries had to overcome the long-standing distrust in relations between them. It was connected, among other things, with the extensive cooperation between India and the USSR, America's ideological and political opponent. In Delhi, many believed that nuclear tests would lead to isolation of the country from the rest of the world. Others felt that India was moving away from the tradition of moral politics in favor of an uncharacteristic so-called real politics.

R. Mohan notes that after Vladimir Putin became president in 2000, cooperation between Russia and India in the civil nuclear sphere found a new breath (Russia's supply of nuclear fuel for the Tarapura nuclear power plant, acceleration in the construction of two nuclear units at the Kudankulam nuclear power plant). At the same time, Russia was experiencing difficulties in this area due to the rules of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG was created in response to India's nuclear tests in 1974). After 2004, Moscow and Paris "signaled" to India that they would not be able to consider serious nuclear cooperation with it if the United States did not are involved in this process. The author assumes that the United States was ready to accept India as a nuclear power, provided that Delhi separates peaceful nuclear installations from military ones. The Bush administration has promised to work with the U.S. Congress and the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group to secure an exemption for India.

R. Mohan asks the question: why did President Bush agree to make such a difficult commitment? And he replies: Bush understood the importance of nuclear power in order to "reduce global dependence on oil" (p. 8). As China and India continue their rapid economic growth, their demand for oil will increase and put pressure on world prices for this raw material. The expansion of peaceful nuclear power in the United States and India will reduce carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere, which will make it easier to solve the problem of global warming. Unlike Europeans, Bush and his like-minded conservatives do not accept the terms of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which sets quotas for gas emissions. Clinton signed the protocol, and Bush withdrew America's signature on it. He insists on market-based solutions to the global warming problem, as well as technological improvements to that end.

According to the author, another important reason that contributed to such a sharp and rapid turn of the United States towards India was their awareness of the growing role of this country in the new balance of power in Asia and the strengthening of China's position. Unlike the Clinton administration, which saw China as a strategic partner, "Bush and his conservative ideologues believe that China is a potential powerful competitor to the United States in the global system, and therefore its growing dominance in Asia requires appropriate decisions" (p.9). In this regard, the Bush administration emphasizes that China should not be an equal to America, but only part of the broader US bilateral relations with other countries, including India, Japan, South Korea and Australia.

Bush's initiative to dramatically improve relations with India has met with a positive response from the Indian government, led by Manmohan Singh. According to R. Mohan, M. Singh managed to " achieve the impossible in Indian-American relations." Unlike previous Indian National Congress (INC) prime ministers, he was "not burdened with anti-American baggage." In this sense, M. Singh was closer to Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi than to the two generations of leaders who preceded him.

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INC., which under the leadership of Indira Gandhi (Rajiv Gandhi's mother) "grew up on the constant repetition of anti-American slogans." However, in the 1980s, Gandhi herself felt the need for a more "creative approach to relations with the United States." Rajiv Gandhi and subsequent prime ministers actively tried to change the very principles of relations with the United States. However, in the end, the "breakthrough" solution to this problem fell to the share of M. Singh. According to the author, his visit to the United States in July 2005, which was accompanied by the signing of an agreement with Bush there, "turned out to be the most productive of all previous visits to the United States by Indian prime ministers, including Jawaharlal Nehru" (p. 9).

At the same time, R. Mohan emphasizes that the signing of this agreement does not mean the final solution of the Indian nuclear problem. "It will take a huge political will of the government headed by M. Singh to overcome the resistance of opponents of rapprochement between India and the United States in these and other countries and implement the Indian-American agreements" (p.10). At the same time, it should be borne in mind that M. Singh's government does not have a majority in parliament, but relies on the support of communists and other left-wing parties that oppose such an agreement with America.

The author's arguments about American unilateral actions in the world and India's "unilateral" position on nuclear nonproliferation are of considerable interest. He writes that India is much closer to the Bush administration in the debate about unilateral and multilateral action that began in the world after Bush came to power in 2001. India has essentially avoided participating in the UN debate on multilateral action. This was due to the fact that it was "vaccinated" against multilateralism on the issue of its national security, especially on the issue of Kashmir. "As a major country, India views its sovereignty as the highest value" and has in the past refused to allow UN intervention in matters related to its security, whether in Kashmir, Nepal or Sri Lanka. "In 1971, when India liberated Bangladesh, it did not wait for the UN's permission. Her action was approved by only a few countries, but none of her fellow NAM members supported India when it dismembered Pakistan in the name of humanitarian intervention " (p. 258).

