Well, take 2 current issues that US needs help.
N Korea and Iran. Is India a player ? At least Brazil and Turkey are now involved in Iran.
Even the current US financial crisis, India can't really help.
Not to mention India is also not a player in central Asia. Not even a member of the Shanghai cooperative organization.
As for Indian ocean. The worlds navy is already there to counter shoeless pirates in wooden boats. Even that cannot stop the pirates, can India?
Perhaps as a counter weight to China. Remotely.
India should know its limitations.
And I am not anti India!
With all due respects since u say ur not anti Indian read below..
The way u say, it means only if India has a roll to play in all issues related to US then only it can be termed as important else useless.
In North Korea/Iran, India may not have a significant role but it does have very important roles in Afghan,Pakistan,Myanmar,SriLanka,China, Bangladesh, IOR ,Bhutan etc. which may be more critical to US than the one's u mention because of nukes, trade routes, Humanitarian crisis,etc.
Also, if I say, that in 1990's India was the only country who had a role to play in Maldives against the terrorist and so US/any other country becomes of lesser value to India since it didnt play any role would be foolish.
And how do u know that India didn't play a role in salvaging the financial crisis?? Do u have any idea how Citi bank(just an example) which was down cutting jobs and selling property in other parts of the world was actually investing more and more during the period in India with huge benefits.
When we are called for G-7+G-4 summits,member of G-20 summits, have huge stakes in IMF, World bank which have wider scope than shanghai co-operation is it really that important? u say this as if Brazil/China is not important to the US/India?world, because its not a part of SAARC.
The pirate issue is totally different than the one I mention when it comes to a standoff between naval powers especially US and China. Check the below pics
U see all the major sea trade routes to SE asia, CHina ,Australia,Japan etc..have to cross IOR which can change the game in a war.
I would not post any further than this, if u need more info u can just google it, if u still consider that India is useless for US then just shrug off by saying US has no brains and be happy; but please don't post crap about India when we are not exaggerating our importance rather the world does it..