Political India: Engaging America

Images of the Letters written by Indian MPs to Barack Obama, calling on the U.S. not to reconsider its decision to deny Narendra Modi an entry visa.

From The Hindu

With an eye on his re-election campaign, U.S. President Barack Obama in a speech to arguably the most powerful pro-Israel lobby sought to carefully balance his commitment to Israeli foreign policy interests with a stern note of caution to stem “too much loose talk of war” with Iran and his intention to continue pursuing diplomatic solutions with the Ahmedinejad regime.


Repeated references to his record of unwavering commitment to Israel's security got Mr. Obama applause every time from the 13000-strong crowd of delegates attending the American Israel Public Affairs Committee conference.

However Mr. Obama's remarks that “We all prefer to resolve [the Iran nuclear] issue diplomatically,” and that loose talk of an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities “has only benefited the Iranian government by driving up the price of oil,” were greeted with a cold silence from the delegates.

His speech comes a day before he is scheduled to meet with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House, where they will discuss a range of strategic issues of mutual concern, according to an official statement. Mr. Netanyahu will also meet with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other administration leaders in Washington.

Reacting to Mr. Obama's speech Mr. Netanyahu was said to have welcomed in particular the American President's statement on Israel's right to defend itself by itself against any threat. “I appreciate all of these statements and expect to discuss them tomorrow with President Obama,” Mr. Netanyahu was quoted as saying.

Mr. Obama's speech, which was littered with allusions to the U.S.' “unbreakable” bond with Israel including terms such as “sacrosanct,” “non-negotiable,” “unprecedented,” however reiterated his administration's belief in the two-state solution to the Palestine question.

He said, “I make no apologies for pursuing peace. Israel's own leaders understand the necessity of peace. Prime Minister Netanyahu, Defence Minister [Ehud] Barak, President [Shimon] Peres — each of them have [sic] called for two states, a secure Israel that lives side by side with an independent Palestinian state.”

That the President had the November elections in his mind became obvious when he hit back at Republican nominee candidates' past comments questioning Mr. Obama's commitment to Israel's security interests.

Mr. Obama said, “If during this political season... you hear some questions regarding my administration's support for Israel, remember that it's not backed up by the facts... Remember that the U.S.-Israel relationship is simply too important to be distorted by partisan politics.”

From The Hindu

In possibly its most optimistic economic forecast to date the White House this week revealed that its projected rate of growth of real gross domestic product of the United States was 3.1 per cent in 2012 and 2013, after it grew at 1.6 per cent during the four quarters of 2011.


The positive numbers were part of the Annual Report, titled “To Recover, Rebalance, and Rebuild,” compiled by the Council Of Economic Advisers and submitted by the CEA to President Barack Obama, who is then due to transmit the study to the U.S. Congress.

The study also said that the Administration “expects the employment situation to continue to improve in coming years,” specifically noting that the average monthly change in payroll employment was projected to rise from 146,000 in 2011 to about 167,000 in 2012.

“At this pace, two million jobs will be created during 2012, an increase from the 1.8 million created last year,” the report said, a number that CEA Chairman Alan Krueger underscored in a conference call with media on Friday.

Notwithstanding the downside risks that could emanate from the continuing financial crisis in the European Union economic area, the CEA expressed hope that such shocks that slowed growth in 2011 would not impede “an upturn in economic growth.” With the economy now operating below its capacity and many resources still underutilised, the CEA said that it had forecasted that the recovery would continue to gain strength.

Describing consumption growth during the early 2000s as unsustainable owing to “excess leverage” and arguing that this leverage had led to the financial crisis, Dr. Krueger noted that future growth in consumption would be in line with income and de-leveraging had already occurred in the U.S. economy.

Future growth would also be consistent with the President’s goal of doubling U.S. exports by 2015, Dr. Krueger noted, indicating that he expected export growth to be strong and to play a key role in driving overall GDP growth.

