Friday, November 7, 2025

"India and the United States: Estranged Democracies" 15 August 1947

Chapter 2 "Truman: Dealing with Neutralism" from Kux, Dennis. India and the United States: Estranged Democracies, 1941-1991. Washington, DC: National Defense U Press, 1992. Print. Introduction by Senator Daniel P. Moynihan

I included footnotes inline in the text separated by brackets {}

I included additional commentary between scissor snippets

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I included my personal snarky remarks in square brackets []

The only thing I knew about Indian Prime Minister Nehru is that hippies used to wear Nehru jackets:











but I didn't hold that personally against Nehru. However, according to this book, it appears, as far as I can tell, that Nehru psychologically transferred is annoyance with his old colonial overlords, the British Empire, onto the United States.

It seems regardless of party, most American administrations perceived India remaining neutral during the Cold War as ingratitude especially after we had been allies, of a sort, during World War II. In fairness, I suppose France must have felt the same way in the 19th C when the USA remained neutral, more or less, during the Napoleonic Wars, after France had been our ally during our Revolutionary War.

























Chapter II

 Truman: Dealing with Neutralism



Harry S. Truman -- even the name sounded unfamiliar -- assumed the presidency with the nation, and indeed the world, stunned by the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt, who led the United States for twelve difficult years through the Depression and World War II. A compromise candidate for Vice President, Truman was in office barely a month when he became the President.  The former Senator from Missouri had little experience in foreign affairs and no special knowledge of Asia or India.

One of his first tasks, just ten days after Roosevelt's death, was to convene the San Francisco Conference to establish the United Nations, the post-war organization on which Roosevelt placed such high hopes as a mechanism for keeping the peace. Thanks to Roosevelt's pressure in December 1941, India was a founder-member--although still under British rule in April 1945.  The Indian delegation, selected by Viceroy Lord Wavell, included Indian supporters of the British Raj, but no [Indian] Congress nationalists. Except for Gandhi, released in late 1944, the party leadership was still languishing in prison.

To protest the composition of the Indian delegation, Nehru's sister, Vijaya Pandit, who was visiting the United States, lead a nationalist delegation to San Francisco, claiming to be the true representatives of India. Although Mrs. Pandit's attempt to challenge the official Indian delegation appointed by the Viceroy got nowhere, the effort proved a public relations success. Representatives of France, the Philippines, and, most important, the Soviet Union, called on Mrs. Pandit. Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov won friends in India by declaring her delegation the true voice of India. Although the United States gave no sign of support for the nationalists at San Francisco, President Truman invited Mrs. Pandit to meet with him at the White House before she left for India. The gesture was appreciated. {1. Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, The Scope of Happiness: A Personal Memoir (New York: Crown, 1979), pp. 195-97.}

The State Department also accepted the advice of William Phillips to urge the British to adopt a more liberal approach toward the subcontinent. Secretary of State Edward Stettinius and Under Secretary Joseph Grew raised the India question with visiting Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden in April and May 1945. Although the Americans received a noncommittal response, US pressure may have played a role in the British offer of an interim government in June 1945. {2. Gary Hess, America Encounters India, 1941-1947, (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1971), p. 160.}


Just before the Allied victory in Europe on 8 May 1945, the British released Nehru and other Congress Party leaders from jail. During the nearly three years the Congressites were imprisoned, Mohammed Ali Jinnah and other Muslim League leaders, who remained free, won much increased support for the goal of a separate Muslim homeland -- Pakistan. Two months later, in July 1945, after the British Labour Party defeated the Conservatives, Clement Attlee replaced Winston Churchill as Prime Minister. Unlike Churchill, Attlee and the Labour Party favored an early handover of power in India.


With Labour in power, Indian independence was no longer in doubt. Although the United States continued to follow events closely, pressure from Washington on London to end colonial rule was not needed. US officials believed it was up to Indian political leaders and the British to work out the modalities, and did not see the need for trying to influence the process. In fact, as the Truman administration grappled with a host of post-war domestic and foreign policy problems, South Asia was scarcely visible on the radar screen.


As the US military presence in India wound down after the Japanese surrender in August 1945, some GIs found themselves entangled in heightened Indian domestic tensions.  One US serviceman died [I presume he was killed vs just died] and more than thirty were injured in riots in Calcutta in November 1945 to protest trials of Indian National Army (INA) members -- the captured Indian troops that fought for the Japanese.


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I had never heard of this event and the above description seems to be a Bowdlerized account. First, four people were killed. Second, this summary makes it sounds like Americans were somehow responsible for getting "entangled" in these Japanese Fascist collaborators' attacks.  According to an account from Madera Tribune, Number 223, 23 November 1945, the Fascists attacked a US officers club, filled with female nurses, on Thanksgiving Day and lynched the Americans. The Indian Fascsists were protesting the fact that the British government was trying them for treason. Why the fascist Indians attacked an American vs British club isn't explained. Presumably, the Indian fascists were also racists and could tell an American apart from a Brit.


















"YANKS KILLED CALCUTTA RIOT
CALCUTTA, Nov. 23, 1945—A major and three other U. S. army men were killed and several other Americans injured during the night in rioting by Indian mobs which boosted overall casualties today to at least 18 dead and 125 wounded. Violence mounted today as unruly thousands of Indians ranged the streets of Calcutta, attacking American and British military vehicles and skirmishing with any who blocked their way. A mob attacked the American Officers’ club late last night when U. S. army men were holding a Thanksgiving day dance. A bloody battle was fought, with the Indians hurling brickbats and grappling with the Americans who defended themselves. Women guests at the Officers' club, including dozens of nurses from the Calcutta base hospital, were marooned. When the casualties were counted, a major and three men were dead and several others injured. Brig. Gen. Robert Neyland, commander of U. S. base section headquarters, had declared all Calcutta out of bounds for American troops when the mass rioting broke out yesterday. The rioting began as demonstrations on Indian National Army day, with specific protests against the trial of former Indian officers  of the Japanese-supported “National army” at New Delhi. The army was organized by the late Subhas Chandra Bose to fight on the Japanese side against the allies.



According to, presumably, lefty professor Alpes, Maybritt Jill. "The Congress and the INA Trials, 1945–50 A Contest over the Perception of ‘Nationalist’ Politics." Studies in History 23.1 (2007): 135-58. Web. 21 May 2017. Indians viewed the fascist Indians who collaborated with Japanese fascists as heroes:

screengrab from linked article:













Converted into searchable text:





from the British point of view, all former members of the Indian Army who had joined the INA were guilty of treason and liable to the death penalty. In August, the Government of India thus decided to hold public trials of about 600 INA soldiers. This move sparked off massive demonstrations of solidarity all over the country. Before the court proceeding had even commenced, the people in India had already passed their verdict: the INA men were heroes. During the trials determined general strikes and occasional street fights in the name of the INA repeatedly took place throughout India. In November 1945 and February 1946 Calcutta saw particularly strong public agitation. In G.H. Corr's words: 'The men marched on Delhi as patriotic soldiers and they arrived as prisoners, but ironically it was as prisoners that they made their biggest impact on the Indian people and the Government of India.' How can this apparent paradox be explained? How and why did the perception of the INA's role in India's path 'towards freedom' change? How do perception and portrayal of the INA link in with notions of 'nationalist politics' and 'anti-colonial struggle'?


Not only did street brawlers advocate for the fascist collaborators, Nehru also defended the INA:

‘Pandit Nehru, that other redoubtable fighter for freedom, took over where Netaji had not been able to continue’.56 By taking up the defence of the INA, Nehru could create a radical image of himself as a ‘fighter for freedom’, rather than as a mere politician. 

Like Kux, Alpes also Bowdelerized "protest" and ignored their murderous behavior:

Public INA Agitation and Late Colonial Politics ‘Students belonging to various political parties marched unitedly with the war cry: ‘Death to British Imperialism,’ ... and ... ‘Hindu–Muslim Unity Zindabad.’78 These were the slogans at the violent INA unrest in Calcutta in November 1945. Public responses to the INA trials did not remain restricted to fundraising activities, the observation of INA Days and peaceful INA processions. From 21 to 24 November, Calcutta saw the biggest and most spectacular outbreak of public protest. The uprising was sparked off by the students’ movement, and later joined by industrial workers.79 For four days public uproar spread all over the city.

and it seems Hitler's choice of incorporating a swastika on his fascist flag attracted a number of Indians to his cause:


‘The tricolour of the Congress, the shimmering blue of Islam, the deep red of the Communists, the Swastika-bearing of the Hindu Mahasabha began fluttering in the clear and soft air of Mid-November’.84


It sounds like nobody was really held accountable for either collaborating with the fascist Japanese or for killing Americans, unless there was a separate trial not reported in the above article.


On 31 December 1945 the verdict of the first court-martial in Delhi was finally announced. All three were found guilty of ‘waging war against the King’. Shah Nawaz was also found guilty of the charge of abetment of murder.98 However, the ‘patriotic motives’ of the INA soldiers had actually been conceded by the court.99 Auchinleck, the Commander-in-Chief, then remitted the sentence of transportation for life for all three. On 4 January Dhillon, Sahgal and Shah Nawaz were released from the Red Fort. ‘But the triumph’, comments Nehru, ‘was that of the Indian people as a whole, civil and military, who had pronounced judgement already and their verdict was too powerful to be ignored.’100 He portrays the final outcome of the trial to be the victory of ‘the people’. As a more detached and historical assessment of the politics of the INA trials, this paper concludes that the final outcome was a political victory of the Congress, rather than of ‘the people’.101 After their release, Shah Nawaz, Dhillon and Sahgal all continued to ‘fight for freedom’ under the wings of the Congress.102 They all became members of the National Congress Party. The Congress had thus fully managed to capture the issue for its own interests, which put the League on the defensive.



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In February 1946 following the conviction of an INA officer, some 37 Americans were among 400 casualties in Calcutta riots. In Bombay, a mob waving the Congress Party flag burned the US Information Service Office. {3. Gary Hess, America Encounters India, 1941-1947, (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1971), p. 166-67.}

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These casualties are especially galling because they occurred in a supposedly allied nation. These casualties are doubly galling because the United States rationed food and fuel to supply our ungrateful allies who turn around and frag us in the back:







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These troubles were the exception. On the whole, the 250,000 US troops in the CBI [ China Burma India ] Theater departed India without problems




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Most US troops in CBI were stationed in China or Burma and only used India , if at all, as a transit stop on way back stateside - like Major Ted Lawson in Lawson, Ted W., and Robert Considine. Thirty seconds over Tokyo. New York: Random House, 1943. Print. Lawson, after losing a leg when his B25 crashed in China, complained about snotty English people in India giving him an attitude problem for being physically disabled:

A screengrab from link:





















Converted into text:

I was thinking a lot about my family now, as we went into the home-stretch. So, on the next morning, June 6th, I went down the street on the crutches to a place named the Ivory Palace. I had been paid in Kumming -- and found that we had gotten only a buck a day subsistence from the time we left the coast until we took off, instead of the $6 we figured on. It's a regulation, but we forgotten, and on the Hornet had played poker against the Navy as if we were rich. But I still wanted to buy some little things to take home/
I had trouble getting around in the shop, but I finally got up to a counter and noticed uneasily that a helmeted Colonial was staring at me. I guess I looked like a bum.
"Seen a bit of the war, old boy?" he asked, not very interested. He stared at my hump and pushed-in-face.
I was sensitive about things then. I wanted to rap him over his pith hat, but I realized that I might as well begin getting accustomed to parrying unfeeling questions. So I told him a canary had kicked me, and bought Ellen an ivory letter opener.




























I swore that if I ever got out to a big city I'd eat myself glassy-eyed on apple pie a la mode. So that afternoon in New Delhi McClure and I wen looking for it. And we found the best possible way to the best place. We spotted a couple of American soldiers who looked as if they knew their way around, and they led us straight to the place. There wasn't any apple pie, but what a job we did on ice cream!
I couldn't sleep again that night. About midnight I went downstairs, hired a carriage and rode around for the rest of the night. About 3 A.M. I saw the two soldiers walking down the blacked-out street with a girl, and invited them to ride with me. We rode around New Delhi, singing a few songs we knew.
We took off at 9 A.M. on Sunday, June 7th, from New Delhi and flew to our last stop in India, Karachi, and saw the Stratoline which was going to take us the rest of the way home. Greening, Hilger, Smith, Holdstrom [sic], Wilder and a few others were there. Some of them had been ferrying fighting ships to several fronts, for this field is a kind of clearing station for such traffic.







