THIS IS A REPORT MADE TO THE SOUTH ASIAN ANALYSIS GROUP at
In this review of the US-India Strategic Partnership, two major deductions arise in terms of strategic gains and setbacks to the United States and India in the last 10 years of the evolving US-India Strategic Partnership. These two major deductions are:
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United States has been the major gainer in the US-India Strategic Partnership. In the Asian strategic power balance the United States has managed to “lock-in” India on its side, if not as an ally, but no less as a strategic partner. With India added the Asian power balance is in favor of the United States.
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India has been the major loser, in that no strategic gains have accrued to India. This US-India Strategic Partnership failed to provide India with countervailing power against Pakistan and China, singly and jointly. Pakistan and China have emerged as more adversarial in the wake of this Strategic Partnership. Additionally, the present Government has stood fixated on the United States and on its prodding appeasing Pakistan, despite Mumbai 26/11 and the terrorist trail preceding it. The Prime Minister’s fixation on the United States in last six years robbed India’s foreign policy of its strategic autonomy, flexibility and manoeuvring space in its foreign policy formulations. Earlier Strategic Partnerships were neglected by India during the last six years with no strategic gains to show from the US-India strategic partnership.
Strategic analysis of the last 10 years or so would indicate that if not from the Indian Governments perspective, but from the perspective of strategically-minded Indian there have been more “lows’ than “highs” in the US-India Strategic Partnership.
The US-India Strategic Partnership, had it been substantively evolved could have matured into a “game-changer” in international politics and the global strategic calculus. Mid-way in its evolution the United States let this Strategic Partnership being eclipsed by American strategic priorities centered in Pakistan and China.
In the last year and a half with the advent of the Obama Administration, a “strategic cynicism” had begun to settle down in India in its perspectives on the US-India Strategic Partnership This basically arose from the Obama Administration’s policy formulations on Pakistan and the US inducements to China to contrive a G-2 combine of USA and China for global economic and by extension strategic management.
Obama Administration’s Pakistan and China policy formulations seriously impinged on India’s strategic interests and strategic sensitivities. India stood marginalized in the regional context of South Asia in favour of Pakistan and in the global context by US deference to China.
Against such a contextual background a visibly concerted renewed emphasis on the US-India Strategic Partnership by the United States at multiple high levels does not generate any euphoria but rather a cautious optimism.
India’s foreign policy establishment therefore needs to make a serious assessment as to whether the US renewed emphasis on US-India Strategic Partnership and it being ‘the United States defining partnership of the 21st century” is once again a tactical rhetorical exercise or has it finally dawned on the United States to invest and add more substantial value to this evolving partnership.
On balance, the following contextual developments seem to have prompted the United States renewed emphasis on US-India Strategic Partnership, currently visible.
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Pakistan: The United States Strategic denouement with its strategic utility, creepingly visible
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China: The economic and political denouement of the United States due to lack of China’s substantial responses to Obama Administration’s overtures on economic issues and regional/global issues.
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President Obama’s forthcoming visit to India in November 2010
The United States renewed emphasis on the US-India Strategic Partnership if arising from the American denouement with Pakistan and China, can then only be viewed as a “rebound” towards India. Saying the right things before President Obama’s visit as an ambience-preparation is expected. The challenge now is therefore for the United States to dispel these conclusions by adding strategic substance to back American glowing tributes to India now emanating from Washington.
On the eve of the first ever US-India Strategic Dialogue at ministerial level a number of re-assuring statements and assertions have emanated from Washington on the value that USA attaches to this Strategic Partnership.
While the above is welcomed and hopefully they would stand reinforced and reasserted during President Obama’s visit to India in November 2010, the US record of delivering the “implicit deliverables” on the US-India Strategic Partnership suggests otherwise.
With the above as a backdrop, this Paper attempts to examine some crucial related issues:
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US-India Strategic Partnership: A “Hedging Strategy” of the United States?
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Strategic Limitations of India’s Political Leadership in Management of Strategic Partnerships
US-India Strategic Partnership: A “Hedging Strategy” of the United States?
