US Polls, Delhi's Mirror

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on March 18, 2016. An excerpt is included below. 

A number of issues on which the presidential candidates have staked positions are of importance to India. These include broader American trade and national security policies, which have global implications, as well as specifics related to such matters as H-1B high-skill visas, outsourcing, Asia policy, and Afghanistan and Pakistan. Based on their known views on these and other issues, how might the five remaining US presidential candidates rate from India’s perspective?

Hillary Clinton is a familiar figure in India. In 1995, she visited as first lady. As senator, she was co-chair of the US Senate’s India Caucus, a position that helped her raise funds from Indian-Americans, but also signalled the priority she placed on better relations with India. In a 2011 speech in Chennai as secretary of state, she called for India to assume a greater role in its region. “We encourage India not just to look east, but to engage east and act east as well,” she said. “India’s greater role on the world stage will enhance peace and security,” she added in an essay in Foreign Policy magazine. Clinton also famously chastised Pakistan for its support of terrorist groups. “You can’t keep snakes in your backyard and expect them only to bite your neighbours,” she publicly warned Islamabad in 2011. However, there are concerns about Clinton’s opportunism. For example, her criticism of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a trade agreement she had earlier championed as secretary of state, has raised eyebrows. But in general, Clinton is a known quantity, a candidate whose worldview broadly aligns with Indian economic and strategic interests.

Bernie Sanders’ views on foreign policy are less evolved than Clinton’s. He has called for restraints on using military force other than as a last resort and for cuts to US military spending. For India, and indeed for the Asia-Pacific, this position erodes America’s credibility as a security provider just as concerns have increased about Chinese militarism. Of greater significance for India, however, are Sanders’ views on commercial and economic cooperation, including his vote against the civil nuclear agreement with India and his steadfast criticism of outsourcing. His campaign has even made attack ads of Clinton’s 2012 appearance in front of an Indian audience on NDTV, in which she discussed some of the benefits of outsourcing.

John Kasich, like Clinton, has run on his qualifications, which include 18 years in the US Congress and six as governor of Ohio. While he proudly declares his national security credentials, that experience is now 15 years out of date. Kasich has stuck broadly within the confines of orthodox Republican foreign policy positions, as on Israel and Iran, and has promised to challenge the “expansionist agendas” of Russia and China. He says he is generally in favour of trade and has been less critical of immigration than many of his Republican colleagues. While he has often described his foreign and commercial policy platforms in broad brushstrokes, Kasich has been short on details, including on many of the issues that might be of interest to Indians.

Ted Cruz, despite being an elected senator of one of the largest US states, has run for president on an anti-establishment platform. Yet, his differences on foreign policy with the Republican Party establishment relate primarily to the use of military force in Syria and Cruz’s public criticism of foreign policy neo-conservatives. On most other foreign policy issues, Cruz’s views do not diverge radically. The Texas senator has little direct experience with India, but often speaks in positive terms, going so far as to cite India as a model of peaceful coexistence with the Islamic world. But while previously supportive of an increase in legal immigration, Cruz now advocates a temporary suspension and reassessment of the H-1B visa programme. Although broadly in support of trade liberalisation, he has opposed the TPP, claiming he can get a better deal, a position that could damage US credibility and economic leadership in Asia.

Donald Trump’s bombastic rhetoric has proved surprisingly and enduringly popular with voters, but it has also been justifiably condemned as unbecoming of a presidential candidate. His spontaneous comments have often been racist, xenophobic, and supportive of violent acts by his supporters. He has reversed policy positions at the drop of a hat, including on H-1Bs, recently saying that incentives are needed to keep bright Indian college graduates in the US. He has praised India’s economy for “doing great” while claiming that India “takes advantage of the United States”. He is also proudly ignorant of many aspects of national security and foreign policy. But what is more worrisome is Trump’s actual worldview. His neo-isolationist refusal to underwrite global security and threats to start trade wars with China, Japan and Mexico would fatally damage the United States’ reputation, credibility, and international standing. His election as US president would accelerate American decline and create a sudden global power vacuum. India — with a precarious economy in an already uncertain strategic environment — would be worse off for it.

Digital India vs Net Neutrality

The following article appeared in The Indian Express on September 30, 2015. The full text is below.

Today, when you start up your computer or iPhone and open a web browser such as Chrome or Safari, you can access over 100 million domain names with a few clicks. Your data costs do not change depending on whether you go to Rediff or Flipkart, or whether you download an app to order pizza or post on Twitter or watch a YouTube video. Your data provider — be it Airtel or Reliance or BSNL — does not discriminate between different kinds of content, only how much data you use. This is the benefit of a neutral net, a system that has worked to the advantage of both internet users (who have enjoyed greater choice of content) and numerous start-ups (which have enjoyed unparalleled market access).

But a shift is underway. When Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited California to drum up support for his Digital India initiative, he effectively endorsed Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s vision of expanded access to a pared down internet. Expanded access is, after all, one of the three pillars of Digital India (the other two being e-governance and electronics manufacturing). Why not shift costs to content providers (such as babajobs.com), who enter into exclusive contracts with data providers (such as Reliance), all enabled by Facebook’s Free Basics app? Such an arrangement could expand internet use rapidly in a country where some 80 per cent of the population does not have access, benefiting crores of people. It would also, naturally, benefit Facebook.

Advocates of net neutrality — a vocal minority linked to NGOs and internet start-ups — are unhappy with such an arrangement, which they feel will disadvantage consumers by limiting choice. It could also discriminate against smaller content providers struggling to compete with established internet companies. Net neutrality advocates have argued that there are other ways to expand access and lower costs, such as subsidising data plans or through advertising.

But this line of argument, too, has its critics. Some believe implicitly that net neutrality is an elitist concern, echoing Zuckerberg’s view that “It’s not an equal internet if the majority of people can’t participate.” Others contend that net neutrality requires unnecessary government intervention, a forcible levelling of the playing field. Why should the government prevent Facebook, Reliance and certain websites from entering into exclusive arrangements, particularly if it helps to expand access and deflect costs from consumers? The arguments against net neutrality, rather bizarrely, offer one area in which populists and free-market enthusiasts might find common cause.

Both sides of this debate bring certain compelling arguments to the table. In the United States, the government eventually came out decisively in favour of net neutrality. This made sense in an economy where the vast majority can afford access to the internet, and where monopolistic data providers were effectively price gouging. Consumer choice advocates and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs were overwhelmingly pleased.

India’s circumstances are, however, radically different. Broadband infrastructure is weak. Spectrum is expensive. Power is still in short supply. Digital access is now linked to the basics: Subsidies and rations, identification, financial inclusion and political participation. Expanding access today is therefore a top priority, which is why most of the big announcements during Modi’s visit to Silicon Valley were in this domain — not just Facebook, but also public commitments made by Microsoft and Google to connect villages and railway stations.

The prime minister has made it clear that access is his top priority, but net neutrality advocates need not completely despair. The relentless drive to expand digital access in India may be necessary in the short term, but may make less sense once the Indian internet market becomes more saturated. That is another way of saying that the access vs neutrality dilemma could resolve itself organically. As incomes rise, consumers may gradually opt for data plans that give them greater access, foregoing more restrictive but free data services. Facebook’s Free Basics would, in that event, simply be a stepping stone that contributes in time to its own irrelevance.

Beijing Unravelling

The following article originally appeared in the Indian Express on March 18, 2015. An excerpt is included below and the full article can be accessed here. 

The future of single-party rule in China ought to be of major concern to India. China is among India’s largest trade partners and the two countries collaborate closely on various multilateral issues. At the very least, China’s political fortunes will have implications for the global economy, with which India’s future is closely intertwined. China alone was responsible for a third of global growth last year and remains an important driver of international commerce and finance.

At the same time, the border dispute remains a serious test of bilateral relations between China and India. The relationship between the CCP and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) means that there could be uncertain, and potentially severe, security implications for India should the CCP disintegrate or lose its hold on power. Whatever India’s concerns may be regarding China’s rise today, the sudden termination of Communist China would present New Delhi with an economic and strategic crisis of the first order.

Indeed, the most satisfactory outcome for all involved may be a soft landing, one by which the party gradually liberalises, democratises, and becomes more accountable and transparent. The probability of this is low, at present. Vested interests in China are resistant to such change and Xi is moving the country  in a very different direction, socially and politically — although not necessarily economically. But it is in India’s interests to assess and anticipate the likelihood of various possibilities, and do anything in its power to realise an optimal outcome. 

Anti-Americanism is Dead

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on January 27, 2015. 

In the two days since US President Barack Obama has arrived in India, we have witnessed a multitude of memorable photo opportunities: Obama and Prime Minister Narendra Modi hugging, them having tea at Hyderabad House, and Obama’s appearance at the Republic Day parade. But what is this visit all about? What is it meant to achieve? There are three ways of evaluating Obama’s second — and most likely final — visit to India as president.

