and the U.S.-Russian Relationship", Report of an Independent Task Force (Council on Foreign Relations Press, with Rodric Braithwaite and Akihiko Tanaka, 1996) Allies Divided: Transatlantic Policies for the Greater Middle East (1997, nonfiction, with Michael Stürmer) "The Future of Transatlantic Relations", Report of an Independent Task Force (Council on Foreign Relations Press, 1999) America's Asian Alliances (2000, nonfiction, co-edited with Paul Dibb) Lee Kuan Yew: The Grand Master's Insights on China, the United States, and the World (2013, with Graham Allison). US Ambassador to India Advisor to Bush Campaign Blackwill, a Republican, was one of a group of foreign policy experts (along with Condoleezza Rice) who advised Bush during his Presidential campaign in 2000. After the election Blackwill was rewarded with the ambassadorship to India. Rice had previously worked for Blackwill during the first Bush administration when they dealt with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Soviet empire. He had never been to India before his appointment as ambassador, but he sought the assignment because of President Bush's designation of India as a "rising great power of the 21st century". Stronger ties with India Blackwill was appointed US ambassador to India in June 2001. He was committed to taking India seriously as an American ally as a counterweight to China's growing power. Blackwill promoted perhaps the closest ties between India and the United States since India's independence in 1947. "The Bush administration perceives India as a strategic opportunity for the United States, not as an irritating recalcitrant", Blackwill said. Blackwill said that before he arrived, India was considered "a nuclear renegade whose policies threatened the entire nonproliferation regime". To promote closer ties, the United States lifted economic penalties applied against India after its 1998 nuclear tests. American military forces also conducted six major joint training exercises with India while Blackwill was the ambassador. Protests by Muslim fundamentalists Muslims protestors belonging to Islamic fundamentalist organizations, Majlis Bachao Tehreek and Tahaffuz-e-Shayar-Islami attacked Blackwill's convoy when it was proceeding towards Falaknuma Palace in Hyderabad. The mob was protesting alleged American injustices in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Palestine. Hyderabad Police cleared the mob and allowed the convoy to proceed safely. Relations with Pakistan One of Blackwill's major concerns while ambassador was terrorism in India and relations between India and Pakistan. After a series of terrorist attacks that India blamed on Pakistan, the two countries nearly went to war over Kashmir