President Obama departs on his first presidential visit to India this week with some critics in the United States and India arguing that his administration hasn’t devoted sufficient attention to a democratic India that could counter a rising China. In a video Q&A, George Perkovich talks about the significance of the trip and relations between New Delhi and Washington.
Perkovich argues that while the bilateral relationship is important, it suffers from unrealistic expectations and largely unavoidable differences in the two countries' short-term interests which their elected representatives will reflect. While it’s possible to balance China in a military sense, this is a nineteenth century game in a twenty-first century world—the more difficult and pressing challenge is to compete with China economically and strengthen international cooperation to solve global problems. Over the next several decades, the United States, India, and China will operate in a triangular relationship that will not be all competition or all cooperation.
- What is the significance of President Obama’s trip to India?
- Is it noteworthy that Obama is stopping first in India?
- How important are U.S.-India relations?
- Are there unrealistic expectations for the bilateral relationship?
- Do the two democracies have the same interests on critical global issues?
- Can India serve as a counterweight to rising China?
- Are the United States, India, and China operating in a triangular relationship?
- Has the civil nuclear agreement between the two countries been successful?
- Does Washington have an effective policy toward India?
What is the significance of President Obama’s trip to India?
The main significance of the trip is to demonstrate and show the importance the United States—and particularly President Obama—attaches to India. In a sense, it’s to show the flag and to reciprocate for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Washington when he was the first foreign visitor on a state visit during the Obama administration.
Is it noteworthy that Obama is stopping first in India?
It’s significant that India is the first stop on the trip, but it’s also noteworthy that he is visiting key Asian democracies. It’s India, it’s Japan, it’s Indonesia—there’s a subtle signaling that values matter in foreign policy and that democracies are especially important to the United States. And all of this is a signal to China, but also to the American body politic and India and Japan, that there’s a special connection among democracies.
How important are U.S.-India relations?
U.S.-India relations are important in several ways. First, it’s important that they aren’t negative and that there is a sense that these two countries are on a positive trajectory—this is very important. In the positive direction, the trend is most important. Is the relationship improving? Is it on a positive trajectory?
Beyond that, the particulars aren’t so consequential. It is not a question of war and peace as it’s impossible to imagine the United States and India going to war. And the two of them are not going to solve the global economic crisis together. So, there isn’t any particular problem that they are going to solve together or particular crisis that they could create together. What you want to see is the general upward trend of the relationship.
Are there unrealistic expectations for the bilateral relationship?
There are unrealistic expectations. U.S.-India relations were on a positive trajectory from the middle part of the Clinton administration onward—and this was a very good thing. The success of American Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama and Indian Prime Ministers Rao, Vajpayee, and Singh basically helped the two countries on a positive trajectory.
And then what happened in the Bush administration with the U.S.-India nuclear deal was that the positive trajectory spiked—it was like injecting amphetamines into a runner. So, it spiked up and that was seen as a good thing. And it was seen as a good thing in India, but inevitably it came back down to the normal trend line, which is positive. But as it comes down from the spike there are people in India and the United States who say the relationship is falling, Obama hasn’t paid enough attention to it, and so on.
But the reality is that is was an unsustainable spike. When the countries come back down it feels different, but they are coming back down to what is still a very positive trend line. The more normal thing is to have this positive trend line and the relationship has little ups and downs. For instance, India passes a law that frustrates the United States and there’s a little down. And vice versa. But you won’t see these big spikes one way or the other.
Do the two democracies have the same interests on critical global issues?
The United States and India in the short term have a lot of divergent interests, especially in the narrow interests defined by their parliaments. In the long term, both countries want the same kind of world and they both want each other to succeed. But in democracies especially, politics is all about the short term.
For example, on trade issues India wants its workers to have more access to the United States, especially its educated workers including accountants, IT professionals, lawyers, and so on. The United States is worried about unemployment and protecting jobs, so it frustrates India by not changing the terms under which Indian workers can come to the United States. The United States would like greater access to the Indian market for American farmed goods and other goods. But, India has 400 million small farmers and it’s worried about employment in India, so it doesn't accommodate the U.S. position.
Going down the list of particular issues, the two countries are at odds in the short term. And this really reflects the fact that India is a very large developing country in Asia and the United States is a rich country in North America. And so the two countries have different interests that reflect where they are, how old they are, and how rich they are—so, it’s natural that there would be that kind of difference.
The fact that both countries are democracies doesn't make those differences go away.
Can India serve as a counterweight to rising China?