The most obvious is through a purely symbolic lens: the significance of having a US president as chief guest at India’s Republic Day. This alone ensures that it is no ordinary visit but an implicit acknowledgement and celebration by the US of India’s constitutional democracy, its diversity and role as a responsible military power. Additionally, between his two visits, Obama will have spent almost a week of his eight-year presidency in India, a not-insignificant amount of time, given his priorities at home and abroad with respect to West Asia, Afghanistan/ Pakistan, Russia and China.

Obama was also greeted warmly in the Indian capital this week, at a time when US relations with several other major countries — Russia and China, and even allies such as Germany, Japan, Turkey and Israel — are relatively poor or frosty. Despite the tyranny of routine crisis management, both sides have shown that they can take the time to invest further in a mutually beneficial partnership. By this measure, Obama’s very presence at Republic Day already makes this visit a success.

A second way of evaluating the visit is by its political logic, on both the domestic and international fronts. Obama’s presence at Republic Day removed the last vestiges of a reflexive anti-Americanism that had persevered among many members of the Indian political and policy establishment. Modi’s government has gone further and recognised the domestic political value of a closer relationship with the US. While many in the UPA felt that maintaining equidistance in India’s relations with major powers was politically beneficial, this view was increasingly out of step with Indian public attitudes. Surveys still consistently reflect a high opinion of the US, especially among younger Indians, although this has declined somewhat since the global financial crisis.

The political logic within the US is less pronounced, beyond the gradual rise in importance of the Indian-American community as a politically organised actor that values good relations with their country of origin. Indian-Americans constitute the best-educated and wealthiest ethnic group in the US, and their numbers are no longer insignificant from a political standpoint. Obama’s administration has been the most heavily populated by Indian-Americans. But in future years, Democrats and Republicans will be in greater competition for Indian-American support. None of this means that there will not be continued differences — and sometimes sharp ones — between India and the US. But as long as they are discussed frankly and managed privately, they need not impede the overall relationship.

Another kind of political logic is international. Modi has been unabashed about deepening partnerships with countries in the Indo-Pacific region with which India shares both interests and values, particularly Japan and Australia. And the Chinese military incursion during President Xi Jinping’s visit last year reinforced the need to manage China’s rise by diversifying regional security partnerships, even while deepening economic engagement with Beijing. A closer relationship with the US, a keystone of security in the Indo-Pacific, helps accomplish that objective.

Meanwhile, Obama’s advisors, after some vacillation, have come around to broadly sharing this viewpoint. The first term of Obama’s presidency swung from attempts at reassuring and accommodating China’s rise to a policy of managing it, described as the “Pivot” (or rebalance) to Asia. While it was only a year or two ago that the momentum behind the pivot was beginning to slow down, Obama’s India visit is one of a number of minor corrective measures that appear to be taking place. The international implications of this visit will not be dramatic, but are part of a gradual and steady process.

A third way of evaluating such bilateral visits is in practical terms, as decision-forcing mechanisms. India and the US now have a vast range of bilateral dialogues and working groups, and negotiations often get bogged down in bureaucracies. High-profile visits are a way of forcing negotiators to reach compromises.

A few such compromises appear to have been reached. These include modest efforts at joint defence development as part of operationalising the Defence Trade and Technology Initiative (DTTI), as well as initial discussions on more ambitious projects related to jet engines and aircraft carriers. A deal on civil nuclear liability appears to have also been struck, as well as a renewed defence framework agreement, and financing initiatives for clean energy. The visit, therefore, proved an occasion to finalise several agreements that might otherwise be languishing in working-level negotiations.

There has been much criticism in both countries, sometimes justified, of the India-US bilateral relationship becoming too transactional, at the expense of strategy. But combined, the symbolism, political logic and decision-forcing aspects of Obama’s visit amount to the closest thing to a strategic partnership that is possible in an increasingly tactical world. Obama’s advisors have made much of the fact that he is the first US president to visit India twice during his tenure. Hopefully he will not be the last.

Re-engaging Washington

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on August 19, 2013.

Has the United States forgotten about grand strategy? All indications point, for the moment, to US grand strategy being on the backburner. However you slice it, President Barack Obama's preoccupations, the secretary of state's travel schedule and the Republican rhetoric suggest that Washington has only two real policy priorities today.

The first is jobs. The US economy may be recovering, but decreasing unemployment from the current 7.4 per cent to pre-crisis levels of 4.5-5 per cent is at the core of Obama's political agenda. Strategic matters — defence partnerships, nuclear commerce, and international trade and economic agreements — have been subordinated to job creation. India is bearing the brunt, whether on intellectual property rights, market access, migration, nuclear liability or defence sales, and New Delhi is now a prime target of criticism not just from the White House, but from narrowly focused department bureaucracies and the US Congress.

The second US priority is counter-terrorism (CT), as exemplified by the recent closure of US missions from Pakistan to Mauritania, and the administration's response to revelations about its surveillance activities. Military operations in Afghanistan are now seen primarily through a CT lens. Barring an attack on American targets or interests, a US withdrawal from Afghanistan is deemed acceptable, regardless of the consequences for regional stability or Indian sensitivities.

India must appreciate that these are the current realities of US engagement, however distasteful. But rather than contributing to bureaucratic gridlock, these ought to provide India with leverage. Few other countries offer the US the ability to alleviate both its near-term economic and security concerns. India remains among the largest potential destinations for US exports and investment, and shares US desires to disrupt terrorist activities post-2014.

But it is important to acknowledge that Washington's obsessive focus on unemployment and terrorism is also temporary. The present circumstances have been brought about by a combination of economic realities, political and military constraints, and personnel, all of which are ephemeral. As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh gets set for his valedictory visit to the US next month, he ought to be focused on overriding short-term differences while keeping the long-term picture in mind.

What does that long-term picture look like? If the past 60 years are anything to go by, it is one in which the US bounces back stronger. Book publishers and television talk shows may still be peddling stories of inexorable American decline, but the US has rebounded from much more adverse circumstances in the past. It has unique demographic advantages among developed states, which, when coupled with its institutions, entrepreneurship and natural resources, offer it a remarkable ability to preserve its leadership position in global affairs. Under the right circumstances, that could play to India's advantage.

In 2005, when India was a nuclear pariah led by a loose coalition and had an economy 40 per cent of its current size, the US took a gamble on its future. It did not seek immediate returns, but calculated that a more robust India was both inevitable and served American interests. That, in turn, led to a conscious decision to facilitate India's rise. That calculation overrode the objections and doubts of naysayers within the US government and across the international community.

India now has an opportunity to reciprocate. Amid its own economic difficulties and political uncertainty, it faces a choice. It can continue drawing red lines in various on-going bilateral negotiations with Washington, playing for time while hoping for more favourable terms down the road. But if it believes that an American resurgence is likely and beneficial to Indian interests, it cannot afford to be bogged down in bureaucratic tu-tu-main-main.

Hagel in a Teacup

The following op-ed originally appeared in The Indian Express on March 2, 2013.

There are two narratives in Washington concerning India’s involvement in Afghanistan. According to the first, India is locked in a proxy conflict with Pakistan, supporting anti-Pakistan elements on both sides of the Durand Line. The logical conclusion for Americans who espouse this view is that a diminished Indian presence in Afghanistan would assuage Pakistan’s insecurities, generate trust and increase regional stability. The second narrative is that India is intent on state-building initiatives in Afghanistan in line with American efforts, in order to support Hamid Karzai’s government and preserve regional stability. According to this line of reasoning, Indian efforts in Afghanistan should be encouraged by Washington, which should also treat Pakistan’s manufactured or exaggerated concerns with scepticism.

The first narrative has long been dominant in the US capital and has been steadily advanced by Pakistani officials, who have used it to generate sympathy and concessions. President Barack Obama seems to have held this view at one point, as did the late Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke. The 2011 remarks by newly confirmed Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel, which recently sparked outrage in New Delhi, are simply another articulation of this assessment. It may have been ill- informed, misleading and potentially dangerous for Indian, Afghan and American interests, but Hagel’s old statement and the controversy it generated in India offer an opportunity for introspection.

Much of the commentary in India over the past few days has assumed that Hagel’s assessment was informed and strongly biased. But to portray him as inherently anti-India misses the point. During his long Senate career, Hagel has often sided with India on important issues. He was a proponent of the Indo-US civil nuclear deal and voted in favour of that agreement’s enabling legislation. But Hagel’s exposure to India was always limited, and like many American policymakers of his generation, he never viewed the country as a priority.

There could not be a sharper contrast than with his familiarity with Pakistan’s regional security concerns. Hagel once told me that the Pressler amendment, the US legislation that imposed sanctions against Pakistan upon its acquisition of nuclear weapons, was a mistake because it complicated cooperation with the country following the 9/11 attacks. “For eleven years,” he lamented, “relations with [Pakistan’s] officers were lost.” His reading of events mirrored the version propagated by Islamabad. It overlooked the fact that the Pressler amendment stemmed from a Pakistani initiative, as a clever means of avoiding sanctions while continuing to pursue its clandestine weapons programme during the 1980s.