Looking towards longer-term trends in growth the CEA report however admits that real potential GDP was projected to rise 2.5 percent a year in 2007–2022, which is slower than the long-term historical growth rate of 3.2 percent a year.

“The projected slowdown in real potential GDP growth reflects the lower projected growth rate of the working-age population and the aging of the baby-boom cohort into retirement,” the report explained, adding that the financial crisis and the 2007–09 recession, in contrast, were expected to have little effect on the level of potential real GDP, because they were not expected to permanently reduce any of the demographically-determined elements of long-term growth.

From The Hindu

After months of haggling the Congress has agreed a proposal for extending President Barack Obama's payroll tax extension and unemployment benefits package for the rest of the calendar year, handing the administration an election-year victory and bringing relief to over 160 million middle-class Americans.


While Republicans have secured a partial success in the negotiations by not compromising on Mr. Obama's request to end tax breaks for millionaires, the breakthrough in Congress this week is likely to buoy the President's prospects heading into the November presidential elections. The latest deal will also help prevent a pay cut for doctors who accept Medicare patients.

Speaking earlier this week Mr. Obama had pressed Congress to agree the stimulus-like package saying, “When a plane is finally lifting off the ground, you don't ease up on the throttle. You keep the throttle on full. You keep going. And our plane is up there, but we're not at cruising altitude yet.”

Yet it is unlikely that the payroll tax cut deal alone will see the economy through its post-recession woes. Experts argued that given the absence of additional revenue from a higher tax rate for the wealthiest Americans, this week's tax cut would likely add $100 billion to the federal deficit. Combined with continuing economic instability in Europe the overall downside risks to the U.S. economy may still be high.

High deficit levels notwithstanding Mr. Obama continued to train his guns on boosting infrastructure and education-sector investments and putting more money in the pockets of ordinary Americans. At a briefing on Tuesday he said he had released a blueprint for an economy “built on new American manufacturing, and new American energy sources, and new skills and education for American workers, and a new focus on the values that are the bedrock of this country.”

From The Hindu

Reflecting the mixture of bonhomie and acerbic disagreement in the United States-China relationship, the ongoing talks between visiting Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping and his U.S. counterparts appeared to swing between warmth and cold dissonance — the latter mostly on the human rights question.


In the brief two days that he has spent here, Mr. Xi, acknowledged by U.S. officials to be the future head of the Chinese political system, has held talks with President Barack Obama, Vice-President Joseph Biden and other top officials, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defence Secretary Leon Panetta.

He has been accorded top honours during his time in Washington, including a 19-gun salute and an honour guard of 350 troops in an unprecedented Pentagon ceremony for a foreign Vice-President.

For all the repeated assertions by the White House that U.S.-China cooperation mattered for the entire world, specifically in North Korea and Iran, and for global issues such as climate change and nuclear security, it was the sharp divergence on a range of core issues that grabbed the headlines.

Leading the charge was Mr. Biden, who said at a State Department luncheon that the relationship could be mutually beneficial only “if the game is fair”. He added that in meetings with Mr. Xi, the U.S. had discussed its areas of greatest concern, “including the need to rebalance the global economy, protect intellectual property rights and trade secrets, to address China's undervalued exchange rate, to level the competitive playing field”. Mr. Biden also did not mince his words when he said the U.S. “strongly disagreed with China and Russia's veto of a resolution against the unconscionable violence being perpetrated by the Assad regime [in Syria]”.

The strongest words came from Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey, who said he believed “Someone in China is hacking into our systems and stealing technology and intellectual property, which at this point is a crime.”

Even President Obama did not hold back on candid critique of China's record on human rights, saying to Mr. Xi at the Oval Office, “On critical issues like human rights, we will continue to emphasise what we believe is the importance of recognising the aspirations and rights of all people.”

