When US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates swings through New Delhi this week, India’s civil nuclear initiative is unlikely to be at the top of his agenda. To be sure, there are growing anxieties in Washington about the UPA government’s inability to bring around its communist allies on a deal that is so patently in India’s favour. Gates, however, knows that there is very little that Washington can do to change the political dynamics in New Delhi.On the other hand, he has every reason to be pleased with the progress on bilateral defence cooperation. From expanded engagement between the armed forces of the two countries over the last few years, Washington and New Delhi have finally embarked on a more significant arms transfer relationship.India’s recent decision to purchase six advanced American military transport aircraft (C-130 J) and the earlier American transfer of the ‘USS Trenton’ (renamed ‘INS Jalashwa’) which allows India to project its power in the Indian Ocean, mark a turning point in Indo-US defence ties. These are the first weapons platforms that India has acquired from the US over the last six decades. Until recently, India’s defence purchases from the US have been limited to equipment such as radars.The enthusiastic American participation in last week’s defence expo in the capital and the rash of joint ventures announced by the Indian private sector and American defence majors underline the huge potential for bilateral cooperation in a globalising defence industry.Despite much progress, Gates and his Indian interlocutors know very well that there is a long way to go before the full potential can be translated into reality. The Indian and American defence bureaucracies are the world’s most recalcitrant. Getting them to work in tandem will need Herculean political assertions in New Delhi and Washington over an extended period of time.When asked last week, whether arms sales would top the agenda of Gates in India, a Pentagon spokesman said: “I would expect that to be a topic of conversation. But I do not trust that it will be the focus of our efforts there. The focus will be. our shared security interests in the region and around the world.”In plain English, the phrase “shared security interests” translates into two words — Afghanistan and Pakistan. The entrenched presence of Al-Qaeda and the Taliban along and across the Durand Line between Pakistan and Afghanistan represents the single most important security threat to the US.Although the Afghan war, unlike the one in Iraq, enjoys strong bipartisan support in America, the Pentagon is confronting new difficulties. For one, the growing number of terrorist attacks have shaken the internal and external confidence in the government of Hamid Karzai.Second, America’s European allies have lost their nerve and are looking for a way out of their Afghan commitments. For the last few weeks, Gates has been warning the Europeans that their refusal to strengthen America’s hand in Afghanistan would effectively destroy NATO, which for six decades has been the world’s most powerful military alliance.Third, the elections in Pakistan provide at best a mixed blessing for the US. Over the long term, a democratic Pakistan may be a more credible bulwark against terrorism and extremism. In the short term, though, America’s decision to tie itself to the person of President Pervez Musharraf has made the war on terror unpopular in Pakistan.India’s stakes in the international effort led by the US to stabilise Afghanistan are huge. American failure in Afghanistan will allow Al-Qaeda and the Taliban to extend their reach into Pakistan and the rest of the Subcontinent. So often in our history, it is the turbulence on the North-Western Frontier that shapes the security dynamics of the Subcontinent.Until now India’s principal focus in Afghanistan has been on reconstruction. The Bush administration has welcomed India’s economic role, but has sought to keep New Delhi out of the security politics of Afghanistan, given its fears of offending Pakistan.Amidst the deepening crisis in Afghanistan and a weakening international coalition, it is not clear whether limiting India’s security role makes any sense for the US. Whether Gates is prepared to accept it or not, India must offer a three-fold package to stabilise Afghanistan and Pakistan.The first is India’s commitment to accelerate the peace process with the new government in Islamabad and make it easier for the Pakistan army to concentrate on the extremist threat from its western frontier. Put another way, better India-Pakistan relations should reduce Islamabad’s suspicions about the New Delhi’s role in Afghanistan. Second, India can more effectively contribute to the building of a badly needed police force in Afghanistan. India can also help in the raising of an Afghan air force.Third, New Delhi must offer substantive triangular economic cooperation with Pakistan and Afghanistan. Restoration of the historic trade links between the Pushtuns and the Indian heartland must necessarily be part of any grand plan for taking markets and modernity to the tribal regions straddling the Durand Line. A modicum of strategic unity within the Subcontinent is essential for winning this round of the Great Game.The writer is a professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singaporeiscrmohan@ntu.edu.sg