Charles Ross Greening


John A Hilger


https://airforce.togetherweserved.com/usaf/servlet/tws.webapp.WebApp?cmd=ShadowBoxProfile&type=Person&ID=160378




Capt Donald Gregory Smith

https://airforce.togetherweserved.com/usaf/servlet/tws.webapp.WebApp?cmd=ShadowBoxProfile&type=Person&ID=173314

BRIGADIER GENERAL EVERETT W. HOLSTROM

http://www.af.mil/About-Us/Biographies/Display/Article/106701/brigadier-general-everett-w-holstrom/


Col Rodney Ross “Hoss” Wilder


 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/20352082


https://airforce.togetherweserved.com/usaf/servlet/tws.webapp.WebApp?cmd=ShadowBoxProfile&type=Person&ID=161834


Doolittle crew


http://www.cv6.org/1942/doolittle/doolittle_crews.htm



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Except for stray racial incidents [like Indians lynching Americans on Thanksgiving], they left behind a good impression. The GIs seemed friendlier and less standoffish than the British. The US soldiers, however, carried away remarkably few positive memories from this first extensive contact between the United States and India. For most GIs, India was an ordeal in which the jungles of Assam and the slums of Calcutta erased any Hollywood stereotypes of glamour and romance in the mysterious East. The India theater during World War II, according to political scientist Harold Isaacs, produced hardly any nostalgia at all, let alone any significant literature or movies. {4. Harold Isaacs, Scratches on Our Mind (White Plains, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1980), pp. 317-19.}

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The documentary series on the Pacific War both agree that CBI theater was a complete waste of American blood and treasure.














http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/centburma/centburma.htm



124th Cavalry Regiment, a dismounted former National Guard unit from Texas
https://marsmen.org/history/
The Mars Task Force was given the mission of clearing Northern Burma of Japanese forces and opening the Burma Road for truck traffic to China

 http://www.texasmilitaryforcesmuseum.org/124th.htm

The Regiment turned in its horses on 10 June 1944, and departed Fort Riley on 25 July. It landed in Bombay, India, on 26 August 1944. Reinforced with the 613th Field Artillery Battalion, and redesignated "Special," it became part of the MARS Task Force and moved into the mountains of Northern Burma on 15 December 1944. 

 http://www.poblar.com/rodriguez/Story/124Cavalry/index.htm
1st Lt. Jack Knight, Troop F, was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor, the only such award for ground action in the China-Burma-India theater. The unit was demobilized in China on July 1, 1945.



http://www.cbi-theater.com/knight/knight.html


medal



http://evanced.nileslibrary.org/vhp/Searchable/Matthew%20Potoczek%20searchable.pdf


Matthew Potoczek memoir

http://vhpanpld.blogspot.com/2013/11/rest-in-peace-matthew-potoczek-us-army.html

 https://www.nileslibrary.org/world-war-ii-pacific


Brits didn't share food from USA lend lease program w/ American troops, or with their Indian subjects, for that matter:

p11-13























Potoczek: We had to report back to the ship, and then, after that, we got some more supplies. Then we headed for Bombay, India. And then Bombay was terrible. They says, "Okay, you can go to shore," for maybe so many hours, but it was so bad in Bombay.

Interviewer: Warms? Hot?

Potoczek: Hot, a lot of poverty.

Int: Yes

Potoczek: Nothing, nothing. People didn't even have food. It was so bad. We said it was better n the ship than it was in Bombay. I'd bever have believed that. We had the Depression in 1929, but it wasn't as bad as Bpmbay was.

Int: Yes

Potoczek: This was terrible. These people were skinny, rags and bones, in India. I said this was too bad....And then they'd be begging. I had a little money. I would give it to them.

Int: Yes

Potoczek: I felt sorry for these people. They had children there. They were begging. That was horrible. I felt that depressed me to see.

Int: Yes

Potoczek: You know, how people lived. I said --

Int: So, Bombay, you were on the West Coast of India?


Potoczek: Mmmm-hmmm

Int: Did you go by train then to --


Potoczek: Then we took - We got onto a train, I remember, and then, from there, we engaged the enemy. The Japanese were all the way into India.

Int: Yes. You went to the other side to Calcutta then, or something, probably, or --


Potoczek: I think it was Assam, India, where we engaged.

Int: Assam, yes.


Potoczek: And then I remember the Merrill Marauders, they called themselves the Merrill -- We were the replacements for them. They were all beat up. They were fighting there first, and we looked at them, we were healthy, they were beat. Oh, I mean terrible, in terrible condition!








Int: So this would have been late '44?


Potoczek: Yes, it was in '44


Potoczek: Like November or October?


Potoczek: Somewhere around there, let's see, October, yes, somewhere.

Int: Yes






Potoczek: But we were the replacements for them. I mean, they were ragged, their uniforms, their shoes, everything. We had all brand new stuff, all nice clothes, everything. Good boots, brand new. Theirs were ragged. So, we were the replacements for them. Then we engaged the Japanese. We fought the Japanese.

Int; In Burma or --


Potoczek: In this -- in India.

Int: In India

Potoczek: But we were doing good, because we were well-trained.

Int: What was the terrain like there?

Potoczek: Oh, rugged. It was --

Int: Kind of Mountainy? Hilly?


Potoczek: Jungle

Int: Oh, jungle.

Potoczek: Jungle. Then we went into --

Int: But you hadn't trained for jungle fighting, though, did you?


Potoczek: No, I didn't train.


Int: No

Potoczek: Not in Fort Riley, Kansas

Int: Yes


Potoczek: So then we replaced the Merrill Marauders. I remember them. Then we had the mules come in later, but we were in combat. We pushed forward. Then the rest of the fellows, they were loading up the mules with supplies, put the howitzers on there. I think they were the 105, they called them Howitzers. That was for backup. And then we engaged the Japanese. We fought the Japanese every day. But we were doing good. We were pushing them back and back. Then I recall some of the towns. Then we went to Burma. There was Myitkina. There was a big battle there. And then we lost quite a few men there. And my Captain Gavel, we lost him. I'd seen him get shot.


Int: He was shot in battle, on the field, the captain?

Potoczek: Captain Gavel. In fact , there is a picture of him, showing Captain Gavel. And he got killed, and a lot of the other fellows got killed.





Can't find Gavel grave in Burma

https://www.abmc.gov/database-search-results?search_api_aggregation_1=&search_api_aggregation_3=Gavel&field_serial_number=&field_service_number=&field_abmc_burial_unit=All&field_place_of_entry=All&field_cemetery=All&field_cemetery2=All&field_branch_of_service=All&search_api_views_fulltext=&field_war_1%5B%5D=1808&field_dod_day=All&field_dod_month=All&field_dod_year=1944&missing-status-dummy=All&field_memorialized_text=All&sort_bef_combine=field_last_name+ASC&items_per_page=10










p16 used captured Japanese food b/c Army Air Force air drops weren't accurate













Int. Were the Japanese good fighters?


Potoczek: They were good fighters, very good. I remember some of them way up there in a tree, snipers shooting down at you.

Then we were starving. We ate the Japanese food. We were so hungry. They had food, so we at their food because, our air drop, they missed the air drop. They didn't know where we were, because half of the time I didn't know where I was! But, thank God, these officers like the Major, bit, he was good! You know, he knew the terrain. He knew exactly what command to give everybody.


p 17 bartered medical supplies and blankets for food from Burmese











































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From New Delhi, American diplomats began to report signs of dissatisfaction about post-war US policy toward Asia. After President Truman reaffirmed US support for self-determination for all peoples in October 1945, Pandit Nehru welcomed the statement, but added his hope that it represented "something more than am expression of vague goodwill." Although "everywhere in Asia and Africa people looked up to America," Nehru commented critically, "There has been some disillusionment in India in regard to American championing independence for freedom." {Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru SWJN, vol. 14, pp. 457-58; Nehru interview with the press, 28 October 1945. } Commissioner George Merrell, who succeeded Phillips as head of the New Delhi office, kept Washington informed regarding on-going Indian criticism of the US failure to press British, French, and Dutch allies for decolonization of their remaining holdings in Asia {Foreign Relations of the United States FRUS, 1946, vol V, p. 91, dispatch from the Commissioner in India to the State Department, 10 June 1946.}When the Philippines formally gained their independence on the fourth of July 1946, Pandit Nehru sent a barbed message of congratulations. "Some countries that are called independent are far from free and are under the economic or military domination of some great power," Nehru cabled, "We hope that is not so with the Filipinos." {SWJN, Second Series, vol. 1, p. 492, press interview, 29 September 1946.}


Within the Congress Party leadership, an aging Gandhi played a less active role. Nehru and the more conservative Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel -- like Gandhi from Gujarat in western India -- emerged as the two senior leaders.  Although in domestic matters, the two shared authority, in foreign policy, Nehru, because of his longstanding position as Congress spokesman and his unusually broad knowledge, was unchallenged. During 1946, Pandit Nehru was at first somewhat vague in talking about the foreign policy an independent India would pursue, but the seeds for neutralism were already germinating. "We want to be friendly with the three principal powers -- America, Russia, and England -- it is impossible for me to say what military and other alliances a free India may approve. Generally speaking, it would not like to entangle itself in other people's feuds and imperialist rivalries," he told journalists in March. {Ibid pp. 524-25, Nehru press interview, 15 March 1946.} In March 1946, talking with the New York Times, he took much the same approach, mainly stressing Indian support for decolonization in Africa and Asia {Ibid. pp. 569-70, interview with George Jones of the New York Times, 30 August 1946.} A month later, in September, after the formation of the Interim Government, in which Nehru served as Deputy Leader and Foreign Minister, he was more precise, declaring "India will follow an independent policy, keeping away from the power politics of groups aligned one against another." { SWJN, Second Series, vol. 1, p. 492, press interview, 29 September 1946.} The concept of neutralism was thus articulated a year before independence.

In the period of intense negotiations in 1946-47 between the British, Congress, and the Muslim League over the future of British India, the United States watched with interest and generally supported British efforts hoping, like London, that some compromise -- such as that envisaged by the British Cabinet Mission Plan of May 1946 -- could be found to permit an independent India to remain united. The battle lines were, however, sharply drawn following the 1946 Indian general elections. In contrast to the balloting in 1937, the League swept the seats reserved for Muslims, lending far greater credibility to its demand for a separate Muslim homeland -- Pakistan. After the British formed an interim government in September 1946, which the Congress, but not the League, initially joined, Acting Secretary of State Dean Acheson sought and received President Truman's approval to raise the US and Indian diplomatic missions to full embassy status, a move designed to bolster the standing of the interim government. { FRUS, 1946, vol. V, pp. 92-96: memorandum from Acheson to Truman, 30 August 1946; telegram from Embassy London to State Department, 9 September; and telegram to Mission New Delhi from State Department, 16 October 1936.}


Technically still under British rule, India made its de facto international debut in the fall of 1946. Ironically, Mrs. Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit -- an outsider in 1945 at San Francisco --  became the leader of the official Indian delegation to the UN's first General Assembly session at Lake Success, New York. Her instructions from Nehru, her brother and the foreign minister, called for India's steering clear of the democratic and communist power groups. Although stressing "we have to be on friendly terms with both Russia and America," Nehru added --foreshadowing his later slant on nonalignment -- "Personally I think that in this worldwide tug-of-war there is on the whole more reason on the side of Russia, not always of course." {SWJN, Second Series, vol. 1, p. 539, Nehru to Mrs. Pandit, 14 November 1946.}

Also revealing of Nehru's sensitivities and pride was the advice he gave Asaf Ali, a senior Muslim member of the Congress Party, who became India's first Ambassador to the United States in late 1946. "The United States are a great power," Nehru wrote, "and we want to be friendly with them for many reason. Nevertheless I should like to make it clear that we do not propose to be subservient to any body ... We have plenty of good cards in our hands and there is no need whatever for us to appear as suppliants before any country." {Ibid, p. 556, Nehru letter to Assaf Ali, 21 December 1946. }


When the Indian envoy paid his initial protocol call on Secretary of State George Marshall on 26 February 1947, {The purpose of the initial call is to present to the Secretary a copy of the letter of accreditation. In terms of protocol, until an envoy presents the original to the President, he or she is not formally ablt to function as an ambassador. The Embassy continues, on paper at least, to be run by the No. 2 as chargé d'affaires while the envoy is called "appointed ambassador." } Asaf Ali seemed to have forgotten Nehru's advice. His remarks -- as recorded by Marshall -- were at some variance from the Nehru line.  Asaf Ali urged India's political and economic development so that "it would be a bastion for the world against the great northern neighbor which now casts its shadow over two continents, Asia and Europe." Asaf Ali also referred to India's need for economic help. "A number of  'Tennessee Valley Authorities' were projected for India and it was especially in regard to these that the Ambassador would call upon me for assistance," Marshall recalled. {FRUS, 1947, vol. III, pp. 147-49, memorandum of call by India's Appointed Ambassador Asaf Ali on Secretary Marshall, 26 February 1947.}

A more accurate preview of the troubled relationship occurred on 14 January 1947, when John Foster Dulles -- a Republican Party adviser to the US delegation to the United Nations -- criticized alleged Communist influence in the Indian interim government in a speech to the National Publishers' Association in New York City. Nehru reacted with "surprise and regret," telling the press Dulles' comments "show lack of knowledge of facts and want of appreciation of the policy we are pursuing." {Ibid., Nehru statement to the press, 20 January 1947} The State Department promptly instructed the New Delhi Embassy to tell Nehru the US government did not share Dulles' views and, indeed, was "favorably impressed with India's avowed intention to pursue (an) independent but cooperative policy." {Ibid., p. 138, State Department to Embassy New Delhi, 21 January 1947.} In a letter to State Department official Henry Villard, Dulles explained he did not mean to suggest India was a Soviet puppet but based his comments "on his impression of the Indian delegation to the United Nations and particularly of delegate Krishna Menon, who he thought a 'confirmed Marxian' and a  protégé not only of Nehru but of Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov." {Kurt Stiegler, "Communism and 'Colonial Evolution': John Foster Dulles' Vision of India and Pakistan," Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, 15 (Winter 1991): pp. 74-75}

As the impasse between the Congress and the League continued, Washington became increasingly concerned about about the future of India. "Any halt in the constitutional process there may well cause widespread chaos similar China which would last for many years and could have worldwide repercussions," a worried State Department cabled the US Embassies in London and New Delhi on the eve of a last-ditch British effort to break the deadlock by flying Nehru, Jinnah, and other top Indian leaders for talks in London. {FRUS, 1946, vol. V. pp. 97-98, State Department telegram to Embassy London and New Delhi, 30 November 1946} On 3 December 1946, Dean Acheson, then Acting Secretary, spoke out strongly during a press conference in favor of mutual concessions to permit a united India. Acheson urged both the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League to accept the British Cabinet Mission Plan for a federation. Acheson expressed confidence that the plan would permit "an Indian federal union in which all elements of the population have ample scope to achieve their legitimate political and economic aspirations." {Ibid., pp. 99-100, text of Acheson press statement as cabled to Embassy London, 3 December 1946.} The Department instructed the Embassy in London to convey Acheson's words to Nehru and Jinnah, and the Embassy in New Delhi to review the text with Sandra Patel.  {Ibid.}