There is a wide gap between the rhetorical flourishes that attend the US-India Strategic Partnership and the strategic realities that have emerged facing India in the wake of forging this Strategic Partnership in relation to Pakistan and China.
In June 2010, the picture obtaining of Pakistan and China’s strategic stances after nearly ten years of US-India Strategic Partnership is as follows:
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Pakistan’s confrontational stances against India and her strategic and political arrogance stand accentuated by United States lavish endowments on Pakistan’s strategic utility to US interests and followed by inflow of sizeable advanced military hardware, military aid and pandering to Pakistan Army’s strategic sensitivities at India’s strategic expense.
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China sensing the United States de-valuation of the US-India Strategic Partnership stood emboldened in the last two years or so to escalate tension on the China-India border in the form of border intrusions and provocations.
In both cases above, Pakistan and China stood emboldened by the United States strategic ambiguity on the value to the United States of the US-India Strategic Partnership.
Retrospectively, it seems on balance that the United States views the US-India Strategic Partnership as more of a US “hedging strategy” till such time India emerges as a more “pronounced strategically collusive partner of the United States".
The above is never likely to happen and in terms of the US-India Strategic Partnership, both the United States and India may have to apply mid-course corrections.
Contextually, in terms of the regional and global security environment emerging, any US “hedging strategy” vis-à-vis India may lead to India being forced into other strategic orbits.
To this Author and to many in India, it appears that the US-India Strategic Partnership with its current contours and nuances has robbed India of its strategic autonomy, flexibility and space for diplomatic manoeuvre in India’s foreign policy. The Indian Government has become a captive to US strategic priorities in South Asia and follows a reactive foreign policy or no policy at all.
Such impressions are not conducive e to the development of a robust and long-lasting US-India Strategic Partnership. United States efforts in this direction cannot be exclusively focused on the person of Dr. Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister. In India, the Prime Minister is growingly being seen as in a “state of disconnect” with Indian public opinion when it comes to USA and Pakistan. The United States must engage in a political quest for bi-partisan political support for this Strategic Partnership. India expects that both USA and India handle the US-India Strategic Partnership in a transparent manner, and not like the American handing of Pakistani dictators and Army Chiefs.
Strategic Limitations of India’s Political Leadership in Management of Strategic Partnerships
Strategic partnerships in terms of their management cannot be perceived as a one-way street. Further, in the management of a strategic partnerships, what counts is as to the substantiveness of strategic gains that accrue to both partners.
The US-India Strategic Partnership when analysed in light of the above indicates that under the present Indian political leadership this Strategic Partnership has evolved into a one way street, where India has acquiesced to facilitate US strategic interests in South Asia centered on Pakistan without any strategic quid-pro-quos from the United States in return.
It is strategically naive for the Indian political leadership to argue that India has gained economically, scientifically or technologically from this Strategic Partnership. Even if it was so, any gains in these spheres cannot offset the lack of strategic gains by India, in the strategic sphere, all too important for India’s national security interests.
India’s political leadership’s lack of strategic culture and strategic vision continue to stymie India’s exploitation of the strategic leverages that are available to it. Because of these limitations, India instead of being an assertive global power in the making stands eclipsed and stands reduced to being a “strategic co-equal of Pakistan" in the US strategic calculus.
India at large fervently hopes that India’s political leadership finds the “appropriate strategic voice” to spell out its strategic quid-pro-quos at the forthcoming Washington Strategic Dialogue and in the run-up to President Obama’s visit to India in November.
Concluding Observations
The US-India Strategic Partnership, if had substantively evolved, should have emerged as a game-changer in international politics and the global strategic calculus. Midway in its evolution the United States strategic priorities on China and Pakistan has seemingly left the US-India Strategic Partnership to be perceived in India as a US hedging strategy.
India’s political leadership also shares a major blame in that it failed to apply pro-active mid-course corrections when it became apparent that Pakistan and China counted more than India in the United States strategic calculus.
The United States renewed emphasis on the US-India Strategic Partnership for whatever strategic compulsions should remind the Indian political leadership that India still counts and that they must at least now find their “strategic voice” to ensure that strategic gains in their purist form accrue to India from a re-vitalized US-India Strategic Partnership.
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