Indo-US foreign policy: a paradigm shift

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Indo-US foreign policy: a paradigm shift

 

By Sanjay Kapoor in New Delhi

Friday, 04 November , 2005, 17:11

 

In 1952, Mahatma Gandhi's personal emissary and director of India's

first community development project (CDP), Sudhir Ghosh, hit upon a

novel idea, which he thought would change the face of newly-

independent India. He proposed to use refugees from Pakistan to build

towns.

 

His argument was that if he could be loaned the funds that the

government would be using for looking after 40,000 refugees for the

next three years, he could create employment for them and out of

their labour build a town that would provide permanent means of

livelihood. India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru jumped at

the idea and extended all help. The town of Faridabad, near Delhi,

was the outcome of this enterprise.

 

 

 

But this is just part of the story as Ghosh reveals in his book,

Gandhi's Emissary. Building a town from the efforts of a community of

refugees was an experiment that had not been attempted in the post-

colonial world and held out interesting possibilities for future

development of such societies. There was the understandable hype

about Faridabad and what Ghosh had achieved. International

recognition also followed. But Nehru suddenly chose to withdraw

himself from the project. Ghosh explains in his book, "The withdrawal

of Nehru's mantle came, strangely enough, through the interest that

my American friends showed in the Faridabad experiment."

 

Nehru's ire at anyone cavorting with the US had a reason. Immediately

after independence, Indian leadership expected support from the US

government, which was an anti-colonial power and a democracy, but it

found them indifferent. During Pandit Nehru's visit to Washington, it

became clear to him that the US wanted to use India as a lever

against China. Nehru was keen to elicit US support as both China and

Soviet Union were opposed to India on the issue of Kashmir. But that

help was not forthcoming.

 

He made it clear that India needed help, but not at any cost. "They

expected more than gratitude and goodwill and that I could not

supply," said a disappointed Nehru. Between 1947 and 1949, the US

ambassador to India, Henry Grady, told the Indian leadership that the

US would not invest in India till economic policies were made

attractive to them. Interestingly, the Indians were more sympathetic

to their colonial rulers. The British occupied many of the important

official positions even after independence, so their sway over

foreign and domestic policies was very much in evidence. Were the

British against the enlargement of US interest in India? This is an

issue that has been dwelt by Soviet era Indologists, but seldom been

the enquiry of Indian historians.

 

Be that as it may, India's reservations with the US deepened when

Washington chose to sign a military agreement with Pakistan in 1954.

It was this agreement that pushed India closer to the Soviet Union.

This was in many ways the turning point in India's relationship with

US and in some ways with Pakistan. It sharpened conflict between the

two neighbours and undid their moves towards peace and amity.

 

In 1952, the two countries came close to solving their border dispute

but, for some inexplicable reason, the deal fell through.

Consistently, India got a feeling that the US was working against its

interest. US maintained a hyphenated relationship between India and

Pakistan that endured five decades.

 

The next chance for India to cosy up to the US came during its war

with China in 1962. When the Chinese crossed into India, it became

evident to Nehru that Indian forces alone would not be able to stop

the invaders. He wrote to president John F Kennedy, beseeching him to

help India. The US did support India and declassified documents

reveal that the US president was wondering whether it would mean even

exercising the nuclear option. Kennedy candidly told his officials

when they pointed out that it could mean bombing Beijing: "We should

defend India and therefore we will defend India."

 

Before the relationship could bloom, China exploded the nuclear bomb.

There was a feeling in the Indian nuclear establishment that the US

government did not do enough to prevent China from going nuclear.

India felt vulnerable and even requested Washington to provide it a

nuclear bomb. US refused to oblige and forced India to build its own

bomb in 1974. In between, India fought two wars with Pakistan, where

the US was seen to be supporting Pakistan.