For the next several weeks, the US diplomats in London, New Delhi, and Karachi forcefully pressed League leader Jinnah and his chief lieutenant, Liaquat Ali Khan, and Congress leaders Nerhu and Patel to accept the Cabinet plan without qualifications. The efforts led nowhere. Saying it was up to the Congress to take the initiative, the League refused to move. The Congress leaders, in turn, spurned the nudge from the United States, expressing doubts about the sincerity of the League -- and of the British. {Ibid., pp. 101-12: New Delhi telegram reporting talk with Sardar Patel, 11 December 1946; State Department telegram of 11 December 1946 providing guidance for talk with Nehru; London telegram of 12 December 1946 reporting discussion with Jinnah; new Delhi telegram of 14 December 1946 reporting conversation with Nehru; 27 and 29 December 1956 New Delhi telegrams reporting discussions with Liaquat Ali Khan. FRUS, 1947, vol. III, pp. 136-38, Embassy New Delhi instruction to Consulate Karachi, 4 January 1947, and Consulate Karachi report to State Department of interview with Jinnah, 6 January 1947.}

In February 1947, disheartened by failure to achieve a compromise formula on independence, the British decided upon shock treatment. Prime Minister Attlee announced Britain's intention to depart from India not later than June 1948 with or without agreement on the future political structure. He named Lord Louis Mountbatten to replace Wavell as the Viceroy to implement the new policy. As a courtesy -- and a sign of the US global leadership role -- the British Ambassador in Washington, Lord Inverchapel, informed Secretary George Marshall of the decision a day in advance and also left a top secret analysis of the background to the British decision. {Ibid., pp. 143-47, memorandum of conversation between Marshall and the British Ambassador, 20 February 1947, and a British Embassy Memorandum on the Indian situation, dated 19 February 1947.} Four months later, in June 1947, Attlee called in lewis Douglas, the US envoy in London, to give him advance word of the decision to move the date of independence ahead to August 1947 and, if a last try by Mountbatten failed to attain agreement on a united India, to accept partition into a "Hindustan dominion and a Pakistan dominion." Attlee, Douglas reported, was "in sober mood, at times tinged with sorrow." { Ibid., pp. 155-56, Embassy London telegram to the State Department, 2 June 1947.}


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Rather than describing how Attlee apparently seemed, it would've seemed more logical for Douglas to have simply asked Attlee how he felt. This description of psychological projection reminds me of the Rush Limbaugh goof on leftists who anthropomorphize animals from Jan 12, 2017 story "Scientists Say Monkey and Deer Had 'Consensual' Sex"



















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In the spring of 1947, the State Department sent career diplomat Raymond Hare, slated to assume charge of South Asian affairs, to spend three months learning about the subcontinent. Within the Department, the former Near Eastern Division became an Office, covering the Near East, South Asia, and Africa, with Loy Henderson, a former specialist in Soviet affairs, named as the first Director. Meeting leading political personalities, the Viceroy, Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, Jinnah, and others, and traveling widely through the subcontinent, Hare had an unusual opportunity to witness the last days of the British India and to ponder how the United States should deal with independent India.


Hare's meeting with Mahatma Gandhi began with a lengthy discussion by the Indian leader on the "beneficial mental effect" of spinning cotton "in times of emotional stress such as the present." When Hare commented he found little enthusiasm in his travels for independence, Gandhi replied the American was right. "The reason was simple," the Mahatma stated, "It was partition." When Hare asked how sympathies between the United States and India could be deepened, Gandhi answered, "By the employment of unselfishness, hitherto unknown in international relations." {Paul Hare, "Journey to South Asia," A Diplomatic Chronicle of the Middle East and South Asia: Biography of Ambassador Raymond A. Hare, 1924-1966 (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1992).}

During talks with Nehru, Hare enquired about India's post-independence foreign policy. The Congress leader, expected to become India's prime minister, said the country would stay "out of entanglement in the current power struggle in the belief that such was best for India and best for world peace." Nehru added there was "a general fear of American economic penetration," but he thought "India would have to depend on the United States for certain type of support." Overall, he emphasized India's desire for friendly relations with the United States. { Ibid. }

Hare puzzled about what the US role should be in dealing with an independent India. His thoughts foreshadowed many of the questions that would occupy US foreign policy planners dealing with India in later years:

In the past our policy had been largely a Revolutionary War hang-over of anti-imperialism and helping colonial peoples to gain their independence; in other words, we had needled the British to take a more liberal attitude vis-à-vis the Indians...But things had changed; India was apparently getting its break, but, more important, we had graduated from the role of kibitzing and were playing the hand ourselves. How should we play the Indian trick? Could we do anything to bring them in actively on our side? If not, did it make any particular difference? Could the Russians make any real headway in India? Might it be too much for them to handle as it might be for us? {Ibid.}



When India finally gained freedom on 15 August 1947, sadness over the turmoil and bloodshed that followed partition mingled with the joy of freedom from British rule. Washington paid only limited attention to the dramatic events in the subcontinent. At the very moment India and Pakistan were emerging as independent nations, the United States was shaping the concept of containment of communism that became the driving force behind US national security policy for the next 44 years.  During the summer of 1947, the US foreign policy focus lay on the mounting difficulties in relations with the Soviet Union. In April, President Truman announced the policy of aid for Greece and Turkey after Britain decided it could no longer shoulder the burden. In June, Secretary of State George Marshall launched the economic recovery program for Europe that bears his name.


India's already expressed desire to have a foreign policy independent of the two power blocs that were then forming did not create too many worries in the State Department.

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US State Department apathy to India not becoming an ally might have been a result of  pro Soviet agents allegedly infiltrating State Dept and trying to sabotage the USA






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The main American concern in Asia related to the sinking fortunes of China's Nationalist leader, Chiang Kai-shek, and the growing strengths of his Chinese Communist rivals.








In India, as expected, Pandit Nehru, in addition to his duties as Prime Minister, continued as Foreign Minister. In his many speeches and writings on international issues over the years, and especially in 1946 and 1947, Nehru had already articulated the broad outlines of the foreign policy India would follow.


First, and uppermost at independence, was India's support for rapid decolonization -- the end of European overseas empires. Free after its long struggle with the British, India wanted the rest of Asia and Africa to gain freedom from Western colonialism.


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I wonder if this was pure altruism on the part of India. Indians were usually employed as administrators, as intermediaries between native colonized people and English overlords, in the British Empire. Perhaps India's strategy was to not eliminate the middle man, but have the middle assume the role of the previous European colonial masters. It could be that Indians were not opposed to imperialism, only European imperialism.


National Review rename lake africa



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Foot dragging by the West European colonial powers, especially the Dutch in Indonesia and the French in Indo-China -- and US reluctance to press its European friends too hard -- disappointed Prime Minister Nehru. The Indians, on the other hand, were pleased by consistent Soviet support on decolonization although they recognized this was hardly disinterested.


Second was Nehru's desire that Asia's destiny rest in Asian hands and that Europe play a reduced role. Nehru envisaged a close partnership with China and its leader Chiang Kai-shek, a supporter of Indian independence during the difficult war years. The Indian Prime Minister soon became free Asia's best known and most articulate spokesman, sponsoring a pan-Asian conference in New Delhi in 1947.



Third was deep Indian resentment about racial prejudice and discrimination, particularly against non-white in South Africa, where a million Indians lived, and also racial segregation in the US South. Nehru made South Africa India's top issue at the very first UN General Assembly in 1946 {Nehru's activism against racial discrimination dated back to the early 1920s. Serving in his first public office, as chairman of the local government in his home city of Allahabad, Nehru in 1923 sponsored a resolution deploring the treatment of Indians in British colonies and the United States [presumably, Nehru was complaining about Native American "Indians" vs Indians from India] Sarvepalli Gopal, Jawaharlal Nehru, vol. I, 1889-1947, (London: Jonathan Cape, 1975), p. 90.}


Finally, there was Nehru's desire that India play an active role in world affairs without joining either of the two power blocs. Nehru favored a policy of "non-entanglement" -- the term he used at the time -- to ensure that India would not see its independence abridged by joining one of the two blocs, presumably the US-led Western group.

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Presumably, Nehru was cribbing from George Washington when he talked about "non-entanglement"




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By standing apart, Nehru believed India would preserve its freedom of action, increase its international stature, and reduce the possibility that foreign affairs would emerge as a divisive domestic issue. In any case, as the strongest power in South Asia, India did not need external support to bolster its foreign policy position. {William J. Barnds, India, Pakistan and the Great Powers (New York: Praeger, 1972), pp. 60-63.}



The first US Ambassador to India was Dr. Henry Grady, a businessman and former Assistant Secretary of State. No stranger to the subcontinent from his service as head of the 1942 war production mission, Grady arrived in New Delhi in June 1947, two months before independence with the interim government still in office. In a July meeting, Nehru gave Grady his thoughts on policy questions:


  • India desired to avoid involvement with either of the power blocs, but, at the same time, wished warm relations with the United States.
  • The Soviet Union held attraction for India as an example of how a backward country could develop rapidly. Politically, however, India disliked the undemocratic and totalitarian nature of the Soviet regime.
  • India had concerns American economic power would in some way impinge on her sovereignty. At the same time, India needed and desired US capital goods to help the country's development.
  • India's economy would probably broadly follow the British Socialist model. As in Britain, basic heavy industries would be nationalized. {FRUS, 1947, vol. III, pp. 160-61, Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 9 July 1947.}




Four months after independence, in December 1947, State Department officials dealing with South Asia and Paul Alling and Henry Grady, the Ambassadors to Pakistan and India, met in Washington to review the situation. The record of their discussions indicated less concern about US relations with India and Pakistan than about their relations with each other -- strained by the continued exodus of Hindu and Muslim refugees and the outbreak of fighting over Kashmir. The consensus of the meeting was that the United States should promote some sort of loose economic cooperation between the two states. {Ibid., p. 138, report of State Department Discussion on South Asia, 26 December 1947.} Beyond expressions of good-will and friendship, US policy toward South Asia remained nebulous. Independent India was not a matter of high priority in Washington.

The Kashmir Dispute: IS Reaction Disappoints India

Neither the Cold War, dollar diplomacy, nor anti-colonialism caused the first major bilateral difference between the United States and independent India. The problem arose over the unfinished business of partition -- the dispute over the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. Under the British ground rules, the rulers of the several hundred princely states were encouraged to join either India or Pakistan, taking into account factors such as geography and the religious make-up of their populations. By August 1947, all but three of more than 350 states had acceded to India or Pakistan. Two of the three still standing apart were, unfortunately, the largest states, Kashmir and Hyderabad.

Strategically located in the Himalayas in the northwest portion of the subcontinent, Kashmir had a Hindu ruler and Muslim majority population. The natural beauty and cool climate of the central valley or Vale of Kashmir had attracted the Mughal Emperors and then the British as a haven from the searing heat of Indian summers. When the temperature mounted in May to over 100 degrees on the plains, the British flocked to houseboats on the lake near the 5,000 foot high capital of Srinagar, where the soaring Himalayas provided a magnificent backdrop.

The Hindu ruler of Kashmir, an unpopular despot, hesitated. Before the British relinquished power, he took a preliminary step toward Pakistan but failed to complete the act of accession. Communal disorders broke out in many parts of the state in mid-summer. In October 1947 -- two months after independence -- as the Maharajah continued to dither about accession, Pathan tribesman from Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province, known for their fierce fighting qualities and their Islamic fanaticism, swept into the state, advancing swiftly toward the capital of Srinagar. In panic, the Maharajah appealed for Indian help. Under pressure from Delhi, he executed the documents of accession to India.

Governor General Lord Mountbatten convinced Nehru that Kashmir's accession should be conditional until the people of the state could vote on the final status. Mountbatten's acceptance of accession for the Government of India stated explicitly that when law and order were restored and the invaders gone, "the question of the state's accession should be settled by a reference to the people." A few days later, in a 2 November radio broadcast, Prime Minister Nehru similarly stated that a plebiscite would settle the state's fate. {Alistair Lamb, The Kashmir Problem (New York: Praeger, 1967), pp. 46-47.}


A dramatic airlift of Indian troops secured the Srinagar airport, preventing the fall of Kashmir's capital. The Indian soldiers then gradually drove back the Pathan tribesman, the invaders having failed to seize Srinagar when it lay defenseless, wasting their advantage on looting and pillaging. After bilateral attempts to end the fighting failed, Nehru -- following Mountbatten's counsel -- took the issue to the United Nations Security Council, believing that India's legal and moral case against Pakistan was strong. {Sisir Gupta, Kashmir, A Study in Indo-Pakistan Relations (New Delhi: Asia Publishing House, 1966), pp. 129-39. } Quite apart from political considerations, Jawaharlal Nehru had a strong emotional attachment to Kashmir, his family's homeland. The Indian leader was a Kashmiri Pundit, a Brahmin sub-caste that ranked near the top of the Hindu social order [Wait - I thought Mr. Self Righteous Nehru didn't believe in racial discrimination - but caste discrimination was A.OK? How hypocritically convenient for him] Nehru was also a personal friend of Sheikh Mohammed Abdullah, the charismatic leader of the nationalists in Kashmir, to whom the Maharajah turned over effective power after joining India. Politically, the Sheikh had close ties with the Indian Congress Party, supported the idea of a secular state, and opposed the concept of Pakistan. {Josef Korbel, Danger in Kashmir (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954), pp. 79-80.}

Initially, the United States was reluctant to become involved in the Kashmir problem. When British Commonwealth Secretary Noel-Baker presented detailed ideas in January 1948 for conducting a plebiscite under international control, the State Department's response was lukewarm, Near East Office Director Loy Henderson -- soon to become Ambassador to India -- urged Acting Secretary of State Robert Lovett to stay out of the dispute. He argued the United States was already overcommitted globally, should avoid "making a choice between giving support to the interests of India or of Pakistan," [or, dare I say, the USA should treat India v Pakistan w/ the same non entanglement that Nehru treated conflict between USA v USSR - karma is a bitch] and should not through US involvement provide the Soviets an opening to mix into the affairs of South Asia. State Department officials were also skeptical the United Nations would prove effective in resolving the dispute. [Because the UN is useless in solving problems, only creating them] {FRUS, 1948, vol. V, pp. 276-78, Henderson to Lovett, 9 January 1948; report of discussions between the British delegation and US officials, 10 January 1948; H.W. Brands, The Specter of Neutralism, The United States and the Emergence of the Third World, 1947-1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1989), pp. 24-25.}


