Declassified documents ‘FOREIGN RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES, 1969–1976, VOLUME E–7, DOCUMENTS ON SOUTH ASIA, 1969–1972‘ contain a wealth of information on what the then American President Richard Nixon and his assistant for NSA Henry Kissinger thought of India, and provide a fascinating insight into how the duo sought to play the Russians and the Chinese in those crucial days of 1971.
Conversation Among President Nixon, the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger), and the President’s Chief of Staff (Haldeman), Washington, November 5, 1971, 8:15-9:00 a.m.
Kissinger: Well, the Indians are bastards anyway. They are starting a war there. It’s—to them East Pakistan is no longer the issue. Now, I found it very interesting how she carried on to you yesterday about West Pakistan.
Nixon: We really slobbered over the old witch.
Kissinger: How you slobbered over her in things that did not matter, but in the things that did matter—
Nixon: Yeah.
Conversation Between President Nixon and his Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger), Washington, May 26, 1971, 10:38-10:44 a.m.
Nixon: Good. Go ahead.
Kissinger: —Embassy. Then you can take credit. You can tell the Indians to pipe down—
Nixon: Yeah.
Kissinger: And we’ll keep Yahya happy.
Nixon: The Indians need—what they need really is a—
Kissinger: They’re such bastards.
Nixon: A mass famine. But they aren’t going to get that. We’re going to feed them—a new kind of wheat. But if they’re not going to have a famine the last thing they need is another war. Let the goddamn Indians fight a war [unclear].
Kissinger: They are the most aggressive goddamn people around there.
Nixon: The Indians?
Kissinger: Yeah.
Nixon: Sure.
Having been re-elected in 1971 on a nationalisation platform, Gandhi proceeded to nationalise the coal, steel, copper, refining, cotton textiles, and insurance industries. Most of these nationalisations were made to protect employment and the interest of the organised labour. The remaining private sector industries were placed under strict regulatory control.
In 1971, Indira Gandhi intervened in the Pakistani Civil War in support of East Pakistan. India emerged victorious in the resulting conflict. India had signed a treaty with the Soviet Union promising mutual assistance in the case of war, while Pakistan received active support from the United States during the conflict. U.S. President Richard Nixon disliked Gandhi personally, referring to her as a “witch” and “clever fox” in his private communication with Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Nixon later wrote of the war: “[Gandhi] suckered [America]. Suckered us…..this woman suckered us.”
The reason for their dislike of Indira Gandhi was because during the 1971 war, foreign-owned (Anglo American) private oil companies had refused to supply fuel to the Indian Navy and Indian Air Force. In response, Indira Gandhi nationalised oil companies in 1973. After nationalisation the oil majors such as the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), the Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPCL) and the Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL) had to keep a minimum stock level of oil, to be supplied to the military when needed.
The Moles of Kissinger
Indira Gandhi sensed a parallel in the activities of her Indian political nemesis Morarji Desai and Jayewardene. Later it turned out, that Morarji Desai had received payments from CIA, while he served as a deputy prime minister under Indira Gandhi. “In his 1983 book, ”The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House,” Mr. Hersh wrote that Mr. Desai, India’s Prime Minister from 1977 to 1979, received $20,000 a year from the C.I.A. during the Johnson and Nixon administrations in exchange for information on Indian foreign policy and domestic politics. Mr. Hersh based his claim on information supplied by six confidential sources.”
Seymour Hersh & Morarji Desai
In his book, Hersh, a Pulitzer-prize winner and former New York Times reporter, wrote that Desai first began taking money during the Johnson years and continued receiving payments through the Nixon era.
In exchange, Hersh wrote, Desai informed the CIA in 1971 that India was preparing to invade Pakistan, and about then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi`s efforts to seek closer relations with the Soviet Union.
Desai v. Hersh, 954 F.2d 1408 (1992), Circuit Judge
In his book, The Price of Power: Kissinger and Nixon in the White Housedefendant Seymour Hersh examines how former National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger conducted U.S. foreign policy during President Richard Nixon’s first term. Included in Hersh’s commentary is a chapter reviewing the U.S. foreign policy decisions concerning the 1971 India-Pakistan War, a crisis in which the United States adopted a controversial, hard-line policy against India and in favor of West Pakistan. According to Hersh, President Nixon and Dr. Kissinger justified this policy based largely on information received from a “reliable source” reporting from India through the Central Intelligence Agency. The identity of the source who furnished this information was never revealed by the National Security Council or the CIA.
