Defence And Strategic Affairs Blog

India Shining, At Least in Geopolitics

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New Delhi is being wooed by both Washington and Beijing, though its ultimate choice is becoming increasingly clearer

A previous post focused on the unexpected improvement in India’s strategic position in its own neighborhood.  Events this week brought evidence of how New Delhi is emerging as an important pivot point on Asia’s broader geopolitical stage.  Indeed, for every global investor fleeing the country these days, there is a foreign statesman who wants to partner more closely with it.

The visit of U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to New Delhi illustrates how the Obama administration has shaken off its disillusionment with India and is now resuming its predecessors’ practice of engaging the country on high-profile security initiatives.   Panetta stopped in India as part of an eight-day swing through Asia designed to fill in the details about Washington’s new military buildup in the Asia-Pacific region that is plainly directed against China even if no one in Washington cares to admit it publicly.  As part of the strategy, the United States will shift the bulk of its naval combat power to the Pacific in the coming years as well as deepen military ties with regional allies and friends.

In an important address in New Delhi, Panetta made clear that the Obama administration sees India as a “linchpin” in this strategy.  Stating that the United States “views India as a net provider of security from the Indian Ocean to Afghanistan and beyond,” Panetta proposed the formation of a long-term strategic partnership, one that featured greater Indian access to the latest U.S. military technology and a defense trade relationship that went beyond a focus on one-off transactions to include joint research and co-production efforts.

The path from Washington to New Delhi has been busy in recent weeks.  In late March, Commerce Secretary John Bryson showed up at the head of a high-level trade mission.  In April, Under Secretary of State Wendy Sherman stopped by to discuss preparations for the upcoming round of the U.S.-India Strategic Dialogue that will take place next week in Washington; Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Kurt Campbell paid a visit to continue the on-going exchange of views on East Asia policy that has sprung up over the last few years; and Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs Andrew Shapiro arrived to resume a bilateral dialogue on non-proliferation and defense trade issues that has not convened in six years.  Last month, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton alighted to talk about Iran, followed by Peter R. Lavoy, the Pentagon’s point person on Asia, who wanted to encourage a greater Indian role in Afghanistan.

While Panetta was paying court in New Delhi, Indian Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna was being serenaded by Chinese officials in Beijing.  In town to attend a summit meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization – a regional security grouping comprised of China, Russia and four Central Asian states – Krishna was told by Executive Vice Premier Li Keqiang (who is widely expected to become China’s head of government) that the Sino-Indian equation would be the important bilateral relationship in the 21st century.  Li’s phrase is a virtual echo of the Obama administration’s regular formulation about Washington and New Delhi constituting “an indispensable partnership for the 21st century.”  Beijing has also upgraded its ambassador in New Delhi to vice-ministerial status.

So India’s geopolitical dance card is filling up.  Officially it remains uncertain about who to take to the prom through its inclinations are becoming increasingly clearer.  Like Washington, New Delhi seeks deeper economic cooperation with Beijing and during his visit Krishna was keen to secure Chinese investment in much-needed infrastructure projects.  China is now the country’s top partner in merchandise trade and according to one estimate the two could form the world’s largest trading combination by 2030.  Moreover, a deep-seated desire for strategic autonomy will continue to limit just how close New Delhi aligns itself with Washington.

Yet Beijing’s expanding strategic reach has also become a cause of deep concern to New Delhi, leading it gradually to tighten security ties with Washington.  Over the past few years, India has moved to fortify its northeastern border areas where China has made renewed territorial claims; tested a nuclear missile capable of targeting China’s largest cities; laid down a conspicuous marker in the South China Sea dispute; ramped up its purchase of U.S. military systems and the number of exercises with U.S. forces; expanded defense relations with Japan; and begun to concert East Asia policy with Washington and Tokyo.

The cross-currents affecting New Delhi’s approach toward Beijing are on display in a report issued a few months ago by prominent members of the Indian foreign policy establishment.  Seeking to chart out a set of basic principles to guide national security policy over the next decade, the report emphasizes that strategic independence remains “the core of India’s global engagements even today.”  Yet it surprisingly had much more to say about China than about the United States.  On the former, it argued that:

China will, for the foreseeable future, remain a significant foreign policy and security challenge for India.  It is the one major power which impinges directly on India’s geopolitical space.  As its economic and military capabilities expand, its power differential with India is likely to widen….

….The challenge for Indian diplomacy will be to develop a diversified network of relations with several major powers to compel China to exercise restraint in its dealings with India, while simultaneously avoiding relationships that go beyond conveying a certain threat threshold in Chinese perceptions.