The bottom line is that Hagel’s worldview was coloured by his frequent interactions with Pakistani military and civilian leaders. While Islamabad has been extraordinarily successful in advancing its narrative in this manner — engaging leading American policymakers even when they are not in positions of influence — India has often fallen short in this regard.

Fortunately, we can expect Hagel’s views to change now that he has been confirmed by the US Senate as the country’s top defence official. The Pentagon has already said that Hagel is “strongly committed” to the US-India strategic partnership. In the Pentagon, Hagel has access to far more intelligence than he did even as a senior legislator. He bears partial responsibility for the security of remaining US forces in Afghanistan, a heavy burden. And he will be working closely with his deputy, Ashton Carter, the designated point person for driving defence relations with India.

A more important aspect of Hagel’s worldview from India’s standpoint may well be his overall attitude toward the exercise of American power. A Republican, Hagel fell out with many members of his party by speaking out strongly against the US intervention in Iraq. He has regularly emphasised the unintended consequences of US actions and the constraints on American power, which will be reinforced by expected cuts to the defence budget. He is fond of citing a quote by former President Dwight Eisenhower: “let no one think that the expenditure of vast sums for weapons and systems of defence can guarantee absolute safety for the cities and citizens of any nation.”

For India, an American worldview that places a priority on what Obama likes to call “nation-building at home” at the expense of power projection is cause for concern. India is comfortable with a strong US presence in the Asia-Pacific region, and American retrenchment generates uncertainty and invites revisionism. Yet Hagel, Obama and newly minted Secretary of State John Kerry all seem to prefer a more modest exercise of American power. As Indian officials begin to engage with Hagel and Kerry in their new capacities, their overall approach to India’s wider neighbourhood, rather than a single line in an old speech, ought to be made the real priority.

Return of the G2

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on February 7, 2013.

Is the United States set to adopt, once again, a "G2" worldview? As key foreign policy positions change hands in Washington, the debate surrounding American policy on the Asia-Pacific is being reignited. The outcome could potentially compromise the interests of India and other countries across the region that harbour latent concerns about China's rise.

The concept of a G2, in circulation for much of the past five years, gives priority to preserving close US-China ties at the expense of other key relationships. Proponents of a G2 argue that an accommodation between the US and China, as the two largest economic and military powers, can best address regional and global challenges, political or economic, existential or institutional. However, this covenant risks compromising liberal values and the interests of other emerging powers, led by India, as well as of long-standing US regional allies, such as Japan and South Korea.  Uncertainty surrounding the nature of the US presence and role in Asia also risks intensifying security competition between China and other Asian states, thus undermining an environment conducive to commerce and regional growth.

The G2 was a defining feature of US policy when Barack Obama first assumed the presidency in 2009. But attempts at strategically reassuring China backfired; Beijing responded with high-handedness during Obama's visit to China and at the Copenhagen climate summit later that year. Although Washington accommodated Chinese concerns, and risked the ire of states along China's periphery, Beijing refused to reciprocate, a product of its premature triumphalism in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. China also responded with greater assertiveness in its dealings with its neighbourhood, whether it was on the South China Sea or the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu islands. In time, a G2-oriented approach gave way to the stated American goal of a "pivot" to Asia, an integrate-but-hedge policy constituting a reallocation of military assets, a stronger commercial presence, and closer relations with states across the Asia-Pacific.

The second Obama administration brings with it a change in personnel, a transition often accompanied by changes in policy. Some of the most vocal proponents of the pivot within the US government, including the former secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, and Assistant Secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell, are moving on. Former Senator John Kerry has succeeded Clinton in the role of America's top diplomat, and several key foreign policy positions are likely to be announced in the coming days and weeks. While Kerry's views on Pakistan have been carefully followed by Indian observers, his approach to China and the Asian balance of power has faced far less scrutiny. In the prepared remarks during his Senate confirmation hearing, Kerry made no reference to the pivot and just a solitary — and neutral — mention of China's emergence. Taken together, his focus on the limitations of US power, tepid convictions about the merits of shared liberal values and emphasis on economic interdependence point to a more accommodating approach towards China.

But doubts about the pivot predate Kerry's nomination and run deep in Washington's diplomatic establishment. Michael Green, a former White House Asia official, suggested as much last December in the context of Japan's and South Korea's elections. "It is not hard to imagine an incoming team (at the US State Department) deciding that the highest priority in the second term must be modifying the harder edges of the pivot and quietly reassuring Beijing," he wrote on Foreignpolicy.com. "There are hints that some in the administration have already been shifting their public statements in this direction." The apparent inability of some of the G2's proponents to learn from past mistakes is another cause for concern. Speaking in Beijing last year, Jeffrey Bader, one of the architects of East Asia policy in the first Obama administration and an early exponent of the G2, reportedly described the pivot as directed equally against a rising India in an apparent bid to assuage Chinese concerns.

If American policy suffers from one structural defect it is weak institutional memory. As Obama's new Asia policy team takes shape under Kerry and other principals, it would do well to revisit the mis-steps of 2009. For its part, New Delhi must begin to anticipate a period of uncertainty — with luck, mercifully brief — as Washington once again weighs the relative merits of the pivot and the G2

Roads to Mandalay

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on October 29, 2012.

India’s Look East policy, now an article of faith among foreign policy practitioners in Delhi, has always suffered from the constraints of geography. Although India’s engagements with peninsular Southeast Asia — particularly Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand — have improved considerably over the past two decades, the absence of direct road and rail networks has limited its presence in the region. Several members of ASEAN, including Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam, have become increasingly vocal about their desire to see an enhanced Indian presence as a healthy balance to Chinese influence. Additionally, as India elevates its commercial relationship with China, it remains wary of compromising its security by establishing a direct transportation corridor that traverses the disputed boundary. And the recent violence in Assam, among other developments in the region, highlights the urgent need to assist India’s Northeast in reaping the full benefits of the country’s rapid economic growth.

The gradual political and economic opening of Myanmar under Thein Sein offers India a rare opportunity to address all of these challenges simultaneously. But it would require New Delhi to act fast. The seventh East Asia Summit in Phnom Penh offers the ideal opportunity to unveil Indian intentions and engage all the relevant stakeholders.

Myanmar and the Northeast stand at the crossroads of three of the most vibrant economic regions in Asia — China, India, and the ASEAN. But along with Bangladesh, they constitute one of the worst-connected and least-developed areas in the wider region. Building a sophisticated road and rail network — and, just as importantly, improving the institutional arrangements to facilitate commerce — between India, the ASEAN and China might appear to be an overly ambitious enterprise, particularly given India’s own track record with major infrastructure projects. Adverse terrain has certainly contributed to the failure to enhance commercial interconnectivity. But Myanmar’s political turn, however plodding and fitful, offers an occasion to overcome the existing political and economic constraints.

The major political limitations have been the international isolation of the junta in Naypyidaw and the furtive competition for access and influence between China and India. The recent political opening is a game-changer, allowing India to establish its own terms of engagement. Complementing, rather than competing with China’s own projects, India can construct a corridor from Guwahati to Kunming through a neutral strategic buffer. The more advanced economies of the ASEAN would also stand to benefit. Should Bangladesh be included in such an initiative, the time required to transport freight by road from Kolkata to Chiang Mai could drop from 50 to 15 hours. In addition to roads, railways, ports, pipelines and power grids, a network would also require renewed customs arrangements, including an easing of restrictions on tradable goods, and improved border security.

The most significant economic constraint to integration has been inadequate financing for such a large-scale project. Again, the opening of Naypyidaw allows India to attract international funding for a major commercial corridor through Myanmar, not just from regional investors such as Singapore, but also from farther afield — Japan and South Korea. By framing this as a win-win for India, China and the ASEAN, India could also tap China’s impressive capacity and knowhow for large-scale infrastructure projects. China, reaching saturation point, facing slowing demand for infrastructure projects at home and seeking better access to Indian markets, could prove surprisingly accommodating.

Bangladesh is an additional opportunity for a regional commercial network, but also a potential roadblock. Although the Awami League government may be more accommodating of Indian entreaties, including Bangladesh means risking unnecessary domestic political opposition in India and gives Dhaka veto power over India’s larger strategic and commercial ambitions. Although efforts should be made to secure Bangladeshi cooperation for such an endeavour, it should not be treated as vital.

Thanks to the gradual democratisation and internationalisation of Myanmar, India is finally in a position to actualise its Look East policy. And there are existing templates for such a plan. Economists working for the ASEAN have developed a sophisticated blueprint, and Indian think-tanks have also been doing considerable work on the prospects of regional integration through Myanmar. But making the plan a reality will necessitate articulating a vision, securing the adequate international support and directing efforts towards an ambitious project destined to reshape the region. If done right, India would not only position itself as integral to East Asian prosperity, thus widening and deepening its strategic ambit, it would also consolidate its cooperative relations with Myanmar, the rest of the ASEAN, China and possibly Bangladesh.

The Story from Chicago

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on May 25, 2012. 

There were few surprises emerging from the Chicago NATO summit, held between May 20-21, where the agenda focused on setting Afghanistan on a path to security self-reliance and on burden-sharing between the United States and its European allies amid looming budget cuts.

