Acknowledging the Reality: India's Emergence as a major Power

(Originally appeared in the 1990s in the Times of India, as published in M. D. Nalapat's book "Indutva", Har-Anand Publications, 1999)

It was Regis Debray who wrote that the past remains as a

constant companion to the present. Analogously, we may argue

that perceptions about countries change slower than the reality.

By the early 1970s Japan was already a major economic power,

and yet it took a decade more before that was reflected in the

standing of Japan in the international community. Today Russia

has lost its coherence as a state; the security system and much of

the economic base has become an anarchic jumble. And yet, the

memories of the superpower-that-was generate a mist that

prevents such a harsh assessment of the Russian situation from

becoming accepted. Even—or perhaps one should say

particularly—within the Indian foreign policy establishment,

Russia is still regarded as a major world player.

India and China

There is an irony in this, because the latest entrants to the ranks

of the major powers are India and China. Both are experiencing

a period of rapid economic growth through an unshackling of

private initiative. They have built up the essential foundation for

growth, which is a large body of trained manpower. Despite

fissions and frissons, both have managed to keep the diverse

elements in their multicultural society from breaking loose and

triggering a Yugoslav-style chain reaction. And both have thus

far resisted pressures directed at lowering their external security

cover through abandoning the option of developing strategic

weaponry.

The collapse of the Soviet Union has led to the United States

winning the 'superpower war' by default. Washington is,

therefore, enjoying its moment of glory on the world stage,

preening as the arbiter and arbitrator of the fortunes of different

countries. Its objective is to prolong this moment of glory by

preventing other countries from equalling it in strategic power

and economic prowess. Thus, using the pretext of ensuring

global disarmament, Washington is seeking to throttle the missile

and nuclear programmes of India and China. It is also seeking

to improve its own economic performance by using its political

strength to get trade concessions from other nations.

It would be unfair to blame the United States for such a

policy. Any country in similar circumstances would have acted

in the same way, perhaps with greater ruthlessness. The contrast

between western and eastern Europe is proof that America has

been a much more benign Big Brother than the former Soviet

Union. Indeed, unlike European nations such as Britain and

France—which ruthlessly bled their colonies—the Americans

realised that a prosperous economic hinterland gave better

returns to the mother economy than an impoverished one. And

thus was born the Marshall and other plans. In the strategic

sphere, the United States was supportive of British and French

efforts at crafting an independent deterrent.

Such support has been in contrast to the stand taken by the

United States on the emergence of India as a strategic power.

Despite the reality of India having exploded a nuclear device 20

years ago, the United States has blocked efforts at admitting this

country as a full member of the nuclear club, and has sought-

these days with greater finesse—to 'persuade' India to give up

the option of a strategic deterrent, using as a rationale the

'danger' of Pakistan emerging as a nuclear power. Numerous

books and articles have surfaced to flash out this concept of

Pakistan as a threshold nuclear state, ignoring the reality: that

the indigenous Pakistani programme is as yet years away from

producing a serviceable nuclear weapon, and is moreover based

on technology stolen from the West.

If the United States is nowadays less shrill about imposing

sanctions on India, it is not because the fundamental aim of

forcing this country off the nuclear track has been given up, but

because of the realisation in Washington that the Indian

programme is an indigenous one that outside sanctions may

delay but not cripple. The strategic establishment in Inndia,

despite opposition from within the country expressed through

underfunding, has become viable on its own, and consequently

has the strength to resist 'murder’ (through international

sanctions). Which is why it is being pressed to commit ’suicide’

(i.e. shut itself down), not just by the United States but also by

a lobby within this country.

Strong Security Cover

This lobby, perhaps because of its external cultural and intellectual

underpinnings, grossly underestimates the mood within India

for a strong—and indigenous—security cover. In large part this

mood is the result of the memory of a thousand and more years

of servitude, to Afghans, to Persians, to the European powers. To

expect a nation that has undergone such torment—and over such

a prolonged period—to set aside the option of developing a

security umbrella that incorporates the world’s most effective

system of deterrence is to forget history and abandon

common sense. Only after the world follows Jawaharlal Nehru’s

vision and becomes wholly nuclear-free, can India abandon the

strategic option. But not before this, not when external pressures

and threats are continuous and powerful. Any government that

is seen as compromising on the country's essential need for

external security will soon be voted out of office. 

War is no longer confined to the clash of tanks and troops in

set-piece battles. Guerrilla war is equally lethal, as first the

French and then the Americans discovered in Vietnam. Using

this criterion, Pakistan has been in a state of war with India for

at least the past five years, ever since it began sending armed

men into the Kashmir Valley on a scale reminiscent of 1947-48.

If it has not expanded this war into the conventional channel as

well, it is probably because of fear of the Indian strategic

deterrent. Seeing the post-Pokhran unwillingness of Pakistan to

enter into a conventional war with India, a strong case can be

made out that the speedy development and deployment of Agni

and Prithvi will diminish (rather than make inevitable) the

prospect of conventional war between India and Pakistan.

'Coming of Age'

The United States needs to become more 'contemporaneous'

with current reality: 1994 is a significant distance away from

1984, and 2004 will be very much more different. If present

trends continue, that year may well see the ’coming of age of the

latest major power, India America needs to adjust itself to this

emerging reality to acknowledging that India and China have as

much right to their own strategic defence systems as Britain and

France have. The Euro- centric world view of the east coast

establishment of the United States has to give way not to the west

coast’s Asia-centred view, but to a recognition that Asia and

Europe have already become equal strategic partners, deserving

of the same treatment. In particular, China and India should not

be judged by yardsticks different from those used by America

for Britain and France.

While the British may have been tardy in acknowledging the

new reality, the largest power in Europe has not. Foreign

Minister Klaus Kinkel of Germany made plain that his country

welcomes a permanent seat for India on the Security Council.

Unlike Britain, which follows the US State Department line with

an embarrassing fervour, the Germans have been much more

understanding of India’s need to protect itself against cross-

border terrorism. Neither the British nor the Americans appear

to be giving sufficient weightage to the effect on international

security that a Yugoslav-type break-up would have on India’s

880 million people. If the fundamentalist elements in Kashmir

did not get encouragement from American expressions of concern

over 'Kashmiri rights' (as though these were different from the

rights of other Indians), an end to the insurgency there would be

swifter.

In sum, the 'unipolar' world of today will in the decade

ahead change into a 'tripolar' world, with America, Europe and

Asia as the three nodes. As for the present sole superpower, the

United States, it needs to recognise that India and China are at

least as responsible and relevant as its traditional allies, Britain

and France. Double standards are no longer an acceptable

medium of dialogue between countries.