There was an
India Ideas Summit organized by US India Business Council which saw addresses
by the top signatories including PM Modi and EAM Jaishankar. The theme was ‘Preparing for the Better
Future’ and thus the address was expected to revolve around the same. The state
of the pandemic originating in Wuhan along with the border tensions with China
seemed an appropriate setting for India to woo US and make its shift to the US
camp more explicit. As the world confronts a possible long Cold War between US
and China, India has very little opportunity to pretend neutrality. As a matter
of fact, India will be in the frontline of the conflict and possibly along with
Japan or Korea may be facing the first line of attack from China. The recent manoeuvres
from China along the Ladakh border are intimidation tactics to warn India of
keeping itself away from the US camp.
The Prime
Minister talked about India and US being natural partners and invited the US
MNCs to invest in India. India is wooing hard to make companies shift their
operations from China to India as tensions rise between US and China. The US,
Japan, Australia and some European governments are encouraging their firms to
shift their operations from China to other countries. As leading officials have
indicated, India could be an option for the firms since they believe it to be
natural alliance and trustworthy partner. India finds itself an opportunity
which might not come again if wasted. Incidentally, the PM quipped he was
giving a free advice on investment and the advice was this was the right time
to invest in India.
Before the PM
spoke, there was an address by the External Affairs Minister S.Jaishankar. He
too touched upon various dimensions. Yet, one point has caught the attention of
many an analyst. He quipped that US needs to prepare itself for multipolar
world and needs to go beyond the alliances. He elucidated that while trade is
bread and butter in any bilateral relationship, India and the US need to go
beyond the complaints that have dominated their trade equations and resolve
them and set higher goals in their partnership. He contended that US needed to
understand much better the post-Cold War era and seek more plurilateral
arrangements and implied in his assertions were it was time to US to go beyond
its traditional alliances.
The address of
the EAM particularly in reference to above seems to have perplexed many. There are
many analysts and pretender analysts who believe the time has come for India
and US to become military allies and enter into a partnership something akin of
the Indo Soviet treaty of 1970 in the run up to the Bangladesh War. They feel
that the EAM was unnecessarily moralising to the US. The moral lectures, in the
opinion of the few was akin to the ghosts of NAM hanging around the Lutyen’s
corridor. To them, the sermons could have been postponed for a future date
given the current priority being pushing China backwards as it seeks to engage
in creeping acquisition in the India’s northern borders. Yet it is too
simplistic a reading of the statement. For all the uninitiated, it must be stated
the S. Jaishankar was probably one of the most pro-US officers in the Indian
Foreign Service over the years despite his father being vocally against the US
especially its stand on nuclear issues. Secondly, there was opposition to
Jaishankar being appointed as EAM since he was found to be too pro-US by the
RSS and others. Thus, it would be wrong reading to attribute NAM motives to his
assertion given he himself said that NAM was something for a particular era and
cannot be replicated each time.
This brings to
the fore on what perhaps made the EAM utter those comments. Were they
unnecessary, provocative and could they have been avoided? The wordings might
be subject to debate, yet little fault can be found in the broad assertion. The
US has been used to certain nature and structure of alliance formation and sustenance.
In the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, the action shifted to the ideological
Cold War between US and Soviet Union with Europe as the playground. In the
scheme of things in NATO, it was the US which was the dominant and net security
provider for the member countries. In return, the member countries were
expected to provide their forces for missions undertaken by US in different
parts of the world in its bid to halt the conquest of Communism. This was
evident in Vietnam though it was predominantly US led war. It however gained
prominence in the Gulf War as the multinational forces sought to liberate
Kuwait and was again witnessed both in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq 2003. The US
policy calculus is perhaps thinking on a similar lines with reference to China.
Partly, the current aggression with reference to China is due to the elections
to be held in November. To Trump, he
needs to find a villain for his constituency and China is a perfect candidate. It
is moot to argue whether US will see China in a similar way post elections irrespective
of who the winner is. Given Trump’s mercurial nature, it is quite possible, he
might seek rapprochement with China in his second term. Of course it must be to
the credit of Trump he has been aggressive on China through his first term something
of a rarity among the US Presidents in recent times.
Therefore, the
Foreign Minister must be having this at the back of the mind. Also could be the
possibility of US seeking Indian involvement in Afghanistan in exchange for
support on China. India would like tread very cautiously on Afghanistan given
there are no independent routes to Afghanistan barring one through Pakistan and
Iran, both hostile. The Quad might be emerging its own, but perhaps US is
looking it as new NATO while India is seeking to fashion in a different terms
of perhaps equals rather than US being first among equals. There are of course
differences in perception in the structure and the shape and hierarchy of the new
alliances. The hesitations of US policy makers might be at the back of
Jaishankar’s mind. As he pointed out, the US and India can play far greater
role in shaping together a new post-COVID world. Yet, behind the scenes, there
would be a lot of hard bargaining going on and this was what conceivably behind
the apparent sermonizing remark by the EAM. Therefore, on the whole, there is
nothing to get excited or angered by his speech.
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