Indians knew about chinese nuclear bomb in advance. The CIA-RAW joint ELINT operations in Himalaya after '64 made it clear that Russia was helping without any hesitation to complete chinese nuclear program.
Afterwards US succeeded in developing high resolution SAR imaging satellites which could tap chinese activity without physical operations like in himalaya hence no longer needed India.
With stand-off in '71, India buried hatchet of suspicion on Russia & confronted US. 1974 test was most important & very timed opportunity because of growing hostility with US while asia was heating up and not to forget Russia had already armed China with nuke development
Nrj,
I think you are analysis is a bit flawed here. There is a reason why the 1964 Chinese ally Soviet Union became a Chinese foe in 1971, So what happened in the span of 7 years? Why did the Soviets agree to raise ante with the Chinese, to physically stopping them from confronting India. The reason is 1969 Soviet-China border conflict.
Sino–Soviet border conflict - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This is why India buried the hatchet, this is the reason for Soviet Support. Question is, The Soviets, Americans, Russians, Chinese, Pakistani's all seem very pratical and rational, while I see most Indians still supporting the Russians when they are fvcking us over for the Chinese. And people still harp about American support to Pakistan(when they are themselves being fvcked by them) and their past misdeeds.
If Indians were intelligent, they wouldnt care about the past, and only take lessons learnt from it. That is how we should be.
Americans left India for many reasons,
1. India was not ready to confront the chinese threat seriously , you could even say that now
2. We may be India focused, US isnt. There is a reason for them why CENTO existed
3. When Soviets-Chinese were fighting, Soviets are Americans biggest threat, why wouldnt they want to side with Chinese
4. Indians were never really serious about Tibet
5. Indians were never serious about Socialism or Communism
6. And our seriously atrocious moral grandstanding, V.K.Krishna Menon types, I cant stand that idiot.
7. We are not even ready to fight our own wars, nor are we ready to support anyone with anything real, just farts mostly. Why should people give you value?
8. Ask yourself this, after all the Soviet Support for us in 1971? What did we do for them in Afghanistan? Ziltch. We could have made it easier for them, by putting pressure on Pakistan, our arch enemy!
What is that we offer?