India-US ties: the most important relationship of our times?
India-US ties: the Most Important Relationship of Our Times?
WRITTEN BY JYOTSNA MEHRA
29 MARCH 2020
Last month, President Donald Trump made his first state visit to India when he flew to the country in the middle of a charged election campaign. Despite this obvious affirmation of New Delhi’s elevated status in Washington’s foreign policy calculations, the trip itself did not result in ‘pathbreaking’ deliverables. The much-anticipated trade deal was not finalised and the three MoUs signed during the visit were limited to cooperation on ‘softer’ issues such as energy and health care. In the absence of major concrete deals, India and the US merely “took note” of their developmental partnership, “encouraged” finalisation of their joint initiative in the nuclear energy sector, and “expressed interest” in their prospects of cooperation in developing the Blue Dot project certification mechanism for infrastructure development.
However, frustrations around perennial bilateral hiccups such as trade, and a seemingly lacklustre account of new agreements are hardly indicative of an unsuccessful state visit. On the contrary, this trip saw the two countries building on the unprecedented progress their bilateral relationship has already achieved—reflective of an unchanged forward trajectory. Moreover, the trip proved resoundingly that their deepened strategic partnership is acquiring greater invincibility.
The high powered visit saw an extravagant public celebration of their increasingly closer ties—with a 125,000-strong crowd at the Motera Stadium in Ahmedabad, and a further 46 million Indian television viewers of the ‘Namaste Trump’ event across the country.
High-level visits between India and the US—complete with their rockstar receptions and media frenzy— have been repeatedly rebuffed for being “low in substance”. However, the story lies elsewhere: India and the US have arrived at a state of strategic alignment through years of painstakingly difficult manoeuvrings and the mere chance of geopolitics that has thrown similar challenges at both.
Having proclaimed that India and the US had finally overcome “the hesitations of history” in his address to the US Congress four years ago, Modi now hailed the relationship as the “most important” one in a century that is experiencing grand-scale geopolitical disruptions—arguably brought about by China’s rise. For his part, Trump expressed his admiration for India’s rise as a free, democratic and peaceful society in a manner “completely unrivalled”— also a snide reference to the ascent of authoritarian China, their common strategic concern. In fact, the President lavished praise on India even as some US officials and media outlets adopted a severely critical tone against India regarding its internal woes on which he refused to comment: the changed-legal status of Jammu and Kashmir, the controversial Citizenship Amendment Act and the sectarian violence than ensued in parts of New Delhi coincidentally during his visit to the city.
Beyond the Trump-Modi chemistry, it is now clear that the Indo-US strategic alignment has been overriding bilateral concerns in their relationship. And more than ever before, their strategic partnership in the Indo Pacific is becoming the linchpin of their ties as China attempts to build a power-based order in this networked region, challenging the rules that have governed it.
During this visit, the US and India reiterated their commitment to enhancing access to quality infrastructure across the Indo Pacific through the partnership between USAID and India’s Development Partnership Administration. Over the last few years, the two countries have taken extensive measures to coordinate their Indo Pacific policies and expand their cooperation therein. Arguably, India’s rise and a greater acknowledgement of the need to engage with New Delhi has significantly driven Washington's policy shift from the Pivot to Asia to the Indo Pacific Strategy in the first place.
This has seen the US renaming its Asia Pacific Command to the Indo Pacific Command, defining the Indo Pacific region as a large maritime stretch from the western shores of the Americas to the western coast to India. More recently, this definition has been expanded—at least unofficially—to include the region westwards to the eastern African coast, covering the Indian Navy’s area of primary interest. India and the US now have a 2+2 foreign and defence dialogue mechanism in place at the highest level. They have been conducting a large number of military exercises including the tri-service Tiger Triumph and the trilateral naval exercise with Japan, MALABAR.
India and the US have also finalised key communications and logistics sharing arrangements such as Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement, Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement, and are concluding discussions on the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement. These exercises and foundational pacts are crucial to enhancing the interoperability between the militaries of the two countries.
Interoperability is also achieved by harmonising one’s defence inventory and ensuring equipment compatibility. In this regard, the US-India relationship has undergone a tremendous transformation with India’s defence trade with the US having risen from zero in 2008 to a staggering USD 18 Billion in 2019. Adding to that, the US concluded the sale of USD 3 Billion worth of attack helicopters and heavy-lift choppers to India during the presidential visit last month. Although exports of US arms to India, its designated Major Defence Partner have risen exponentially over the years and the two have signed the landmark Industrial Security Annex, imports from the USA have seen a decrease in their share of India’s total arms imports as New Delhi continues its policy of procurement diversification.
However, US concerns regarding Indian defence procurement have largely centred around threats posed to their interoperability as a result of Delhi’s purchases of Russian equipment. Thankfully for the US, Russian arms have been losing their “traction” in India—traditionally their top buyer.
The role of the ‘Quad’ or the quadrilateral coalition of Indo Pacific maritime democracies, India-US-Japan-Australia in maintaining regional stability received an extraordinary endorsement by both the sides during President Trump’s visit. While the Quad was revived in 2017 after a decade of inactivity, this joint-thumbs up to the initiative is especially noteworthy given that historically the two have exercised significant caution in explicitly associating with the group, primarily driven by fears of provoking Beijing that sees the initiative as a containment ploy.
Recent high-level visits between India and the US—complete with their rockstar receptions and media frenzy— have been repeatedly rebuffed for being “low in substance”. However, the story lies elsewhere: India and the US have arrived at a state of strategic alignment through years of painstakingly difficult manoeuvrings and the mere chance of geopolitics that has thrown similar challenges at both. The trips reaffirm this transformation, allowing New Delhi and Washington DC to commit to deepening their partnership and addressing their bilateral concerns.
DISCLAIMER: All views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent that of the 9DASHLINE.com platform.
Author Biography
Jyotsna Mehra is a Consulting Editor for Indo Pacific and Geopolitics at the New Delhi-based strategic affairs publication, The Kootneeti. She is also a Pacific Forum Young Leader. She graduated from the University of Oxford’s Modern South Asian Studies programme in 2018, and also holds a degree in Politics and International Relations from The University of Manchester. Image credit: CC by White House/Flickr.