The United States, nonetheless, cooperated with the British when the Kashmir issue came before the UN Security Council. The initial presentations by India and Pakistan made clear the enormous gap between the two parties. As Indian political scientist Sisir Gupta wrote, "Both appeared as the aggrieved parties, both as the complainants. To India, Pakistan had committed aggression and violated her territory; to Pakistan, India was always hostile and was intent on undoing the creation of Pakistan itself." {Gupta, p. 148.}

With the US and British delegations the prime movers, the Security Council on 21 April 1948 adopted a resolution setting up the UN Commission for India and Pakistan (UNCIP). The Indians reacted sourly, angry that the UN failed to condemn Pakistan as the aggressor and seemed to be treating the two countries as equal parties to the dispute. Based apparently on what Belgian Ambassador Prince de Ligne told him, [thanks for throwing the USA under the bus, ungrateful Belgium, after we liberated your country from Nazis & rebuilt you country with the Marshall Plan] Nehru saw the US stance on Kashmir as influence less by the merits of the dispute than by US global interests in light of the tensions with the Soviets. Expressing great distress to the Viceroy Lord Mountbatten, Nehru called the American and British attitude on Kashmir, "completely wrong," warning their stance would have "far-reaching results in our relations." Writing his sister, he charged, "The U.S.A. and the U.K. have a played a dirty role." [Kind of like Indians who collaborated with the Fascist Japanese during WWII and then lynched Americans after the war was over?] Nehru told British Commonwealth Office Under Secretary Gordon Walker "the motives of the United States were to get military and economic concessions in Pakistan." [Well, duh, since India just Heisman trophy stiff armed the USA, why wouldn't we try to work with people who want to work with us?] {SWJN, Second Series, vol. 5, pp. 188-90,203-05, 210-11, 218: letters to N. Gopalaswami Ayyangar, 17 January 1948; Gordon-Walker's record of meeting with Nehru, 30 January 1948; letter to Lord Mountbatten, 8 February 1948; and letter to Mrs. Pandit, 16 February 1948.}


During most of the summer of 1948, UNCIP shuttled back and forth between Pakistan and India trying in vain to reach agreement on arrangements for a cease-fire and a plebiscite. A major hurdle was a basic disagreement over who would control Kashmir during the plebiscite. Pakistan wanted a UN-led administration. The Indians wanted a Sheikh Abdullah to remain in charge of the state, aided by UN observers. When India eventually accepted the UNCIP proposal in August, Pakistan rejected the plan.


In October 1948, as UNCIP continued its work, Secretary of State George Marshall -- at the urging of British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin -- discussed Kashmir with Prime Minister Nehru during the UN General Assembly session in Paris. According to Marshall, Nehru was touchy during their discussion, finding it difficult to remain calm while talking about Kashmir. Beyond the issue of Pakistan's aggression, Nehru asserted with much emotion that the fate of Kashmir was important for India's policy of secular democracy which he contrasted with Pakistan's idea of a state based on religion. Eventually calming down, Nehru, in the end, said he was "very conscious of this problem, was sincerely desirous of having it settled and he hoped that some solution could be worked out." {38 FRUS, 1948, vol. V, p. 431, telegram from Embassy Paris reporting Marshall-Nehru meeting, 20 October 1948.}

1 January 1949 saw an important step forward as both countries accepted a cease-fire. Although there was no agreement on the arrangements for holding a plebiscite, the Security Council appointed Admiral Chester Nimitz, commander of the US Navy in the Pacific during World War II, as plebiscite administrator. The principal differences related to the place of withdrawal of Pakistani and Indian forces from Kashmir and the control of the Kashmir administration during the voting. Unlike the previous year, the Pakistanis gradually shifted their position to accept almost all UNCIP proposals, It was India that began to dig in its heels in opposition.


US pressure in support of UNCIP increasingly irked New Delhi. On 15 August 1949, reacting to charges India was not acting in good faith on Kashmir, Nehru called in Ambassador Loy Henderson -- who had by then replaced Henry Grady -- to complain he was "tired of receiving moral advice from the United States . . . So far as Kashmir was concerned he would not give an inch. He would hold his ground even if Kashmir, India, and the whole world went to pieces."{39 FRUS, 1949, vol. VI, p. 1732, Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 15 August 1949.} Nor was Nehru any happier when President Truman urged him, in a 25 August message, to accept arbitration as a way to break the impasse on the plebiscite. The Indians rejected Truman's suggestion, along with a similar proposal from British Prime Minister Clement Attlee.{40 Ibid., pp. 1733-34, 1736-38, State Department to New Delhi, 25 August 1949, and New Delhi to State Department, 5 September 1949.}

Kashmir figured prominently in the official talks during Prime Minster Nehru's visit to the United States in October and November 1949. After President Harry Truman raised the issue during a White House meeting -- and Nehru agreed on the importance of finding a solution -- Secretary of State Acheson tried and failed in a subsequent talk with Nehru to pin the Indian leader down on specifics. An exasperated Acheson wrote, "I got a curious combination of a public speech and flashes of anger and deep dislike for his opponents." Nehru's main points -- according to Acheson -- were that the UN should not deal with the merits of the dispute until the Pakistani forces withdrew from Kashmir, that a plebiscite on the basis of a religious states would be disastrous for the stability of the subcontinent, and that the Pakistanis had not legitimate claim to Kashmir.{ 41 Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation (New York: Norton & Co., 1969), pp. 334-36; FRUS, 1949, vol. VI, pp. 1750-51, memorandum of conversation between Nehru and Truman, 13 October 1949.}

With UNCIP stymied, the UN Security Council -- to India's annoyance -- did not drop the dispute. In December 1949, the Council asked its President, General McNaughton from Canada, to try to find some way to break the impasse. On 26 December, Nehru called in Ambassador Henderson to complain that "his Christmas had been spoiled by (the) message from, Bajpai (then in New York){42 The former Agent General of India in Washington during World War II, Girja Shankar Bajpai stayed on briefly as No. 2 after India's first Ambassador Asaf Ali arrived in 1947. Returning to New Delhi, Bajpai sat on the sidelines for a while, but was then appointed by Nehru as Secretary General in the Ministry of External Affairs, the top civil service position in the ministry. Despite past differences in outlook during pre-independence days, the two worked closely together until 1952 when Nehru named Bajpai governor of Bombay. } outlining McNaughton's proposals re Kashmir." [I didn't know Hindus practiced Christmas and thought hard core Hindus want to outlaw all Christian holidays]






Nehru's main complaint related to the details of the troop withdrawal proposals and to the fuzziness of the provision for arbitration.{43 FRUS, 1949, vol. VI, pp. 1766-68, Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 26 December 1949.} In contrast to Nehru's frosty response, the Pakistanis adopted a positive attitude toward McNaughton's proposals.{44. Ibid., pp. 1763-64, 1771-72, US Mission to the UN report of talk with Zafrullah Khan of Pakistan, 20 December 1949, and US Mission telegram to State Department, 28 December 1949.}


Despite Nehru's negative reaction, the United States continued to press for Indian acceptance of McNaughton's ideas. Om a 9 January 1950 meeting with Mrs. Vijayalakshmi Pandit, who had become ambassador to Washington, and External Affairs Ministry Secretary General Bajpai, Dean Acheson strenuously urged India not again to refuse UN Kashmir proposals.{ 45 FRUS, 1950, vol. V, p. 1367, report of meeting between Acheson, Ambassador Pandit, and Secretary General Bajpai, 9 January 1950.}

Angry about the US démarche, Nehru sharply replied via Bakpai that Acheson's message:

Is not only unfriendly in tone and substance but appears to us to be seeking to bring pressure on our government under threat of consequences....It appears to be totally forgotten that we are not the aggressors, but that we are the victims of aggression....I would like to add that it is a matter of great personal regret to me that Mr. Secretary Acheson should have sent us a message of this kind.{46 Ibid., pp. 1369-70, USUN to State Department, 16 January 1950. Bajpai delivered Nehru's response to New York during meetings at the United Nations.}
After the failure of McNaughton's effort, the Security Council sent prominent Australian jurist Sir Owen Dixon to South Asia to try his hand. Arriving during the oven-like heat of May, Dixon toiled through the summer of 1950, working quietly with Nehru, Pakistan's Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan, and others. When he concluded that a statewide plebiscite was impractical, the Australian suggested an approach similar to an idea put forward earlier by Girja Bajpai -- limiting the vote to the Valley while partitioning the rest of the state on religious lines. In the end, this proposal failed after Nehru rejected the idea of UN control of the Valley during the plebiscite.{47 Korbel, pp. 174-76; FRUS, 1950, vol. V, pp. 1415, 1422-23, cables to the State Department from Embassies New Delhi and Karachi reporting on the Dixon Mission 25 and 29 July and 15 and 21 August 1950.}



The Australian, who perhaps came closer to reaching a Kashmir settlement than anyone else, left disappointed at the end of the summer. In his report to the Security Council, Dixon wrote, "I have formed the opinion that if there is any chance of settling the dispute over Kashmir by agreement between India and Pakistan it now lies in partition and in some means of allocating the Valley rather than an overall plebiscite." He recommended that the UN not pursue the mediation effort on Kashmir, letting the two countries seek a political settlement on their own.{48 Gupta, Kashmir, pp. 220-21.}

The United States -- not withstanding Dixon's recommendations -- did not favor letting the issue drop. In a 17 November 1950 meeting between Secretary Acheson and Pakistan's Foreign Minister Zafrullah Khan, Acheson said, "I needed advice and guidance. We had been very discouraged by India's attitude and had been trying through our Ambassador to make India see what could be done -- with what success I do not know." In the discussion that followed, Acheson was in basic agreement with Zafrullah's position that unless Indian troops were removed and a UN administration appointed for the Vale, it would not be possible to have a plebiscite.{49 FRUS, 1950, vol V, pp. 1435-39, memorandum of Conversation by Secretary Acheson on his meeting with Sir Zafrullah Khan, 17 November 1950.}

1951 saw a renewed effort to tackle Kashmir with Dr. Frank Graham appointed as UN mediator. A former President of the University of North Carolina and US Senator, Graham had gained an excellent reputation for his work in resolving the Dutch-Indonesian dispute. His approach was to package ideas into a series of detailed points and then seek agreement  on these by both sides. By October, Graham was down to three outstanding questions: the number of Indian troops to remain in Kashmir after demilitarization, the length of demilitarization period, and the date for the formal appointment of the plebiscite administrator. Although the assassination of Pakistan's Prime Minister Liaquat in October 1951 and India's first general elections in January 1952 delayed Graham's work, he toiled away. Graham impressed the Indians, Nehru describing him as "a sincere and earnest man anxious to do what he can to further a settlement."{50 Jawaharlal Nehru: Letters to Chief Ministers, 1950-1952, vol. 2 (New Delhi: Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund, 1986), pp. 432-33.}

Chester Bowles, who replaces Loy Henderson as Ambassador in November 1951, quickly injected his own ideas on Kashmir. The contrast between the two American envoys was striking. Henderson was a veteran career diplomat, whose service in the Soviet Union helped shape a strong anti-Communist bent. Conservative in outlook, he had few hopes that Indo-American relations would be smooth. Although Henderson established a good working relationship with Secretary General Bajpai, his dealings with Nehru were often tense and blunt. Henderson's cables were down-to-earth and terse.



Bowles came to the job after losing a bid for reelection as Governor of Connecticut in the 1950 elections. A pioneer in modern advertising in the 1920s and 1930s, Bowles had gained a national reputation as the successful head of the Office of Price Administration during World War II. He became active in politics after the war as a member of the Democratic Party's liberal wing. Following the communist takeover of China, Bowles felt people would look closely at India to see if democracy could provide an alternative to communism as a path to economic development in Asia.{51 Chester Bowles, Ambassador's Report (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1954), p.2.}


Once he arrived in New Delhi, Bowles quickly engaged himself in recommending a less active US stance in the Kashmir dispute. In his messages, Bowles urged the United States to restrict its role to serving as a friend to both countries, willing to help in solving the dispute without taking sides. Since Bowles believed Graham's insistence on a statewide plebiscite was certain to fail, he was at a loss to understand why Graham felt unable to suggest different approaches. The State Department responded unsympathetically to Bowles' views, instructing the envoy to continue giving full and firm support to Graham's efforts.{52 FRUS, 1952-4, vol. IX, pp. 1167-70, 1183-84, 1190-91, Embassy New Delhi to State Department 10 January 1952, and State Department to Embassy New Delhi, 18 February 1952.}


In July 1952, Bowles briefly became the man in the middle on Kashmir when, after consultations in Washington, he stopped in Karachi on the way back to Delhi. There, Pakistani Prime Minister Nazimmudin said he would be willing to make a substantial concession on the ratio of Indian to Pakistani troops to remain in Kashmir. Bowles was reasonably hopeful this proposal would be accepted since it was close to what the Indians were seeking in troop rations.