The summit clarified NATO’s intentions of handing over responsibility for the security of Afghanistan to the Afghan National Security Forces by 2013 and terminating all combat operations by 2014. But contrary to the belief in many quarters, the timeline did nothing to obscure the very real security challenges that remain in Afghanistan. US President Barack Obama acknowledged that any gains made on the ground by NATO forces were “fragile,” and that challenges on the Pakistani side of the Durand Line were yet to be dealt with. Even after 2014, the US and its allies are expected to continue investing resources in a bid to secure the country. Their support will include approximately $4.1 billion each year for Afghanistan’s security forces, and as many as 15,000-20,000 US and NATO troops in support roles ranging from artillery and air support to medical assistance and logistics.

Meanwhile, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari — whose participation was the subject of considerable speculation in the run-up to the summit — is leaving Chicago disappointed and empty handed, without an agreement on NATO supply lines to Afghanistan, a one-on-one meeting with Obama or an apology for last year’s US air strike, which killed several Pakistani soldiers. While some see the rebuke as unnecessary humiliation of a civilian government in Islamabad that is just beginning to assert itself, the episode also demonstrates the limitations of Pakistan’s platform for negotiation. By staking its legitimacy on a single, impossible proposition — a public apology from a US president facing re-election, for an action whose provocations were at best disputable — Pakistan’s government had only itself to blame for painting itself into a corner.

This strain in diplomatic ties between the US and Pakistan stood in stark contrast to the friendliness and apparent relief with which Obama engaged his Afghan counterpart, Hamid Karzai, their meeting coming not long after the conclusion of a strategic partnership agreement. Bonhomie between leaders should never be over-interpreted but, if genuine and durable, this could mark the end of a difficult period in relations between Washington and Kabul, during which Karzai had made several demands on the US military and political leadership that the White House and the Pentagon deemed impossible. As progress in Afghanistan depends on the relationship between Washington and Kabul, the shift in tenor is a welcome sign.

The other narrative emanating from Chicago involved negotiations about the nature and role of the NATO alliance, which faces uncertainty at a time of expected defence budget cuts on both sides of the Atlantic. In Europe, this means reconciling the demands of expanded membership, the decline of traditional security threats, the changing nature of collective defence and ownership of security with today’s sobering fiscal realities. NATO’s latest answer to this conundrum is “Smart Defence”, which — despite its name — essentially translates into pooling resources to provide military capabilities at lower costs, often by eliminating redundancies. However, the new principle threatens to limit NATO’s relevance to regional security in Europe and the North Atlantic, rather than allow the alliance to position itself at the centre of a global security architecture. For an organisation whose member states are collectively responsible for over two-thirds of global defence spending, this bar appears rather low.

NATO may appear a declining force — and it has always been constrained as a policymaking body, subject to the whims of its member states — but the absence of any structured engagement or dialogue with India is nonetheless striking. The alliance operates a counter-piracy task force in the Indian Ocean, it is involved in ambitious ballistic missile defence plans, and it plans on retaining its presence in Afghanistan in some shape or form for the foreseeable future.

India, for its part, continues to constrain itself by its aversion to NATO’s Cold War legacy. This is self-defeating as other countries — including Russia and, in particular, China — are beginning to sense opportunities, despite seemingly greater obstacles for dialogue and collaboration. NATO today holds regular working-level meetings with the Chinese military in Beijing, and Chinese officers now study in NATO academies. Given that the alliance was built on principles and values that its members ostensibly share with India, there are no reasons why India’s defence establishment should not be considering similar opportunities for interaction. India is certainly not interested in a formal partnership, but shared interests and realms of activity — whether in Afghanistan, the Indian Ocean, or in various technological pursuits — lend themselves, at the very least, to an agenda for consultations and dialogue.

Ten Commandments of Camp 14

The following book review of Blaine Harden's 'Escape from Camp 14' was originally published in The Indian Express on March 5, 2012. 

Barely 200 kilometres from the ultramodern Seoul high-rise where I write this is North Korea’s Camp 14, where some 15,000 inmates are literally worked to death, forced to witness periodic executions, subjected to beatings, rape, disfigurement and torture, and compelled to consume rats to avoid protein deficiencies and their own vomit to combat hunger. Such gruesome details about life in North Korea’s unacknowledged labour camps are what emerge from Escape from Camp 14, an account by former Washington Post reporter Blaine Harden, based on his interviews with Shin Dong-hyuk, the first North Korean born and raised in the camp to have escaped abroad.

The squalor and wanton brutality of life in the North Korean political prisons are certainly shocking. Prisoners are rarely issued clothes and provided no water for cleaning, reeking at times “like farm animals”. Many inmates are guilty only by association, as the parents, siblings and children of those feared by the state. (Great Leader Kim Il-Sung decreed that “enemies of class… their seed must be eliminated through three generations.”) Rape by guards is commonplace, and any resulting pregnancies mean death for both mother and child. And then there’s the torture and physical punishment. In 1989, at the age of six, Shin watched a teacher beat a female classmate to death with a wooden pointer for having “stolen” five kernels of corn. Shin himself had a finger chopped off for dropping a sewing machine.

There are evident parallels between Shin’s story — retold by Harden in plain, unvarnished prose — and Alexandr Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago and Elie Wiesel’s Night, the defining, first-hand accounts of Soviet gulags and Nazi extermination camps. But the book also recalls aspects of Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies. Prisoners live by 10 rules committed to memory, most of which contain the sub-clause that violators “will be shot immediately”. And incentives are given for inmates to inform on one another. Shin, for example, provided the information that resulted in the executions of his mother and brother.

Indeed, what makes Escape from Camp 14 much more than simply a long-overdue exposé of North Korea’s prison camps is the amorality of its protagonist. Despite having resided in South Korea and the United States in the years since his 2005 escape, Shin remains unfamiliar with such notions as compassion or forgiveness, although he acknowledges guilt. In his original memoir — published in 2007 in Korean to little fanfare — Shin overlooked the fact that he was responsible for the deaths of his family members, revealing it to Harden only in a later interview.

At least 26 defectors have experienced the labour camps, including some as guards, and this has allowed Harden to corroborate aspects of Shin’s story pertaining to the general condition of prisoners. But unlike any of the others, Shin’s tale is distinguished by the fact that he alone, having been born in the camp, knew of no alternative life and, as such, had no expectations. “He had no hope to lose, no past to mourn, no pride to defend,” Harden writes. Even when Shin’s physical and psychological conditions hit bottom, he never contemplated suicide, a form of escape that was also discouraged by the threat of collective punishment meted out to surviving relatives. The complete isolation of the camps is best revealed when Shin says that he had only a vague notion of who North Korea’s leaders were, and had not even heard of Pyongyang — let alone South Korea, China or the United States — until he turned 20.

Harden performs the service of interspersing, throughout Shin’s account, details of life outside the labour camps. The collapse of the state food distribution network in the 1990s and the cult of personality of the Kim dynasty may be well known to outsiders, but the elaborate hereditary caste system created in the 1950s by Kim Il-Sung to reward loyal families is less so. The lowest stratum, composed of family members of South Koreans, Christians, former property owners and Japanese collaborators, is unable to secure government jobs or attend university in this purportedly classless society. Harden also details the clandestine human migration networks within North Korea and the difficulties defectors face in assimilating in the South.

The tragedy is that the plight of political prisoners in North Korea has received remarkably little attention abroad. They do not feature on the agendas of any bilateral or multilateral diplomatic dialogues with Pyongyang and there is little international activism in their support. While Shin’s story reads like it was set in a far-removed past, the reality is that his experience is very much the present for some one to two lakh people.

The Forces behind Dassault's Coup

The following article, co-authored with Sarah Raine, appeared in the Indian Express and Financial Express on February 10, 2012.

India’s lucrative and long-running medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) competition took an important step forward recently with the announcement that India will now enter into exclusive negotiations with French contractor Dassault for its Rafale. This is a major blow for the other major contender, the Eurofighter Typhoon, the product of a consortium of the major aerospace companies of four partner nations: Germany, UK, Italy, and Spain. The Eurofighter group had been convinced that they were offering the technically superior aircraft, and the Typhoon certainly performed better in competitive trials in 2010. But as everyone who follows defence sales knows, selling fighter planes is not necessarily about having the better product.

Indian analyses have focused on explaining the latest decision largely on the basis of costs. It is true that concerns over its price tag have dogged the expensive Eurofighter Typhoon from the outset. But this explanation is a little too convenient in the complex world of arms sales, where other issues including technology transfers, the possibility of joint production, and political partnerships all play a role in influencing the decision-making process. Providing they are not too far apart (and the bids submitted by Dassault and Eurofighter would not have been), costs can be altered to suit a strategic choice. Small adjustments to factors such as payloads carried and distances flown on hypothetical sorties can make a big difference. And taking total life-cycle costs into account has proved a complicated, difficult and possibly contestable process.

