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In 71 years of bilateral relations, this was only the fifth official high-level engagement between the US and Nepal—not including the ones at the undersecretary and assistant secretary of state levels. Why then is America sud­denly giving importance to its relations with Nepal?

Make America great again

For cues, one needs to look at the churning inside the US gov­ernment since the inauguration of Donald J Trump as the 45th President in January 2017.

President Trump’s sloganeer­ing under the broad theme of ‘Make America Great Again’ (MAGA) may appear crude given his mercurial nature. But there is lot more sophistication there than meets the eye. While Trump is the salesperson (to his base), there are several architects behind this major reordering of American economic, security, for­eign and environmental policies, among others.

On the economic front, the trade and tariff war with China and even with US allies is what Steve Bannon, Trump’s former chief strategist, describes as an effort to reorder the global supply chain to make it Ameri­ca-centric again. Bannon, a for­mer navy officer and investment banker, argues that America has a limited window of opportunity before China becomes too power­ful to be confronted on economic terms. Bannon may have left the White House, but there are oth­ers in the US administration who share his worldview.

With the elevation of Mike Pompeo as Secretary of State straight from the CIA, American security and for­eign policies appear to be morphing into one. Pompeo, a former hawkish Congressman from Kansas, is the first former CIA director to take charge of the State Department. Histor­ically, the next career stop for former CIA chiefs is either the Pentagon or the National Security Council. That is because, at the heart of America’s decision-mak­ing process, there used to be an imaginary line between security hawks and doves—giving com­peting but useful inputs to the President for the best course of action. (Ex CIA Director Walter Bedel Smith did become Under­secretary of State in 1953 and a few were appointed ambassadors at a later stage, but none became the chief diplomat).

These are not just personnel changes in America; these are major changes in terms of world- view. Empires and big powers need well-defined enemies to ensure internal coherence. Trump’s team has decided that China, not Russia, is their next strategic rival, and that current efforts to contain Beijing have been inadequate. Even the ‘civi­lizational risk’ posed by Islamic terrorism seems to have been downgraded under Trump’s pres­idency, as demonstrated by the decision to pull out troops from Syria and Afghanistan.

Nepal’s challenges

America also appears to have decided that it will no lon­ger outsource its initiatives to its allies or proxies but rather take direct charge—in large part due to the fact that the allies are no longer in lockstep with the new American approach. Japan, India and South Korea have been undergoing their own rapprochement with China. This means the wish of Nepali officials and strategic thinkers, who have been urging the US to stop looking at Nepal through an Indian lens, might just come true. But this isn’t without risk—particularly against the backdrop of Nepal seeking to court both China and the US. Yes we need to diversify our relations, but we also need to attain internal coherence and clarity on what our national interests are. Subse­quently, we also need to build our negotiating capacity.

As winds of a new cold war blow, Nepal has to understand the changes within the US to avoid being caught in the crossfire and misled by false expectations. America, under Trump, wants to retain its preeminent status, with­out necessarily wanting to bear the cost it entails—as indicated by its continued demands from NATO and other allies to pay their ‘fair’ share.

Nepal’s journey to republican­ism has not been a smooth one, one reason being the lav­ish luxuries enjoyed by our VVIPs that sometimes dwarf even those enjoyed by our ex-monarchs. People are not amused. One of the reasons they over­threw monarchy was the Royal Place’s open exploitation of public resources. The monarchy was abol­ished, and a republic proclaimed. Yet the leaders of the new repub­lic, starting with the President, have so far given a poor account of themselves. The president’s rather extravagant ways are making people compare her lifestyle to that of the former monarchs.

Austerity with public resources should be a hallmark of democratic leaders. In this, the president, the ceremonial head of the state, should set an example, as she is the custo­dian of the new republic. But she instead appears determined to milk the state dry.

As if the sumptuous 160 ropanis of land on which Sheetal Niwas (President’s Office) sits were not enough, the government is shifting the adjacent Nepal Police Academy. The premier training facility for the national police force is being moved to expand the President Office premises and build a helipad.

