At one time the best London clubs wouldn’t admit doctors or bankers because gentlemen didn’t feel comfortable with those who knew too much about their insides or their finances. People still don’t. In a wider sense this means that an element of confidentiality is necessary for harmonious relations, social in the case of clubs, diplomatic when it comes to what the Osama bin Laden of the Internet, Julian Assange, assures us are classified American government cables.
We must accept Assange’s word that the WikiLeaks material is genuine. But that still doesn’t remove other reasons for scepticism. If Peter Burleigh says Rahul Gandhi is a young man in a hurry or Steve White claims to have been shown stacks of money, those are personal opinions and experiences. Not absolute truth.
All the derogatory stuff about Jawaharlal Nehru that Loy Henderson, America’s first ambassador to India, sent back can be read in the Foreign Relations of the United States series which are now online. When I was researching Waiting for America: India and the US in the New Millennium at the East-West Center in Honolulu, I asked a senior State Department official about the impact of Henderson’s cables. He laughed and said everyone knew Henderson hated Nehru but loved New Delhi because nowhere else could he and his White Russian (Latvian) wife live in such style. If the history of the world depended on the length of Cleopatra’s nose, Assange’s disturbed childhood might explain his passionate commitment to “open government”.
There could be two explanations for Indians being so worked up over his revelations. First, they play right into the hands of a BJP which can only hope to get anywhere by blackening the Congress. Secondly, it’s psychological slavishness, like Shyam Sinha, a Bihar MP, vowing he wouldn’t wash for three months the hand Bill Clinton pumped.
We don’t know how seriously Washington took the cables. Nor do we know if the formal signatories were always aware of the contents since it’s customary for juniors to file in the boss’ name.
Assuming they were properly authenticated and treated seriously, much of the matter is like the gossip one hears amidst the tinkle of glass and munching of canapés on the cocktail party circuit. Pranab Mukherjee’s business links have always been a matter of speculation. Manmohan Singh’s liking for Montek Singh Ahluwalia is no secret. The quality of Sonia Gandhi’s leadership is constantly being questioned. This trivia doesn’t become gospel truth just because it emanates from the pens of American diplomats. One especially credulous report about Rahul Gandhi from a Robert O Blake, Jr echoes the know-all bombast of hardened habitués of the Delhi Press Club bar late on crowded Saturday nights.
I am reminded of Michael Shea, when he was Queen Elizabeth’s press secretary, trying to impress on tabloid press editors that “the public interest” was very different from “the public’s interest”. Bearing that in mind, some senior American diplomats would do a good job as gossip columnists.
There remains the question of motive. I have no doubt that no matter what lofty reasoning they trot out, “the public’s interest” rather than “the public interest” motivated WikiLeaks’ international newspaper partners, Der Spiegel, The New York Times, Le Monde, The Guardian and El País. Even the biggest and best of papers need readers and, even more, advertisers, to survive. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to learn that sales of The Hindu have shot up since it began covering the leaks. They make compelling reading.
When I first learnt of the cables I instinctively reverted to the belief that there is no such thing as a scoop in journalism. There are only leaks, witness Deep Throat who supplied the two Washington Post reporters with the Watergate dirt. Even if this is an exception and Assange is his own master, the timing is intriguing. Remember the Dange letters? Or Britain’s disclosure of Benazir Bhutto’s property there? Both played into local political battling. Indian publication of the American embassy’s cables may do just that.
We are told there are 6,000 more such cables and that the worst – or best, depending on your point of view – is still to come. All that can be said with certainty is that there may not be much government, leave alone open government, left by the time it’s over.
Trying to put my thoughts down, I missed out on today’s WikiLeaks ration. I must catch up if The Hindu isn’t sold out. As I said, they make fascinating reading of the Page Three genre.