If not simply cost, a further explanation is required for India’s choice. Dassault may have shown more flexibility over matters of technological transfer than Cassidian, the EADS subsidiary that led on the Eurofighter bid. But Cassidian certainly tried its best to suggest otherwise, opening the first foreign-operated defence-oriented engineering centre in India last year. Another criterion may have been greater political benefits. But it is unclear whether a single partner is more attractive than several European partners who have combined to make Eurofighter the continent’s largest collaborative military programme.

In part, the decision could have related to lobbying, although not of the sinister kind being whispered about in many Delhi salons. Simply speaking, the French government was more politically active, particularly when compared to the more low-key approach of Germany, which acted as the lead nation of the Eurofighter bid. Germany’s defence industries have never enjoyed the level of political support experienced by their French counterparts. In Germany, a “war room” — like that assembled by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to coordinate his defence, finance, and foreign ministries in support of Dassault’s search for its first foreign buyer — would have been unimaginable. While lobbying may not have made a difference in this particular case, greater political support for a major defence contract generally translates into a more flexible approach in linking it to other incentives in the defence or non-defence realms.

Keeping the debate focused on the aircraft’ costs does, however, play to India’s advantage as negotiations now enter a new, exclusive, phase. After all, as both suppliers know, this is not a final decision. Protracted negotiations between Dassault and the MoD can be expected over the coming months. India will want to extract the maximum concessions possible and hinting periodically that Eurofighter are not entirely out of the running will do it no harm. Meanwhile, Dassault knows only too well from prior experience that exclusive negotiations can always break down and decisions can be reversed. Only late last year, the UAE stepped back from its exclusive talks on buying the Rafale to ask the Eurofighter consortium to make a counter offer.

The latest decision is an important one for India. But it is also an important one for France. If this deal goes ahead, the Rafale’s future, which had been in question, looks assured. The multi-billion dollar deal also offers the prospect of a vital economic boost for French President Nicolas Sarkozy as he prepares for a difficult re-election campaign. Now that the French are the frontrunners, they cannot afford to lose this tender. New Delhi will know this, and will be hoping to use it to its advantage.

India's Strategic Challenges

Indian strategic thinker K. Subrahmanyam passed away on February 2, 2011. This article is the second of two adapted by Dhruva Jaishankar from four of Subrahmanyam’s unpublished essays on grand strategy, Indian foreign relations, defence policy, and nuclear deterrence

Among the strategic challenges facing India are those relating to defence policy, nuclear strategy, and governance. India is the world’s fourth-largest military power and has fought five wars against neighbours that are today nuclear-armed revisionist states advancing territorial claims against it. But India has lacked an ability to formulate future-oriented defence policies, managing only because of short-term measures, blunders by its adversaries, and force superiority in its favour. The cardinal mistake of India’s leaders was flouting the principle that chiefs of staff should never be in command of their forces. Separating command and staff functions enables the service chiefs to focus on defence planning and policymaking, including procurement, human resources, and military diplomacy. Theatre commanders handle the administration, daily management, operational planning, and operational training of forces. This is the practice of all large, modern armed forces, but there is no demand to rectify this shortcoming in India.

At present, defence policymaking is ad hoc, short-term, and service-specific. The state of readiness of forces and jointness of operations, training, and planning have not been addressed. Although a Chief of Defence Staff has been discussed, the position is not in harmony with India’s size and democratic structure; a Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee under a full-time chairman is more appropriate. The National Security Council, which had been expected to address policy incoherence and inadequate strategic planning, burdened itself with executive responsibilities. The services intelligence directorates are ill-equipped for long-term intelligence assessments, and area specialists are few, suggesting a greater need for think tanks. The armed forces have also not fully though through important aspects of nuclear policy and strategy. In a nuclear era, the role of the military becomes, essentially, preventing wars from breaking out through appropriate weapons acquisitions, force deployment patterns, the development of infrastructure, military exercises, and defence diplomacy. This is a far more demanding task than peacetime operations in a pre-nuclear age.

India is a reluctant nuclear power. After the Bangladesh war, India opted for a “recessed deterrence”, but this position could not be sustained after a 1979 intelligence assessment that Pakistan was attempting to acquire nuclear weapons. Indo-Pakistani nuclear deterrence is often viewed in the West through the prism of the Cold War, with doubts about the viability of India’s no-first-use doctrine and concerns about an arms race. But theirs is not an unconstrained competition, and India’s position has always been that deterrence is not proportionate to the number of warheads a country faces. No-first-use is also at the essence of deterrence, as the threat of a first strike is plain aggression. Although China was first in announcing a no-first-use policy, its caveat is that areas considered parts of China are excluded. The more important challenge with China is not nuclear confrontation but its defying international regimes and norms.

As a revisionist state espousing terror as state policy, Pakistan’s conception of deterrence is radically different from that generally accepted by the international community. Pakistan’s lesson from various crises over the last twenty-five years was that India had been successfully deterred. Other than perhaps during Operation Parakram, India, not being a revisionist state, has never been deterred because it never contemplated aggression against Pakistan. Successive Indian governments have proclaimed that a stable and prosperous Pakistan is in India’s interests, but these sentiments have never been reciprocated. Given Pakistan’s nuclear deterrent, India must resort to engagement as the only viable strategy against terrorism. India is handicapped because Pakistan defines itself as anti-Indian, and its army is against developing commercial or social contacts with India. As Pakistan requires American aid, the US has a better chance of increasing Pakistani dependency in order to persuade it to give up terrorism as a state policy.

A final note on governance: It is a myth that India’s political classes submit themselves to public accountability at every election. India’s first-past-the-post elections, in which as little as 25 per cent support can produce victory, results in patronage politics that favour some sections of the population at the expense of the majority. Democracy therefore does not always result in the fair delivery of goods and services to the entire population. Non-inclusive growth is consequently not a result of globalisation but of patronage politics. Politicians also often have a vested interest in keeping voters poor, as it costs less to buy their votes. As long as the first-past-the-post system prevails, corruption, caste politics, and the poor delivery of goods and services by the state will continue, and the elimination of poverty and illiteracy will be hampered. The simplest solution is run-off elections if candidates are unable to attain a majority, but second-preference voting is another possibility.

India’s foreign relations: The transformation of the Indo-US relationship from estranged democracies to strategic partners is bound to take time, and relations should not be measured by the number of successful transactions. The shared values of both countries — democracy, pluralism, tolerance, openness, and respect for freedoms and human rights — acquire a greater prominence in building a more peaceful, prosperous, inclusive, secure, and sustainable world. The relationship must therefore be assessed on its progress in setting up structures that make it more effective in countering the challenges of the 21st century. In addition to terrorism, failing states, organised crime, pandemics, and nuclear proliferation, there are threats to various global commons — such as international waters, cyber space, and outer space — which cannot be addressed unilaterally or through NATO-like military alliances. In any other age, China’s rapid and inevitable rise would also probably have led to war, but that is unthinkable in a nuclearised and globalised era. US advantages in its competition with China include China’s ageing and unfavourable demographics, US immigration policies, and its culture of innovation. But to sustain its preeminence, the US still has every incentive to enter into a partnership with India, a democratic, pluralistic, and secular country with a young population that will soon exceed China’s.

What about Indian interests? If not sabotaged by poor governance and corruption, India’s growth will make it the world’s third-largest economy. It could then try to develop further on its own, but will be unable to bridge the vast gaps between it and the US and China. It could cooperate with China, but the Chinese model is inadequate for a diverse country such as India. Finally, it could partner with the US, a country that is home to a large Indian diaspora and shares India’s values. Other countries — including Japan, France, and Germany — face similar concerns as India. Together, the leaders of the democratic world must face the combined challenges of authoritarianism and jehadism, which cannot be countered by military means alone. Comprehensive and cooperative action by democracies, who constitute more than half the world’s population for the first time in history, is therefore necessary. Global governance must rely upon networks of bilateral strategic partnerships among democratic powers that manage rather than impose outcomes, and provide a powerful response to the challenges they face.

India's Grand Strategy

Indian strategic thinker K. Subrahmanyam passed away on February 2, 2011. This article is the first of two adapted by Dhruva Jaishankar from four of Subrahmanyam’s unpublished essays on grand strategy, Indian foreign relations, defence policy and nuclear deterrence.

India is unusual in having had a grand strategy at Independence to meet the external and internal challenges to its growth in order to become a major international actor. The Constituent Assembly’s oath in 1947 implied that India would promote world peace for the welfare of mankind, including its own population, and it would assume its rightful global position by developing itself to the standards of the industrialised world. This was the strategic goal. It had to be achieved in a world recovering from a war-ravaged economy and entering the Cold War. At Independence, India was a downtrodden former colony with 80 per cent poverty, a life expectancy of 31, food shortages and low literacy. India’s grand strategy during the second half of the 20th century, therefore, involved a policy of non-alignment to deal with external security problems, the adoption of the Indian Constitution to address governance challenges, and a partly centrally planned development strategy to accelerate growth.