His optimism was misplaced. When the Ambassador presented the idea to Nehru on 8 July, the Indian leader thought silently for several minutes and then rejected the proposal. Arguing ratios were not the way to deal with the problem of troop levels, Nehru refused to budge from the previous Indian position. A second meeting found Nehru still unwilling to accept the proposal. Bowles reported, "Nehru acting wholly unreasonable manner and probably will continue to do so." The Prime Minister, Bowles continued, hoped the problem would go away since he knew India had a weak position internationally.{53 FRUS, 1952-4, vol. XI, pp. 1272-76, 1278-79, Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 8 and 11 July 1952.}

At the United Nations, the Russians generally remained silent during Kashmir debates until 1952. They abstained from voting although their propaganda portrayed the dispute as an Anglo-American imperialist plot. By not openly taking sides, they presumably hoped to avoid damage in their relations with either India or Pakistan. Soviet Delegate Jacob Malik thus caused surprise when in January 1952 he sharply criticized Dr. Frank Graham's report to the Security Council, Taken aback by Soviet support, Bajpai called in the American chargé d'affaires. Stressing that India had not asked the Soviets to intervene, Bajpai emphasized that India did not want Kashmir to become embroiled in the Cold War.{ 54 FRUS, 1952-4, vol. IX, pp. 1172-73, USUN cable to State Department, 17 January 1952, and Embassy New Delhi cable to State Department, 18 January 1952.}


Graham labored on until early 1953 before giving up. The final report, his fifth, reached the Security Council on 27 March 1953 -- two months after Dwight Eisenhower succeeded Harry Truman in the presidency. Combined with three UNCIP reports, those of McNaughton and Dixon, and the record of numerous Council debates, Graham's report added to an impressive library of official documentation on unsuccessful efforts to resolve the Kashmir dispute. Nothing had been achieved, in fact, since India and Pakistan agreed upon the cease fire in 1949. Although there was no progress toward a settlement, the guns at least had remained silent.{55 Gupta, pp. 239-54. A good summary of Graham's patient -- but ultimately unsuccessful -- mediation effort.}

Chronic friction between Washington and New Delhi over Kashmir inevitably had a negative impact on bilateral relations -- as Nehru predicted. In October 1952, Nehru wrote G.L. Mehta, the Bombay businessman he appointed to succeed Mrs. Pandit as Ambassador to Washington, that India has told the State Department "in the clearest language that we consider their attitude in this matter completely wrong and unfriendly to India and that this comes in the way of the development of cordial relations between India and America, that all of desire, more than anything else."{56 Gopal, 1947-56, pp. 116.}

For Indians, the Kashmir question was a central and vital foreign policy issue inevitably linked with the traumatic partition of British India and the creation of Pakistan. As Josef Korbel, onetime chairman of UNCIP, wrote:

The struggle for Kashmir is in every sense another battle in this continuing struggle and by now irrational war of ideals. In the minds of Nehru and the Congress, Kashmir is, in miniature, another Pakistan, and if this Muslim nation can be successfully governed by India, then their philosophy of secularization is vindicated.{57 Korbel, p. 42.}
The United States looked at Kashmir quite differently. Washington regarded the problem as a serious dispute between two countries with which the United States had friendly relations, but not as an issue involving vital US interests. Kashmir also appeared to be the type of regional dispute that the United Nations should be able to resolve, especially as India's original suggestion for a plebiscite provided a basis for settlement. The concern in Washington was that in the absence of a settlement fighting would again break out between India and Pakistan. Although at first Washington took no strong position on the merits, the United States backed the UN call for a plebiscite and gradually became exasperated by Nehru's backsliding on this question and by incremental steps New Delhi took to formally incorporate Kashmir into the Indian Union.{58 The Kashmir Constituent Assembly adopted a constitution giving Kashmir a special autonomous status within the Indian Union, Pakistan complained bitterly that this action clearly ran counter to the state's future being settled by a plebiscite. The Indian response: since the people of Kashmir voted for the Assembly, this amounted to a "free choice" for India. Needless to say, the Pakistanis strenuously opposed  India's action -- nor were US observers impressed with the strength of India's argument.} George McGhee, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs through much of this period, commented that the main  US concern was about the possible outbreak of war over Kashmir. "We wanted to avert full-scale war between India and Pakistan -- this was always a threat. Our efforts failed -- because of Nehru," McGhee asserted.{59. Interview with George McGhee, 14 August 1991. A Rhodes scholar, McGhee became wealthy as a young man in the oil business in Texas before entering public service through connections in the Democratic Party. After heading US aid to Greece, McGhee became the first Assistant Secretary of the new Bureau of Near East, South Asia, and Africa (NEA). He later served as Ambassador to Turkey under Truman and Under Secretary for Political Affairs and Ambassador to Germany under Kennedy and Johnson. [couldn't find link to this interview but here's June 11, 1975 Oral History Interview with George C. McGhee from Truman Library]}




Bilateral Relations: Mutual Misunderstanding



Quite apart from Kashmir, the United States and India found themselves at odds on many foreign policy questions unrelated to the Cold War. International control of atomic energy, Palestine, and the creation of Israel, Indonesia, and Indo-China [aka Vietnam] were issues on which the two countries differed [and all were proxy wars between the USA and USSR - so I don't understand how they were separate from the Cold War, but whatever]. Although Nehru's insistent independence from the West annoyed US policy makers -- Ambassador Grady told him "India should get on the democratic side immediately"{60. State Department Memorandum of Conversation with Henry Grady, 26 December 1947.} -- Washington unenthusiastically accepted India's policy not to become entangled. The overall orientation of Indian policy was not directed against the United States. In the late 1940s, India's relations with Moscow were frosty. Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin regarded Jawajarlal Nehru with suspicion as a "bourgeois democract" and "lackey" of British imperialism. Even though Nehru sent his sister as India's first envoy to Moscow, the Soviet leader never once received Mrs. Pandit during her two years in the Soviet Union.


On 8 March 1948, when Nehru elaborated India's foreign policy before the Constituent Assembly, he made a point to have the Ministry of External Affairs inform Ambassador Grady that it would be "unthinkable" for India to be on the Russian side in the event of a world war.{61. FRUS, 1948, vol. V, p. 498, Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 20 March 1948.}Visiting Washington a month later, External Affairs Secretary General Girja Bajpai made the same point in meetings with Loy Henderson, then Director of the State Department's Office of Near East and South Asian Affairs, and Acting Secretary of State Robert Lovett. Bajpai stressed that people in the United States, who thought India was in the Soviet camp, were wrong. In the event of war, India would side with the forces of freedom [ well, that's still vaguely and subjectively worded and gave India a big fig leaf to CYA]{62. Ibid., pp. 502-04, 506-07, reports 2 April 1948 meeting of Bajpai first with the Office of Near Eastern Affairs and then with the Acting Secretary of State.}


The desire for better relations with Washington paralleled the remarkable turnaround in relations between India and Britain after independence. Contrary to expectations and the Indian Congress Party program, independent India decided to remain in the British Commonwealth -- a step which London and New Delhi regarded at the time as a great importance.{63. Gopal, pp. 45-46.} After having improved ties with London, Nehru hoped in 1949 to firm up relations with the United States. The Prime Minister wrote his friend Krishna Menon, then High Commissioner in Britain, he was prepared to "align with the US somewhat" as long it was not necessary to become subservient.

Personally, Nehru, had ambivalent feelings about America, a country he had never visited. The Indian leader had a considerable bias that seemed to combine the anti-American social prejudices of the British elite and the anti-American policy views of the left-wing of the British Labour Party. In foreign policy dealings, he found the United States too cocksure about the rights and wrongs of the Cold War

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I mean, Stalin just killed more people than Hitler and Mao killed more people than Stalin - but what's the big deal?





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too insensitive to the aspirations of colonial peoples, and too patronizing in dealing with India. Despite disappointments over Kashmir and differences on anti-colonial issues, Nehru remained, nonetheless, hopeful about relations with Washington, believing the United States would be interested in friendly relations with India because "it is well recognized today all over the world that the future of Asia will be powerfully determined by the future of India." [whose being cocksure and patronizing now? - So because Truman didn't agree with Nehru's inflated opinion of himself, Nehru viewed Truman as "insensitive" 🙄😒]{64. Ibid., pp. 58-59.}

A note Nehru wrote on negotiations for a commercial treaty with the United States spelled out his ambivalent views:

America is the most powerful and richest country in the world and can certainly help India a great deal. There is no reason why we should not get that help and remove causes of friction between us. But it is true that America represents a reactionary policy in world affairs, I think a policy which will not succeed....The safest policy, therefore, appears to be friendly to America, to give them fair terms, to invite their help on such terms, and at the same time not to tie ourselves up too much with their world or their economic policy.[spoken like a true Communist - why should the USA give money to India and get nothing in return? Nehru wanted any relationship with the USA to be a oneway street🙄😒]{65. SWJN, Second Series, vol. 8, p. 629, note on negotiations for a Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation, 12 August 1948.}
In October and November 1949, the Indian leader paid his first visit to the United States. During the three-week trip, Nehru traveled from the Atlantic to the Pacific coasts, seeing much of America and meeting many prominent figures from a broad cross-section of US life. The Prime Minister cut an impressive figure in numerous public appearances as an eloquent advocate of India, explaining its neutralist policies and seeking friendship with the United States without becoming a political camp follower or a supplicant for economic. The public generally accorded him a warm welcome as a leading representative of free Asia. The liberal press lauded Nehru as the hope of Asia -- especially after the fall of China to the Communists.

The official side of the trip went much less well. Nehru's ambivalence toward US policy was matched by the skepticism of US leaders toward the Indian approach. The Americans found Nehru's views on foreign affairs perplexing and imprecise. They received coolly his suggestions that the West should be more reasonable in dealing with the Russians and should recognize Communist China. After a three-hour informal private meeting, Secretary of State Dean Acheson wrote:

I was convinced that Nehru and I were not destined to have a pleasant personal relationship. He was so important to India's survival and India's survival was so important to all of us, that if he did not exist -- as Voltaire said of God -- he would have to be invented. Nevertheless, he was one of the most difficult men I have ever had to deal with.{66. Acheson, p. 336.}
If the American leadership found the Indian Prime Minister stiff and vague, Nehru, in turn, found both Truman and Acheson condescending. The Prime Minister wrote Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, the South Indian scholar-philosopher who replaced Mrs. Pandit as Indian envoy to Moscow, "They had gone all out to welcome me and I am very grateful to them for it and expressed myself so. But they expected something more than gratitude and goodwill and that more I could not supply them."{67. 2 February 1950 letter from Nehru to Radhakrishnan, quoted by Gopal, vol. II, p. 60.}


The Prime Minister was taken aback by the flaunting of material wealth and what often seemed a lack of culture and good taste in the United States. In New York, for example, the hosts at a lunch with businessmen made a point of boasting that the companies represented at the table were worth more than $20 billion. Nehru also found the conversation at the White House dinner less than intellectually scintillating -- a min topic of discussion between President Truman and Vice President Alben Barkley concerned the merits of Kentucky bourbon whiskey.{68. Pandit, pp. 252-53.}

A few months after returning to India, Nehru was annoyed by the warm welcome given Pakistan's Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan in the United States. Writing to his sister in Washington, he carped:

The Americans are either very naive or singularly lacking in intelligence. They go through the same routine whether it is Nehru or the Shah or Liaquat Ali.....It does appear that there is a concerted attempt to build up Pakistan and build down, if I may say, India. It surprises me how immature in their political thinking the Americans are!....In their dealings with Asia, they show a lack of understanding which is surprising.{69. Letters from Nehru to Mrs. Pandit, 10 and 29 May 1950, quoted in Gopal, vol. II, p. 63.}

The positive public relations impact of the trip also proved short-lived. In the spring of 1950, the American Embassy in New Delhi reported about increased anti-US feelings in India. Although ostensibly directed at supposed US faults (racial prejudice, pro-colonialist policies, etc.), Ambassador Loy Henderson thought the real causes were: the lack of economic aid, the US position on Kashmir, and fears that the United States was using its economic muscle to press India to shed its socialist policies. With the Communists on the Indian political left fanning the flames, Henderson thought the upsurge was unlikely to dissipate unless the United States backed up its rhetoric about friendly relations with concrete action, especially in the area of economic aid [why should the USA give money to extortionists who hate us and point blank say they do not want to be our allies?}{70. FRUS, 1951, vol. V, pp. 1461-63, Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 12 April 1950.}

The State Department replied testily -- reflecting growing distaste for India -- that friendly relations had to be based on more than loans and gifts. The message was argued the best way to win Indian friendship was to convince New Delhi that "our objectives are disinterested (and) constructive as we are confident the Inds wld [sic - presumably examples of cablese] wish their own to be regarded. Present Ind [sic] attitidues subj [sic] these beliefs to serious doubt."{71. Ibid., pp. 1464-66, State Department telegram to Embassy New Delhi, April 1950. In the days when classified messages required time-consuming encoding, State Department telegrams often omitted unnecessary words and abbreviated others. Once the computer age and optical scanner arrived, cablese became a thing of the past; brevity was no longer at a premium.} When placed alongside similarly pointed comments Nehru was making about the United States in his letters to his sister and others, the exchange between the State Department and Henderson underscored the troubled nature of relations between India and America in the early months of 1950.

The Korean War: Indian Neutralism Put to the Test


The Cold War became a "hot war" after North Korean forces invaded South Korea on 25 June 1950. The initial Indian reactions to the outbreak of hostilities pleasantly surprised Washington. Sir Bengal Rau, India's UN delegate, voted for the Security Council's condemnation of the invasion. Several days later, India voted for a second resolution calling for support to South Korea to repel the attack. Nehru delayed taking this action until the full cabinet could approve the Indian position. India appeared, thus, to be standing with the West against the Communists on a fundamental issue of war and peace. "There could be no doubt that the North Korean Government had committed aggression on a large-scale on South Korea," Nehru wrote his Chief Ministers, "to surrender to it was wrong and would have meant the collapse of the United Nations as well as led to other dangerous consequences."{72. Nehru, vol 2, p. 120, 2 July 1950.}

Prime Minister Nehru was, however, extremely uneasy. Apart from fear that events would lead to a World War, he strenuously disapproved of President Truman's linking the Korea conflict with the problems of Formosa [Taiwan] and Indo-China. He saw US policy as threatening to enlarge the war in the defense of Western interests. Favoring Chinese incorporation of Formosa and the withdrawal of the French from Indo-China, Nehru saw both issues in terms of Asian nationalism, as part of the struggle to free the region from Western domination, rather than as a contest between pro- and anti-communist forces.