In a subsequent newspaper piece, Shyam Saran, a former foreign secretary who was involved in the report, elaborated on these themes.  He argued that it would be best, at least for the time being, to avoid the encumbrances of an alliance with Washington.  Yet he also acknowledged that:

Given the challenge that China’s apparently relentless rise poses to India, the pursuit of a “non-aligned” policy appears unwise.  The U.S. has greater affinity and empathy with India.  It supports India’s acquisition of economic and technological capabilities and has convergent concerns over Chinese hegemony.  But the U.S. has not yet determined whether, in its relative decline, its interests are better served by playing a balancing role in Asia among Asian powers including between China and India, or seeking to contain China through a network of allies. Neither precludes India and the U.S. pursuing closer partnership and both seeking a more cautious and nuanced relationship with China.

Panetta’s tour of Asia and his visit to New Delhi have addressed Saran’s concern: The Obama administration is committed to organizing a regional balance of power against China and desires India’s key assistance toward that goal.  New Delhi’s response to this overture will undoubtedly be halting, more than occasionally causing frustration in Washington.  But over time its strategic imperatives will ineluctably draw it into a closer geopolitical affiliation with the United States.

This commentary was originally posted on Chanakya’s Notebook.  I invite you to follow me on Twitter.

Defence And Strategic Affairs Blog

Glimmers of Hope in Pakistan

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Pakistan’s prospects careen from bad to worse, but there is still some possibility that it might one day evolve in a more liberal and moderate direction

 

Events over the last few weeks have amply demonstrated the growing decrepitude of the Pakistani state, providing fresh justification for its perennial ranking at the top of the world’s failed-state indices.  Yet out of the gathering gloom, several flickers of light can be detected.

First, though, there can be no doubt about the country’s cloudy prospects.  The massive energy crisis, which has resulted in prolonged black-outs, has crippled the already weak industrial base.  With the national government defaulting last month on its loan guarantees to power producers, some experts warn that the energy crunch is more of a threat to stability than is terrorism.

The economic crisis has also careened from bad to worse.  Last week, Finance Minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh disclosed that the economy grew only 3.7 percent in the July 2011-June 2012 fiscal year, undershooting the government’s 4.2-percent target.  Shaikh’s budget proposal to parliament the following day was widely criticized as perpetuating the status quo.  Its presentation was also a riotous affair, with loud heckles emanating from the opposition benches and shuffles breaking out between parliamentarians.

The country is running wide budget and trade deficits, exacerbated by the marked decline in U.S. financial assistance over the past year.  Inflation is at an 11-percent rate, investment is at the lowest level in decades, and the Pakistani rupee is trading at record lows.  The Wall Street Journal last week quoted the head of the central bank, Yaseen Anwar, as saying that Islamabad may soon have to turn again to the International Monetary Fund even though repayment of a prior $4-billion IMF loan is likely to test the national exchequer in the months ahead.  Anwar’s lament – “There are many serious challenges.  I have a rough job here” – neatly encapsulated Pakistan’s situation.

The rise of religious extremism has continued unabated, including the escalation of violence throughout the country against the minority Shia community by the Pakistan Taliban and Sunni militant groups.  Two weeks ago, Human Rights Watch took Pakistani authorities to task for failing to protect the small Ahmadi sect that is regarded as heretical by many Muslims, a theme that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also repeated when she released the State Department’s annual human rights report.  The use of the notorious blasphemy laws against Christian minorities is another source of national disgrace.

Yet against this darkening horizon, a few glimmers of hope appear that are worthy of note.  The current issue of OPEN magazine, an Indian weekly, carries an article about how the privately-owned television channels that have proliferated over the past decade have become forums challenging hard-line anti-India policies, government malfeasance and societal extremism.  It reports:

A new breeze is blowing over Pakistan—most Indians are unaware of this because they cannot watch Pakistani TV channels—and it may well be a sign of the road Pakistan might go down in future. It augurs well for both countries.

 

Pakistan’s new media—actually old, but in its new incarnation—comes down really hard on Pakistan’s new and old rulers, including the military, for encouraging distortions in its new history books and spending time, effort and money on preparing for a future conflict with India rather than concentrating on building a better and more prosperous Pakistan.

 

It draws inspiration from India’s economic growth over the past decade or two. Its praise and admiration for India is almost embarrassing. It advocates free flow of trade between India and Pakistan. Just a few years ago, these thoughts would have been regarded as anti-Pakistani and deeply subversive. But Pakistan’s media is now free. It is on a roll and it is angry and rebellious.