Mr. Xi, however, did not allow his interlocutors to escape unchallenged and hit back at Mr. Biden saying, “We should address each other's economic and trade concerns through dialogue and consultation, not protectionism.” In his rebuttal on the human rights questions, Mr. Xi struck a balanced tone, insisting China had made “tremendous and well-recognised” progress while admitting that there was “always room for improvement”.

From The Hindu

In the most unmistakable sign yet that he has thrown down the gauntlet to his Republican challengers in the November presidential election, United States President Barack Obama announced a dramatic increase in the tax rate for the wealthiest Americans, to about 30 per cent.


Though even with the increase the tax rate for Americans earning over $1 million annually will only fall in line with the standard income tax rate, Mr. Obama struck a defensive note about the increase in a budget speech in Virginia, doubtless anticipating obstructionism in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.

Mr. Obama said the U.S. had already spent nearly $1 trillion more on “what was intended to be a temporary tax cut” for the wealthiest two per cent of Americans — a reference to the Bush-era tax compromise — and that this was set to cost the economy another trillion dollars.

“Keep in mind, a quarter of all millionaires pay lower tax rates than millions of middle-class households... Warren Buffett pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. That's not fair. It doesn't make sense at a time when we've got to pull together to get the country moving,” said Mr. Obama.

Under his new budget proposals, taxes on dividend income for the wealthiest taxpayers could jump from 20 per cent to 36.9 per cent. Millionaire Republican presidential hopeful and former Massachusetts Governor, Mitt Romney, was said to have paid a tax rate closer to 15 per cent, holding much of his wealth in overseas tax havens.

Mr. Romney and Republicans in Congress were quick to attack Mr. Obama's 2013 budget proposals. Even before the budget document was unveiled on Monday Mr. Romney said it would not take “any meaningful steps toward solving our entitlement crisis”. Similarly Mr. Romney's rival and former U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum, said Mr. Obama had “failed to lead on budget deficit”.

In Congress, Paul Ryan, Republican Chair of the House Budget Committee, said Mr. Obama had put politics ahead of country, adding in a comment to the Associated Press “It seems like the President has decided again to campaign instead of govern... He's just going to duck the responsibility to tackle this country's fiscal problems.”

Mr. Obama appeared to anticipate some of these criticisms saying in his speech, “Some people go around, they say, well, the President is engaging in class warfare. That's not class warfare. That's common sense.”

Using himself as an example, Mr. Obama said, “I'm doing fine. We don't need the tax breaks. You need them. You're the ones who see your wages stall. You're the one whose costs of everything from college to groceries has gone up. You're the ones who deserve a break.”

From The Hindu

From The Hindu

 

From The Hindu

Exerting additional downward pressure on an already-muted rate of economic growth in the United States economy the U.S. Commerce Department cut third quarter growth estimates for 2011 from 2.5 per cent to 2 per cent.

The bad news on the growth front compounded Monday's failure in the Congressional supercommittee on deficit reduction, as a gridlock over tax increases and cuts to welfare programmes forestalled a deal on spending cuts to the tune of $1.2 trillion.

In a statement the Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) said that real gross domestic product increased at an annual rate of 2 per cent in the third quarter of 2011, that is from the second quarter to the third quarter, as per a second estimate of the BEA.

In an “advanced” estimate of the growth rate issued in October the BEA had noted that the increase in real GDP was 2.5 per cent; yet it justified the estimate downgrade because “The GDP estimates released today are based on more complete source data than were available for the ‘advance' estimate issued last month.”

Sector level

Deconstructing the various components of the latest growth figure, the BEA said that the rise in real GDP in the third quarter “primarily reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures non-residential fixed investment, exports, and federal government spending that were partly offset by negative contributions from private inventory investment and state and local government spending.” Imports, the BEA added, increased during the period.

At the sector level, final sales of computers were said to have added 0.22 percentage points to the third-quarter change in real GDP after adding 0.07 percentage points to the second quarter change. Similarly, motor vehicle output reportedly contributed 0.18 percentage points following a negative figure of 0.10 percentage point in the second quarter change.

