Opinion - Letters to the Editor   

Romancing Russia

Sir,_ In his analysis C. Raja Mohan states perceptively: "With Russia, India cannot hope to sustain the old romance only on the basis of defence purchases" (Dec. 3). Part of the "old romance", it must be remembered, was shaped by Cold War dynamics.

As Taya Zinkin then put it: "The only country which backs India at the Security Council over Kashmir is Russia. To assure India of Russian veto, Nehru has had to be partial to the Russian invasion of Hungary."

As regards defence purchases, Samuel P. Huntington in his "Clash of Civilisations" thinks "it will clearly be in India's interests to maintain its close ties with Russia and to remain a major purchaser of Russian military equipment."

Huntington, needless to say, has been accused by some critics of being an Israeli sympathiser propounding a dangerous theory which might well prove to be a "self-fulfilling prophecy" in the sense that when something is oft-repeated it becomes a truth.

Jaiboy Joseph,

Chennai

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