Common Interests Bring U.S, India Closer
WASHINGTON, Jun 10 (IPS) - One of the enduring mysteries in international relations was the hitherto cool relations between the United States and India. Both were, and are, proud democracies. Both are suspicious of Islamic fundamentalism. Both are deeply concerned with the rise of China. And yet, the two nations ended up in opposite camps during much of the Cold War.
Even today, more than 15 years after the end of the Cold War, fundamental differences remain, particularly on how to deal with Iran and how best to secure future energy supplies. But these differences have deliberately been put on the backburner as the two giants embark on a path of partnership.
The clearest sign that relations have changed came in March, when U.S. President George Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh signed a far-reaching nuclear agreement in New Delhi. In exchange for allowing international inspection of most of its nuclear reactors, India was assured by the U.S. government of a steady supply of enriched uranium and other nuclear technology for its civilian nuclear programme.
Predictably, the deal has caused a furore around the world, and more importantly, within the United States and India itself. Critics charge that the agreement strikes a fatal blow to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which has been a cornerstone of international nuclear equilibrium since 1968.
India is not a signatory to the NPT, having always criticised it as a mechanism of control by the nuclear haves over the have-nots.
But the treaty’s supporters argue that the deal finally brings India, a rising power with demonstrated nuclear capabilities, into the institutional controls of the international nuclear regime.
“It is better to manage India’s rise peacefully and integrate it into the international order than keeping it an outsider. Making India a stakeholder in the (NPT) regime and supporter for its enforcement for regional states may have value for global peace and order,” T V Paul, professor of international relations at McGill University, said at a recent conference hosted by the Sasakawa Peace Foundation in Washington DC.
Both these arguments ring true. But what the nuclear deal, and the ensuing debate, is really about is three things: the crumbling status of the NPT, the rise of India, and U.S. concerns of China. The Indo-United States treaty links all these together in a way that no other document could.
The NPT, long criticised by India, has been on its deathbed due to what is often called the ’rogue’ actions of Iran and North Korea. Now that the Bush administration has pledged assistance to a country that has refused to sign the NPT, the deal only induces other powers to pursue their own nuclear ambitions, critics argue.
This concern is even more acute because, by providing India with enriched uranium, so the argument goes, the United States is helping India use its own stock of enriched uranium to increase its nuclear weapons stockpile - a stockpile aimed solely against China, as then Indian Defence Minister George Fernandez famously remarked in 1998.
Paul, however, discounted that possibility summarily during the Washington seminar noting that the German and Japanese governments dropped their nuclear option after being provided a nuclear security umbrella by the United States during the Cold War. A similar path can be forged in Asia for other smaller states, he argued.
That contention however cannot hide the delicate balancing act underway in Asia – one where the United States is trying precisely to save the NPT by reining in the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran, while at the same time offering nuclear assistance to India.
For this reason, many critics have called the U.S. policy hypocritical and one that could provide more incentive, not less, for others to pursue nuclear weapons – thus further destabilising Asia.
The second point contained in the Indo-U.S. treaty is that the United States, at long last, is recognising the growing potential of India in security affairs in Asia.
Despite the United States’ long-standing alliance with Pakistan, India’s subcontinental rival, the United States and India think alike in security terms in the post- Sep.11 world. Both are concerned by Pakistan’s nuclear proliferation activities. South Asian Islamic fundamentalism – Taliban, Al-Qaeda – is a common concern. There is a school of thought within the U.S. foreign policy establishment that sees India as a bulwark against these dangers.
India is happy to play the role, though not at the cost of its own security interests, especially when it comes to China. Economic ties and regional stability are too important to both India and China to get caught up in someone else’s strategic games.
This was a point hammered forcefully by Martin Walker, an editor with United Press International who spoke at the same seminar. “Anybody who has been to India recently, agree that the Indians do not want to become the kind of guaranteed American ally that Britain has been in Europe. They do not want to become America’s client state, to help encircle or restrain China,” Walker said.
But it does not mean that India is not totally concerned about Chinese intentions, despite their growing rapprochement since the late 1980s.
Paul, the expert on India, pointed out: “What has been characterised by the past (Sino-Indian) relationship is China’s engagement and containment of India at the same time. China was engaging India but at the same time building Pakistan as a way to contain India to some extent.”
This last point underscores the third important aspect of the Indo-U.S. deal, which is about the two countries’ joint concerns over China. But just as surely, the Indo-U.S. deal also raises concerns in China, which knows only too well that it has emerged as the latest bogeyman in the peculiarly U.S. game of finding an “enemy”.
Walker again illustrated this point. “If you’re sitting in Beijing at the moment and you see American troops in Japan, South Korea, you see Americans building up a base in Guam, you see the Americans becoming very friendly with the Vietnamese, American having almost base facilities in Singapore and America building military bases in Central Asia – and now you see the Americans wooing India – it must look from Beijing’s point of view as though you are being encircled,” he said.
These developments may be new and may have been thrust out into the open by the Indo-U.S. nuclear deal, but the issues are quite old. Experts note that the three important aspects of the treaty have always been India’s longstanding policy goals.
“If you looked at a wish list of what India wanted from the US in 1965, it would look remarkably similar to the deal,” pointed out Kurt Campbell of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Basically the US had a choice. It could either negotiate on these issues which have been firm and clear on India’s agenda for decades, and then move on to other issues, or it could have no agreement whatsoever.”
While that may be true, the difficult tasks all lie ahead. The most pressing however remains the ratification of the treaty by the both countries’ legislatures.
Though not a certainty, it is more likely that the Indian parliament will ratify the treaty in its present form since it is seen as more beneficial to India. The U.S. Congress however could be an entirely different matter because there are numerous critics of the treaty. (END/IPS Asia-Pacific)