The 0.5 percentage point drop in the most recent estimate of the third quarter increase in real GDP implied that GDP was $15 billion lower than the advance estimate and this lower value primarily reflected downward revisions to private inventory investment, non-residential fixed investment, and personal consumption expenditures, the BEA said.

From The Hindu

From The Hindu

When is a stimulus package not a stimulus package? When it's been paid for. At least that's what United States President Barack Obama hoped to underscore when he unveiled a $447-billion plan before the U.S. Congress, a combination of tax code and expenditure reforms aimed at creating an undefined number of jobs and jumpstarting the ailing U.S. economy.

“It will provide a jolt to an economy that has stalled, and give companies confidence that if they invest and if they hire, there will be customers for their products and services. You should pass this jobs plan right away,” the President said on Thursday night.

In a move that surely bolstered his centrist credentials, the President sought to woo his truculent Republican opposition in Congress through what the White House has labelled the American Jobs Act, a proposal that remained silent on actual job-creation projections and details of the financing mathematics.

What is known is that the plan, which was obviously forged in the cauldron of the 2012 presidential election, included a “centrepiece” $240-billion payroll tax cut for employers and employees; a $50-billion proposal to invest in highways, railroad and airport modernisation; a $10-billion infusion to Mr. Obama's idea of a national infrastructure bank; a $35-billion initiative to stem the layoffs of nearly 280,000 public sector workers; a $30-billion project to modernise 35,000 public schools; a $49-billion scheme to extend insurance payments for the long-term unemployed; and a “returning heroes” tax credit to “spur hiring of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans”.

While he pleaded no fewer than 17 times that Congress should “pass this bill,” there was little doubt that Mr. Obama had deftly manoeuvred to put Republicans on back-foot.

His speech in the Capitol saw him concede to some of their demands such as expenditure reform in Democrat-favoured Medicare; yet he equally pressed them to yield ground on their top priority — blocking any form of tax hike on the wealthiest Americans.

Taking a dig at continuing partisan logjam on Capitol Hill, Mr. Obama also warned the U.S. Congress that it was short on time.

While some legislators may have decided that party differences could only be resolved them at the ballot box, he warned, “The next election is 14 months away... the people who hired us to work for them... don't have the luxury of waiting 14 months. Some of them are living week to week, paycheque to paycheque, even day to day. They need help, and they need it now.”

In particular Mr. Obama kept up the pressure on Republicans, presently under the sway of the fiscally ultra-conservative Tea Party, to stop insisting on tax loopholes for oil companies and tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires.

“This isn't political grandstanding... [or] class warfare. This is simple math... [and] these are real choices,” said Mr. Obama.

For all its bells and whistles, however, the American Jobs Act has received a lukewarm, mixed response from different constituents.

Republicans such as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called the initiative “a re-election plan,” saying, “It's time the President starts thinking less about how to describe his policies differently and more time thinking about devising new policies.”

Even liberal economist and Nobel laureate Paul Krugman criticised the scale of the proposals, arguing that the “lingering effects of the housing bust and the overhang of household debt from the bubble years are creating a roughly $1 trillion per year hole in the U.S. economy, and this plan... would fill only part of that hole.”

From The Hindu

Tea Party darling Michele Bachmann, the winner of Saturday's pre-caucus straw poll in Iowa, is a supporter of the Dominionism sect, “which says Christians should rule the world”. Another frontrunner that joined the race over the weekend, Texas Governor Rick Perry, immediately launched an attack on Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, calling him “treasonous” for wanting to print more money during the recession. And establishment-favourite Mitt Romney, a multimillionaire and former head of private equity firm Bain Capital, earlier joked with unemployed people that he too was currently unemployed.

These are some of the credentials of the leading candidates in the still-wide-open field for the nomination of the Republican presidential candidate in 2012.

