Over 2014 and into 2015, the world’s first and second most populous nations exchanged high level visits. India’s Prime Minister Nahendra Modi and China’s President Xi Jinping both visited each other’s capitals. Photos showed them bonding. Xi in New Delhi sat sipping tea with his counterparty. Modi in Beijing was shown using chopsticks. From the body language at least, they seemed to be enjoying themselves.
India and China’s sometimes willful ignorance of each other in the past has been one of the world’s great geopolitical anomalies. Two ancient civilizations, with a long (if contended) land border, their cultural links go back centuries. They can both claim too to be post-colonial success stories, countries which have shed foreign oppression and created their own specific sense of modernity. Despite this, the history of their modern interaction has been more about disagreement, war and tension than seeing eye to eye. It was unsettling but fitting that the day Xi arrived in India his army launched skirmishes across the contested border.
The context of their relationship though is important. In the 2000s, during the era of President George W Bush after September 11th 2001 and the terrorist attacks in the US, and with the emergence of India and Pakistan as nuclear powers, the US needed to concentrate on the region more than ever before. Pakistan became a key ally in the fight against terrorism, and extremist muslim groups. India began to receive presidential attention, with President Obama visiting soon after coming to power. The idea that this region was now a zone for US interests and involvement unsettled many in Beijing. Suddenly, there was a kind of encirclement strategy emerging around them. All of this went hand in hand with the ideas being promoted by the then Secretary of State Hilary Clinton of a rebalancing to the Asian Region, the famous `US pivot to Asia.’ The notion of deeper security and military co-operation between the US and India emerged, and antagonized China.
Despite this, under former Prime Minister Singh, India seemed to be pursuing western economic reforms. This gave a separate strand to the relationship India had with the world. In this area, it was China rather than the US which appeared more appealing. Right next to India was a vast market of 1.3 billion, with a growth rate in double digits, and an economy that now stood at three times the size of their own. Indian entrepreneurs started looking hard at what China was doing. Politicians started noticing that India had a trade deficit with its neighbour, exporting far less than it imported. It also noticed that China’s mode of export led growth, investment in infrastructure, and accommodation of high amounts of foreign investment, was one that India needed to look at hard.
Until the election of Modi, however, the most that could be said of India China relations was that they were underwhelming. Trade figures were low, flows of investment almost non existent, people to people contact surprisingly limited, and top level links equally small. Modi and Xi in their meetings with each other have at least corrected the diplomatic mood. On top of this, in 2016, India looks set to outperform in terms of GDP growth, looking to post over 7 per cent.
In this context, it makes it clear why India might be sanguine about being over close to the US in security terms, and why it might feel that joint patrols in the South China Sea are a gesture they don’t wish to currently make. Already tensions in this region are running high. India is not a claimant to any of the territory. The best it can do is to occupy the position as a disinterested external observer, wanting the region to be stable and not collapse into conflict.
Diplomatically, therefore, India’s words towards the US are as warm as ever. Modi visited America soon after coming to power, bolstering the good moods between the two countries. Ash Carter, the US Secretary of Defence, is due to visit in April. But India is caught in a triangle, having to balance interests with China in the economic realm against interests with the US in the security one.
It is not alone in this dilemma. Throughout the Asian region, right down to Australia, countries have to now have a two pronged diplomatic approach, acknowledging the huge role that the US with its naval dominance plays in the region in terms of securing maritime water ways, but also paying heed to the fact that China is now prime trading partner to almost every country around it. The aim is to take benefits from both without antagnoising them, balancing interests, ensuring that red lines are not crossed, and that benefits that could be gained from China in terms of finding new areas of growth and prosperity are not closed down.
India does need to forge a better quality relationship with China, and now is probably the right time to do it. It is cautious about China’s close relationship with Pakistan, but this has been a long standing issue. In terms of developing India’s own capacity, however, getting better export success into its neighbour, attracting better investment, and being able to duplicate some of the elements of the Chinese development strategy, so that it can become a stronger exporter, are key things for Modi. After all, his domestic programme was around improving his country’s economic and business capacity, with promises to simplify legislation, get rid of bureaucracy, and make the country more investment friendly.
China stands as an ally in that. If India and China can make better linkages between their vast respective populations, the results could be extraordinary. Something like a free trade agreement or a common economic zone might be possible, if not soon then in a few years time. Jeopardizing this by being seen as overclose to the US and wholly signed up to its security agenda would be a price too high for India to pay. For that reason, it is at the moment perched on top of a fence, balancing itself. It is in good company. Most of the rest of the region are sitting beside it, trying to craft policies that get economic benefit from China, and security returns from the US.
Kerry Brown is Professor of Chinese Studies and Director of the Lau China Institute at King's College, London. From 2012 to 2015 he was Professor of Chinese Politics and Director of the China Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, Australia. Prior to this he worked at Chatham House from 2006 to 2012, as Senior Fellow and then Head of the Asia Programme. From 1998 to 2005 he worked at the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office, as First Secretary at the British Embassy in Beijing.
Source: King's College London
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