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Monday, Apr 26, 2004

Opinion

Opinion - Leader Page Articles

A tale of two choices

By Sumit Ganguly

After the uncertainty of the Indian general elections ends, the emergent political order will have to set a definite set of priorities in the U.S.-Indian policy agenda.

DURING MUCH of the Cold War, grand rhetoric and much inaction characterised Indian foreign and security policy. Despite the politico-military tragedy of 1962 and the striking success in handling the 1971 crisis, India's foreign and security policy establishments still pursued ad hoc and incoherent policies. The country's leaders seemed torn between the pursuit of a Nehruvian legacy that had been found wanting in the realm of defence policy and the adoption of a more hard-nosed, statecentric approach to international affairs. As a consequence, they pursued a most curious and inefficacious amalgam of the two. For example, after carrying out the first Indian nuclear test in 1974, its policymakers were utterly taken aback with the adverse international fallout. The sheer incapacity of India's key decision-makers to anticipate the likely reactions of the global community and especially the major powers was simply staggering.

The Cold War's end has brought about a new coherence to India's foreign and security policies. Two recent foreign and security policy choices reveal that the country may be finally pursuing policies designed to secure its national interests and avoiding the propensity to engage in fatuous political grandstanding. For example when the United States sought an Indian military contingent for Iraq. After some spirited public debate, the National Democratic Alliance Government chose not to send Indian forces to Iraq even though it knew that such a decision would be most irksome to many in Washington.

The ostensible reason that the Government proffered for its inability to provide forces for Iraq was that India's own national security needs precluded sending troops abroad. This public posture was obviously quite disingenuous. At an international level, the war had already proven to be most unpopular in much of the Muslim world. India for its own domestic as well as historical reasons had long sought to maintain good relations with the Muslim countries of the Middle East. It would have lost considerable goodwill if it sent troops to Iraq for policing duties. Domestic concerns were also at work. For obvious reasons, the BJP had failed to endear itself to most of India's Muslim population. It could also ill-afford to further alienate this key constituency in an election year.

However, there was one other reason that may not have been immediately apparent to most political observers. This was, no doubt, the realisation within India's politico-military apparatus that the end of the major military operations against Saddam Hussein's forces could simply be the beginning of a military quagmire. The bulk of the Iraqi populace would have come to see these Indian troops, like their American, British, Polish, Spanish and Italian counterparts as an integral component of a multinational army of occupation and not as a liberation force.

India's politico-military elite had already learnt this harsh and bitter lesson in 1987 when it had brokered a peace in Sri Lanka and then quickly found that its armed forces were ensnared in a brutal, cruel and internecine civil war with an elusive, canny and deadly enemy. In the Sri Lankan case, India had intervened to maintain regional stability as the dominant power in the region and was not engaged in an imperial venture. Motivations aside, this enterprise was tragically ill fated. Ultimately, India withdrew its forces from the country, with the original mission in tatters, the Indian armed forces bloodied and with no discernible progress toward ending this fratricidal civil war. States and decision-makers all too often make the wrong inferences from their strategic blunders. This is one case where the Indian politico-military apparatus made the correct judgment based on the memories of a grisly and painful episode. Even though the Indian decision may have not endeared the ruling regime in New Delhi to the Bush administration, it was the wise course to pursue.

More recently, the absence of official Indian chest thumping in the wake of a gratuitously callous American decision, namely the decision to grant Pakistan a "major, non-NATO ally" status, also shows a remarkable degree of maturity in the conduct of diplomacy. If this decision had been made during the Cold War, a major rift would have ensued in Indo-U.S relations. Such a chasm would also have been accompanied with official demarches, angry public rhetoric, carefully planted stories in the fawning segments of the otherwise free Indian press and a prompt clamping down on visa applications from the U.S. Of course, all this political theatre would have accomplished little of substance other than widening the existing chasm in Indo-U.S. relations. Over time, India would simply accommodate itself to the new strategic reality having thrown the international equivalent of an adolescent temper tantrum. In the meanwhile, the display of Indian petulance would merely add to the lore of anti-Indian proclivities in Foggy Bottom and at the Pentagon. Foreign policy based upon public displays of anger and harsh rhetoric, backed up with little else of substance rarely accomplishes the desired results. The consequences of this form of puerile behaviour are almost uniformly perverse.

The reaction of the Ministry of External Affairs to the U.S. Secretary of State, Colin Powell's insidious and thoughtless announcement from Islamabad was measured, temperate and to the point. Better still, when the South Asia Bureau in a desperate face-saving act sought to offer India the same status it was met with a cold and crisp rejection. Accepting this offer would not only have been utterly craven but would have also played into the long-standing tendency of certain members of the American foreign and security policy establishments not to see India and Pakistan as vastly dissimilar entities calling for markedly different policies.

Despite this contretemps in U.S.-Indian relations during an election season in India even the ardent critics of the U.S. in the Congress Party did not choose to make this an election issue. They could well have started a steady drumbeat of criticism against the ruling coalition for having brought on this humiliating episode. Instead they properly criticised the Bush administration for its maladroit and disingenuous diplomacy and left matters there.

Regardless of the outcome of this election one can only hope that the kind of dexterity, skill and nuance that has now come to characterise India's foreign and security policy choices will continue. The differences with the Bush administration over the sending of troops to Iraq and the adverse consequences to India of granting of a new strategic status to Pakistan aside, much progress has been made in Indo-U.S. relations. It is vitally important to remember that this progress was not made only under the Bush regime. After the Clinton administration overcame its hysteria about the Indian nuclear tests of 1998, it started to steadily build on its earlier efforts to fashion a more durable and constructive relationship with India. Consequently, regardless of the outcome of the American elections, India should prepare to work with the dispensation in Washington, DC.

For all the progress that has been made in Indo-U.S. relations, important challenges still lie ahead. Both Democrats and Republicans will continue to press India to open its markets further to American investment, they will both view India's nuclear and ballistic missile programs with scepticism, they will press India on global trade negotiations and they will be at odds, albeit to varying degrees, on the vexed question of global climate change. Nor is either party likely to be more sympathetic than the other toward India's claim to a United Nations Security Council seat. Accordingly, it would be foolish and shortsighted to believe that the success of one party or the other is likely to do away with existing irritants in Indo-U.S. relations. With either party winning the presidency, India is likely to face some policy differences in particular issue areas.

The task ahead for Indian diplomacy remains clear. After the uncertainty of the Indian general elections ends, the emergent political order will have to set a definite set of priorities in the U.S.-Indian policy agenda. These goals will have to be pursued with vigour, clarity and purpose. Any temptation to air lofty sentiments and engage in rhetorical flourishes will undermine the genuine and desirable progress that has been made during the past decade. India, as much as the U.S., has been the beneficiary of these developments. It would ill-serve India's national interests to return to the politics of pique of yesteryear.

(Sumit Ganguly holds the Rabindranath Tagore Chair in Indian Cultures and Civilizations and is the Director of the India Studies Program at Indiana University in Bloomington.)

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