VZCZCXRO1383
OO RUEHBI RUEHCI RUEHLH RUEHPW
DE RUEHNE #3272/01 1311415
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 111415Z MAY 06
FM AMEMBASSY NEW DELHI
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 3738
INFO RUEANAT/NASA HQS WASHDC PRIORITY
RUCPDC/NOAA WASHDC PRIORITY
RUEHBJ/AMEMBASSY BEIJING 1964
RUEHLM/AMEMBASSY COLOMBO 5252
RUEHKA/AMEMBASSY DHAKA 5273
RUEHIL/AMEMBASSY ISLAMABAD 8245
RUEHBUL/AMEMBASSY KABUL 2850
RUEHKT/AMEMBASSY KATHMANDU 5932
RUEHLO/AMEMBASSY LONDON 9831
RUEHMO/AMEMBASSY MOSCOW 8339
RUEHKO/AMEMBASSY TOKYO 3257
RUEHCI/AMCONSUL CALCUTTA 3769
RUEHCG/AMCONSUL CHENNAI 3667
RUEHKP/AMCONSUL KARACHI 3842
RUEHLH/AMCONSUL LAHORE 2570
RUEHBI/AMCONSUL MUMBAI 2937
RUEHPW/AMCONSUL PESHAWAR 3226
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
RUEIDN/DNI WASHINGTON DC
RHHMUNA/CDR USPACOM HONOLULU HI
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 0680
RHMFISS/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RUEHGV/USMISSION GENEVA 2947
RHHMUNA/HQ USPACOM HONOLULU HI
RHMFISS/HQ USSOCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHDC

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 NEW DELHI 003272 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
PLEASE PASS USTR 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ETTC MOPS MTCR PREL SENV TSPA IN
SUBJECT: INDIA ROLLS OUT THE RED CARPET FOR NASA 
ADMINISTRATOR 
 
¶1. (U) This is an action request for OES and SCA.  Please see 
para 6. 
 
¶2. (SBU) In a remarkably warm May 9 meeting at the ISRO 
Satellite Center in Bangalore, ISRO Chairman G. Madhavan Nair 
welcomed Michael Griffin as the first NASA Administrator to 
visit India in 30 years and outlined a broad agenda of 
potential US-India space cooperation. 
 
¶3. (SBU) Noting NASA's central role in the birth of India's 
space program, Nair lamented that this early partnership was 
followed by a "phase of estrangement" in which an "embargo 
regime" constrained options for bilateral space cooperation. 
Nair underlined that his goal is to "get back to the same 
pattern of the 1960's and 70's" citing the Chandrayan mission 
as a major milestone in this revived partnership.  Nair 
welcomed the renewed US vision for space exploration, and 
noted that India looks forward to cooperating "on whatever 
you undertake." 
 
¶4. (SBU) Nair called together for this visit his top 
management team from key ISRO development centers across 
India, and asked them to delineate possible areas of 
short-term collaboration.  Several mentioned data sharing, 
pointing to the INSAT series of satellites and the potential 
value of collaboration on environmental modeling, disaster 
mitigation and weather prediction.  Nair and his colleagues 
acknowledged that ISRO faces a challenge in assimilating and 
promptly applying data gathered from space, and noted that 
this problem would grow as India deploys a new generation of 
satellites with "Landsat capabilities."  The head of India's 
National Remote Sensing Agency flagged India's experience 
with translating data to everyday applications and boasted of 
how ISRO worked with the Ministry of Home affairs after the 
Indian Ocean Tsunami to build an architecture for emergency 
database management.  The ISRO team saw communications and 
rural connectivity as a major priority for the years ahead. 
They also noted with regret that the US-endorsed ISRO program 
for telemedicine linkages in Afghanistan had failed due to 
security problems in the field, but indicated that India 
would be interested in perhaps deploying this capability in 
other countries. 
 
¶5. (SBU) Amid an otherwise upbeat and positive discussion, 
ISRO Scientific Secretary V. Sundararamaiah expressed 
frustration about the fact that the US-India Space Working 
Group has met only once in the summer of 2005 and noted that 
this group was intended to be the key forum for bilateral 
coordination.  Dr. Nair chimed in that the Working Group 
should meet at least twice per year, once in the US and once 
in India.  He expressed frustration at ISRO's inability to 
identify a single point of contact for coordination with US 
authorities, leaving the agency on its own to navigate 
between State PM, State OES, NASA, Commerce and USTR.  With 
this in mind he asked for Administrator Griffin's assistance 
to identify a "single person and agency who will be our prime 
focal coordinator."  The NASA Administrator agreed that we 
should engage more robustly on the Space Working Group, 
noting that this was a natural follow-up to the President's 
India visit. 
 
 
NEW DELHI 00003272  002 OF 002 
 
 
¶6. (SBU) Comment and Action Request: This meeting was notable 
both for its relentlessly upbeat tone and the various 
US-India issues that Dr. Nair chose not to raise.  Unlike the 
journalists later in the day, Nair did not press the Commerce 
Entities List, our debate over a Satellite Services Agreement 
or any of the historical baggage (like cryogenic engines 
sanctions) that impeded US-India space cooperation in the 
past.  Instead, he focused on the positive, drawing attention 
to the fact that NASA is returning to the moon and renewing 
its commitment to manned space exploration at precisely the 
moment when India is launching its own moon mission, which 
ISRO hopes will provide material inputs to the US lunar 
mission.  Nair politely declined the US offer to put an 
Indian citizen into the NASA astronaut program, noting that 
ISRO has not decided whether to undertake a costly manned 
space effort "and it will take a year or so for us to make up 
our minds."  However, he made clear that cooperation with 
NASA and procurement of components from US vendors is a top 
ISRO priority.  Against this positive background, the 
Ambassador would welcome an early Department response to 
ISRO's request for revival of our Space Working Group and 
designation of a single point of responsibility in the USG. 
 
¶7.  (U) Visit New Delhi's Classified Website: 
(http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/sa/newdelhi/) 
MULFORD