NEW DELHI: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Wednesday took offence to former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s condescending remarks about his predecessor Sushma Swaraj, in his book titled Never Give an inch: Fighting for the America I love. Pompeo said he never considered Swaraj as an “important political player”, while describing her as a “goofball’’ and “heartland political hack’’. His book was in the news as he claimed that India and Pakistan were “this close” to a nuclear war after the Pulwama attack in 2019.
Jaishankar hit back, saying, “I have seen a passage in Secretary Pompeo’s book referring to Sushma Swaraj ji. I always held her in great esteem and had an exceptionally close and warm relationship with her. I deplore the disrespectful colloquialism used for her.”
In contrast, Pompeo had good things to say about Jaishankar and NSA Ajit Doval. “On the Indian side, my original counterpart was not an important player on the Indian foreign policy team. Instead, I worked much more closely with National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, a close and trusted confidant of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.”
Expressing his fondness for ‘J’ which stands for Jaishankar, he wrote, “My second Indian counterpart was Subrahmanyam Jaishankar. In May 2019, we welcomed “J” as India’s new foreign minister. I could not have asked for a better counterpart. I love this guy. English is one of the seven languages he speaks, and his is somewhat better than mine.”