Judging by how India-US relationship went into limbo after the warmth of George W Bush's second term, India can be expected to make a proper accounting once the new US President assumes office in 2016
The Indian-American relationship has always been strangely awkward. Indian students love studying in the Ivy league colleges of America, either on scholarships, or at an enormous expense, and Americans, on their part, admire peace apostle Mahatma Gandhi and the Mughal architectural beauty of the Taj Mahal, in almost equal measure. Our understanding of each other is patchy, like the proverbial curate’s egg.
Both the sides always want to improve the other with both one-sided demands and gratuitous advice, but to little or no effect. America has a track record of getting along much better with tin-pot dictatorship and totalitarian regime where the transaction, not understanding, is the main thing. Democracy may be what both India and America espouse, and practice, but it does not seem to engender much mutual recognition of affinities.
And yet, John F Kennedy came to our rescue in 1962 when the Chinese invaded. It was probably the US show of naval muscle that sent the Chinese scurrying back. Nixon sent in the aircraft carriers too, but this time to menace us, during the liberation of Bangladesh. We also got the message. Mr Bill Clinton summoned Mr Nawaz Sharif from Islamabad to Camp David and threatened him with dire consequences if the Pakistan Army and irregulars did not withdraw from Kargil forthwith. Two out of three times, it was America to India’s rescue, and the third time too, there were no adverse reactions to the birthing of Bangladesh, in place of the erstwhile East Pakistan.
But our democracies, that of the US and India, do differ hugely in terms of scale. America has a much bigger land mass and many fewer people. Ours, involves 1.30 billion souls, with 525 million voting in the recent general elections, a number nearly double the entire American population. America’s democracy is neither as numerous, nor so variegated. It is also underpinned, willy-nilly, with the neo-imperialism of the biggest economy of all, and the greatest technological and military might on earth.
Is the Modi-Obama fan-dance then about an enhanced security cooperation and the pressures of geo-politicsIJ One that is aimed at containing Chinese temptations towards expansionismIJ Does America want to manufacture defence equipment in India in spite of its Intellectual property rights and patent reservationsIJ What about the stalled nuclear power equationsIJ Only time, and tide, will tell.
Meanwhile, India is the upcoming democratic poor cousin, with three million of its ethnic brethren who are now US citizens. India as an independent republic is just 69-year-old, but also an ancient civilisation, rivalled perhaps only by China for sheer antiquity. America is just 200 years young, taking its civilisational cues from old Europe, from whence, after all, it was spawned.
After the two World Wars, the US graduated from being considered gauche colonials, gaining in stature from each. It rose to its undisputable preeminence, its massive power and glory. But it is now also being challenged by an increasingly multi-polar world, in a weakened economic state, and hampered by a tendency to be insular.
Totalitarian China, set on its ascendancy by Nixon, is catching up, with a possibility of overtaking it in the coming decades. India is bringing up the rear, from a long way behind. But, if all goes well, she too could be ranked very much higher in the not too distant future. And yet, not just now, but always, there has been a clumsiness at our mutual efforts to draw closer.
It is, therefore, difficult to expect very much from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to America beyond a level of satisfying personal vindication on his part, pleasant ‘optics’ on all the Indian TV channels blanket-covering the visit, and an evident swell of pride in the American-Indian community.
Mr Modi’s first visit to Washington, DC, as Prime Minister also coincides with President Barack Obama going into his lame-duck period. And judging by how the India-US relationship went into limbo after the warmth of George W Bush’s second term, India can only really expect to make a proper accounting of where things are going strategically, once the new US President assumes office in 2016.
Mr Modi has certainly assessed this, and spent a lot of time meeting many people from the American business community, boosting ties with the Indian diaspora, illustrated in some measure by permanent visas for Persons of Indian Origin. He met politicians and influencers from both the Democratic and Republican Parties. He wants to tell all those who wish to know that he will make things very much more hospitable once he comes back home. This should attract a flow of new investment in due course, assuming that the Americans are enthused.
Mr Modi has evidently built a strong lobby group amongst the US ethnic Indian community during this trip, who may succeed to keep the momentum in bilateral initiatives going. Some have compared the emergence of the Madison Square Garden effect to be a lobby second only to Israel’s. This too remains to be seen.
But perhaps, the world is changing faster than America’s ability to control the difference. Japan is seeking a meeting of minds with China. China likewise has made a significant overture towards India, as has India and Japan towards each other. It is possible that the powers that be are not looking to America for either dictation or protection any more. Old North Atlantic Treaty Organization is now a little redundant, with the demise of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Russia is on its own, but reasonably unafraid of the US.
The alliances to be made today cannot sustain if they want to be master-vassal treaties. What exactly they are to become instead is hard to define, but the sharing of power seems to be involved to an appreciable degree. America with its propensity to leave chaos behind in its wake wherever it has chosen to force itself, or has been welcomed in, needs to change its tack. For the most powerful country in the world, it is surprisingly callous in the conduct of its foreign policy.
And in its commerce and technology concerns, it must also decide to voluntarily share its knowledge or be supplanted by those who are more willing to do so. Many of the ready-to-do-business without holding back, are from Europe. There is greater recognition in the European Union, that it cannot afford to not jump in. Israel, like Barkis, is also more than willing. So is Australia. In other ways, so is Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and yes, Iran.
It may be high time for Uncle Sam to welcome, even embrace, this change that has come unbidden but won’t go away.