During his testimony at trial, Hersh explained that he relied on six separate confidential sources to support his assertion that Desai was a CIA informant. Hersh testified that of the six sources, “two were out of government, one was in the CIA, one was in the world of the NSA, National Security Agency, which is the communications intelligence people, and two were working in the White House.” Two of these sources he characterized as “active sources” who “were telling me details, a lot of detail.” And, at one point during his direct testimony, Hersh stated that “I thought the most important thing was to know that the sources upon which I was relying were sources that I had the utmost confidence in, and that was the driving force of what I wrote.”
Kissinger Testifies At Hersh Trial
October 03, 1989
Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger testified Monday in the federal libel suit of author Seymour Hersh that he doubted that former Indian Prime Minister Morarji Desai worked as a $20,000-a-year spy for the Central Intelligence Agency.
Kissinger was subpoenaed to testify by Desai`s attorneys last week in hopes of bolstering their contention that Desai was libeled by Hersh in his 1983 book, “The Price of Power: Henry Kissinger in the Nixon White House.“
Hersh wrote that Desai was a paid informant for the CIA and a valuable asset to the U.S. government during the Johnson and Nixon administrations.
Before a packed courtroom in front of U.S. District Judge Charles Norgle, Kissinger was asked by one of Desai`s attorneys, Cyriac Kappil, if he knew the names of CIA spy sources.
“No, I would not know the names of any sources,“ Kissinger replied.
“We did not want to be briefed as to names.“
Kissinger, national security adviser under President Richard Nixon and secretary of state under President Gerald Ford, said that although the sources were not named, some were categorized as “sensitive“ on the intelligence reports to show if their discovery would “provide embarrassment to the United States.“
Asked to describe the categories, Kissinger responded, “I think that would get me into classified areas.“
Asked by Kappil if information coming from Desai, a member of the Indian Parliament in 1971, would be considered “sensitive,“ Kissinger responded,
“I would have expected that, yes.“
In the book, Hersh wrote that Desai was considered by President Lyndon Johnson`s administration to have been a “star performer“ for the CIA. Asked if he thought that was true, Kissinger said, “I was not aware of that.“
“Do you have any reason to believe that Desai was paid by the CIA from 1969 to 1971?“ Kappil asked.
“I have no such reason to believe that,“ Kissinger answered.
Under cross-examination by one of Hersh`s attorneys, Bernard Nussbaum, Kissinger was pressed for details about the CIA sources. He was asked if the Nixon administration believed it had access to what Mrs. Gandhi was saying at Cabinet meetings.
“We believe we had access to Prime Minister Gandhi`s opinions from various sources,“ Kissinger replied. “I don`t want to get into sources.“
Nevermind Kissinger, his sources were recently revealed through diplomatic and intelligence records released by Wikileaks special project.
Wikileaks Special Project K
The Kissinger Cables
The Kissinger Cables comprise more than 1.7 million US diplomatic records for the period 1973 to 1976, including 205,901 records relating to former US Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger. Dating from January 1, 1973 to December 31, 1976 they cover a variety of diplomatic traffic including cables, intelligence reports and congressional correspondence. They include more than 1.3 million full diplomatic cables and 320,000 originally classified records. These include more than 227,000 cables classified as “CONFIDENTIAL” and 61,000 cables classified as “SECRET”. Perhaps more importantly, there are more than 12,000 documents with the sensitive handling restriction “NODIS” or ‘no distribution’, and more than 9,000 labelled “Eyes Only”.
At around 700 million words, the Kissinger Cables collection is approximately five times the size of WikiLeaks’ Cablegate. The raw PDF data is more than 380 Gigabytes in size and is the largest WikiLeaks publication to date.
Subramaniyan Swamy
In a recent revelation, WikiLeaks has released cables containing information about how the United States managed to scoop details about late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s election strategies and health details during the Emergency in 1977 from Subramanian Swamy.
The cables also gives details about how Swamy acted as the Indian source of information for US officials.
The report states that Indira Gandhi was ‘indisposed’ and wanted to set March as the election date to square things in her favour in light of her alleged bad health (according to the report, she was suffering from terminal cancer).