On a related note, a new Gallup Pakistan poll finds that a strong majority approves of the deepening trade ties that are driving improved relations between India and Pakistan.

Encouragingly, too, the state-run Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation has asked All India Radio for a copy of its recording of the address Muhammed Ali Jinnah made to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on the eve of the country’s founding.  In it, Jinnah, the leading figure in the Pakistan national movement, articulated the secular ideals he hoped would animate the new state, including the equal treatment of religious minorities:

You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed – that has nothing to do with the business of the State.

Pakistani officials have done much since Jinnah’s death a year after the country’s creation to mask his liberal views and decidedly un-Islamic ways, including censoring his remarks before the Constituent Assembly.  So, the audio copy of his address is not just of historical interest.  Similarly, the pilgrimage that President Asif Ali Zardari – a minority Shia like Jinnah – recently undertook to the tomb of a 12th-century Sufi saint located in India contained a good measure of political symbolism.  Sufism is a mystical and largely tolerant variant of Islam practiced by many Pakistanis and is in stark contrast to the austere faith professed by the Taliban.

On a political note that deserves some cheer, Yusuf Raza Gilani last week became the longest serving civilian prime minister in Pakistan’s tumultuous history and, against all odds, the present government seems likely to serve out its allotted term – another first in the country’s dismal record of civil-military relations.  It’s also managed to claw back some authority in the national security arena that previously was the sole province of the men in khaki.  Of course, Gilani’s government is highly dysfunctional and unpopular, but its unexpected longevity nonetheless is a sign of Pakistan’s on-going democratization.

A final point concerns the growing number of leading voices calling for greater public scrutiny of defense expenditures, which consume about a quarter of the wobbly national budget.  Nawaz Sharif, a former prime minister who now heads the main opposition party, has in the past called for a reduction of military spending.  Now Imran Khan, a rising political star, has joined the chorus.  General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the powerful army chief, also recently acknowledged the need for greater balance in defense and development spending.

All these gleams of light, however tentative and faint, indicate that there still remains some hope that Pakistan might one day evolve in the liberal and moderate direction that Jinnah posited at the outset.  The lesson for New Delhi is to continue searching out areas of engagement with those Pakistanis eager for more normalized relations.  For Washington, justifiably frustrated by the double game Islamabad is playing in Afghanistan and the anti-Americanism coursing through Pakistani politics, it is important to continue helping build up the country’s increasingly influential civil society and supporting the often messy democratization process.  There may be long stretches when such efforts appear in vain but they may end up making a good bit of difference.

This commentary was originally posted on Chanakya’s Notebook.  I invite you to follow me on Twitter.

Defence And Strategic Affairs Blog

Pakistan’s Nukes: How Much is Enough?

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The time has come to question why the country needs tactical nuclear forces

Marking the anniversary of Pakistan’s 1998 nuclear tests, Nawaz Sharif on Monday boasted of the key role he played as prime minister in bringing about this achievement.  Sharif, who now heads the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, the main opposition party, asserted that his actions have provided an infrangible guarantee of the country’s security vis-à-vis Indian military might, thereby resolving the fundamental vulnerability that had plagued Pakistan since its tumultuous founding.  “India could have attacked Pakistan many times,” he stated, “but due to Pakistan being an atomic power, India could not gather the courage to do so.”

The impact of South Asia’s nuclearization on regional security is a subject of vigorous scholarly debate.  But Sharif’s words raise a basic policy issue: If he truly believes that the country’s defenses are now impregnable, why doesn’t he speak out against the on-going expansion of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal that is rapidly leading Islamabad away from the minimum deterrence posture it declared following the 1998 tests?  After all, if he really means what he said, this expansion is not only militarily unnecessary but also diverts precious economic resources away from more pressing national priorities.

Worries have arisen that South Asia is on the verge of a nuclear arms race that, according to U.S. intelligence experts, “has begun to take on the pace and diversity, although not the size, of U.S.-Soviet nuclear competition during the Cold War.”  Islamabad in particular has added to its armory in dramatic fashion over the past few years and is reportedly on a path to soon eclipse the United Kingdom as the world’s fifth largest nuclear weapons power and to become the fourth largest by the end of the decade, overtaking France.

A 2008 U.S. intelligence assessment noted that “despite pending economic catastrophe, Pakistan is producing nuclear weapons at a faster rate than any other country in the world.”  It is increasing its capacity to generate plutonium and just last week reports emerged about the development of a submarine-launched nuclear cruise missile.  And over the past month it has conducted a spree of missile test-launches, including an air-launched cruise missile and a ballistic missile with a 60-kilometer range that can deliver a small, low-yield nuclear warhead designed for battlefield use.  According to media reports, the military establishment is placing an emphasis on short-range nuclear forces in order to achieve “strategic parity” with India.

