Negotiating the forks in the road of diplomacy (India faces clear-cut binary choices on multiple fronts)

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 Negotiating the forks in the road of diplomacy (India faces clear-cut binary choices on multiple fronts)

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Read more on - Polity | Economy | Schemes | S&T | Environment

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• India's future policies hang in balance : The present period of massive flux means India has to finally decide on the future course of action, on multiple foreign policy fronts.

1. The G-20 meetings (June 28-29) saw 8 bilateral meetings, and 2 trilaterals (RIC and JAI) - venue : Osaka
2. The SCO (June 2019) saw India-China bilateral - venue : Bishkek
3. Coming up : Eastern Economic Forum, Vladivostok, Russia; Wuhan  return visit of Xi Jinping; Meeting Trump during UN GA meet.

• Policy binaries : The problem is that many policy choices have become binaries, with the US holding one prong of the fork, and Russia + China the other.
• Trade issues :

1. The Trump trade war is now unleashed against India also, blunting whatever happiness India experienced on seeing China squirm earlier! Now, India will try to push trade issues to the multilateral WTO forum only, and that will be clear in the RIC trilateral in G-20 and the BRICS meeting at G-20.
2. Should India join the RCEP or not, now that US is out of the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership)? If US doens't relent on trade, then RCEP is a must-do.

• Energy : Trump pulled US out of the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) with Iran. Soon, India has lost heavily, on both principle and profit, by surrendering to the Trumpian dictat on Iran. As India stopped buying Iranian crude, it is now buying costlier and lower-grade crude from US! And the waiver of Chabahar is meaningless as no company (banks, shipping, insurance) is willing to work on it, due to sanctions fear on other businesses.
• War between US and Iran : The worst will happen as India's Chabahar port dream may collapse, and with it may collapse the larger dream of connecting with Eurasia via the Russian-led INSTC (International North-South Transport Corridor).
• 5G networks are coming : The US has "told" India to ban the Chinese firm Huawei completely. That is a tough choice to make, as is the threat on not buying the Russian S-400 system.
• US versus Russia-China : India worked well with both camps in earlier decades, but now is different.

1. The Russia-China bond now is much firmer than earlier, due to Xi-Putin friendship.
2. Trump is strengthening that bond by projecting them as America's top enemies (National Defence Strategy 2018)
3. India earlier hoped to pick and choose the best deal from both camps, but now both are talking about 'interoperability'
4. The Indian stand (pivot) from non-alignment to multi-alignment or issue-based alignment is unsustainable.

• What to do :

1. India has to define its foreign policy clearly now, while remaining totally rooted in South Asia. Friendship in the region makes India formidable.
2. India has to move beyond asking big powers for punishing Pakistan (the Masood Azhar case - a success). Forget demanding more visas too.
3. India has to re-envision the original non-alignment movement. What was that? "Standing on our own feet, and not being a plaything of others".

• A big mistake : The Australian PM said that "it would be a mistake if we become nothing more than the sum of our deals". Trump wants that. India should not. The wave of "tactical transactionalism" is deadly. And deadlier is the "zero sum game" of our deals.
• Summary : The global political situation is such that India is faced with clear cut binary choices now, with long-term implications.

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