It is not by conscious design that Indo-US relations have largely been taken out of the context of the cold war and placed on a bilateral footing. But this is by far the most notable point about them. This is generally not recognised with the–result that related issues continue to be discussed in the old and by now irrelevant framework.
This is not to suggest that there has been a clean break with the past. America’s as well as India’s past commitments and attitudes unavoidably continue to influence their policies and outlook. But this influence has ceased to be decisive or even dominant. New Delhi’s refusal to endorse America’s Viet Nam policy, its repeated calls for an unconditional end of U.S. bombing raids and its stout championing of the Arab cause continue, for instance, to irk the Johnson Administration and alienate powerful groups there. But India’s title to U.S. economic assistance is judged in Washington not so much in terms of the country’s foreign policy postures as of its economic performance. This is a dramatic change from the past when Indo-U.S. relations were viewed almost exclusively in terms of foreign policy issues.
Two points can be urged against this proposition. First, India was never debarred from U.S. economic assistance in the Nehru era when its foreign policy was seldom viewed with favour in Washington. In fact the aid then, can be said to have been unconditional, which is not always the case now. Secondly, America’s interest in the economic and political viability of India is at least partly determined by considerations of the cold war. The US concern may have shifted from the Soviet Union to China, but it remains interested in ensuring that neither communist power acquires a grip on India either through aid or subversion and military pressure.
Obvious
Both arguments arc partly valid and emphasise the obvious point that there can be no clean break with the past in a country’s foreign policy. But in connection with the first point it should be recognised that in the past the competition with the Soviet Union in the third world left the United States little choice but to extend economic assistance to India. The American obsession with Russian moves in India may not have been justified in view of the limitations of Soviet economic and military power but the fact of the obsession is undeniable. It is notable that in the second half of the last decade India received less aid from America than Pakistan in absolute terms.
The country’s economic performance and its long-term consequences figured: fairly low in American thinking and calculations in that period. It is doubtful if Mr. John Foster Dulles and men of his persuasion cared much for the fact that India was a democratic country and that it offered far greater freedom to its people than any of America’s Asian allies. They would have almost certainly welcomed a more pliable, if less popular regime in New Delhi. The accent, in short, was almost exclusively on foreign policy which was viewed wholly in the framework of the cold war.
The picture has entirely changed. Washington is now interested not in excluding Russia as a source of aid and trade for India but in persuading New Delhi to extend its economic ties with Moscow to the maximum extent possible. The point may be illustrated by reference to the fact that last year the U.S. Administration virtually compelled Mrs. Gandhi’s Government to seek food aid from the Soviet Union. That the Russian response was not particularly generous is a different matter.
Purchases
Of late the criticism in Washington of even India’s military purchases in the Soviet Union has died down though some Senators continue to embarrass the Administration on this issue because they seem to believe that a poor country does not need to defend itself. The more relevant point however is that the US Government is no longer haunted by the fear that Russia will acquire excessive influence in India’s armed forces through the supply of military hardware. The importance of this point cannot be over-emphasised in view of the fact that in the past America was particularly critical of regimes that acquired military hardware from the Soviet Union.
As for the second argument, American public opinion is not obsessed by the Chinese danger to the same extent as it was by the Russian threat in the ‘fifties and early ‘sixties. As for India, Washington appears to take the view that Chinese-inspired subversion has little chance of success. It also rules out the: possibility of Peking trying to repeat 1962 not only because New Delhi is much better prepared to meet such an onslaught but also because, in the American view, China has little to; gain from such an adventure. The U.S. Administration has therefore tried to exert its influence in favour of a cut in India’s military establishment. New Delhi does not share this view and has successfully resisted American suggestions. But that is a separate issue.
It would also be a mistake to think that Washington’s plea for a cut in India’s defence expenditure is principally the result of its desire to maintain military parity between India and Pakistan. It is equally concerned with the economic consequences of defence spending.
The United States is now interested in India’s economic and political viability mainly because a major crisis in this country can wreck its own efforts to stabilise South and South-East Asia more or less on the basis of the status quo. China’s hostile posture makes India’s stability a matter of immediate concern for America but even otherwise a stable South and South-East Asia presupposes a stable and viable India.