Non-alignment, while a strategy, is often mistaken for ideology. Nehru first articulated it as a means to safeguard Indian security in 1946, after Churchill’s “Iron Curtain” speech, but before independence or Partition plans had been decided. But Nehru was not enthusiastic about a non-aligned movement. He favoured remaining in the Commonwealth and procuring defence equipment and licences from the UK, France and the US. It was only when the Soviet Union emerged as a more reliable provider of cheap but adequate military equipment against an increasingly hostile China that India’s security interests aligned with Moscow’s. Even then, India made defence deals in the 1970s and the 1980s with France and the UK, and also with the Reagan administration for jet engines. Non-alignment was therefore pragmatic, and meant that India could get support from a superpower if its national security was threatened.

While campaigning against nuclear weapons, India’s leadership from Nehru onwards also kept the nuclear option alive. India was compelled to declare itself a nuclear weapon power in 1998, only after the international community legitimised nuclear weapons by indefinitely extending the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and China armed Pakistan with nuclear weapons to balance India. Once India declared its nuclear capability, the attitudes of major powers changed.

The other aspects of India’s grand strategy related to governance and development. No other country is comparable to India in terms of its diversity of religions, languages and ethnicities. Consequently, unity is only possible under a secular, pluralistic, democratic and quasi-federal constitution. Although India’s Constitution implied accountable governance and the delivery of goods and services by the state, grave deficiencies emerged. Inadequate justice and law enforcement, unacceptable poverty and widespread illiteracy all persist, but universal adult franchise has empowered the previously disadvantaged to a level incomparable to elsewhere in the decolonised world. Although the record of the Election Commission is something to be proud of, deteriorating governance remains a serious internal security threat.

By century’s end, India was a pluralistic and secular democracy on the path to becoming the world’s third largest economy, with 62 per cent of the population above the poverty line despite its having grown fourfold. India had also dismantled the licence-permit-quota raj, demonstrated its technological prowess, and developed sizeable foreign exchange reserves. Despite such positive trends, poverty and illiteracy have still regrettably not been eliminated. Many have wondered whether India’s development could not have been expedited by following another model, such as China’s. They forget that Chinese communism allowed 30-40 million deaths from starvation. Independent India, by contrast, has never experienced that thanks to its democracy. Moreover, China benefited from Soviet assistance in the 1950s and external investments in the 1980s. Nor were many US allies significantly better off than India. It was only after the rehabilitation of Western Europe and Japan that available capital enabled the development of the Asian Tigers. India (along with the US) is unusual for democratising before industrialising. The emergence of most major nations — Britain, France, Russia, Japan and Germany — was viewed with concern by others, often resulting in war. While China’s rise causes concern today, India’s emergence does not.

The 21st century is vastly different from the 20th century. The number of states, their populations, their productivity and their standards of living have all increased manifold. The transportation and information revolutions have globalised the international system. Humanity as a whole has become more sensitised to gender, racial, and religious inequality and inequality of opportunity. Migration and demographic trends mean that pluralism will be required for peace and domestic stability. Violent conflict between great powers is becoming ever more unthinkable, and major states are today competing in peace, not war. There are many reasons for this: the existence of nuclear weapons, the establishment of the UN, powerful military alliances, decolonisation, the success of armed insurgencies and the spread of democracy. In this century, knowledge — not weapons — will be the currency of power and will determine the international hierarchy.

However, there are still challenges and threats to peaceful human progress and the preservation of pluralistic and democratic societies, including terrorism, failed states, one-party rule, pandemics and organised crime. The 20th century world order is unable to adequately address these challenges. The NPT cannot address terrorism resulting from acquiring nuclear weapons, old military alliances cannot deal with challenges such as Afghanistan, and the UN is not designed to defend pluralism, secularism, and democracy.

India’s gravest security problem is jehadi terrorism, centred in Pakistan. Pakistan has been using terrorism as a state policy since it acquired nuclear weapons with Chinese help and American acquiescence in the 1980s. The United States’ motives at the time were anti-Soviet, but China’s were anti-India. India, of roughly equal population to China, has proved that a developing country can grow rapidly without sacrificing either democracy or pluralism. Along with American influence, India’s rise threatens China’s hegemonic ambitions in Asia, and Pakistan serves as a convenient springboard by which to counter both.

Thus the real question about the future world order is whether it is to be democratic and pluralistic, or dominated by one-party oligarchies that prioritise social harmony over individual rights. If the US remains the world’s predominant power, and China is second, India will be the swing power. It will therefore have three options: partnering with the US and other pluralistic, secular and democratic countries; joining hands with China at the risk of betraying the values of its Constitution and freedom struggle; and remaining both politically and ideologically non-aligned, even if against its own ideals. Many Indians worry about an unequal partnership with the US because they do not appreciate the full potential of India as a knowledge power. In the years ahead, the US will require a reservoir of skilled manpower, and India will require green energy and agricultural technology to grow faster. The emerging Indo-US partnership is not about containing China. It is about defending Indian values from the challenges of both one-party rule and jehadism, and realising a future in which poverty and illiteracy are alleviated.

Wishful Mud-Slinging

The following column appeared in the Indian Express on December 2, 2011.

Coming only days after the dramatic exit of Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani, the November 26 NATO assault on two Pakistani outposts in the Mohmand Agency has led to a further deterioration in US-Pakistani relations. Although the major implications may not be very different, this incident has been unlike other setbacks this year in transcending the strictly bilateral, and directly involving the United States’ NATO allies as well as Afghanistan’s security forces.

But as with many such episodes related to Pakistan over the past few years, the exact details continue to be hotly disputed. In the absence of credible investigations or after-action reports by state authorities, or reliable independent reporting by the local media, the full facts may never be properly established, even though US and NATO forces have promised an investigation of their own. The US, led by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, has expressed regret for the incident and the White House has made efforts to convince Pakistan to reverse its decision to boycott next week’s Bonn Conference, where it had been expected to play the role of a pivotal stakeholder.

And yet, none of these gestures has stopped what has now become a predictable pattern of assertions and accusations. Pakistan has seen nationwide protests fed by a largely unquestioning and vitriolic press and repeated assertions by senior Pakistani army officers that NATO’s attack was deliberate. NATO and Afghan officials have countered that the Pakistani forces initiated the engagement, thereby preventing the hot pursuit of militants across the Durand Line. The American ambassador to Pakistan, Cameron Munter, subsequently relayed to Washington that a direct apology from President Obama would be required to placate the public furore, but the White House — frustrated by Pakistan’s antics, sceptical of Pakistani blamelessness, and worried about the political optics in the backdrop of next year’s elections — has balked at the suggestion.

Wherever the blame lies for the 28 deaths in Mohmand, the timing of the incident — and, even more importantly, the stage-managed free-fall into which it has set US-Pakistan relations — appears almost too convenient. Pakistani umbrage has ensured a suspension of NATO supply lines to Afghanistan, led to its insistence that the US vacate the Shamsi airfield in Balochistan (whose use by the US Pakistan had previously denied) and provided a fait accompli for Pakistan to undermine any positive outcomes of the forthcoming Bonn conference. Furthermore, it coincides with rumoured peace talks between Pakistan and factional leaders of the Pakistani Taliban in South Waziristan, who have reportedly made the withdrawal of the army from the agency and a break in US-Pakistan relations preconditions for a settlement.

Where does all this leave Washington? As Americans would say, between a rock and a hard place. With the self-imposed deadline for the military surge coinciding with severe budget cuts, popular anti-war protests and a presidential election cycle, the urgency behind seeking an appropriate end-state in Afghanistan and its region is unprecedented. This is complicated by a number of uncertainties pertaining to the nature and extent of the long-term US presence in Afghanistan, American end goals and red lines and the exact objectives and feasibility of US engagement with various Taliban factions. Furthermore, American assessments of the situation on the ground are themselves increasingly contested. Intelligence estimates reportedly paint a much dimmer picture of the durability of US military gains in Afghanistan than the claims made in public, although field commanders and US diplomats in Kabul have privately disputed such assessments.

Against this backdrop, the increasing recklessness of Pakistan’s security establishment resembles a high-risk game being played with fewer chips and a weak hand. Although the official reaction to the Mohmand incident by the White House, the State Department and NATO headquarters has sought to minimise the fallout, it is unclear whether the break in Pakistan’s relationship with the US will be temporary or whether it is in any way reversible. US officials still seem to believe it is, but that may well be the result of the same wishful thinking that has sustained the precarious US-Pakistan relationship for over a decade.

The Rocky Road to Damascus

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on November 16, 2011.

No country is ever immune to charges of double standards in its foreign policy, and this year’s popular uprisings across West Asia and North Africa — often collectively referred to as the “Arab Spring” or “Arab Awakening” — have exposed many such contradictions in both rhetoric and behaviour. Last week, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was forced to defend her government’s reluctance to intervene in Syria, where, according to UN estimates, the eight-month government crackdown has resulted in more than 3,500 deaths and over 23,000 refugees fleeing to Turkey and Lebanon. Citing the need to protect US allies and forces, secure energy supplies from the region, and combat terrorist groups, Clinton resisted calls by many compatriots to replicate the kind of military intervention that unseated the late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Left unsaid were the complications Damascus can still cause for US interests in neighbouring Lebanon.