So what is driving all this effort?  Despite mounting internal security challenges – including a spectacular terrorist assault upon the Pakistani army’s general headquarters in Rawalpindi in October 2009 – the armed forces continue to be preoccupied, almost to an excessive extent, with the conventional military balance vis-à-vis India.  General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the powerful army chief, regularly cites the risks posed by the Indian army’s “Cold Start” doctrine – which emphasizes the threat of large-scale but calibrated punitive actions in order to deter Pakistani adventurism.

But Kayani’s alarm is exaggerated, as Cold Start is still more of a concept than an operational reality.  Indeed, the present government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seems to have disowned it altogether.  Moreover, the Indian army’s condition does not inspire much confidence in its ability to carry out the doctrine even of it were assured of political support.  Military leaders reportedly told Mr. Singh in the days following the November 2008 terrorist strikes in Mumbai that the army was utterly ill prepared to go to war.  A 2009 internal assessment that the army submitted to parliament concluded that it will take some two decades for the army to gain full combat preparedness.  And in a February 2010 cable to the State Department, Timothy Roemer, the then-U.S. ambassador in New Delhi, assessed that the Cold Start strategy “may never be put to use on a battlefield because of substantial and serious resource constraints.”  More recent revelations have further underscored the army’s woeful state.

All military establishments tend to inflate the capabilities of their enemies, and the one in Rawalpindi is no exception.  But something more fundamental is at work in driving Pakistan’s nuclear buildup: the dysfunctional state of civil-military relations.  The army’s fixation on the Indian threat is rooted in large measure in a desire to perpetuate its traditional praetorian role.  An important factor, too, is the cloistered nature of the nuclear weapons complex, which not only lacks any semblance of civilian oversight but also impedes interaction with the broader military establishment.  With decision-making compartmentalized within a small coterie of officials, searching examination of the political and military utility of nuclear weapons as well as the development of sound strategies for their employment is severely constrained.

One issue that demands more rigorous scrutiny is why Pakistan is moving toward a Cold War-style strategy by acquiring a capacity to execute battlefield nuclear options against invading Indian forces.  Tactical nuclear forces might have made sense when the United States and the Soviet Union were attempting to extend their deterrence shields thousands of miles away from their national homelands.  But Pakistan needs only to deter its immediate neighbor, whose two largest population centers – Mumbai and Delhi – are within easy reach of existing Pakistani nuclear weapons.  Moreover, as I have detailed elsewhere, a minimal deterrence posture seems to have worked just fine in safeguarding Pakistani territory from Indian attack during the serious military crises in 1999 and 2001-02.

The good news is that some Pakistani leaders are starting to ask the right sort of questions.  Nawaz Sharif in the past has called for a reduction in the heavy share of the budget consumed by the military, and General Kayani recently acknowledged the need for greater balance in defense and development spending.  The current government of President Asif Ali Zardari has also managed to claw back some authority in the national security arena that previously was the sole province of the men in khaki.

Parliamentary elections are due in early 2013 and perhaps will take place as soon as this fall.  Once a new government is in place in Islamabad, it would do well to ask tough questions about the direction and scope of the nuclear weapons program.  Maybe then Pakistan can find the resources to address dire domestic needs like an increasingly wobbly fiscal situation, a chronic electrical power crisis that some experts suggest is more of a threat to stability than is terrorism, or a woefully underfunded education system that features the lowest enrollment rates in South Asia.

This commentary was originally posted on Chanakya’s Notebook.  I invite you to follow me on Twitter.

Defence And Strategic Affairs Blog

Rather Unexpectedly, India’s Neighborhood is Looking Up

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Things are going bad domestically, but at least India’s regional position is improving

 

A regular concern of this blog is the internal constraints on India’s rise as a great power.  But for decades the country’s global aspirations also have been encumbered by a quite problematic regional environment.  Unlike China, India has had the misfortune of residing in a highly volatile neighborhood, surrounded by weak and unstable, and often hostile, countries that habitually top various failed-states indices.   Fortunately, and somewhat unexpectedly, the situation is starting to improve.

As detailed in a previous post, India’s relations with Pakistan, its perennial arch-nemesis, are warming, driven by growing trade ties.  And against all odds, a remarkable measure of political stability has taken root in Islamabad.  The civilian government is weak and unpopular but looks like it will become the first one in the country’s 65-year existence to complete its allotted term.  It’s even managed to claw back authority in the foreign policy arena from the overbearing military establishment.

