U.S.-India Strategic Dialogue

Until recently, India and the United States had limited interactions and few cooperative endeavors. However, the relationship has improved dramatically over the past several years. Because the candid exchange of ideas is the key to ensuring that differences of interests and perspectives do not lead back to the estrangement that characterized the relationship between the two countries for the last half-century, the Observer Research Foundation and the RAND Corporation held a “strategic dialogue” in New Delhi on December 10-11, 2003. The meeting brought together scholars, diplomats, and functionaries from the governments of India and the United States to discuss policy issues important to both countries. This report is designed in part to keep decisionmakers in Washington and New Delhi-as well as others interested in improving U.S.-India relations-informed of the current thinking of leading intellectuals on these issues, to acquaint them with areas of consensus, and to provide insights that will help them understand how each country’s strategic perspective on each issue could affect the bilateral relationship between the two nations. Discussion topics were organized in five panels: National Security Strategies and the Future of U.S.-India Relations; The Campaign Against Terrorism; Pakistan’s Internal Security and Politics; Postwar Afghanistan; and Political Trends in the Gulf Region.