As if the placards and the protests in and outside Parliament House were not enough, they also took off on a jatha along the east coast of India to protect it from American contamination. Commissar Karat went on national TV to pronounce that a ship that carried nuclear weapons and had been involved in killing innocent people in Iraq was not welcome in Indian waters.

Speak for yourself, Comrade Commissar. Yet, in an odd sort of way the communists have done us a favour by making such a hoo-ha over last week’s naval exercise in which Indian warships sailed alongside those of the United States, Australia, Japan and Singapore. It is time to take sides as we approach the sixth anniversary of 9/11. And, I have not the slightest hesitation in admitting that I would be very nervous if India was not on the side of the United States because it is the side of democracy and open societies. No hesitation in admitting either that I would think it a terrible shame if we fell back into the crowd we used to hang out with before. I could be wrong, but I seem to remember we were the only democratic country in the non-aligned club.

Our friends during the Cold War were a truly grim bunch. To a country they were totalitarian states of one kind or other and we gained nothing from them except an inferiority complex and a chip on our shoulder that remains embarrassingly evident. A treaty makes us fear that our ‘sovereignty’ is in terminal danger and a naval exercise has some of our citizens running around hysterically in fear of the US taking over the Bay of Bengal.

If it were just the Marxists who were behaving in this way we could ignore them, our problem arises when ideologically unaffiliated commentators start talking about a ‘New Great Game’. This is when the discussion deteriorates into worrying silliness. There is no new Great Game and there are no mysterious designs that lie beneath the naval exercise or our increasing closeness to the US. It should be clear to anyone who is not ideologically blind that we live in troubled times and in a very difficult neighbourhood.

Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh are all on the boil for jehadi reasons and our old foe China is busy stirring the pot by aiding and abetting Pakistan in its unending enmity with us. In such a situation, if we can be friends with the most powerful country in the world, what do we lose?

America is not perfect but it is an open society that lives by values that India shares. When mistakes like Abu Ghraib are made, ordinary people have the right to express an opinion against their government. This is something to cherish and be proud of. Personally, I think the war on Iraq will go down as the worst foreign policy mistake the US ever made, but I believe it was a mistake made for the right reasons. It’s true you cannot force democracy down the throats of people who believe that all they need is Allah and the Koran but if the Middle East is to ever emerge out of the morass that it is it will one day need democracy and open societies. It’s a shame the American effort failed in Iraq but we know every detail of it because the American media told us.

Are there Chinese newspapers that have the right to criticise what Mao did in Tibet? Was there anyone who dared speak up when he let millions die of hunger so he could build his nuclear bomb? Are there Chinese newspapers that can criticise their government even today? What of Iran, whose nuclear ambitions our Marxist parties support? How many ordinary Iranians dare object to what their government does? How many dare protest when women are arrested for not covering their hair?

As we approach the terrible anniversary of 9/11, we need to remember that the global war on terrorism we have fought since then is a war to preserve the open societies and freedoms we cherish in a country like India. America is our natural ally in this war.