The author notes that while India always promotes slogans of multilateralism, its perception of the UN is more international than supranational. This largely coincides with the ideas of US liberals. Like all great Powers, India opposes UN interference in its internal affairs, as well as in security issues on its borders.

It is also interesting how R. Mohan explains India's support for the US withdrawal from missile defense in 2001 and the Bush administration's plan to create an American missile defense system, which caused protests both in India and in other countries. This support is not an uncommon exception, despite past disagreements between Delhi and Washington on global issues. India, for example, has found itself in a similar position to the United States on a number of issues, such as the problem of global warming or critical attitude to the International Criminal Court. This is despite the fact that earlier it often voted against the United States in the UN on many resolutions.

According to R. Mohan, the new trend in relations between India and the United States is manifested in the "real parallelism" of India's foreign policy and American interests, as they are seen by the Bush administration, which intends to consider India as a great power. Therefore, the Bush Government's policies are very favorable to India's national interests. In September 2002, the US government came up with the idea of preemptive strikes against terrorist groups and rogue states. This caused widespread protests around the world. However, India was one of the few countries that welcomed such a policy. Moreover, it said that preemptive strikes are in its interests. This showed that India is responding to new challenges to global security and does not want to repeat the old clichés about multilateral action. India is also familiar with Bush's other idea of "regime change" in undemocratic countries. As R. Mohan writes, in addition to "participating in the creation of Bangladesh, India acted as an instrument for restoring the monarchy in Nepal in the 1950s. As a country responsible for security in its backyard, India has never stopped using doctrines and models that fall far short of its own rhetoric on multilateralism and collective security" (p.261).

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In his analysis of India's foreign policy, the author insistently promotes the idea of India as a future great country. Like the United States, India is a continent-sized country that believes that "it should step forward to the beat of its own drummer." Striving for the status of a great power, it requires changes in global rules and strengthening its position in international institutions. Built on the ashes of World War II, the Yalta system is unacceptable to India. Although she made a significant contribution to the victory of the allied forces, she was left without a place at the prestigious table. Hence its efforts to become a permanent member of the UN Security Council.

In his conclusions, R. Mohan resolutely and bluntly states his position on the United States: "The emergence of the Bush administration with its ideas of fundamental restructuring of the world order should be" instinctively " welcomed by India. Moreover, a hegemon Power that is ready to revise the world order is a God-sent one for India, which aspires to the status of a great power. These aspirations of India cannot be realized without a dominant Power willing to change international rules. A world order that recognizes the new realities of power sharing is in the interests of both America and India. And if the Bush administration believes that Yalta has outlived itself, then there is no reason for India to shed tears for a system that marginalised it" (p. 262).

This is the position of the author, who is not alone in his approaches to the current Indian-American relations. But this approach reflects only a fraction of public opinion and sentiment, mainly in corporate India, which has joined the flow of globalization conducted in the interests of the United States. There are other influential forces in India that are opposed to it becoming a" satellite companion " of America and losing part of its sovereignty. A number of R. Mohan's artificial constructions not only do not fit into India's officially proclaimed policy of creating a multipolar world, but also do not stand up to comparison with real historical facts. How can we talk about the "marginalization" of India after the Yalta Agreements (February 1945), when at that time it was still a British colony and the end of World War II contributed to its independence in August 1947?

R. Mohan ends his book with a brief reference to Bush's visit to India in March 2006. But after this visit, the two countries continue a difficult dialogue on the nuclear issue. Time will tell what its results will be. But we can already say that India will not put all its eggs in one American basket. And the author himself leaves room for a different development of Indian-American relations: "Despite the emerging strategic parallelism between India and the United States, there is a broad consensus in India that New Delhi and Washington will have difficulties in creating a formal alliance" (p.277).

R. Mohan's book is of considerable interest to the reader, as it contains new ideas and approaches that are not always familiar to us, not only to the problems of Indian-American relations, but also to changes in the world order at the beginning of the XXI century.

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