Huma Abedin emerges as Clinton’s closest personal confidant.
By Sujeet Rajan
NEW YORK: E-mails of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton during her time as secretary of state contain plenty of nuggets about India. Though there aren’t any major revelations, some of them shed light into US-India relations and the role played by various individuals in policymaking, especially in the early days of the Obama administration.
One person whose presence is ubiquitous throughout the nearly 2,900 pages of emails, released on Tuesday, is Indian American Huma Abedin, long-time Clinton aide who’s considered part of the extended Clinton family.
Related Story: India said ‘no’ to Holbrooke’s presence at meeting during Menon visit: Clinton email
As Politico wrote earlier this week, “Abedin’s omnipresent role organizing Clinton’s life was clearly on display [in the emails]: the late diplomat Richard Holbrooke, former Vice President Al Gore, Sen. Chuck Schumer and even former President Bill Clinton all phoned Abedin to reach Clinton. Abedin scheduled Clinton’s hair and medical appointments, knew where Clinton’s physical therapy instructions were to be found, delivered to her the sacred daily briefing book, and enjoyed full access to Clinton, at home or at work.”
Here are some of the interesting e-mails that concern India:
Who’s S.M. Krishna?
On May 23, 2009, a day after S.M. Krishna was named minister of external affairs following the United Progressive Alliance’s reelection victory, Abedin forwarded an email from the State Department’s Operations Center informing the change of guard at the Ministry of External Affairs: “S.M. Krishna has been officially named Indian Minister of External Affairs, succeeding Pranab Mukherjee, Embassy New Delhi reports.”
To which Clinton responds, “What do we know about him?”
Abedin writes back saying that Krishna is a “Long time politico, was close to rajiv ghandi [sic].” She further tells the secretary that Krishna’s bio will be sent. Abedin adds:
On election calls, SCA [State Department’s Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs] is recommending calls to Congress Party head Sonia Ghandi, outgoing FM Mukherjee, and incoming FM Krishna. We also have a call sheet for Prime Minister Singh in case you want to call. Please let me know if u want to do these calls tomorrow.
Strobe Talbott and nonproliferation
The e-mails also reveal that Clinton administration officials Strobe Talbott and Sandy Berger, two old Washington hands, served as intellectual sounding boards and unofficial advisors to Clinton during her time at the State Department.
Clinton and Talbott, the president of Brookings Institution, exchanged a series of emails prior to Clinton’s first trip to India.
… I’m so pleased you’re going to India. It was your trip to the region, with Chelsea, in 95 that established the momentum for Bill’s. I’ll always remember you talk (with slide show) at State after you returned. I’ll send you tomorrow my book “Engaging India” now that you’re reengaging them. Hard work ahead of on non-pro[liferation], as you know. Hope to see you before long.”
In his email, Talbott is trying to steer Clinton toward putting pressure on India on the non-proliferation issue. He sent her a copy of the op-ed he wrote in The Financial Times “about the climate/nonpro agenda with India, pegged to your trip.”
In another email, Clinton thanks Talbott for helping with a speech that was delivered at the Council on Foreign Relation on July 15, 2009, days before her India visit. She also praises the book profusely.
Strobe–I really appreciate your help on the speech, along w all of your advice. I just finished reading “Engaging India” which is a marvelous read and sober reminder of how hard this work is. You may have heard me plug it yesterday at CFR! So, thanks my friend, Hillary
In the CFR speech, Clinton specifically mentioned nonproliferation and Talbott’s book:
[there] are a number of areas where we would welcome Indian leadership and involvement that are difficult. There’s nothing easy about nonproliferation. Anybody who ever read Strobe Talbott’s book, “Engaging India,” knows that it’s a very difficult issue. But, we want to look at new ways for global and regional regimes on weapons of mass destruction, particularly nuclear.
Sandy Berger memo
Sandy Berger, who served as the National Security Advisor in the Clinton administration, was another informal adviser to Clinton. A memo he sent on October 3, 2009, clearly shows that Clinton had sought Berger’s advise on “how to gain leverage over the Pakistanis to move them to more aggressively pursue AQ [Al Qaeda].”
HRC: I wasn’t satisfied by my answer to your question about how to gain leverage over the Pakistanis to move them to more aggressively pursue AQ. I’ve thought about it some more and, while I have no silver bullet, here are some further thoughts.
The memo has several suggestion on how Pakistan can be pressured to crack down on Al Qaeda. It ends with this passage on India-Pakistan relations:
— Finally, there is the defining relationship with India. Are there measures that the Indians could take that would reduce Pakistani anxieties about the Indian front and thus better enable them to focus on threats to the East, including both AQ and anti-Indian militant groups like LET? Are there confidence building measures such as information sharing on troop movements that would both reduce uncertainty and support a Pakistani public narrative for a shift in emphasis from India to the militancy? To the extent India seeks to have Pakistan move more vigorously against the militants, they could see such steps as advancing their interests. This is tricky territory but may be worth pursuing.
Richard Verma’s many confirmation battles
The emails also reveal behind-the-scene efforts by the current US Ambassador to India Richard Verma in pushing the nominations of various State Department officials through the Senate, including that of Timothy Roemer, who served as American ambassador in Delhi from July 2009 to June 2011, and Indian American Rajiv Shah as the USAID administrator.
Verma was assistant secretary of state for legislative affairs from 2009 to 2011.
In an email dated July 15, 2009, Verma writes that Arizona’s Republican Sen. John Kyl “Is holding all of our nominees. Finds our last letter to him to be unresponsive. I’m working on this now.”
On November 17, 2009, Clinton writes to Verma and another aide that “Sen. Kerry told me he would do all he could to get Raj [Shah] confirmed, but he needs to meet him asap.”
In another email exchange, on December 24, Clinton informs Verma that [Sen.Kyle] told me that if the letters were delivered he would lift hold on Raj but not others.”
In the following mail, a seemingly impatient Clinton asks, “Can we still get him confirmed today?” Verma’s response: “He is clear and will be confirmed.”
The Senate confirmed Shah the same day.