HARD CHOICES
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Simon & Schuster;
656 pages; $35
If there were still any doubts about Hillary Clinton's intention to stand for US president in 2016, her latest book, Hard Choices, should finally lay them to rest. This is a very carefully measured account of her four years as US secretary of state from 2008 to 2012, with tensions with the Barack Obama White House only discreetly hinted at. We know from other sources that the bitterness and bad blood from the campaign for Democratic Party nomination lingered on in the aftermath, but Hard Choices portrays a more convivial relationship. As she herself says, in the early pages, "... I also knew the press would be looking - even hoping - for any signs of discord between me and the White House. I intended to deprive them of that story." The book also describes a relationship of mutual trust and respect between her and husband, Bill Clinton, with no hint of the storms that buffeted it in the wake of his serial philandering in the White House. Here he appears, as always, supportive - a friend, a mentor and a guide. These are good credentials for the future first family, this time led by the better half.
There is little doubt that Ms Clinton was an energetic, articulate and experienced interlocutor for her country. Her understanding of the challenges confronting the US, the limits of the country's power and influence, and the importance of political engagement with friends and adversaries alike comes across clearly in the book. She played a weak hand with skill, dealing with a transformed international landscape and despite serving a "retrenchment president". She supported the US troop surge in Afghanistan, but was rightly sceptical of the president's insistence on announcing a date for subsequent full withdrawal. Why show your hand to your adversaries?
One of the more fascinating chapters of the book is on China. Ms Clinton paints an insightful portrait of her chief interlocutor, former state councillor Dai Bingguo, who is well known in India as the Chinese Special Representative for the India-China boundary talks. Those of us who have dealt with Mr Dai would agree with Ms Clinton's high regard for his keen intellect and negotiating skills, combining an easy affability with tough assertion of China's perceived national interests. Ms Clinton is also perceptive in drawing attention to China becoming a " 'selective stakeholder', picking and choosing when to act like a responsible great power and when to assert the right to impose its will on its smaller neighbours". She confirms that in deliberations with the US in 2010, the Chinese had begun to describe their territorial claims in the South China Sea as a "core interest", alongside Taiwan and Tibet. Though she believes that China has overplayed its hand in this case, more recent events indicate that China has been successful in changing the "facts on the ground (or here on the seas)" through a process of relentless attrition.
Ms Clinton is proud of her handling of the case of the blind Chinese dissident, Chen Guangcheng, who sought shelter in the US embassy in Beijing, but was later allowed to travel to the US with his immediate family. The drama played itself out even as Ms Clinton was in Beijing for an official dialogue, and risked derailing relations. This was somewhat of an uncharacteristic gamble on Ms Clinton's part and the White House was clearly not amused. The detailed account is clearly designed to burnish the author's human rights credentials.
Pakistan deserves a chapter of its own, and that reflects how large the country looms in US calculations. India is seen off with barely a paragraph. Ms Clinton did some plain speaking during her visit to Pakistan in October 2009 and publicly alleged that the "masterminds of this terrorist syndicate" - that is Al Qaeda - were all in Pakistan. She added that she found it hard to believe that "nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn't get them if they really wanted to .... ". This then leads to her account of the Abbottabad raid in May 2011 and the assassination of Osama bin Laden, which in turn substantiates her earlier allegations and justifies the decision not to associate Pakistan in any way with the planned raid. In her view, America's relationship with Pakistan was "strictly transactional, based on mutual interest, not trust". The problem is that these transactions often spill over negatively into Indo-US relations, which do not as yet command a high enough strategic or transactional value for Washington. While Ms Clinton acknowledges the democratic values the two countries share and India's role in the Asia-Pacific region, the remarks appear mostly perfunctory.
One of the final chapters in Ms Clinton's book deals with the climate change summit at Copenhagen in December 2009, which I too had the privilege to attend. Former Chinese premier Wen Jiabao had invited leaders from Brazil, India and South Africa to decide what they should say about the failure to reach an accord at the summit and their game plan for the future. Although Mr Wen informed us that an hour later he was scheduled to meet the US president, our meeting lasted longer than expected and Mr Obama and his delegation arrived before our deliberations concluded. It is true that the Chinese security barred entry into the room, but when Mr Obama called out to Mr Wen, the former Chinese premier welcomed Mr Obama to join. I do not recall any forced entry or Ms Clinton slipping into the room under the arms of the Chinese security, as she narrates. I suppose a little spicing is par for the course.
Hard Choices is neither a gripping read nor a critical evaluation of Mr Obama's foreign policy. It is an insider's narrative, but without the insights one may expect from an intelligent and experienced political figure. Ms Clinton wishes to convey that she possesses a safe pair of hands and has the ability to make hard choices. She will face plenty if and when she is president of the US.
The reviewer, a former foreign secretary, is chairman of the National Security Advisory Board and RIS and a senior fellow at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi
