| Publication |
2010.
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| Summary/Abstract |
Indian elites spent much of Barack Obama's first year trying to discern whether he would continue the "strategic partnership" cultivated between New Delhi and Washington over the previous decade. In the absence of early affirmation and concerned that the United States was developing a pro-Pakistan outlook on regional security issues (particularly Kashmir), India focused intensely on the new president's evolving "Af-Pak" policy as a proxy for the state of U.S.-India relations. This impulse made for continued uncertainty, given the unsettled U.S. regional strategy. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's official visit to Washington in November 2009 put a new seal on U.S.-India friendship, and New Delhi's worst fears about U.S. intentions have been laid to rest. The strategic partnership remains intact, albeit amid less euphoria than during the Bush administration. It likely will continue to mature owing to broadly convergent strategic interests, but U.S. and Indian interests are least convergent with respect to Pakistan's involvement in Afghan affairs, and this will continue to be a source of tension in U.S.-India relations.
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