Separately, the president already has twos set of motorcade. Yet an electric vehicle is being added, and an additional Rs 160 million sought to get her new bullet­proof cars. Combined with the Rs 1.5 billion that has been set aside for a helicopter to be used by the President, Vice President, Prime Minister and other VVIPs, this represents a gross misallocating of state resources in a relatively poor country.

It increasingly looks like the cere­monial president styles herself after the queens of yesteryears as she tries to match their opulence.

In addition to the aforementioned lavish amenities, the president has also developed a thing for need­less foreign junkets. The president’s high-level state visits are normally fixed by the calendar and budgeted accordingly. However, the Bidhya Devi Bhandari’s recent visits, such as to Qatar and Poland, have been ad hoc and made purely at the behest of the president.

Apparently, the President’s Office continuously lobbied with the Qatari government to get Bidhya Devi Bhandari invited to Doha. Inter­estingly, while 10 government offi­cials accompanied Bhandari on her Qatar visit, another 27 were allowed to tag along, at an additional cost of Rs 13 million. The final bill from Poland, where the president took along an even bigger retinue, is yet to be published.

This is unbecoming of the head of the state and the first female presi­dent of the republic. The damaged credibility of her office will be hard to restore.

Thirteen-year-old Tomiko Matsumoto was in school in Aki district (close to Hiro­shima) on August 6, 1945. She had no idea it would be a day she and her little world of her friends and family would change forever. She survived the bomb, but her young brothers and her mother did not. Neither Tomiko nor her family had anything to do with the war.

On August 11, 1945, two days after the bomb was dropped in Nagasaki, “in the ashes of their home, Dr Takashi Nogai discov­ered the bones of his wife beside her rosary beads.” A devout Cath­olic, he wasn’t a military man nor was he involved in planning and implementing the attack on Pearl Harbor. He hadn’t been conspir­ing with Germany to dominate the world either. He was in his own little world with his wife, and they too had nothing to do with the war (Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Paul Ham, 2011).

Nor did countless others who died and survived the A-bombs dropped in Hiroshima and Naga­saki on August 6 and 9 respec­tively. They were hit by a terrible weapon of mass destruction. A weapon so powerful that it had the capacity to destroy a whole city. A weapon so powerful that it left the survivors scarred both physically and mentally for the rest of their lives—the scars so severe that many survivors thought it would have been much better if they too had perished, just like their parents, children and friends. But they were the survivors, the hibakusha. And for a long time, they were untouchables.

You may very well say, what happened to those in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was sad and they didn’t deserve it. But what does it have to do with us living in Nepal in 2018, as if we are going to be hit by a bomb anytime soon? Fur­ther, both our neighbors have a stockpile of nukes and the “deter­rence” will dissuade them from ever using the weapon against each other. So we are pretty much safe and we have no reasons to be “paranoid” about a nuclear apocalypse.

But we have every reason to be paranoid and concerned. I am not saying it. The institution that is responsible for our sur­vival as a country and for our security, Nepal Army, believes that Nepal would be a lot safer in a world without nuclear weap­ons. Its Defense Doctrine of 2014 specifically calls on the govern­ment to champion the cause of denuclearization. It rightly views a nuclear war between the neighboring countries as a potential security threat. Is Nepal Army paranoid? No. Its fear is quite legitimate.

Many factors can trigger a nuclear war, including something as simple as “faulty intelligence.” If a country gets the idea that the other is about to nuke it, then it will try to preempt the attack. And you can never be sure of human reaction in the face of believable-but-faulty intelligence.

Further, today’s nuclear bombs are more destructive than the ones dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki 73 years ago. If our neighbors nuke each other, we will not be able to protect our­selves from the fallout effects.

Therefore, so long as there is something awesomely destruc­tive that let the insane leaders play God (or Satan) by unleash­ing hell on earth, we can nev­er feel secure. No sane people could. Nobody has to endure what Tomiko and Dr Nagai had to.