In early July, Nehru launched a vaguely coordinated peace effort with Indian envoys in Moscow (Radhakrishnan), London (Krishna Menon), New York (Sir Benegal Rau), Washington (Mrs. Pandit), and Secretary General Bajpai in New Delhi all in the act. The heart of the proposal was that in return for talks on Korea, the Soviets would return to the Security Council and the Chinese Communists would occupy the UN Seat of the Chinese Nationalists [what the what? So, commies could steal South Korea and the Security Council seat in exchange for anti Communists acting like punks - thanks India, you're no help to the US]. Although Stalin temporized in his reply, Dean Acheson -- with Truman's blessing -- turned Nehru down flatly, bruising the Indian leader's feelings [aw, poor baby - go ask your commie friends to assuage your hurt feelings]. The Indian press, taking its cue from the government, blamed Washington for thwarting the peace initiative [again, why didn't India take West's similar peace initiative and cede Kashmir to Pakistan - or is acting like a punk only something commies expect from capitalists?]{73. Acheson, pp. 419-20; FRUS, 1950, vol. VII, pp. 454-55, Embassy New Delhi telegram to State Department, 23 July 1950.}



Acheson explained in some detail in private correspondence with Nehru why the United States disagreed with the Indian approach. This extremely substantive correspondence showed that Washington took India seriously, always important for someone as sensitive to Nehru. The exchange also indicated American interest in using the Indian Ambassador in Beijing, K. M. Panikkar, as a channel to the Chinese Communists. Although Washington regarded Panikkar with suspicion, he was the only non-Communist envoy with good access to the Chinese leadership.{74. Ibid., pp. 444-45, 447, 478-79, and 526, State Department to Embassy New Delhi, 22 July, 3 August, and Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 23 and 27 July 1950.}


In September 1950, UN fortunes rose after General MacArthur's daring Inchon landing broke the back of the North Korean military. With the stage set for victory in South Korea, the question was whether UN forces should cross the 38th parallel into North Korea. India opposed a UN advance above this line from fear that the action would bring in the Chinese Communists. After the Chinese warned Ambassador Panikkar on 3 October that they would intervene if UN forces crossed the 38th parallel, Nehru pleaded for caution [how convenient - so Commies could play offense into South Korea, but Allies could only play defense and weren't allowed to return the favor]. The United States disregarded the Indian leader. President Truman declared that he did not take Panikkar's report "as that of an impartial observer," believing the Indian envoy played "the game of the Chinese Communists fairly regularly."{75. Harry S. Truman, Memoirs, Years of Trial and Hope (Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1956), pp. 361-62.}


Being right about the Chinese intervention won Nehru no friends in the US press or in the American leadership. The New York Times, once full of praise for the Indian leader, was sternly critical. "Pandit Nehru purports to speak for Asia ," the Times wrote, "but it is the voice of abnegation, his criticism turns out to have been obstructive, his policy appeasement."{76. New York Times, 10 October 1950.}Mrs. Pandit reported that Truman supposedly told a Congressman that "Nehru has sold us down the Hudson. His attitude has been responsible for our losing the war in Korea."{77. Gopal, vol. II, p. 109.} At a staff meeting of the US delegation to the UN, John Foster Dulles -- serving as a Republican adviser -- said that since the Indians were always eager to solve someone else's problem, perhaps the United States should sit on the sidelines and let the Indians try to solve Korea. That might make them less willing to meddle in other people's affairs, the future Secretary of State commented.{78. FRUS, 1950, vol. VII, p. 746, Minutes of staff meeting of US Delegation to UN General Assembly, 21 September 1950.}

In early 1951, Secretary Acheson was less than enthused about a push by the Indians -- supported by the British -- for a Korea cease-fire resolution that collided with a US-backed drive for a UN resolution condemning the Chinese Communist military intervention [the Communists usually used "cease fires" to regroup and resupply their troops on the front lines]. After difficult deliberations, Washington agreed to go along with the Indian proposal, which the General Assembly approved in January 1951. When the Chinese Communists rejected the resolution, the General Assembly proceeded to condemn the Chinese as aggressors by a resounding 50-7-8 majority. India and Burma were the only two countries to join the Communists in opposing this resolution. Nehru then temporarily gave up his peacemaking efforts, writing in exasperation to his friend Krishna Menon in London that we "failed in the end before the big stick of the United States."[Failed at what? Helping the ComIntern take over the world?]{79. Gopal, vol. II, p. 136.}

In the summer of 1951 the UN and Communists began cease-fire talks at Kaesong in Korea, but these discussions soon broke down. The war continued across the waist of the peninsula. Although neither side gained a decisive advantage, the UN gradually pressed the Chinese north of the 38th parallel where the line stabilized for the next two years. In the summer of 1952, prodding from the Americans and Chinese revived Indian interest in serving as a go-between for a cease-fire. On the US side, Eleanor Roosevelt, visiting New Delhi, and Ambassador Chester Bowles urged the Indians to tell the Chinese that the United States wanted a settlement.

At this point, a new Indian face appeared on the UN stage in New York. This V.K. Krishna Menon, formerly Indian High Commissioner to London and an intimate foreign policy adviser to Nehru with whom he had been on close terms since the 1930s. Menon left London under a cloud after the British complained about leaks from the High Commission to the Communists and Menon's mismanagement of the Mission became a political embarrassment in New Delhi. When Nehru suggested that his friend return to Delhi or go to Moscow as Ambassador, Menon balked, having lived away from India most of his adult life. The Prime Minister finally found a solution by assigning Menon to New York to deal with the Korean issue -- a subject on which India's permanent representative Sir B.N. Rau sought help.{80. Ibid., pp. 140-44.}

Highly strung, highly irascible, and highly intelligent, Menon was one of the few Indians Nehru accepted as his intellectual equal. The two saw eye-to-eye on the basic approach to foreign policy, although Menon stood politically to the left of Nehru [What- Menon was a Trotskyite vs Leninist?].



Krishna Menon's acid tongue and striking -- almost diabolic -- looks soon made him a media celebrity at the United Nations.

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 I suppose diabolic is in the eyes of the beholder


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 Since his barbed verbal thrusts were more often than not aimed at the United States, Menon's presence added a new, and ultimately heavy, burden to Indo-American relations.
After Dwight D. Eisenhower swamped the Democrats in the November 1952 elections, the Indians and British feared that  the incoming Republican administration might widen the war in Korea. They were eager to have a cease-fire in place before the new President took office in January 1953. Seizing the opportunity, Krishna Menon toiled frenetically to shape a resolution that would bridge American and Chinese and North Korean differences over the fate of the thousands of communist prisoners of war who did not want to return home. Although Nehru agreed on the basic issue of no forced repatriation, Acheson found Krishna Menon exasperatingly difficult to negotiate with. Reporting to President Truman, the Secretary commented that Menon's resolution "as they say in the strike settlement lingo, gives us the words and the other side the decision." Menon, Acheson told a staff meeting, seemed to be "a master of putting words together so that they conveyed no ideas at all." Menon's plan, the Secretary asserted, was like a room with only one door, "pointing to the north." {81. FRUS, 1952-54, vol. XV, pp. 633, 653-54, Letter from Acheson to Truman and report of USUN staff meeting, 17 November 1952.}

In the end, Acheson agreed reluctantly to go along with Menon's resolution, provided amendments made the text more to Washington's liking, After Bowles intervened with Newhru, the Indians agreed to modify the draft sufficiently to gain US acceptance. Although the General Assembly adopted the resolution with an overwhelming majority, the Indian effort came to naught. Russia's Andrei Vyshinksy flatly turned down the proposal, which he attacked as a device for perpetuating the war. Ten days later the Chinese Communists followed the Soviet line, announcing their rejection. Nehru had to "confess that I was somewhat surprised at the attitude of China and the virulence of Russia," [why? Stalin and Mao were both mass murdering war mongers] as India had remained in touch with them during the negotiations.{82. Nehru, vol. 2, p. 186, 4 December 1952.}

Running parallel to Indo-American friction over the Korean war was the continuing dispute about the  recognition of Communist China. Even before Indian independence, Nehru regarded good relations with China as a fundamental plank in India's foreign policy. He saw the two ancient countries and civilizations emerging from European domination to become pillars of the New Asia. When the Nationalists, with whom he had friendly relations, fell from power, Nehru believed the Communist victory was due less to the attractiveness of Marxist ideology than the shortcomings of the Chiang Kai-shek regime.


Nehru argued with American leaders during his 1949 visit that Chinese nationalism would prevent the domination of China by the Soviet Union [ Chinese nationalism didn't prevent the domination of China by Fascist Japan during WWII]. He believed that bringing the new China into the family of nations would accelerate this process and thought that the US desire to ostracize China would have the opposite effect, leading to strengthened Sino-Soviet ties. {83. FRUS, 1949, vol. VI, pp. 1750-56, memorandum of conversation between Nehru and Truman, 13 October 1949, and of meeting between Nehru and US representative to the United Nations Warren Austin, 19 October 1949.} Although India had plenty of company in its China policy -- including the closest US allies, Britain and Canada, Washington's differences with New Delhi over China added to bilateral frictions, particularly after the Chinese intervened militarily in Korea.

Another bone of contention between Washington and New Delhi was the peace treaty with Japan. Negotiated by John Foster Dulles, the treaty was ready for signature in the summer of 1951. To the dismay of Washington and Dulles, Nehru decided that India would not sign. The Prime Minister believed the treaty should have included the Soviet Union and Communist China [the USSR only deigned to declare war against Japan after the USA dropped two atomic bombs on Japan, and Chiang Kai-shek was our legal ally during WWII - Nehru was such a commie tool] and was also unhappy about the security arrangements between Japan and the United States.{84. Nehru, vol. 2, p. 484, letter of 15 August 1951.} The US leadership, but especially treaty negotiator Dulles, was put out by India's insistence on standing apart. Apparently staggered by the final India turndown, Dulles told Ambassador Pandit, "I cannot accept this. Does your Prime Minister realize that I have prayed at every stage of this treaty?" The Prime Minister's sister was at a loss for words.{85. Pandit, p. 255} Nehru recognized that India's decision would "naturally cause resentment and some disappointment" in Washington. When the US reply "was couched in language which is not usual in correspondence between governments," the Prime Minister was annoyed but decided against using "strong language in our answer."[Really? Why not? And good luck mooching any development money from the USA afterwards] {86. Nehru, vol. 2, p. 486, 31 August 1951.}

In Kashmir, where Indian soldiers shed their blood Pakistan [as opposed to all the blood American soldiers spilled defeating Fascist Japan with little to no help from India and all the blood Americans spilled fighting the Communists with India egging on the Communists], the US attitude badly upset the government of India.[boo hoo - so Nehru is allowed to act like an anti-American jack wagon 24/7 and then he expects the USA to bail him out] In Korea, where US soldiers were shedding their blood against North Korean and Chinese Communist forces, the Indian attitude badly upset the US government. India and the United States each wanted aggression punished and basic principles of international morality upheld. Fearful of expanded conflict in the Far East, the Indians urged moderation and compromise in the case of Korea. Fearful of an India-Pakistan War, the United States similarly urged moderation and compromise in the case of Kashmir. Neither Washington nor New Delhi won friends in each other's capital by playing the peacemaker.


Economic Assistance to India: A Slow Start


Although in the 1950s and 1960s, economic assistance became a major element of US policy toward India, aid was not an important issue immediately after independence. The United States had yet to initiate assistance programs for the developing world. It was only in 1948 that Washington launched Marshall Plan aid for the nations of Western Europe [WWII ended in 1945, so it seems unreasonable to have expected the USA to help out countries much sooner].





With the United States at the peak of its economic power, Nehru and other Indian leaders, nonetheless, looked to America for help. Even before the first anniversary of independence, Ministry of External Affairs Secretary General Bajpai, during an April 1948 visit to Washington, sought aid for hydroelectric projects. Bajpai's feelers led nowhere.{87. Bimal Prasad, ed., India's Foreign Policy: Studies in Continuity and Change (New delhi: Vikas, 1979), pp. 235-26; FRUS, 1948, vol. V, pp. 501-06, memorandum of conversation between Bajpai and Loy Henderson, Director of Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs, 2 April 1948; and Dennis Merrill, "Indo-American Relations, 1947-1950: A Missed Opportunity in Asia," Diplomatic History 11 (Summer 1987): p. 208.} There was also limited activity on the part of the US private sector. Despite the fact that Washington encouraged investment in India, few US businesses took this advice, except for larger concerns -- like the oil companies -- already experienced in the international field. India's announced socialist economic policy, corporate ignorance about South Asia, and the reputation India soon acquired -- not only as a being a terribly poor country but as a difficult place to do business -- all acted as dampeners on investment.


In India, the attitude toward foreign business was ambiguous. Although New Delhi wanted US investment, there was, at the same time, fear the United States would use its economic might to interfere with India's sovereignty or to unfairly exploit the country's resources. Nehru himself thought the concerns were overdrawn. "The question of economic domination of India by the U.S.A. is not one that frightens me," he wrote.{88. SWJN, Second Series, vol. 7, p. 628, note on the Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Treaty negotiations, 12 August 1948.} The political left in India was able, nonetheless, to exploit nationalist fears about foreign business encroachment deeply rooted in the British economic exploitation of India during the colonial period.


In his January 1949 inaugural address. President Truman announced the program of technical assistance to help poorer countries, known as Point Four [must have been a total waste of money, because I never heard of it]. Although the idea -- inserted in the speech by White House staffers [probably Communists] without advance planning -- generated much interest, little actually happened for more than a year.




