The cracks in India-US relations over the arrest of an Indian diplomat will take some time to fully mend. But, like the US is being today, New Delhi has in the past been hypocritical on similar issues. Consistency must come
This year saw George Perkovich, the vice president for Studies and Director of the Nuclear Policy Programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, came out with his essay, ‘The Non-Unitary Model and Deterrence Stability in South Asia’, arguing that “Pakistan may not be a unitary rational actor in the traditional sense, because violent, extremist groups on its territory that engage in sub-conventional warfare can provoke crises and armed conflict on the subcontinent. These groups may or may not be an extension of Pakistan’s military and intelligence services, which may themselves be riven with factions.”
This is an encapsulation of the line the United States uses more often than not to placate India after every major terrorist strike that happens in India. Obviously the Union Ministry of External Affairs quite rightly treats these claims with utter disbelief and scorn. Even if Indians don’t agree on anything else, the one thing we all can agree on is that the terror apparatus in Pakistan is centrally controlled and guided. Any ‘non-authorised’ strikes on India, far from being ‘non-unitary’, are the obvious fallout of a deliberate policy of using sub-state elements against India, and are considered acceptable in Pakistan’s cost-benefit analysis.
As a result a pattern emerges over the last few decades where the US diplomats keep arguing the non-unitary model with their Indian counterparts — urging them, not to hold the Pakistani state responsible for every strike that happens in India. India has obviously over the years seen these arguments as a broken record and does not take them seriously — except when it needs some kind of a face- saving formula.
This is the exact argument the US has been trying to give India over the arrest of Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade — that the US is not a unitary actor, for that matter neither is the State Department itself. As things stand, the US’s argument is no different from India’s claim when the Italian Marine episode blew up earlier this year, leading to the near arrest of the Italian Ambassador.
The issues are the same — that diplomatic immunity is conditional, not absolute, and that states do not function as a unitary entity. The Supreme Court’s argument on March 14, 2013, was that the Italian Ambassador had impleaded himself into an ongoing case. By giving a patently false affidavit (that the sailors would return to India) he was bound by Article 32 of the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, which meant his submission to the court had nullified his immunity with regards to that particular case. The External Affairs Ministry acted in much the same way as the State Department is doing now. It cannot undermine Indian institutions aboard, and so while insisting that the judgement would have ‘implications’ for India’s diplomats, it said it was committed to upholding the orders of the Supreme Court. This is a classic example of the non-unitary state model.
This is also the explanation the External Affairs Ministry gives to the United States when the issue of not delivering on promises related to the India-US nuclear deal is discussed. Specifically with regards to The Civil liability for Nuclear Damage Act, India’s basic argument is: Parliament functions as an independent body.
If they upset the applecart; well too bad, deal with it — we are after all a democracy with several independent institutions.
The US Government’s reaction to the Khobragade case has also been classic non-unitary — both within the State Department and within the Government. The State Department’s response to the affair is a mirror image of India’s handling of the nuclear liability Act. Essentially the former has ‘regretted’ the handling of the arrest. However, it is duty-bound to protect the integrity of the US institutions and of the US legal and judicial processes. Therefore, despite what US Secretary of State John Kerry and the US Ambassador to India Nancy Powell may have thought of the issue, they were duty-bound to uphold the integrity of the US process — including the evacuation of Ms Khobragade’s maid Sangeeta Richard’s husband, even though it constitutes a crime under Indian law.
Effectively one hand did not know what the other hand was doing, and when they realised it was too late. While the State Department may be thinking this, it can’t say so publicly. To do so would be to admit the Obama Administration lacks a captain, or that Secretary Kerry is not in full control of his department. Sadly the US advocacy of Pakistan as a non unitary state model, knowing it to be patently false, has just made its case on the Khobragade affair, that much weaker, feeding into the conspiracy narrative.
The Pentagon on the other hand has reportedly expressed strong dismay over the episode. If anything, it would seem the Pentagon understood the working with India far better than the State Department did and, in fact, insulated itself from missteps far better than the State Department did. Under former US Secretary of Defence Ashton Carter, the Department of Defence brought its entire India programme under a straight line of control, where one hand knew exactly what the other was doing.
The default ‘no’ that had greeted Indian weapons’ requests for the last 60 years was changed to a default ‘yes, but let me check’. If anything, it is India that is now on the back foot in defence ties, where the doors have been opened so wide to India, that our ‘we are a non-unitary’ Government and a non-unitary Union Ministry of Defence, seem like flimsy excuses.
India expects the world to understand that it is in fact a non-unitary model, where different, perfectly legitimate, democratic push and pull pressures, and institutions, mean that India is sometimes going to breach the Vienna Convention and sometimes not make good on its promises. Moreover,the world should not blame India for dragging it feet, promise welshing, or threatening to violate international law — but rather be ‘culturally sensitive’ to us. But India retains the right to be culturally insensitive to others.
The State Department is a monolith. The arrest of Ms Khobragade, rather than being a patently stupid, extremely embarrassing misstep by one section of the State Department that effectively railroaded the whole department into a course of action it would not have normally taken, is in fact a deep-rooted conspiracy by the US to humiliate India.
The issue here is one of hypocrisy by the US State Department, the Union Ministry of External Affairs and others.