While the actual caucuses, through which the nomination would be finalised, are not set to occur until early next year, the pre-caucus straw polls such as the one in Iowa are designed to build momentum for the debate and whittle down the range of candidates in the contest.

While Ms. Bachmann, a Republican Party outsider who is considered further to the right than current front runner Mr. Romney, struggled to answer queries about her remark that she was “submissive to her husband,” she outshone former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, who later announced that he would retire from the race.


A surprise result was second-place victory of party stalwart Ron Paul, a libertarian who has won approval of his party's mainstream for his “neo-isolationist foreign policy” yet has also been labelled a closet Democrat by some.

Others in the race, including Herman Cain, former CEO of Godfather Pizza Company, and Rick Santorum, former Senator from Pennsylvania, failed to generate any buzz and face declining prospects as 2011 rolls on.

While the candidates engaged in a debate that was at times fiercely critical, all of them were united in their condemnation of President Barack Obama, attacking all his policies from healthcare reforms described as “Obamacare” to Mr. Obama's purportedly failed plans to create more jobs in the ailing U.S. economy.

The President meanwhile launched some of his own 2012 campaign activities this week, travelling to Iowa, Minnesota and Illinois on a three-day economic bus tour in the Midwest that aimed to discuss “ways to grow the economy, strengthen the middle class and accelerate hiring in communities and towns across the nation and hear directly from Americans including small business owners, local families, private sector leaders, rural organizations, and government officials.”

From The Hindu

United States President Barack Obama on Wednesday said that he strongly condemned the “outrageous attacks in Mumbai,” and his thoughts and prayers were with the wounded and those who had lost loved ones.


In a statement Mr. Obama added that the U.S. government continued to “monitor the situation, including the safety and security of our citizens.” “India is a close friend and partner of the U.S.,” the President added, underscoring that “the American people will stand with the Indian people in times of trial, and we will offer support to India's efforts to bring the perpetrators of these terrible crimes to justice.”

From The Hindu

While sociologists have documented the heightened consumption of superhero comics and movies during hard times, this weekend the United States turned to a more ordinary champion of American family values – fathers.

And it is U.S President Barack Obama who has been at the forefront of a sustained effort to underscore the importance of fatherhood for a generation of children that has likely seen tremendous economic pressures erode the very foundations of the American family.

With nearly one in ten persons unemployed and the march of home foreclosures across states continuing unabated, a sense of hopelessness has gripped the middle class in recent months as the government seems to be unable reverse these trends.

The impact on children, especially, has been exacerbated by the reality for many military families where U.S. engagement in conflicts overseas has often required servicemen and women to spend months of continuous service away from their families.

It was with this backdrop, and reflecting upon his own fatherless upbringing, that Mr. Obama said on the occasion of Father’s Day this Sunday, “I grew up without my father around... I felt his absence. And I wonder what my life would have been like had he been a greater presence.”

Acknowledging the turbulent times for ordinary families, Mr. Obama said that while life was tough for a lot of Americans today and “more and more kids grow up without a father figure,” every father had a personal responsibility to do right by his children.

Admitting that the recession had taken a harsh toll, Mr. Obama said “If you’re out of a job or struggling to pay the bills, doing whatever it takes to keep the kids healthy, happy and safe can understandably take precedence over all else.”

Among those elements of parenting that he had understood to be the most important were the need to give children quality time, the need for structure, including self-discipline and responsibility, and the need for unconditional love, he said.

The President touched upon some of his administration’s efforts to support fathers across the nation, in particular highlighting its work with community and faith-based groups focused on fatherhood, its partnerships with businesses to offer opportunities for fathers to spend more time with their children outside the office, and its outreach to military chaplains to help deployed fathers connect with their children.

Many of these efforts were outlined in detail at the government website for fathers, Fatherhood.gov, Mr. Obama noted.