When the Prime Minster visited Washington in October 1949, obtaining US aid was high on Nehru's agenda, but -- perhaps out of pride -- in talking with US leaders, he "mentioned this, though rather casually."{89. Nehru, vol. 1, p. 483, letter of 1 December 1949.}


Just before Nehru arrived, Ambassador Henderson made the first serious proposal on aid to India, recommending a five year $500 million program. With economic assistance, India might become a "stalwart and worthy champion of the West in Asia; without aid, Henderson argued, India "might degenerate into a vast political and economic swamp."{90. Loy Henderson to Under Secretary James Webb, 3 October 1949.}Henderson was ahead of his time in making the proposal. The Truman administration remained ambivalent about India, uncertain US interests warranted an investment on so large a scale and uncertain the US Congress would support such a program. Nehru did not help the case for economic aid when he failed to press the issue seriously during his visit. A month later, in November 1949, the State Department informed Henderson his aid proposal was rejected. {91. State Department to Ambassador Henderson, 21 November 1949; Dennis Merrill, "Indo-American Relations, 1947-1950: A Missed Opportunity in Asia," Diplomatic History 11 (Summer 1987): pp. 220-23. The issue, of course, did not go away. Henderson continued to press the case, gradually winning support in the State Department. His successor, Chester Bowles, enthusiastically took up the cause of large-scale aid where Henderson left off.}


India's most pressing economic need in late 1949 was for food assistance to stave off a possible famine. With this in mind, Nehru asked the President for a million tons of wheat to provide a stronger food reserve. In spite of the fact that Truman responded positively, {92. FRUS, 1949, vol. VI, pp. 1750-52, Memorandum of conversation of the meeting between Nehru, President Truman, Secretary Acheson, and Secretary General Bajpai, 13 October 1949.} delays and misunderstandings, including an attempt to barter the wheat for strategic materials, frustrated an accord.

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Truman Library has the six page Memorandum of Conversation with Jawaharlal Nehru, Prime Minister of India, October 12, 1949. Acheson Papers - Secretary of State File . It makes no mention of anyone bartering wheat for strategic materials, so I'm not certain to what the author refers





















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The upshot was ill-will. The Indians thought the United States stingy, trying to use food aid as a policy lever. The Americans complained the Indians never adequately followed up after Nehru talked with Truman. As the State Department cabled stiffly to Ambassador Henderson, "(The) USG may be pardoned if it is puzzled to learn it is criticized for India's failure to obtain aid when no firm or formal request was ever made."{93. FRUS, 1950, vol. V, pp. 1461-66, Embassy New Delhi telegram to State Department, 12 April 1950, and State Department telegram to New Delhi, 21 April 1950.}

The food situation in India failed to improve in 1950 with poor summer monsoon rains again threatening famine. This time the Government of India made clear its need, Ambassador Pandit formally requesting two million tons of wheat aid from Secretary Acheson in December.{94. Ibid., pp. 1481, State Department telegram reporting a meeting between Mrs. Pandit and Secretary Acheson, 30 December 1950.} Ambassador Henderson seconded the Indian request, cabling that the shortage and threat of famine were real.{95. FRUS, 1951, vol. VI, pp. 2087-90, 2092, Embassy New Delhi telegrams to the State Department, 20 and 28 January 1951.}President Truman at first held back, only giving Assistant Secretary of State George McGhee a hunting license to test the Congressional waters. In closed Senate Foreign  Relations Committee hearings in January 1951, McGhee got an earful. Committee Chairman Tom Connally of Texas stated point blank, "I want to tell you right now you are going to have one hell of a time getting this thing through the Congress."{96. US Senate Executive Sessions, vol. 3, pp. 227-46, 26 January 1951; interview with George McGhee, 14 August 1991.}



Despite the unfriendly reaction -- confirmation of India's unpopularity with many in Congress -- Truman decided to proceed with food aid legislation. Enlisting the support of former Republican Herbert Hoover -- who won fame for his role in feeding Europe after World War I -- Truman sent a strong message to the Congress on 12 February, urging two million tons of wheat for India on both humanitarian and national interest grounds.{97. Brands, p.66} At first, things went smoothly, but anti-Indian feelings led to procedural delays, especially in the Senate where Senator Connally refused to schedule hearings.


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 From Gary, Howard C. "The Question of Grain for India." Far Eastern Survey20.6 (1951): 57-60. Web. 29 Jan. 2017. It seems Senator Connally viewed Indians as commie SOBs wrt not helping the USA defend South Korea and didn't want to waste American food on people who weren't our allies vs communism.









The author of the above article, Howard Gary,  also leads off by saying that Indians always have famines and starve to death, so why should the USA start caring all of the sudden ?








There was also bipartisan annoyance at Truman's bait-and-switch tactics of turning what started as a loan to India into a grant:


















There was also American speculation that the Indian famine was artificially man made due to India boycotting Pakistani goods






















India denied these charges





















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After a plea from Truman, the Senator finally relented in mid-April. Conservatives in the House of Representatives Rules Committee then raised new obstacles that threatened to block the bill. Annoyed by Congressional foot-dragging and criticism of India, Nehru hit back. [smart move from somebody begging for charity 🙄😒] "We would be unworthy of the high responsibilities with which we have been charged if we bartered away in the slightest degree our country's self respect or freedom of action, even for something we badly need," the Indian leader stated on 1 May over All-India Radio. {98. FRUS, 1951, vol. VI, p. 2153, footnote 1: text of remarks from Congressional Record, vol. 97, pt. 4, p. 5739.}



Nehru's comments prompted an angry response among legislators in Washington, who postponed further action on the bill until the Indian government clarified whether it, in fact, still desired the aid.
{99. Ibid., pp. 2153-55, memorandum of conversation at the State Department between E.G. Mathews, South Asia Director, and B.K. Nehru, Indian Embassy Economic Minister, 2 May 1951.} An additional complication was whether the wheat would be provided as a gift -- the Truman administration and Senate proposal -- or as a loan -- the House of Representatives approach. Realizing the damage he had caused, Nehru spoke positively about food aid in Parliament on 10 May, indicating that, if given a choice, India preferred a loan rather than a gift. Nehru's statement soothed Congressional nerves. The bill approving $190 million of wheat as a long-term loan finally passed in early June. {100. Ibid., pp. 2155-58, New Delhi to Secstate, 4,5, and 7 May 1951; Robert J. McMahon, "Food as a Diplomatic Weapon: The Indian Wheat Loan of 1951," Pacific Historical Review, LVI (August 1987): pp. 372-74.} On 15 June 1951, President Truman singed the measure into law, initiating the first of many US food aid shipments to India.


The arrival of US wheat to India could avoid famine. The extended haggling in the Congress and the outburst of anti-Indian sentiments [uhm, why is US critique of Indian foreign policy denounced as xenophobic "anti-Indian" but Indian critiques of US foreign policy is not similarly dismissed as simply bigoted anti-Americanism?] however, undercut any public relations benefits. Nehru commented that despite the best efforts of the US administration, "there has been a feeling of resentment in India re the long delays and obstructionist tactics of some people in the American Congress." {101. Nehru, vol. 2, p. 384, 2 May 1951. Nehru also brought up the congressional delays in his letters of 18 February, 2 March, 10 and 21 April, 17 May, and 2 June 1951. (Ibid., pp. 334. 365. 370-71, 377, 395, and 409).} [talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth - Nehru sounds like a real jerk]. In contrast, the Soviet Union received much applause for a smaller food shipment that arrived before US wheat. {102. Pandit, pp. 255-56.}[great, Indians can mooch off the wheat the Russians stole from starving Ukrainians in the future - ingrates].


The episode made Ambassador Henderson wary of proceeding with a pending request for a regular economic aid program unless the Prime Minister personally gave "firm assurances" that India accepted the terms.{103. Ibid., pp. 2158-59, Embassy New Delhi to State Department, 7 May 1951.} In late May, Nehru obliged. After spending over an hour with  chargé  d'affaires Lloyd Steere, he affirmed India's willingness to accept US aid conditions and stated his country was anxious to receive American economic help. {104. FRUS, 1951, vol. VI, pp. 2164-66, Embassy New Delhi telegram to the State Department, 25 May 1951.}

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How gracious of Nehru 🙄😒  He's almost as condescending as Lady Catherine de Bourgh

 "Lady Catherine's condescension." Grammarphobia. N.p., 1 May 2010. Web. 29 Jan. 2017.
In Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mr. Collins describes Lady Catherine de Bourgh this way: “I need not say you will be delighted with her. She is all affability and condescension.”These days, we don’t like condescending people, but condescension was a virtue in Mr. Collins’s eyes. He meant that Lady Catherine was capable of laying aside the privileges of rank and being nice to her social inferiors. 
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After Chester Bowles replaced Loy Henderson in November 1951, the new envoy quickly made a larger bilateral aid program one of his major goals. Bowles urged a program for the coming year of $150 million, pushing this relentlessly in Washington at all levels of the administration, including directly with President Truman.  In the end, the State Department agreed to support a $115 million program request from the Congress.{105. FRUS, 1952-4, vol. XI, pp. 1634-38: memorandum on India aid to Deputy Under Secretary of State Matthews, 8 February 1952; Embassy New Delhi telegram to State Department, 21 February 1952; Bowles telegram to President Truman, 21 February 1952; and State Department to Bowles, 3 March 1952.} Not satisfied, Bowles asked for additional funds. When the issue was put before the President, Truman agreed with Secretary Acheson to sidetrack the proposal to the Budget Bureau. The administration thought Bowles was moving too fast, wanted to see existing aid programs launched before considering increases, and was skeptical Congress would approve an expanded effort. {106. Ibid., pp. 1646-48 and 1653-54, memorandum for President Truman from Secretary Acheson and Mutual Security Director Harriman, 5 June 1952, and letter to Bowles from Truman, 1 July 1952, enclosing Bureau of the Budget Memorandum.}

In the fall of 1952, Bowles renewed the campaign in lengthy letters to Dean Acheson, calling for a three-year commitment to support India's development plans, [ 3 year plan - just two years short of a standard Soviet Union 5 year plan - the American left's new improved command and control economy!] including $250 million in the coming fiscal year. Bowles' argument -- one that would be repeatedly used over the next decade to justify aid to India -- linked the fate of India's economic development to US security interests in Asia. The choice, Bowles declared, was between the current democratic government or, if India failed to develop, communism [so, the USA had to become communist in order to defeat communism 🙄😒] After the Democrats lost the 1952 elections, Bowles' suggestions became superfluous. With one foot out the door 2 weeks before leaving office in January 1953, Acheson replied that he agreed with much of what Bowles said but would have to pass on his letters to the new Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, and to Harold Stassen, the former Republican Governor of Minnesota, whom Eisenhower named as foreign aid chief.{107. Ibid., pp. 1668-77, 1679-84, letters from Bowles to Acheson, 28 October and 19 November 1952, and Acheson's reply to Bowles, 8 January 1953.}


Although Chester Bowles' first tour as Ambassador to India lasted little more than a year, he made an enduring impression. A master at public relations, Bowles "sold" America to Indians in a way that his predecessor Loy Henderson, a superb professional diplomat but no salesman or image maker, could not do. Bowles spoke frequently with the Indian press, fielding with patience and understanding tough questions about US racial discrimination, criticism of US foreign policy, and other subjects. He traveled widely throughout India, visiting villages and impoverished urban areas as well as hobnobbing with the wealthy elite. He focussed US aid on India's community development program to help India's rural poor.

Bowles' enthusiasm and good will had a positive impact, helping to offset the policy irritant and frictions between New Delhi and Washington. He succeeded in showing Indians that America cared about them and their nation's efforts to modernize within the democratic framework. He also had an impact on informed US opinion [love the lefty ad hominem gambit that everyone who agrees with them is well "informed" and everyone who disagrees is dumb]. When India held its first democratic elections on the basis of universal suffrage in 1952, Bowles stressed the significance of India's adherence to the democratic system. He made some headway, especially among liberals, in gaining acceptance for his conviction that India deserved greater attention from American foreign policy makers. Bowles' achievement -- in one short year -- was substantial. {108. Bowles' book, Ambassador's Report, which appeared in 1954, did a good job in putting across his point of view.}

Professionals in the State Department found Bowles personally warm hearted and an unusually effective salesman of the United States in India. The fact that he also acquired the reputation for becoming a salesman of India to the United States [ that's not why Americans pay his salary - so he can audition to be a foreign lobbyist in DC after he retires - that's the job of the Indian Ambassador to the United States ] reduced the impact of his policy recommendations within the Truman administration. Bowles' cause was, however, helped by the development in Washington of what became known as the India lobby -- an informal group of liberal activists who strongly urged better relations with India despite Indo-US foreign policy differences over the Cold War. Democratic Senator Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota was one of the earliest supporters of the  India lobby along with Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas.{109. McGhee, Envoy to the Middle World (New York: Harper & Row, 1983), pp. 51-52; Pandit, p. 250.}

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Unsurprisingly, lefty Douglas was appointed by lefty FDR




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US Military Supply to South Asia:The Beginnings


After 1954, the US military supply relationship with Pakistan would become a major irritant in Indo-US relations -- from the Indian perspective the biggest single bar to friendlier ties. Although Pakistan first requested arms aid barely two months after independence in the fall of 1947, when it received a flat State Department turndown, {110. M.S. Venkataramani, The American Role in Pakistan, 1947-1958 (New Delhi: Radiant, 1982). See pp. 1-31 for a discussion of the early and unsuccessful Pakistani attempt to obtain US arms aid.} it was, ironically, India that first procured arms from the United States. Before the Kashmir War, modest sales of military equipment to a former World War II ally posed no difficulty for the State Department [describing India as a WWII ally of the USA seems a bit of an over statement]. The outbreak of fighting in Kashmir, however, led President Truman to impose an embargo on arms exports to either India or Pakistan in order to avoid fueling a conflict which the UN was trying to stop.{111. FRUS, 1948, vol. v, pp. 496-97, memorandum for President Truman from Secretary Marshall, 11 March 1948.} After the cease-fire agreement, in January 1949, the ban was lifted.


