During Secretary of State Rice's recent visit to India, and important joint statement was issued on March 25th, portending a great geostrategic realingment.

Boldly stated, the US agreed to help India become a major world power. This forthright declaration received astonishingly little attention in the American press, but the Indians immediately understand its importance. India is a forthright ally against two of the greatest strategic threats facing America: Islamofascism and the rise of China. Both the US and India have ample self—interest in allying with one another. The fact that both countries are democracies and former members of the British Empire is icing on the cake.

Tom Donnelly, writing in the Daily Standard, explains much of the background, and also places in context the recent sale of F—16 aircraft to India's neighbor Pakistan.

Back when the American Thinker was in our experimental beta—site stage, we published an article hailing the emerging Indo—American alliance, and noting the crucial and nearly invisible factor of Israel in the equation. Practically nobody saw it, but it still lives way, way down at the bottom of our list of archived articles.

For reasons examined by Donnelly and other reasons examined in our article from late 2003, we are very bullish on the prospects for increasong closeness between India and the United States. This is a natural and highly welcome entente.

Thomas Lifson  3 31 05