More has happened in taking India –US relations to higher levels in the last twelve months than in the preceding twelve years. The period has witnessed one of the most intensely argued public discourse on India’s strategic needs. The discourse involved political parties, India’s Atomic Energy Establishment, a host of experts in India and the US. Indian and US officials parleyed intensively and extensively to make it possible for a new strategic partnership to begin. The media in both countries went hammer and tong for and against the nuclear deal between the two countries. Major nuclear powers and others with nuclear capabilities or uranium and technology resources joined the fray. It had become a free for all for proponents and opponents of the deal. The dust raised by the intellectual melee obscured the fundamentals of the strategic issues for the lay observer. C. Raja Mohan has rendered a service to the experts and less informed alike, by compiling a readable and credible account of this tumultuous engagement between India and the US. Raja Mohan is a dependable strategic analyst who can be trusted to sift the grain from the chaff in strategic issues.
May 2006, volume 30, No 5