 

Not just that, India's leadership of the non-aligned movement was

ridiculed. Indira Gandhi was always seen as antagonistic towards the

US. In fact, her charisma owed itself to the manner in which she

withstood US pressure. (Richard Nixon's statement on the eve of the

India-Pakistan 1971 war comes to mind here: "While she was a bitch,

we got what we wanted, too. She will not be able to go home and say

that the United States didn't give her a warm reception and,

therefore, in despair she's got to go to war.")

 

The collapse of the Cold War in 1991 provided an opportunity to

reconfigure relationships. P V Narasimha Rao, who was the prime

minister when the Soviet Union collapsed, realised the necessity of

working closely with the US. His policies of economic reforms brought

India closer to the US, and there was a belief that copious

investment would begin to flow into the Indian economy.

 

Closer economic cooperation between the two economies began to

influence India's foreign policy, too. Recognition to Israel was the

outcome of this change in worldview. At that time, the left parties

raised a howl of protest, but Rao refused to back off.

 

When the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) was in power in 1998,

foreign minister Jaswant Singh went around chasing deputy secretary

of state, Strobe Talbott, to neutralise the embargo imposed by

Washington after India tested the nuclear device again in 1998.

 

But the turning point came in 2000 when the US president, Bill

Clinton, responding to the growing influence of the Indian diaspora

in US, chose to visit India. They put together a vision statement

whereby the two countries were to be partners in peace and attempt to

bring about regional security in Asia. There was a suggestion, not

stated, that this new compact was meant to serve as a counterpoint to

the rapidly expanding Chinese influence in the region.

 

The September 11 attacks in 2001 followed by the US-led war against

terror saw the two countries fighting against the same enemy. US

began to see substance in India's case against Pakistan fomenting

trouble in the Kashmir valley. Its intervention was also at display

in forcing Pakistan to stop giving support to mujahidins. The US made

public its efforts at finding a solution to the protracted problem of

Kashmir. While Pakistan was comfortable with third party mediation,

India was unsure of US motives and refused such brokering. The fact

that the peace process between the two countries is painfully slow

shows that India does not really trust either Pakistan or the US.

 

The US expected support from India when it invaded Iraq. It also

wanted the Indian government to send troops to Iraq. Then prime

minister Atal Behari Vajpayee astutely managed to wriggle out of this

difficult situation. A slew of reconstruction contracts were promised

if India agreed to send its troops, but organised opposition from

political parties and civil society prevented the government from

sending troops to Iraq.

 

After the NDA was voted out, there was a feeling that the left-

supported United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government would not

carry on with its pro-US policies. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh not

only carried on these policies, but also enlarged and deepened them.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice promised to help India become

a superpower. And this meant cooperating in the civilian sector.

 

The US government also promised to take care of India's energy needs.

The implications of this promise were available shortly when the US

government began to put pressure on India to withdraw from the

proposed Indo-Iranian pipeline. Singh, during his July visit to the

US, hinted that the pipeline could be off. But the biggest test for

India's new partnership with the US came when a demand was made on

them to vote against Iran in the International Atomic Energy Agency.

 

When India voted alongside the US and European Union against a fellow

non-aligned country, it was clear that Delhi had made a break.

Political observers built a case for India supporting the US, by

stating that for a country aspiring to be a superpower; it has to

take a stand. And it was better to support the US rather than a

country run by the mullahs. But the Indian government is uncertain

about how far it should go with the US. Should it dump its old allies

and the comfort of multi-polarity or embrace the US whole hog?

 

US officials like Nicholas Burns have tried to sell their partnership

with India by promising an Indian in space, cooperation in

agriculture and infrastructure development. They expect the nuclear

energy deal to be cleared before President George W Bush arrives next

year. No one really minds close ties with US; in fact people are

quite gung ho about it, but the past record of the relationship

raises the fundamental issue: can India really trust the US? Would it

jettison India at the expense of Pakistan? Would it expect a more

confrontationist attitude with China as a price for help on energy

and defence issues?

 

These are some of the issues that gnaw the Indian government that

strives for a closer relationship with Washington on the same terms

as elucidated by Nehru 57 years ago when it refused to give "more"

than gratefulness and gratitude.

 

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