The US-Syria relationship has long been somewhat anomalous in a region characterised either by tight US alliances or sharp adversarial relationships with Washington. On the one hand, relations between Washington and Damascus have been shaped by the history of the Cold War, longstanding differences over Israel, economic sanctions, charges of sponsoring terrorism or regime change, and Syria’s periodic attempts at developing weapons of mass destruction. At the same time, the two countries have maintained fitful diplomatic relations with one another, collaborated on specific regional diplomatic or security challenges, and even aligned against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq during the 1991 Gulf War.

The last few days have seen a shift in the fortunes of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his regime, with the nearly unanimous decision by the Arab League to suspend Syria marking an apparent turning point. This move was followed by further international sanctions against the country, and a public statement by Jordan’s King Abdullah urging Assad to step down. Pro-Assad elements responded to these developments by attacking several diplomatic missions in Damascus. While the US may still be hesitant to use force in a bid to actively depose Assad for the very reasons Clinton outlined, these recent events — and the flurry of diplomatic consultations taking place in their wake — suggest that Assad will only find himself further isolated.

India too has staked out a default position on Syria. In August, when India presided over the UN Security Council after a gap of almost two decades, it opted for an exceedingly cautious approach to the Syrian protests, and subsequently abstained during a key October vote. More than the vote itself, India, as on other occasions during its current UNSC tenure, presented a weak justification for its decision, citing reports of violence perpetrated by protesters against Syrian security forces as a reason to take a more measured stand. At a similar juncture in the Libyan uprising, Indian officials had pointed to the lack of adequate information as the basis for Delhi’s decision to abstain at the Security Council.

There are several reasons — some defensible — for India’s position. As with Libya, the security of Indian citizens and interests cannot be easily jeopardised. The government also appears far too preoccupied with a plethora of domestic concerns to risk what it sees as unnecessary controversy over a foreign policy issue. Finally, based on experiences in its own neighbourhood, India is suspicious about the feasibility of spreading democratic values. National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon said, “A people cannot be forced to be free or to practice democracy.”

And yet there are several reasons for India to reconsider its traditional stance, even if ideological or humanitarian reasons were to be temporarily set aside. The Arab world’s overwhelming support for Syrian opposition groups renders weak the logic of remaining sensitive to the Muslim electorate at home. In any case, supporting the removal of an authoritarian secular leader of a majority Muslim state should never be reflexively construed as an anti-Muslim decision. Moreover, with considerable diplomatic capital being invested in a bid for permanent UN Security Council membership, India should be better attuned to the expectations which that privilege entails. Abstaining on key decisions as a UNSC member is hardly a marker of leadership, and weakens Delhi’s claims to what it sees as its rightful position in global affairs. Finally, India’s own growing security amid increasing regional instability means the possibility of India having to intervene in another country is today far greater than that of India being at the receiving end of such an intervention. With an eye on the future, setting a precedent for intervention on dire humanitarian grounds may be prudent.

According to Christian mythology, it was on the highway to Damascus that the Apostle Paul saw the proverbial light, resulting in his conversion to Christianity. As the US and other countries calibrate their own approaches to the Syrian crackdown, India should be prepared for a rocky diplomatic road ahead, one that hopefully leads to further enlightenment concerning the onerous burdens of global leadership.

A Fighting Chance

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on September 28, 2011.

Even veteran observers of the US-Pakistan relationship — long inured to suppressed animosity — have been surprised by the severity of the latest US message and the choice of messenger. Although constituting no major revelations, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen’s testimony to a Senate committee last week, in which he accused Pakistan’s government and military of exporting terrorism, has focused public attention across the US and around the world on the growing fissures in US-Pakistan ties.

The latest accusations follow a brazen attack on the US embassy compound in Kabul, which, according to Mullen and other US officials, was planned and executed by the Haqqani network with ISI support. Mullen stated that the government of Pakistan — and in particular the army and the ISI — were using “violent extremism as an instrument of policy”. At the same hearing, US Secretary of Defence Leon Panetta refused to publicly detail what policies the United States were now contemplating with regards to Pakistan, when pressed by committee members.

The decline in US-Pakistan relations last year has been well-documented. The Kabul embassy attack is but the latest in a series of revelations that have shed light on Pakistan’s duplicity, following close on the heels of the outing of the CIA station chief in Pakistan, the arrest of CIA contractor Raymond Davis, several developments in China-Pakistan ties, and the killing of Osama bin Laden in the Pakistani heartland. Although an uneasy diplomatic détente might yet be possible, the overall trajectory in US-Pakistan ties is likely irreversible. It is almost impossible, for example, to envisage a US strategic relationship of the kind Pakistan has long desired, involving virtually carte blanche development aid, the provision of advanced military hardware, and limits to US cooperation with India. The growing consensus in Washington is that, over the short-term future, US-Pakistan ties will be purely transactional in nature.

But while a cold, mercenary relationship may satisfy US political and military leaders and buy Washington both time and space, it will not address the structural factors that make Pakistan a challenge to regional and global security and stability. These include a political system and notion of the national interest dictated by the army, a socio-political climate conducive to religious extremism and ethnic strife, and a willingness to incubate and employ terror as a means of advancing national objectives. Such dysfunctions will persevere, and while the United States may one day extricate itself from South Asia, India does not enjoy that luxury.

The present state of US-Pakistan relations thus presents a rare opening of sorts for New Delhi. Developments over the past five years have broadly supported India’s view of Pakistan as a hub of state-supported international terrorism under an unaccountable, untrustworthy and temerarious military leadership. So for the first time, the United States may be willing to entertain Indian policy inputs with regard to Pakistan. Although New Delhi has often been understanding of the US dependence on Pakistan, and at other times justifiably critical of its wilful blindness to Pakistani transgressions, it should now be more forthcoming in articulating what approach to Pakistan it would like to see Washington adopt. This will be a major test of the Indian strategic community’s acumen and responsiveness.

Unfortunately, there is a real danger that New Delhi will miss its chance. Turning George Santayana’s aphorism on its head, the historian Arthur Schlesinger once wrote: “Too often it is those who can remember the past who are condemned to repeat it.” Indian policy-makers, who continue to dwell far too much on the United States’ history of support for Pakistan, risk overlooking the present juncture as a ripe opportunity to shape US regional policy in India’s favour.

Jury's Prudence

The following column appeared in The Indian Express on June 16, 2011.

There has always been a tension between the compulsions of national security and those of justice, the irony being that each exists in part to preserve and advance the other. At its crudest, that tension can be captured by the cliché of a ticking time-bomb, and the debatable use of illegal interrogation techniques to determine its location, Jack Bauer-style. In an era of transnational threats such as terrorism and cyberwarfare, it is perhaps more useful to think of the dilemma in the context of determining responsibility or culpability for state-supported, cross-border crimes.

Most legal systems are based on the presumption of innocence. But this is often disregarded in the realm of national security. And with good reason. Expediency and complications pertaining to jurisdiction mean that due legal process resulting in guilt beyond a reasonable doubt is often either impractical or impossible. Evidence acquired through covert or clandestine means can be compromised and, in any case, is unlikely to hold up in a court of justice. National security decisions must by their nature be based upon lower levels of probability and certitude, meaning that in effect one can sometimes be considered guilty if not proved innocent. It is little wonder then that sceptics — based on their priorities — consider international law to be everything from unnecessarily onerous to quaintly irrelevant.

The acquittal in a Chicago court of Pakistani-Canadian Tahawwur Rana on the charge of providing support to David Coleman Headley for the 2008 terrorist plot against Mumbai has elicited a curious response in India, a blend of doubt, confusion and misapprehensions about US motives. But because it is a legal, rather than a national security, decision, the jury’s verdict is ultimately of little consequence either as an indicator of US policy or as a determinant of Pakistani state or official complicity.

Rana was arrested by US law enforcement officials in 2009. A federal grand jury found reasons to indict him on charges of providing material support for the planning and execution of 26/11 attacks, for the plot against the Jyllands-Posten newspaper in Denmark, and to the Lashkar-e-Toiba. Because the evidence linking Rana to the 26/11 plot was based heavily on Headley’s testimony, the credibility and motives of the prosecution’s star witness were called into question by the defence. Although Rana did indeed seem to provide cover for Headley’s visits to India, the jury apparently felt they could not determine beyond reasonable doubt that he did so fully cognisant of Headley’s intentions.

Given the independent judicial process, and the steps taken by US law enforcement officials up to and during the trial, the jury’s verdict can in no way be construed as an extension of US policy. While that may appear obvious to many in the legal, political and policy communities, it appears not to be reflected fully in popular Indian consciousness. Online commentators, newspaper columnists and even opposition political leaders have suggested, for example, that bureaucratic politics, international appeasement and even racism might have been factors in determining the outcome, the last element a result of Rana’s having been found guilty for his role in the Danish plot.

