Current global developments indicate four major trends relevant to India. First, with a booming economy and no foreign threat, American policy is focussed on maintaining a worldwide economic system which can benefit its constituents. Shocks or even distractions to geopolitical stability are to be avoided. Hence the US Senate voted overwhelmingly in favour of China's entry to the World Trade Organisation despite extreme disquiet about China's record on human rights or its threat to Taiwan.

Second, there is growing unease over American domination in world affairs or US-inspired solutions to local problems, from EU to Japan to Russia, albeit for different reasons. This is pushing nations to re-work external relations on practical self-interest. This is why Israel-PLO could not reach an accord despite days of intense US cajoling, and why the Koreas reached an entente of sorts without US sponsorship. In the last few years there has been a rush of regional summits and cross-border ministerial visits, indicating initial steps to circumvent the US.

Third, in many parts of the world where key US interests are at stake there is increasing instability, overt or emerging. The list includes the oil-rich nations of the Caucasus, Indonesia, Philippines and even Saudi Arabia. In many of these countries American influence on society if not politics is in sharp decline, largely due to US support to a ruthless local power elite. At a minimum, most of these countries are likely to undergo a painful internal transition brought upon by complex socio-economic forces.

Lastly, China remains the last big puzzle. The overhang of Taiwanese independence and the continuing rule of unelected Communists remain unresolved issues begging for `closure', and a leadership change in China, whenever it happens, may well upset the gentle balance between the two key arms of the US foreign policy establishment, market expansionists vs `open and free society' proponents.

These trends portend largely good news for us, and India is now viewed as a stable and cooperative Asian middle power. But they also indicate that the time to settle Kashmir has never been better, and may not be so in future. Mr Clinton may be keen to leave a solid foreign policy legacy but, ironically enough, he leaves behind for his successor difficult foreign issues. The `China card' which has come in so handy - the US has belatedly realised that to force India to adopt a half-baked or hasty solution on Kashmir has serious implications for America's already tense relations with China since the latter has even less moral claim over Tibet than India does over Kashmir - may outlive its value if US-China relations were to undergo serious strain in future. That appears unlikely, but the risk is real of a new era of uncertainty and posturing among the three major powers.

That would leave India with a less patient international audience. Right now, the US line on Kashmir is echoed in other world capitals, but the itch to put India ``in its place'' is still strong in some Western countries, especially those with an activist foreign policy disproportionate to their size. Many have their own Robin Raphels at senior levels in the foreign service. Though the Indian view of its relations with the US is somewhat exaggerated, real success has been achieved. But chronic tension with Pakistan undermines this and puts India on the backfoot.

Even now, mentioning `India' in the broader activist world in the US, those outside the think-tanks and the IT firms, often evokes negative views due to concerns over child labor, global warming, health epidemics and nuclear tests. Kashmir is a fuzzy, intractable problem left over from history, and few Americans understand or even know about it, but they do see TV pictures of flooded countryside and emaciated children.

Ideally, we should be addressing these basic social issues with top priority, but given our politics, resources and history it is very unlikely we will. So that leaves Kashmir. If nothing else, India should encourage a South Asian energy market, an idea which provides immense business potential to US firms and which increases Western stake in a peaceful South Asian status quo. But in any event, prolonging global attention on Kashmir may be poor strategic thinking.

(Subhash Agrawal is an analyst of Indian political and business trends. He is the editor of India Focus, a political risk report for international investors)