India-US must
revisit what is truly strategic in their ties
By Rajesh
Rajagopalan
Whatever
adjectives are being used to describe the state of India-US ties — as Secretary
of State John Kerry comes visiting —it is clear that the relationship is not
where it should be or where it was expected to be. New Delhi has to share a
significant part of the blame because in the years after the India-US nuclear
deal, it has seemed much more uncertain about what it wants from the
relationship and much more sceptical about its benefits.
These opinions
are now being echoed in Washington. As the US withdraws from Afghanistan next
year and the national election campaign kicks off in India, the prospects for
any immediate improvement are dimming. It is time both sides returned to what
is truly strategic in their relationship.
Instead, the two
sides are now back to their old habit of talking past each other. India appears
to be focusing on the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and its likely
consequences. The US wants to discuss trade, intellectual property rights and
climate change. These are important concerns and should be discussed but they
cannot be the centrepiece of a strategic partnership. Far from being issues
that will strengthen partnership, these are issues that will divide and dilute
it. If this relationship can be built at all, it will be on the issues the two
countries are tip-toeing around: China and the Asian and global balance. The
longer the two sides fail to recognise this, the longer this relationship will
stagnate.
Both sides need
to realise that on some issues, they simply do not have common interests —
especially on regional issues. The US would like New Delhi, Islamabad and Kabul
to work together, but this is easier said than done. The change of regime in
Pakistan is promising, but India has been down this particular garden path
before. On important strategic issues such as Pakistan's support for terrorism
and the future of Afghanistan, there is no indication yet that the Nawaz Sharif
government can wrest policy control from Pakistan's army. Irrespective of what Washington
wants, India needs to pursue its own interests in these areas rather than
simply complaining to Washington about Islamabad's behaviour.
On Afghanistan,
similarly, the US's primary interest is in winding up its involvement. It hopes
it can talk to the Taliban to reach some sort of
settlement that
will serve as a fig leaf to cover its withdrawal, though it will not change its
mind about withdrawing even if the Taliban do not oblige it on this issue. The
US hopes that Afghanistan does not again become a haven for international terrorism,
but there is little that the US can do about it. It is rare that you can win
around the negotiating table what you have lost on the battlefield and there is
little reason for the Taliban to give in when they are clearly winning.
New Delhi, correctly,
does not take much comfort in these negotiations because India is going to
suffer much more as the ISI and its terrorist proxies return to Afghanistan. But
New Delhi is also being unrealistic. It would be nice if Washington would fight
to the last American to protect Indian interests in Afghanistan, but that will
not happen. New Delhi needs to do what is necessary in Afghanistan: in the near
term, help bolster the Afghan security forces so that they can tackle the
Taliban better and in the long term build alliances with other forces in
Afghanistan to sustain Indian interests if and when the Taliban take over
Kabul. Platitudes about Afghanistan's stability or regional solutions will do
little to resolve the problem.
China Delusion
The issue both
sides should be focusing on is China and the Asian and global balance. On this
crucial issue, both sides are living in their private fantasy islands. The
Obama Administration has revived the old delusion, much favoured in Democratic
party circles, about a US-China understanding to jointly solve the world's
problems. Between the Asian pivot and the recent "shirt-sleeve
summit" in California, Washington shouldn't be surprised if Asian powers
are confused about what to make of America's steadfastness. India is in the
grip of its own China delusion. Though there is little indication that China
has changed its long-standing policy of containing India within South Asia or
even about the border dispute, there is unnatural optimism that India can frame
a middle path between China and the US.
Such a middle
path might have been possible if, like the Soviet Union during the Cold War,
China was a distant power rather than a neighbour with which India has disputes
both over territory and over each other's relative power position. If the
India-US strategic partnership has to regain its footing, they should stop
wallowing in regional and trade issues and recapture what "strategic"
means in their relationship.
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