We take pride in the Buddha. We never tire of telling the world that the apostle of peace was born in Nepal. But taking pride in being the birthplace of Lord Bud­dha isn’t enough. We are weak, defense and economy wise. But we have immense spiritual power. After all we are the people who believe in the universal brother­hood of the Geeta and peaceful ways of the Buddha. We can, we must and we should be the ones doing all we can by taking on glob­al leadership to abolish nuclear weapons from the face of this earth. And it starts with us, you and me.

The first step in the right direc­tion would be to start a campaign to be signatory to the ratification of the UN Treaty on the Prohi­bition of Nuclear Weapons. (We have signed the treaty but we are not yet a signatory to ratifica­tion. That’s half-hearted. We are only deceiving ourselves.) Let’s not care what our nuclear armed neighbors and other big powers think, or give into their pressure. Let’s use our conscience and prac­tice what we preach to make our­selves and others safe. Others will soon follow.

For humanity’s sake, let’s for once be proactive.

On a foggy December morn­ing, mix crews of Chinese and Nepali nationals are working on the foundation of what will be the terminal building of the new regional international airport in Pokhara. “Foundation­al level work of taxiway, apron and the hangar have almost been completed,” says June Zhu, site manager of the construction com­pany, China CAMC Engineering, a state-owned enterprise. “I am happy to report 20 percent work is complete.”

Over three hundred Nepali and Chinese crew are working 12-hour shifts

Being built with the state-of-the-art technology, once com­plete, this airport would include features such as modern board­ing bridges instead of shuttle buses that the TIA currently uses to transfer passengers from boarding area to the airplane. It will also feature Instrument Landing System (ILS), including a localizer, to assist in safe landing of the incoming airplanes even during bad weather. The Tribhu­van International Airport is yet to have ILS localizer and some experts have wondered if the March 12 US-Bangla plane crash that killed 52 passengers could have been avoided if the system had been in place.

An eight-storey air traffic con­trol tower is being constructed with wide area multilateration (WAM) technology. In a mountain­ous terrain like ours, WAM has more advantage where the line of sight can be blocked by natural barriers. Given that Pokhara sees heavy rainfall, the runway will have concrete pavement, instead of asphalt. Concrete pavements are durable and have lower main­tenance costs over time, accord­ing to engineers.

The project is being financed through a soft loan from China EXIM bank. Of the $215.96 million loan, 25 percent will be interest-free.

Over three hundred Nepali and Chinese crew are working 12-hour shifts. “We will increase the work­force, if we need to,” says Zhu, the site manager. “We would like to hand it over to the government before the June 2021 deadline.”

Both the federal and provincial governments as well as the private sector are pinning their hope on timely completion of this nation­al pride project. In fact Gandaki Province’s whole growth strategy appears dependent on bringing two million tourists by 2022—and about half of them are expected to come through this airport. Once complete, this regional interna­tional airport will handle one mil­lion tourists annually.

A hotel construction spree is underway in Pokhara and sur­rounding areas, leading to a glut in rooms. Hoteliers report average annual occupancy of 45 percent.

The provincial government has begun lobbying other provinces for their consent to declare Pokha­ra as tourism capital of Nepal.

While agriculture and hydro­power are other pillars of the economy, they seem dependent on increased arrivals and tour­ist consumption. The provincial government is bringing a policy to incentivize use of local agri­cultural produces in hospitality sector so that tourism dollars are spread to other areas of the econ­omy. They are also encouraging resort and hotel owners to start their own farms with an aim of doubling agricultural output.

It is true that the provincial gov­ernment does not have adequate policy and institutional mecha­nisms to effectively translate these ideas into action (only 30 percent of the available 2,000 public ser­vice vacancies have been filled). But it is only a matter of time before they do.

Given the natural endowments, human capital and provincial leadership, Gandaki is poised to be the model among seven provinces. Tourism earnings will play a key role in all these; and the state-of-the-art airport infra­structure sits at the center of that growth strategy.