THE U S AND US 55 issue then is one of being a Hindu or being a Sikh, and so on. In the cacophony, social transformation or the organisation of the masses to achive that, becomes a very difficult, if not altogether impossible, proposition. Conservatism rules supreme. Fundamentalism, thus, is, in the last analysis,^ a weapon of imperialism which does not want any modern consciousness to arise. It wants dependent capitalism which has little use for modernity. Further a radical transformation is ruled out if the fundamentalist consciouness is the dominant element in the polity and society. The complexity of factors forming the mainstay of imperialism in Asia may be expressed thus: political instability—fundamentalism/consolidation of communal consciousness—Western dominance.11 The details of the strategy would vary from place to place. But the thrust is clear. Wrong Approaches to the Study of U S Policies In discussions, even in our own country, the real role of US imperialism is often not percevied, because the very categories and approaches used for analysing U S policy are wrong. For example, to think of the U S as committed to liberal democracy and to analyse U S policies in terms of this commitment, as is often done not only obscures the real thrust of these polices, • but even makes these policies wholly unintelligible. For a foreign policy maker in Washington, democracy is a slogan for propaganda. It is not a slogan for action. It cannot be. The American policy makers have been quite candid about this. For example, Under Secretary Bucklcy told a Congressional Committee on Security Assistance on September 16, 1981: "A strong stable and independent Pakistan is an essential anchor to the entire South-West Asian region."12 Singnificantly, among the virtues which would enable Pakistan to become an "essential anchor", Buckleydid not include democracy. Buckley is not wrong, it is we who are wrong in not seeing what he means. The other approach usually begins with the assertion that South Asia is a low priority region for American foreign policy. This is false since it simply ignores the fact that imperialism is a world system. Its priorities are determined not by geographic prefrences but according to to what the world imperialist system needs at a given point of time and in a given area. If South Asia appears to be a "low priority area'^, it is mainly because the present levels of U S involvement are enough to keep us on the right track. No major challenge to U S supremacy, comparable, say, to Latin America, has grown as yet in South Asia. The "high" or "low" priority terminology simply misses this point. It also ignores the significance of the absorption of Pakistan, Bengladesh and and Sri Lanka into the imperialist orbit. If South Asia was indeed a low priority area for the U S» one would be thankful for it, but unfortunately, international politics today leaves little scope for neatly