NEW DELHI, May 27: The national security advisers of India and the United States on Thursday exchanged notes on the political change of guard in New Delhi as US Secretary of State Colin Powell reverted to his theme: but for Washington India and Pakistan would have gone to war in 2002.

Indian National Security Adviser Jyotindra Nath Dixit told Dawn that he had a preliminary chat with his US counterpart Condoleezza Rice a day after US President George W. Bush called Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to greet him and asked him to get the security advisers to talk.

Mr Dixit had said earlier that managing India's nuclear assets and the Kashmir issue would be a major foreign policy objective for the new Indian government.

A major problem facing Ms Rice is to help increase a global military support for America's agenda in Iraq. But Mr Dixit is likely to be constrained in this regard because India's new communist-backed United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government has expressed serious reservations over American presence in Iraq.

Mr Powell recalled on Thursday that 'stopping' a war between India and Pakistan was an achievement of the Bush administration. The UPA said in its Common Minimum Agenda on Thursday that it would continue a sustained peace dialogue with Pakistan.

Press Trust of India quoted Mr Powell as telling journalists in Washington that India and Pakistan had mobilized their armies almost two years ago. "There was a great deal of discussion and commentary about these two nuclear powers... There was a great deal of concern. It was international diplomacy led by the US that went to the task of talking to these two nations," he said.

"I went there several times. My French colleague went there several times. My British colleague went there several times. My European Union colleague, Javier Solana, went there several times.

The Canadians were there. We were in constant touch with the Chinese foreign minister and Chinese leadership about this danger," Mr Powell said. "As a result of those efforts, we were able to bring caution and prudence to the equation and found a way for that situation to be defused.

"And after more diplomacy on our part and the part of our friends and colleagues, working with them internationally, in an international framework, we were able to persuade the Indians and the Pakistanis that they should start talking to one another again and "in January of this year, [India and Pakistan] produced a framework agreement.

And then bus travel started and air travel started and the two leaders [President Pervez Musharraf and the then prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee] got together recently. "And they have a plan as to how to go forward and deal with all their outstanding issues.