Opinion India’s Asia

On his part the PM underlined India’s perceptions of the region in his address to the Council on Foreign Relations on Monday.

Referring to the dramatic geopolitical and economic shifts unfolding in Asia,Dr. Singh declared that Delhi and Washington must “work together with other countries in the region to create an open and inclusive regional architecture in the Asia-Pacific”.

This short formulation covers all the bases. His emphasis on power shift refers to the rise of China,and underlines theimportance of cooperation with Beijing.

“We have tried to engage China and they are one of our major trading partners. We have border disputes we are trying to solve that and both have agreed that while that is pending we should keep the peace,” the PM said.

The PM suggested that India has no desire to either seek US support against China or contest the terms of Sino-American cooperation. At the same time,he also put some store by the role of the United States in preserving the Asian security order.

The PM’s emphasis on ‘open and inclusive’ architecture is the affirmation that India has no interest in keeping the US out of future Asia Pacific institutions. ‘Open and inclusive’ is also a code word for Delhi’s position that no Asian order can be constructed without India’s participation in it.

At his interaction with the American foreign policy community,Dr. Singh was drawn into the usual comparison between the economic performance of China and India and the higher growth rates of the former.

Dr. Singh was quite emphatic in reaffirming the principle,‘equal but separate’,that defines Delhi’s understanding of its position vis-a-vis Beijing. The PM pointed to the obvious and massive difference in the political systems China and India.

In stressing factors other than the growth rates of the GDP,such as political pluralism and individual rights,Dr. Singh was doing something that Indian leaders have traditionally avoided: to unabashedly advertise India’s democratic virtues.

Space play

Another line of comparison between Obama’s two communiqués will be on the question of space cooperation. Although India and the United States have a longer record of cooperation in space technology,China may be poised to catch up.

“The United States and China look forward to expanding discussions on space science cooperation and starting a dialogue on human space flight and space exploration,based on the principles of transparency,reciprocity,and mutual benefit,” the joint statement issued in Beijing last week said.

Not everyone in the United States is pleased with the Obama administration’s decision to open the door for space cooperation with China. Many voices in the US defence community are apprehensive that Beijing is determined to undermine American primacy in outer space.

Some analysts to point to the export of sensitive American space technology to China in the late 1990s that allowed Beijing develop more accurate and long-range missiles.

Arms sales

As India struggles to come up with credible policies on defence industrialisation and arms exports,China is making big strides.

Unlike India,China has always understood the value of arms exports as an instrument of national security strategy and diplomacy. In the past Chinese arms sales were limited to low end weapons of dubious quality at ‘friendship prices’ to a few nations.

The sophistication of Chinese arms production has rapidly increased in recent years; and so has the purposefulness of Beijing’s military diplomacy. It now encompasses the sale of small arms in large quantities as well as well high-end weapons like fighter aircraft across the developing world.

Beijing’s recent sale of J-10 fighters to Pakistan and support in the local manufacture of JF-17s would hopefully get Delhi to assess the prospects for the rapid spread of advanced Chinese conventional weapons in India’s neighbourhood and its implications.

The writer is Henry A Kissinger Chair in Foreign Policy and International Relations at the Library of Congress,Washington DC.