At the same time, the absence of adequate evidence in support of Rana’s willing involvement in the 26/11 plot exonerates neither the Lashkar-e-Toiba nor Pakistan’s security forces. Given the immense amount of circumstantial evidence and the efforts taken by Pakistani officials to obfuscate the truth behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks, the onus remains upon them to demonstrate their innocence. Tahawwur Rana may have benefited from due legal process. But others responsible for the deaths of 26/11 do not necessarily enjoy that privilege in the Star Chamber of international politics.

Mixed Signals

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on May 30, 2011.

The weeks since the killing of Osama bin Laden by US Special Forces have witnessed intensified recriminations and engagement between the US and Pakistan. Last week, President Barack Obama said that Pakistan’s obsession with India as an existential threat was misplaced, reiterating a theme he and his top advisers have embraced since assuming office. In doing this, the Obama administration has been attempting to assuage Pakistan’s purported insecurities vis-à-vis India in order to redirect its energies towards addressing challenges at home and along its western frontier.

There is an unwillingness on the part of the US to recognise and completely contradict Pakistan’s pernicious national narrative. This narrative has directly compromised the integrity of the Pakistani state and the well-being of its public, as well as the security of every state actively engaged in Pakistan’s neighbourhood. This narrative consists either of complete fabrications or, more frequently, half-truths or select facts bereft of context. Although often associated with the military, Pakistan’s recent diplomatic overdrive illustrates how the civilian leadership is equally culpable for its perpetuation.

Washington’s response, both before and after bin Laden’s killing, has been uneven. It has forcefully rejected certain elements of Pakistan’s narrative, its obsession with India being but one. The State Department has also made sustained attempts of late to encourage Pakistan to get its economy in order, and thus transfer responsibility to the Pakistani government for the country’s economic well-being and offset the moral hazard of international aid. Furthermore, while Washington may regularly pay lip service to Pakistani sovereignty, it is perfectly willing to interfere in Pakistan’s internal affairs if they impinge on US national security interests. The US should therefore be expected to continue unilateral cross-border strikes and intervene in support of democracy despite Pakistani protestations.

At the same time, the US tacitly tolerates other elements of Pakistan’s narrative. For example, Pakistani leaders regularly state that their country remains a victim of terror, and is responsible for capturing several leading terrorists. This may be true, but it does not absolve Pakistan of either its support for terror groups acting abroad or its offers of sanctuary. Vociferous public anti-Americanism is yet another element of Pakistan’s narrative, employed to delineate limits to its manoeuvrability, yet Washington nonetheless tolerates the ISI’s sustained efforts to shape public opinion against America.

Finally, there are those elements that Washington continues to give credence to, or at least leave unquestioned: Pakistan’s insecurities are legitimately propelled by fears of encirclement, India’s growing resource base, its nuclear weapons programme, and its reported “Cold Start” doctrine, thus adequately justify Pakistan’s inordinate military spending, greater investments in its nuclear and missile programmes, and support for terror groups targeting India and Afghanistan. That lasting peace between India and Pakistan and the settlement of the Kashmir dispute to Pakistan’s satisfaction will almost entirely eliminate its insecurities. That the army remains the only secular institution in Pakistan that “works” and is therefore deserving of support. And that Pakistan’s top military and intelligence officials bear little or no responsibility for the actions of their subordinates and affiliates, a claim even less credible given revelations from the ongoing trial of Tahawwur Rana and the testimony of David Coleman Headley. The erroneous conclusion drawn by the Obama administration from such questionable assumptions is that demonstrations of Indian magnanimity will allow Pakistan’s misguided, but not necessarily malevolent, security forces to reallocate resources towards improving the country’s security and economy.

Responding to Pakistan’s narrative requires an important cognitive leap, one that most in Washington are still reluctant to take: Pakistan’s purported obsessions and insecurities are self-inflicted, created and consistently advanced to serve important private interests, almost always to the detriment of the country and its people. This applies equally to all the challenges commonly associated with Pakistan, be it the military’s political preponderance, the proliferation of nuclear technology and materials, the cultivation and use of terrorist proxies against both adversaries and nominal allies, the growing radicalisation of the body politic, and periodic India-Pakistan crises. There is also little clarity regarding Pakistani pleas for a long-term strategic relationship, which it professes to desire as a symbol of legitimacy, but also works to undermine through its transactional demands and poorly concealed enthusiasm for a hasty US withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Although the US is using bin Laden’s whereabouts as leverage to extract short-term concessions, it remains unwilling to recognise the centrality of Pakistan’s self-defeating narrative and the dire need for its complete reversal, absent which the multifarious challenges associated with Pakistan are unlikely to be meaningfully addressed. This, in turn, necessitates the coordinated advancement of a counter-narrative by states whose national security interests are compromised by Pakistani misbehaviour, including India, Afghanistan and — most importantly — the US. What must be promoted is an entirely different conception of Pakistan’s national interest, including its self-identification as a non-revisionist and peaceful state wholly responsible for its own behaviour and well-being. Based on the mixed signals from Washington, it is unclear whether even the dramatic circumstances of bin Laden’s death will produce that desirable outcome.

Intelligence Design

The following article originally appeared in The Indian Express on May 5, 2011.


Based on the initial reports provided by US officials on the operation that culminated in the killing of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, it appears to be a textbook case of gathering and analysing intelligence on “high-value targets”. Not only has the operation burnished the reputations of President Barack Obama, CIA Director Leon Panetta (soon to become secretary of defence), the CIA and the broader US intelligence community, but it also provides some valuable lessons about the collection and analysis of intelligence today.

The trail to Osama bin Laden was deemed by many American al-Qaeda experts to have gone cold after 2003, when an al-Qaeda commander reported having met him in Khost province in Afghanistan. Earlier, bin Laden had reportedly left Tora Bora for the frontier with Pakistan, but his continued absence led to suggestions that he had perished, either accidentally or from natural causes. Some CIA operatives began jokingly calling him “Elvis”, a reference to the frequently reported sightings of the singer long after his demise. In hindsight, it emerges that bin Laden was careful enough to avoid all forms of communication that might have been compromised by the United States’ sophisticated signals intelligence capabilities, including telephones and the Internet. This also proved to be the source of his downfall.

The US intelligence analysts honed in on the fact that bin Laden employed couriers to communicate with al-Qaeda’s operational commanders, at least two of whom landed in US custody. The courier network was, in the words of one Bush administration official, “the holy grail” for locating al-Qaeda’s senior leadership. The name Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti came up during interrogations at CIA “black sites” as that of one of bin Laden’s couriers. The capture of an operative in 2004 identified the mysterious al-Kuwaiti as an associate of Faraj al-Libi, who had succeeded 9/11 architect Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as al-Qaeda’s operational commander. After al-Libi’s capture in 2005, he seemed to confirm through his persistent denials that al-Kuwaiti was continuing to serve as bin Laden’s courier. It was only later, in 2007, that the name was reportedly recognised as the nom de guerre of the Pakistani-Kuwaiti Sheikh Abu Ahmed.

The fact that this key piece of intelligence was gathered through interrogations of detainees has already been trumpeted as a vindication of the controversial programme by former and current CIA officials, as well as by former department of justice lawyers. Although some of those interrogated as part of this process underwent the widely criticised treatment known as waterboarding, reports suggest that the relevant information for finding bin Laden was not extracted using that technique.

Once Ahmed had been identified, the next breakthrough came using signals intelligence, specifically the interception of a phone conversation between Ahmed and another individual that was being monitored by the US. This helped locate Ahmed, whose vehicle was subsequently tracked to the now-infamous compound outside Abbottabad. The design of the building clearly pointed to its use as a safe house, but it was next to impossible to determine who was living there. While the site was constantly tracked using overhead surveillance, American analysts carefully examined the intelligence and worked through the probabilities of various alternatives to bin Laden’s presence in the compound. The ultimate call came down to the US president after several options were presented to him. Evidently, the US intelligence community concluded with considerable certainty that there was a high probability of bin Laden being housed in the compound outside Abbottabad.

An obvious lesson is the continued centrality of human intelligence, or “HUMINT” in intelligence parlance. After the Cold War, the US invested considerable resources in technical collection systems, often at the expense of HUMINT. The 9/11 attacks reversed much of that. Former director of National Intelligence (DNI) Mike McConnell confirmed in late 2008 that “HUMINT is back, big time”, while current DNI Jim Clapper lamented only last year that it is “still dwarfed by other disciplines”. The discovery of bin Laden’s sanctuary in Pakistan reinforces the importance of HUMINT just as it seems to have been going out of fashion.

A second lesson can be derived from the relatively seamless and complementary roles played by different collection disciplines. While interrogations produced the name and identity of bin Laden’s courier, the US employed signals and geospatial intelligence to locate the courier and then track the compound. Finally, there are lessons to be drawn from the analytical process that helped narrow the level of uncertainty regarding the compound and its inhabitants, although information about it is, at present, scarce. At the very least, “red team” exercises were conducted to explore the probabilities of other plausible explanations. Ultimately, it came down to a courageous call by the president to go ahead with the operation, despite lingering uncertainties. As we now know, it proved to be the right one.