2. As Seen from New Delhi:

...Russia's bloody suppression of the Hungarian Revolution brought the first slight doubt about the true nature of Soviet intentions...

...As Nehru clearly stated, India feels that "there is very great need to lower mounting tensions in Southeast Asia...

...This is why it has swung its support behind the three-part British compromise proposal which seeks 1) an immediate resummoning in New Delhi of the Indian-Polish-Canadian International Control Commission...

...It would seem, therefore, that neutrality and non-involvement in military blocs is a very difficult proposition for those countries which unfortunately have to live on the periphery of the Communist empire...

...Now that the United States strongly favors it, Nehru feels Khrushchev should help try to stop the fighting...

...The Indian Government, while it attempts to stick to the letter of international agreements, obviously is not altogether unaware of the pressures to which smaller Asian countries are subject — pressures sometimes disguised as local revolts and symptoms of local discontent...

...This marks the first time since independence that India has placed this type of onus squarely on Moscow's shoulders...

...Then came Tibet, aggressive moves in the Himalayas, the constantly stepped-up activities of the Pathet Lao in Laos and the Congo explosion...

...There are, of course, differences of opinion between the U. S. and India on the extent of external interference in Laos and even on the validity of its existing Government...

...Now New Delhi is warning Moscow that any further advance toward the Mekong river basin by the pro-Communist Pathet Lao will bring the armed forces of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization countries into the Laotian conflict—and India is leaving the Soviet Union in no doubt as to where its sympathies lie...

...This also explains why Prime Minister Nehru, responding to an urgent communication from President Kennedy—personally conveyed by Ambassador at Large Averell Harriman — quickly informed Moscow of his support for the British proposal and urged its hasty adoption...

...Meanwhile, Nehru has again emphasized that the whole basis of the original Geneva Agreement on Indochina is that the countries there must not join any military bloc and must remain neutral...

...Underlining the extraordinary unanimity of opinion here on this subject is the Indian press, which has been lavishing editorial praise on President Kennedy's Laos stand and on the spirit of his message to Nehru...

...India and the United States made new overtures to each other...

...One leading newspaper, the Indian Express, declared that the message "draws on a source of strength hitherto untapped in relations between nations...

...But on what now needs to be done there appears to be little or no argument between India, Britain and the United States...

...It is the second time since independence that India has seen eye to eye on an international crisis with the United States...

...Nehru's concept of neutrality includes the setting up of an administration which is honest, sound and as far as is possible, based on the will of the people...

...Sharokh Sabavala regularly reports on Indian affairs for The New Leader...

...And, ironically, the main engineer of this collapse was not a democracy, but the Peoples' Republic of China—aided and abetted in this country by the Communist party of India...

...India, moreover, put forward this plan because it seemed to be close to some original Russian proposals and New Delhi had reason to believe that Moscow would accept it...

...In London, the colored peoples suddenly discovered they had come of age and were being treated as adults—and friends—by former imperialists...

...But Hungary was in Europe, it was not a colony in the strictest sense of that word, and Asia was soon preoccupied with British and French adventures in Egypt...

...the first time, also this year, was on the Congo situation...

...President Kennedy's election gave a powerful fillip to this urge: to Indians, it once again began to appear that Democracy was prepared to do what it said...

...This was followed by Queen Elizabeth's enormously successful visit to India and South Africa's quitting the Commonwealth, giving a new meaning to the Commonwealth concept...

...Indians are quick to point out that India and the other two members of the International Control Commission eventually were pushed out of Indochina, because the governments there considered the commission ineffective...

...Barely a decade has passed since India warned the Western powers that the crossing of the 38th parallel in Korea would bring Communist China into the war...

...Moreover, it was pushed out at a time when the Laotian Prime Minister, if memory serves correctly, was none other than Prince Souvanna Phouma, a very recent New Delhi visitor for whom India has much sympathy...

...This evolution in Indian foreign policy is due as much to its confidence in President Kennedy's new approach to world affairs as to India's own recent and sad experiences with international Communism...

...Everything Moscow had painstakingly built up finally collapsed...

...Indian visitors returning from Laos ruefully admit, however, that successive administrations either are unable or unwilling to administer for the people's benefit or to insure that the aid that comes in from Western sources will go where it is intended to go...

...In fact, as British Foreign Secretary Lord Home has pointed out, London's proposal is based on an Indian plan...

...After 1947, when India and Pakistan won their freedom, Moscow invariably managed to emerge from every period of international tension as the champion of the underdog, the friend of all colonial peoples and the upholder of the peace...

...and 3) the calling of a 14-nation international conference to again lay down the terms under which Laotian neutrality is to be guaranteed and maintained...

...India and Britain moved closer together...

...Thus, by 1960, the Indian Government and people were more than ready to moderate their neutrality sufficiently to make common cause, whenever and wherever possible, with all those nations and peoples who believed in what they believed in, who basically spoke the same language...

...Agreement on Laos is a natural corollary of all this...

...2) an immediate cease-fire in Laos...