On a personal note the President also proudly announced that he had taken up a “second job,” as Assistant Coach for his daughter Sasha’s basketball team. He said that on Sundays, he would get the team together to practice, and he had help coach the games on a few occasions.

“It was a lot of fun – even if Sasha rolled her eyes when her dad voiced his displeasure with the refs,” he added, describing fatherhood as “my hardest, but always my most rewarding job.”

From The Hindu

Did not want to leave anything to chance

United States Navy SEALs were authorised by President Barack Obama to engage in a fierce fire-fight with the Pakistani military during their clandestine operation against al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden on May 1, it has emerged.

As per an initial plan, the elite commando unit would have relied on backup from two combat-ready helicopters positioned on the Afghan side of the Durand line. However as it would take them 90 minutes or more to reach the primary strike team in Abbottabad, Mr. Obama stepped in and changed that plan at the last minute, insisting that the backup choppers and troops fly deep into Pakistani territory as well.

The President's decision to expand the size of the commando unit flying to Pakistan suggests that he was “willing to risk a military confrontation with a close ally in order to capture or kill the leader of al- Qaeda,” reports here said.

Even as U.S.-Pakistan relations sank to a new low in the aftermath of the raid, officials speaking on condition of anonymity said two further teams of specialists were on standby: “One to bury bin Laden if he was killed, and a second composed of lawyers, interrogators and translators in case he was captured alive.”

While sources said these teams were likely to have been stationed on the U.S. aircraft carrier Carl Vinson in the North Arabian Sea, they conceded that a running battle in Abbottabad between almost 80 U.S. commandos and the Pakistani law enforcement authorities would have “set off an even larger breach with the Pakistanis than has taken place”.

Speaking to the New York Times, one senior administration official said, “Their instructions were to avoid any confrontation if at all possible. But if they had to return fire to get out, they were authorised to do it.”

An official also explained that while the Americans may have been able to talk their way out of a potential confrontation with the Pakistani military or even local police, “given our difficult relationship with Pakistan right now, the President did not want to leave anything to chance.” It was this concern for the safety of the SEALs that prompted Mr. Obama to insist on “extra forces if they were necessary,” officials were reported as saying.

The NYT also quoted officials saying in planning for the possible capture of Osama it was decided they would take him aboard a Navy ship to “preclude battles over jurisdiction”.

The aim of that exercise would be to rapidly conduct a preliminary interrogation for information that might help prevent an imminent terror attack or pinpoint other al-Qaeda operatives.

The aftermath of Osama's killing has witnessed a spike in tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan, yet both sides have sought to limit the hostilities in some regards. Unconfirmed reports this week suggested that American investigators would soon be allowed to interview Osama's three widows, currently in Pakistani custody.

Simultaneously, the Obama administration put out a slew of statements affirming Pakistan's vital role as an ally in the U.S. continuing fight against terrorism.

However, even the publicly expressed resentment over the raid appeared to take on a theatrical air when some reports revealed that the former U.S. President, George W. Bush, and the former President of Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf, had struck a secret deal in late 2001 whereby a unilateral, clandestine U.S. strike against Osama on Pakistani soil would be permitted by Pakistani authorities.

The Guardian, quoting both serving and retired Pakistani and U.S. officials, reported that as part of this deal after the U.S. strike, “Pakistan would vociferously protest the incursion,” and while there would be a “hue and cry,” in Pakistan over the raid the Pakistani military establishment would not actually attempt to stop U.S. forces from conducting it.

From The Hindu

Even as United States President Barack Obama and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh spoke on Monday about the next round of the bilateral Strategic Dialogue, Indian organisations in the U.S. and Indian-Americans have been pushing for even stronger commercial ties between the two countries.

Earlier this year the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) unveiled an insightful and wide-ranging survey showing evidence that India-based companies with U.S. operations saved, through their acquisition of U.S. firms, 2585 jobs from being eliminated during the global economic downturn.