Pakistan's Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan renewed the request for US arms without success during a 1948 meeting with Secretary Marshall. Liaquat's line -- similar to the approach Jinnah used when Raymond Hare called on the Muslim League leader in 1947 -- was to seek military aid to bolster Pakistan and other Muslim states against the Communists.{112. Ibid., pp. 435-36, report of meeting between Liaquat and Marshall, 29 October, 1948; FRUS, 1950, vol. V, p. 1492, "US Policy Toward Pakistan."}Liaquat continued the quest during his spring 1950 visit to the United States. In contrast to Nehru, the Pakistani leader made an excellent impression, voicing his country's support for US foreign policy at the same time he urged the United States to provide Pakistan military assistance{113. McGhee, pp. 96-97.}

Even if there was no immediate payoff for the Pakistanis, the Korean War spurred American interest in containing the Soviet threat through a chain of security alliances. As Washington became more supportive of a long-standing British proposal for a Middle East Defense Organization (MEDO), [an unsuccessful Southwest Asia analogue of NATO] Assistant Secretary McGhee strongly backed the idea of including Pakistan in a Middle East security system. US Ambassadors to South Asia, meeting in Ceylon in March 1951, endorsed the proposal although noting that until the Kashmir dispute was settled and Indo-Pakistan relations improved, the real potential could not be realized.{114. Ibid., pp. 277-83.} McGhee pressed the case for Pakistan in talks with the British in London and back in Washington. He told the Joint Chiefs of Staff in May, "Without Pakistan, I don't see any way to defend the Middle East."{115. Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1951 1887/16, quoted in Robert J. McMahon, "United States Cold War Strategy in South Asia: Making a Military Commitment to Pakistan, 1947-1954," Journal of American History 75, no. 3, (December 1988): pp. 822-23.} When the British examined the Pakistan issue more closely, however, they decided to back off, anticipating a negative Indian reaction. Washington by the summer of 1951 appeared to come around to the same view.{116. State Department telegram to field posts, 30 June 1951, quoted in McMahon, pp. 824-25.}



Henry Byroade, who replaced McGhee as the region's Assistant Secretary of State in December 1951, shared his predecessor's enthusiasm for providing arms to Pakistan. A West Point graduate, Byroade served in India during the war, building airfields in Assam [aka he was a rear echelon desk jockey who didn't see real combat].


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 war effort

 https://www.trumanlibrary.org/oralhist/byroade.htm
on Byroade seems a good dhimmi or infidelphobe pro Arab vs Israel and pro Pakistan vs India

http://myrightword.blogspot.com/2017/01/off-moral-road-with-byroade.html

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He became the Army's youngest general when General Marshall selected him as his aide for the ill-fated mission to China in 1946. After President Truman asked Marshall to serve as Secretary of State, Byroade resigned from the Army to become head of German Affairs in the State Department.

When Byroade shifted to the Near East Bureau, one of the issues on the agenda was the question of Middle East defense arrangements, It quickly became clear, according to Byroade, that the official British proposal for MEDO was going nowhere. "The British didn't seem to realize that the concept, with a British commander, belonged to the colonial age. We never said no, but just let the idea die by itself."{117. Interview with Hnery Byroade, 3 May 1990. After his service as Assistant Secretary, Byroade went on to hold a series of five ambassadorships -- to Egypt, South Africa, the Philippines, Afghanistan, and Pakistan -- before he retired in 1981.}

Still as Byroade looked at the area -- so close to the Soviet Union and with Persian Gulf oil so important to the West -- the Assistant Secretary felt that something should be done to provide greater stability. Doubting that most Arab states would join, he gradually came to favor some sort of defense arrangement, involving Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Pakistan, with which the United States would be associated. A student of maps, Byroade saw an alliance extending from Turkey to Pakistan as forming a natural geographic arc of Muslim states that, with the help and political support from the United States, might do better economically and become more stable politically. Byroade envisaged this grouping more in political and psychological than in military terms. In Byroade's thinking, such an arrangement made more sense than the British idea of MEDO. Two years later, with Eisenhower in the White House, the concept became a reality as the Baghdad Pact.{118. Ibid. Byroade's ideas were similar to those of former British Indian official, Sir Olaf Caroe, in his influential book, The Wells of Power. Although Selig Harrison, in his excellent three-part series of articles on the US decision to arm Pakistan in the August 1959 New Republic, reported that Caroe saw Byroade among others when he promoted his ideas during a 1951 visit to Washington, Byroade did not recall meeting Caroe or reading his book.}

Given India's concerns about possible US arms for Pakistan, the most significant military sales to South Asia during the Truman administration were paradoxically not to Pakistan but to India. In the summer of 1952, the Indians sought substantial numbers of tanks and aircraft to modernize their forces. The request for 200 Sherman tanks,

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Sherman tanks were named for the famous Buckeye, General Tecumseh Sherman:





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worth at the time $19 million, received rapid approval. This action promptly drew a strong complaint from the Pakistanis who -- foreshadowing later Indian complaints about arms to Pakistan -- asserted that the transaction would adversely affect the military balance in the subcontinent. When the Pakistanis said menacingly they would regard the sale as an unfriendly act, Byroade asserted they were exaggerating the significance of the purchase.

A parallel Indian request to buy 200 jet aircraft costing $150 million received less sympathetic consideration. A year after the US Congress voted $190 million of food aid and at a time India was seeking substantial development aid, officials asked how India could justify spending such a large sum for arms. In the end, the Indians decided to seek a far less expensive package of 54 C-119 transport aircraft. The State Department approved this request.{119. FRUS, 1952-54, vol. IX, pp. 1658-60, and 1678, reports of meetings between Pakistan and Indian Embassy officials and Assistant Secretary  Byroade, 1 and 7 August, and 5 November 1952.}


Shortly before the end of the Truman administration, the British decided to sound out the Pakistanis about membership in MEDO, reversing their position of the year before. In informing the US Embassy in Karachi about the planned British demarché , the State Department said the United States was ready to support the idea and take this into account in considering future Pakistani requests for arms assistance.{120. Ibid., pp. 315-17, State Department telegram to Karachi, New Delhi, Ankara, and London, 13 November 1952.} From New Delhi, Ambassador Chester Bowles shot back a strong -- but uncharacteristically short -- message.

The arms proposal, Bowles cabled, would be seen by the Indians as a new form of colonialism, would confirm a rumored arrangement about US bases in Pakistan, would have a bitter effect on Indo-American relations, would provide the Communists a major propaganda weapon, and would make Indo-Pakistani relations more explosive and harder to settle [but besides all this, it's a great idea - #sarcastichashtag] {121. Ibid., pp. 317-19, Embassy New Delhi telegram to State Department, 20 November 1952.} Bowles' message -- along with a sharp response from Nehru when rumors of an arms accord started circulating -- killed off the proposal. The State Department cabled New Delhi on 28 November that Washington was aware of the adverse Indian reaction and that no approach had been made to the Pakistanis.{122. Ibid., p. 319, fn. ii, State Department telegram to Embassy New Delhi, 28 November 1952.} In a State/Joint Chiefs of Staff meeting the same day, Byroade put the problem frankly: Pakistan would probably join an anti-Communist defense pact if the United States provided enough equipment. This would be a plus, but would run directly into the Kashmir problem and the Indians. Sooner or later, Byroade added, the United States might have to meet this question head on.{123. Ibid., pp. 323-24, minutes of State/JCS meeting of 28 November 1952.}


During the Truman administration, arms for Pakistan thus received consideration, but nothing concrete happened despite support from senior officials, like McGhee and Byroade. Although there was some interest in the Defense Department in possible US airbases in Pakistan, South Asia did not have a high priority in the Pentagon's strategic planning. Funding for military aid was short. Needs and priorities were greater elsewhere. Washington also knew arms for Pakistan would encounter a severe Indian reaction. A comment by Secretary Dean Acheson best summed things up. The Pakistanis, Acheson recalled, "were always asking us for arms and I was always holding them off."
{124. Selig Harrison, "Pakistan and the United States," New Republic, 10 August 1959, p. 14.} After John Foster Dulles became Republican Secretary of State in January 1953, the situation would change.


Indo-US Relations: Through The Prism of the Cold War

Once the Korean War started [by Communist North Korea invading South Korea] in June 1950, Cold War considerations became an even more dominant element in US foreign policy. Discussions between Ambassador Henderson and Prime Minister Nehru in November 1950 mirrored the sharp differences between the two countries on this basic problem -- the United States stressing collective security and India following a neutralist approach as the best way to preserve peace.

In December 1950 -- just after the Chinese routed UN forces in North Korea -- a State Department policy review of South Asia made clear that Washington's main concern about India was that that country not be "lost" the way China was. "With China under Communist domination," the study stated, "Soviet power now encroaches along the perimeter of the Indian sub-continent. India has become the pivotal state in non-Communist Asia by virtue of its relative power, stability and influence."{125. FRUS, 1950, vol. v, p. 1478, Department of State policy statement on India, 1 December 1950.} The policy paper hoped India would agree "voluntarily to associate itself with the United States and like-minded countries opposing Communism," and supported Ambassador Henderson's recommendation that an aid program be initiated.{126. Ibid., pp. 1476-80.}

The following month, in January 1951, after a National Security Council (NSC) review, President Truman approved NSC document 98/1, the first formal policy for South Asia. The Cold War framed the approach. Behind a fog of bureaucratic prose, NSC 98/1 stated bluntly that if India were lost to the Communists "for all practical purposes all of Asia would have been lost". The United States wanted to gain more Indian support because of the prestige of the country's leadership, and also to have continued access to strategic materials. NSC 98/1 proposed a more activist policy -- closer consultations, an economic aid program, the supply of military equipment--taking into account higher priorities elsewhere -- and continuing efforts to improve Indo-Pakistani relations. {127. FRUS, 1951, vol. VI, pp. 1650-53, draft statement proposed by the National Security Council on South Asia, 22 January 1951.} India's importance thus rose somewhat in the eyes of the Truman administration from the relatively marginal position it had occupied in earlier years.

The continuing incompatibility of US and Indian views was, however, underscored in April 1951 discussion that Assistant Secretary McGhee and Ambassador Henderson had with Prime Minister Nehru in New Delhi. These talks confirmed a wide gap between US and Indian thinking on the major foreign policy issues of the day -- handling the war in Korea, the Soviet Union, and Communist China. As Henderson put it, there remained "a fundamental difference between us about the aggressive intent of international communism."{128. McGhee, pp. 293-95.}

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I'm on team Fulton Sheen wrt lying Marxists:



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Although official Indian documents have yet to be released to the public, Nehru's public remarks and his private letters to Chief Ministers, which have been made available, provide a good picture of Indian policy views. Justifying neutralism as an effective policy to promote peace, Nehru told the Constituent Assembly on 8 March 1949:

Our policy will continue to be not only to keep aloof from power alignments, but to try to make friendly cooperation possible....If by any chance we align ourselves definitely with one power group, we may perhaps from one point of view do some good, but I have not the shadow of a doubt that from a larger point of view, not only of India, but of world peace, it will do harm....Therefore, it becomes all the more necessary that India should not be lined up with any group of powers which for various reasons are full of fear of war and preparing for war. {129. Jawaharlal Nehru, Independence and After (New York: The John Day Company, 1949), p. 241-43.}

Nehru believed firmly that the war in Korea proved that India's policy was right -- just the opposite of the US view/ Writing to Chief Ministers in April 1951, Nehru stated:

I believe the policy we have pursued has been demonstrably proved to be good for India and good for world peace. I think it has averted or helped in averting the spread of the Korean War ....The mere fact that both our friends and critics inevitably look to India to take some step to break the present impasse in the world is significant of the virtue of India's foreign policy. {130. Nehru, vol. 2, p. 374, letter of 21 April 1951.}

The Prime Minister remained consistently critical about US policy toward Kashmir, continuing to believe this was motivated by an interest in aligning Pakistan with an Islamic bloc, under Western tutelage, against the Soviets -- "Pakistan was easy to keep within their sphere of influence in regard to wider policies, while India was an uncertain and possibly not reliable quality."{131. Ibid., p. 460, letter of 1 August 1951.} Still, the Prime Minister doubted the United States would push too far, believing "it is thoroughly understood....in the U.S.A. that India counts far more than Pakistan.{132. Ibid., p. 461-62, letter of 12 August 1951.}

By the end of the Truman years, Indo-American relations had fallen into the pattern of chronic friction that has so perplexed observers over the years. Although there were positive aspects, especially with Bowles as ambassador, a sense of estrangement was only too evident. With hindsight, the reasons are not hard to find. After the Korean War made the Cold War a global struggle, the US and Indian world views were bound to clash sharply--and did--on fundamental security issues. The United States saw a world-wide threat from the Soviet Union and its fellow communist states and felt peace could be secured only through a strong military posture and collective security.

India, in contrast, thought the Communist threat over-stated and saw both East and West as gripped in mutual fear. Nehru's concern was that this security psychosis would end not in preserving the peace, but in provoking war. He saw peace best preserved through dialogue not force, pursuing this end as actively as the United States pursued a stronger security posture. Added to this fundamental difference of outlook was the friction over Kashmir -- an issue of far greater importance to India than the United States. Stung and annoyed by India's frequent criticism of US policies, India's unwillingness to follow through with the plebiscite New Delhi itself had proposed seemed to Americans a far cry from the lofty moralism and principled views Nehru so often articulated.

Underlying the estrangement was a sense of mutual disappointment fed by unrealized expectations. Democratic and secular India expected the support of the United States on issues like Kashmir. The United States as leader of the democratic world expected that free and democratic India would back the general thrust of US policy in dealing with the Soviet threat. Washington did not welcome India's effort to follow a path between the Western democratic and Communist totalitarian camps, especially after the United States began to shed its blood in the war in Korea. And thus it was that Indo-American relations got off to a rocky start in the early years of Indian independence.









































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