In a telegram to the State Department on March 27, Keating mentioned his meeting with Indian Foreign Secretary Pratap Kishen Kaul. He told Kaul about the US government's position that the present conflict was an internal matter that should be settled internally.
Keating also said he believed that it would be useful for the US to be reasonably full and frank in exchanging information on East Pakistan with the Indian government.
On March 30, in a telephone conversation with Nixon, Kissinger said envoy Blood did not have the strongest nerves. Nixon replied that Keating too did not have nerves. “They are all in the middle of it…,” he said.
On June 4, Nixon and Kissinger felt that Keating had effectively become an advocate of the government to which he was accredited.
Nixon said that he told Keating the previous day that the US should not become involved in an internal conflict. He was sceptical about Keating holding to that line.
Kissinger noted that it seemed as though every US ambassador who went to India got "sucked in," Keating included.
‘Mujib, a tin god'
During the June 3 meeting, Ambassador Keating told Kissinger that he just did not know how or whether the US could help Pakistan achieve a political settlement. Kissinger replied that the Pakistanis did not know it either.
Keating said that the West Pakistanis seemed intransigent about imprisoned Prime Minister-elect Mujibur Rahman, "who is a tin god in East Pakistan."
The ambassador explained that there were two reasons for India's concern: when Mujib's landslide victory was achieved with a platform plank of better relations with India, Indians got their hopes up for a Pakistan which would have a dominant political element in it espousing that policy; and the Indians are also concerned about the deep ties of the West Bengalis with the East Pakistanis.
Kissinger said there was a third Indian concern – that over time, radicals would take over the resistance movement and would eventually cause more trouble for India.
Kissinger continued that the US had a difficult gradual process ahead, while the situation ended up where Ambassador Keating wanted it. "We want to buy time for this to happen. We have no illusions that West Pakistan can hold East Pakistan and we have no interest in their doing so.”
Ambassador Keating noted that if Bangladesh became independent, the US would like to have friends there. Kissinger said: “We also want to maintain good relations with India but we do have a ‘management problem' over the next few months.”