When people talk about India being a counterweight to China, you need to ask what they mean. If they’re thinking in terms of military balancing, it’s the wrong expectation and, in a sense, it’s the wrong question. China is not going to attack India—most Indians understand this—and therefore the issue of banding together to defend India is not so much the challenge of the day.
In the twenty-first century, the balance that needs to be made isn’t military—that can be done and it’s important—but is really economic. China’s power has come from economic growth, its share of the global economy, the debt it holds, and so on. So, the United States, India, and other countries need to balance China in an economic sense, and that’s a much harder thing to do than balancing military power.
Another way to think about this is if the twenty-first century is going to be all about knowledge and the knowledge production economy, then the United States and India could actually team up. The two countries could be more cooperative because there are more reasons for them to cooperate in knowledge as they have similar tolerance levels and liberal cultures (compared to China) and research and development and intellectual property are more respected in India. So, there really is a basis to cooperate and kind of compete with China economically. And this could be done in a military sense, but that’s a nineteenth century game, and we’re in a twenty-first century world.
Are the United States, India, and China operating in a triangular relationship?
There’s an assumption or a hope that the United States and India can team together to balance China, but the reality is the United States, India, and China are in a triangular relationship and they will be in one for decades.
The United States cooperates with China on a number of things. For example, the two countries are cooperating on economics, the United States would like to cooperate with China on climate change, and there are other issues where there will be cooperation. The two countries also compete. The United States is warning China about territorial claims in the South China Sea and the East China Sea. China worries about our American military build-up and missile defense. So, the United States and China will be mixing cooperation and competition, trying to feel their way forward.
India and China are doing the same thing. China is now India’s largest trading partner. China and India have had basically positive diplomatic relations in the last 10 years, but they’re also worried about each other (or India’s very worried about China and China affects a view that China doesn’t care that much about India because India is not too consequential). But they too will mix cooperation and competition.
In many ways, India has played the United States and China off each other for the last 10 years—and if it’s smart, will continue to do so. So, the United States tries to court India and draw India closer to the United States. China sees this and tries to court India to keep it from getting closer to the United States.
So, it really is a triangular relationship that won’t be all competition and it won’t be all cooperation.
Has the civil nuclear agreement between the two countries been successful?
The nuclear agreement has been great for Russia, pretty good for France, not so good for the United States, not so good for the global nonproliferation regime, and pretty good for India. What I mean by that is the deal was supposed to transform the U.S.-India relationship. Five years later, there are people who are exaggerating and saying the relationship is on the skids, the United States hasn’t done enough, and so forth. So, how could the deal have transformed that relationship if people are as concerned as they are?
The reality is nuclear energy isn’t as important in India as people claimed or advertised over the last few years. Providing nuclear cooperation is welcome, especially to the Indian elite, but to the Indian economy and average Indian, it’s pretty irrelevant in their lives. So, it couldn’t transform the relationship.
India has also been slow to change domestic laws that would enable American companies to participate in the Indian market, so this frustrates people in the United States. Meanwhile, Russia didn’t need liability protection to do business, so it filled the void.
The biggest problem with the deal is that it frustrated other countries around the world that felt the United States was unilaterally trying to change the rules. The United States had, in many ways, helped create the rules on nonproliferation and people felt that the Washington came by one day and said we have this new friend India, and we have people who want to do business in India, so we’re going to change the rules. We’d like to consult with you and have you agree, but we’ll do it anyways.
And so the rest of the world got pretty angry about it and there’s been a backlash in Brazil, Egypt, and other places. U.S. credibility on nonproliferation has suffered for not much in return.
Does Washington have an effective policy toward India?
In a sense, the Obama administration has wanted to maintain the upward trend in U.S.-India relations that began with President Clinton and continued with Bush. But Obama has tried to avoid certain things the Bush administration did that causes relationships to spike up in the short term—like an amphetamine injection, it makes someone feel energetic, but they can’t keep injecting or they become an addict, and then they kind of crash when they come off of it. And so the Obama administration wanted to have a sustainable upward trajectory and didn’t want to go through the positive jolts to the system that aren't sustainable.
The United States also needs to tend to global problems—climate change, proliferation, and so on—where India may want something that’s not what the rest of the world wants. So, the United States needs to balance its policy more than perhaps was done during the Bush administration. I think the administration’s got it about right in terms of balancing global interests with those in the bilateral relationships—so, the administration has done an okay job.
It’s fair to say that the administration hasn’t paid as much attention to India as people hoped, but one can counter this with the fact that the United States has had a lot of other things to deal with. Hopefully this visit will signify to India and others that, notwithstanding everything else that’s going on, India really is important.