Below is the full text of WikiLeaks report:
Cable 1977STATE024965_c – PRIME MINISTER’S HEALTH
Several reports suggesting the prime minister may be in ill health have come to the department’s attention in recent days. It has been reported Jagjivan Ram wished her speedy recovery in his letter of resignation. An AFP report from Delhi February 2 cites an informed Indian source to effect she is in poor health. However those close to her are also reported by AFP as explaining that she is slightly indisposed. A further report from Delhi indicates she looked tired and drawn in responding to Jagjivan Ram’s announcement. Subramanian Swamy suggested to department officer ten days ago that he heard Mrs. Gandhi was prompted to set the March election date because she wanted to square things away in view of her failing health. Newsweek has a story she has terminal cancer and the surprise election call was a way to assure the quick succession of Sanjay in the next 60-90 days.
Complicity in Rajiv Gandhi Assassination
It should also be noted that the Jain Commission Report included startling depositions and intelligence intercepts that indicate that Dr Subramanian Swamy and former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar, had prior knowledge of a threat to Rajiv but did not react in a “timely manner”. Even the files containing intercepted messages from foreign intelligence agencies, said to be addressed to Chandraswami and Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy, were destroyed by senior officials in the PMO. Intelligence sources say one file contained intercepted messages as well as details of the movements of Subramanian Swamy and Chandraswami on assassination day.
However there were others also who had sought allegiance with CIA.
In a sensational revelation, the WikiLeaks have alleged that firebrand socialist leader George Fernandes had sought funds from the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to overthrow Indira Gandhi’s government in the 1970s.
According to the cables, at the height of Emergency, the trade union leader sought funding from CIA and the French government to sustain his anti-government activities.
The US cables said Fernandes, made this request for funding during a meeting with the French Labour Attaché Manfred Turlach on or around November 1, 1975.
He asked Turlach for help from the French government. When this was refused, he asked Turlach if he could suggest CIA contacts, the WikiLeaks said.
During the meeting, Fernandes claimed there were 300 people with him engaged in sabotage activities and that they had “already blown up two railway bridges in the south and a bridge between Bombay and Pune”.
India – A Spies Paradise
David Alan Hume was a veteran British Spy Chief in India who studied intelligence reports of past 35 years literally 35000 documents filed by British officers all across India, Indian social settings, castes hierarchies and their abilities to fight their interrelationships. His recommendation was there should be an Indian intermediate agency (agencies) that can claim superior to all other Indians and handle the anger of Indian masses of BOTI. He recommended these agencies be filled with absolutely loyal English educated anglophile Indians who must be monitored by seasoned British intelligence officers (both British and Indian origin specially trained for this purpose) for not wavering from their goal.
Even if they waver these embedded spies will discredit them. The sole purpose of these agencies is to divert the attention and anger of population of Occupied Territories towards diversionary fratricidal ideologies promoted by the organizations set up by the chosen men of British Intelligence.
For this a careful selection and nurturing of candidates from young age was necessary. British used the schools set up for this purpose. First they erased the memory of cultural history of the young boys. Then they indoctrinated them that British and European systems were superior. Later they were instructed to save the heathen or the poor Indians suffering from the lack of enlightenment.
India & the Grand Blueprint for CIA’s Resurrection
The CIA is expanding its operations in India. The CIA is sending Indian-origin and south Asian-origin officers to India so that they can merge better.
The basic approach [of the CIA] will be to befriend senior bureaucrats, senior military officials, politicians to find what our intentions are and what we are planning to do.
The spooks in the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, are tracking virtually everything from Parliament proceedings to political parties to arms deals to internal security issues.
CIA’s best men are secretly travelling through different states and are setting up networks to watch political developments and separatist movements. These networks will seek information about India’s nuclear arsenal and military modernisation. They will also keep their eyes peeled for terrorists who might prove dangerous to the US. Based on all this information, Langley will predict India’s strategy viz-a-viz Pakistan and China.
This process culminated by 1890 in creation of three organizations and dozens of movements. Indian National Congress directly under David Alan Hume, Hind MahaSabha, Indian Muslim League. Many movements like Brahmosamaj, AryaSamaj, Theosophical Society etc are also offshoot of this strategy. For most of these leaders it was a time pass in spare time to discuss about the plight of fellow Indians about whom they never know and find solutions with the British leaders in summer and Christmas parties. The intellectual void this generation experienced under British education made them neither to live with their own brothers Indians whom they thought inferior not let them live with British whom they held superior. This is the lost generation of India from 1890–1950 and unfortunately they led our fates for next six decades.
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