On that occasion the Indian Ambassador to the U.S., Meera Shankar, noted that these companies, which span a diverse range of sectors and had operations across 40 U.S. states, had not only generated and sustained thousands of direct and indirect jobs in the U.S., but had also “contributed to the global competitiveness of U.S. companies.”

The survey’s results showed progress made since Mr. Obama’s November 2010 visit to India, which saw the inking of trade and commercial deals exceeding $14.9 billion in value with $9.5 billion in U.S. exports leading to the creation of an estimated 53,670 U.S. jobs.

Last week there was yet another connection made between India and one U.S. state in particular – Texas. With a view to giving a fillip to trade ties between India and the “Lone Star” state, several members of the Texas Congressional delegation had a dinner meeting with Ms. Shankar.

Ashok Mago a businessman and a prominent Indian-American who was involved in some of the discussions leading to the Indo-U.S. nuclear agreement, was one of the prime organisers of the event, which to him was a step towards promoting even more trade between Texas and India.

Pointing out that Texas was a leading U.S. state for exports and agriculture and also had a large number of Fortune Five Hundred companies, Mr. Mago said in comments to The Hindu, “Business and political leaders in India should look into the opportunities Texas has to offer.”

Describing the event he added, “The Indian Ambassador was delighted to have the opportunity to exchange ideas with nine Congressmen – Pete Sessions, Mike Conaway, Sylvester Reyes, Sheila Jackson Lee, Ted Poe, Pete Olson, Bill Flores, Blake Farenthold and Francisco Canseco.”

Ms. Shankar was said to have not only hosted these nine Congressmen but also met individually with Congressmen Mac Thornberry, Eddie Bernice Johnson, Ralph Hall, Joe Barton and Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison at their offices.

From The Hindu


‘This continues to be a tough fight'

Even as there was a growing clamour of voices questioning the legality of the United States entering Pakistan's territory without notice and killing an unarmed Osama Bin Laden last Sunday, U.S. President Barack Obama struck a defiant note on terror group al-Qaeda on Friday, saying “We have cut off their head and we will ultimately defeat them.”

Speaking to soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, scarcely five days after Navy SEALS stormed bin Laden's walled compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, the President said that the U.S. was making progress in its “central goal in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and that is disrupting and dismantling... al-Qaeda.”

After a visit a day earlier to New York City, where Mr. Obama spoke with the families of victims of the 9/11 terror attacks, he said at the military base, “I came here for a simple reason — to say thank you on behalf of America.” Adding that this was “an historic week in the life of our nation,” he said the terrorist leader who struck our nation on 9/11 “will never threaten America again”.

Mr. Obama also confirmed that he had met Admiral William McRaven, a former SEAL, and commander of the Joint Special Operations Command, and also the members of the SEAL team involved in the operation.

He said, “Today... I had the privilege of meeting the extraordinary Special Ops folks who honoured [Mr. Obama's promise to “never forget” those lost in the 9/11 attacks]. It was a chance for me to say – on behalf of all Americans and people around the world — “Job well done.”

Mr. Obama also touched upon the Af-Pak region, noting that the U.S. was “making progress in Afghanistan... taking insurgents and their leaders off the battlefield and helping Afghans reclaim their communities.”

Further, across Afghanistan the Taliban's momentum had been broken and they had been pushed out of their strongholds. “We are building the capacity of Afghans, partnering with communities and police and security forces, which are growing stronger.” Mr. Obama said that this “This continues to be a very tough fight,” and in the coming months U.S. forces would start transferring responsibility for security to Afghan authorities reducing U.S. troop numbers.

Arguing that the planned long-term partnership with the Afghan people would help ensure that “al-Qaeda can never again threaten America from that country, Mr. Obama reiterated, “The bottom line is this: Our strategy is working, and there's no greater evidence of that than justice finally being delivered to Osama bin Laden.”