The rise of what some American writers have called “communal dictatorship” – a euphemism for a right-wing communal party backed by a military junta – would also not be welcome in Washington because such a development would tend to further exacerbate relations between New Delhi and Rawalpindi and stimulate an arms race which appears to have been contained for the time being. The United States does not want India to compete with China in respect of military strength and an increase in the political influence of the services in New Delhi would tend to strengthen the possibilities of such a competition. Mr. Dulles on the other hand would not have been alarmed at the prospects of a “communal dictatorship” in India in spite of his country’s military alliance with Pakistan.
It is difficult to say when the process of taking Indo-U.S. relations out of the framework of the cold war began. In a sense it can be dated back to 1958 when Mr. Dulles passed away and Mr. Nehru began to show a more sympathetic understanding of U.S. policies. The process began to acquire momentum with Mr Kennedy’s election as America’s President in 1960. He was not enamoured of SEATO and CENTO though he was not prepared to go so far as to scrap them. By then the pactomania of the Dullesian era was over and there was a widespread recognition in America of the usefulness of the policy of non-alignment. It was no longer regarded as “immoral” and as a cover for anti-Americanism and pro-communism. But October 1962 must be rated as the critical point for two reasons.
Admission
First, the Cuban episode hastened the process of the Russo-American detente and led to the explicit admission in Washington that the Soviet threat in Europe, as well as the third world, had been greatly exaggerated and that Moscow must be conceded a certain measure of influence and room for manoeuvre if it was to be made a responsible member of the international community. Secondly, in the wake of the Chinese aggression against India in October 1962, Washington decided to begin a limited programme of assisting India’s military build-up in defiance of an officially inspired hysterical campaign in Pakistan. The American decision to ignore Rawalpindi’s objections to military aid for India was immediately accompanied by a sharp increase in the pressure on New Delhi that it must make major concessions to Pakistan on Kashmir. But the pressure proved short-lived and not particularly difficult to resist and the end result was that American policy acquired a new direction which has helped to take Indo-US relations out of the cold war context.
The political consequences of the US military aid to India deserve far greater attention than they have received. In all probability Washington would not have been able to overrule Rawalpindi’s objections if it was not simultaneously moving towards a policy of détente with Moscow. But whatever the circumstances the fact remains that in the process of ignoring Pakistani protests, the American Administration removed a major obstacle to Indo-US friendship on a bilateral basis.
It is indisputable that the US decision to provide military aid to Pakistan in 1954 brought the cold war to the sub-continent. The move itself was an admission of Washington’s distrust of Indian policy and of its willingness to line up with Pakistan in the latter’s disputes with this country to a certain extent. The pact aggravated this trend in the American thinking. Kashmir thus became one of the issues in the– cold war. By agreeing to supply military hardware to India in 1962 without making it conditional on a settlement of the Kashmir dispute, America finally reversed the process. The parallel development of Russo-Pakistani and Sino-Pakistani ties has inevitably reinforced the process.
US Policy
Pakistan’s alarm at this turn in U.S. policy in 1962 was not wholly unjustified inasmuch as it involved a weakening of America’s commitment to espouse its cause against this country. This was proved in 1964 when for the first time in many years the American delegation in the UN Security Council adopted a relatively passive role during the debate on Kashmir. It did not sponsor a resolution either directly or indirectly. All that it suggested was that India and Pakistan accept U Thant’s good offices for bilateral talks. No resolution was moved ostensibly on the ground that the Soviet concurrence could not be obtained for any draft. But such difficulties had not in the past dissuaded the United States and Britain from sponsoring a motion, or getting one sponsored. The significance of this new neutrality on Kashmir was unfortunately missed in India.
The Indo-Pakistan war in September 1965 finally convinced Washington that whatever its justification in the past the policy of arming Pakistan was no longer viable. But it could not have stopped military supplies to Rawalpindi alone without running the serious risk of losing all its influence in that country. It therefore settled for a policy of stopping military aid to both India and Pakistan. After an initial reaction New Delhi and Rawalpindi more or less reconciled themselves to this policy.
Washington must have realised the implications of this decision. By stopping military aid to India it made New Delhi dependent on the Soviet Union for military hardware. But this no longer alarmed Washington. Equally important, the: new move meant the burial of the old half-hearted policy of projecting India as China’s rival in South-East Asia. The country’s economic difficulties in recent years have confirmed Washington in the view that the best that can be expected of any regime in New Delhi in the foreseeable future is that it is able to cope with the problems of economic development, population growth and national integration within the democratic framework.
The Times of India, 3 January 1968