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Home page  About CSIS Programs South Asia Program President Bush's trip to South Asia in 2006
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President Bush's trip to South Asia in 2006
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 President Bush said before leaving for India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan that his trip through South Asia was one of high stakes and unprecedented opportunity. He was right: the United States and India signed a historic nuclear pact. To provide insight into what that pact means for the United States and global nuclear security, CSIS’s Mary Beth Nikitin and Jon Wolfsthal have written a commentary about the agreement. For context and background about the region and its issues, CSIS has assembled a selection of its assets on South Asia, including the monthly newsletter South Asia Monitor, publications, and congressional testimony. Also, CSIS gathered together four of its experts to brief the news media before the president’s trip. A transcript and audio from that briefing are available.
U.S.-INDIA NUCLEAR AGREEMENT
Mary Beth Nikitin and Jon Wolfsthal, both fellows with CSIS's International Security Program, say that close examination of the agreement "raises serious questions about both the actual and relative value of the deal for nuclear security in India and for the global nonproliferation system." Read their commentary, The U.S.-India Atomic Balm, here.
KEY DOCUMENTS:
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INDIA
The strategic relationship between the U.S. and India stands to top the trip’s agenda, which Ambassador Teresita Schaffer discussed in an op-ed for The Times of India. Schaffer also used Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Washington in July 2005 to explore the transformation that’s taking place between the two countries, much of which can be attributed to India’s emergence as a global power.
Robert Einhorn, former assistant secretary for nonproliferation at the State Department, testified before Congress in October about the nuclear issues that are fundamental to U.S.-India affairs and to President Bush’s trip. He wrote about them a month later for YaleGlobal Online.
PAKISTAN
When the president leaves India to travel to Pakistan the strategic importance of his trip won’t diminish, as security issues will be paramount to his meetings there. Ambassador Schaffer previewed the president's trip in an op-ed in The Christian Science Monitor. She also has written about U.S. policy options toward Pakistan, the status of negotiations between Islamabad and New Delhi, and economic prosperity as a path to peace in Kashmir. She also has appeared before Congress to testify on strategic trends in South Asia and U.S. strategy in Pakistan.
AFGHANISTAN
Afghanistan’s reconstruction likely will be on the agenda when the president visits the region. CSIS’s Post-Conflict Reconstruction Project has conducted studies on the progress of the reconstruction and on how Afghans perceive it.
Teresita Schaffer devoted most of her 30-year career in the Foreign Service to South Asia, including serving as deputy assistant secretary of state for the region. MORE
Frederick Barton served as U.N. deputy high commissioner for refugees and as the first director of the Office of Transition Initiatives at the U.S. Agency for International Development. MORE
Kurt Campbell served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for Asia and the Pacific and as a director on the National Security Council staff. MORE
Robert J. Einhorn served as assistant secretary for nonproliferation at the Department of State from November 1999 to August 2001. MORE
Michael Green served as special assistant to the president for national security affairs and senior director for Asian affairs at the National Security Council. MORE
Jon Wolfsthal worked for the Department of Energy in a variety of nuclear security positions, including overseeing several programs to eliminate trade in weapons-usable nuclear materials. MORE
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PUBLICATIONS
CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY CONFERENCE/MEETING SUMMARIES |
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