To be sure, Pakistan’s long-term prospects continue to be cloudy at best and the ever-latent rivalry with India will be re-ignited by coming regional scramble to secure influence over post-NATO Afghanistan.  But the present situation along India’s western flank is much better than one could have imagined just a year ago.

Ditto for the eastern flank, where the national fortunes of Bangladesh and Myanmar are trending upwards.  Not too long ago, Bangladesh was a pitiable basket case, known for its cyclone disasters, ferry boat tragedies and outbreaks of famine.  But the country has maintained a 5-6 percent growth rate for much of the last two decades and earned a spot on Goldman Sachs’ “Next 11” roster of countries with a high potential to become economic success stories.  It is a prime destination for labor-intensive manufacturing that is now migrating out of China and a hub for the global garment trade.  It has largely tamed the scourge of religious radicalism that keeps Pakistan, its erstwhile sibling, aflame.  And it has now embarked upon a cooperative approach vis-à-vis India, eschewing the confrontational line it pursued for decades.  Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Dhaka last September is widely seen as inaugurating a new era in India-Bangladesh relations.

Like Pakistan, Bangladesh is just four years removed from military dictatorship and it is conceivable that the army will once again storm out of its barracks given the prospect of political turbulence as the 2013 parliamentary elections approach.  The country also faces long-term environmental challenges.  Still, the overall situation there is a welcome relief to security managers in New Delhi.

Things also are suddenly looking up in Myanmar, which was part of the British empire in India until the mid-1930s.   Despite being blessed by abundant natural resources, decades of economic mismanagement made it one of Asia’s poorest countries.  Repressive, xenophobic and quixotic military rule guaranteed that it was an international pariah subject to Western embargoes as well as suspicion by even its Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) brethren.

But a series of dramatic political and economic reforms over the past year, which have prompted a lifting of U.S. and European sanctions, have given rise to new hopes.   According to media reports (here and here), Yangon, the country’s commercial hub, has become a boomtown filled with foreign investors searching out long-denied deals.  Earlier this month, the International Monetary Fund released a report highlighting the country’s “historic opportunity” to become the next economic frontier in Asia.  Similarly, the Asia director of the United Nations Development Program notes that Myanmar “could become the economic engine of the region,” while an Asian Development Bank official states that it “has the capability for private-sector growth that we haven’t seen anywhere else for a long time.”

The new stability and prosperity among the immediate neighbors promises to bring economic and security dividends to New Delhi.   For all the talk about the country as a rising global actor, it remains a less than “fully convincing hegemon within its own subregion,” as David Malone, former Canadian ambassador in New Delhi, recently put it.  Despite the common civilizational and historical links that permeate South Asia, India up to now has been unable to integrate the area in the same way that China has economically stitched together the much more culturally diverse and geographically dispersed East Asian region.

The result is a strategic paradox for India: A broadening diplomatic, economic and even military profile in East Asia, juxtaposed with a rather lackluster record of leadership in its own back yard.  In recent years, New Delhi’s economic diplomacy has been firing on all cylinders in East Asia, penning trade and commercial deals with Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and the ten-country ASEAN.  It is also deepening security relations with Japan, South Korea and Vietnam.  Yet until recently, it has not displayed the same dynamism in its sub-continental diplomacy.  Conspicuously unsuccessful were efforts at promoting cross-border economic cooperation via the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation – a forum largely created by New Delhi.

But that may be changing.  Deepening economic linkages with Pakistan promise to enliven the 2006 South Asia Free Trade Agreement which up until this point has been all but a dead letter.  Last week, New Delhi also approved an ambitious $7.6 billion gas pipeline project that runs from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan and Pakistan to India.

New Delhi has become more magnanimous and imaginative in its relations with Dhaka.  It has liberalized Bangladeshi apparel imports; offered generous terms for a free trade accord geared toward services to complement an existing pact for goods; and worked out agreements to settle complex border disputes and nettlesome water-sharing problems.

With Myanmar distancing itself from China’s longtime patronage, New Delhi is moving with celerity to fill the void, including developing the deep-water port of Sittwe on the Bay of Bengal.  This landmark $120 million project, scheduled for completion next year, would directly link India’s economically-isolated and insurgency-ranked northeastern states to the growing markets of Southeast Asia and so is significant for both commercial and geopolitical reasons.

Citing Sri Lanka’s flirtations with China and New Delhi’s slow response to the toppling of the democratic government in the Maldives in February, some Indian pundits lament the erosion of regional influence.  But India’s position in the neighborhood, at least for the time being, is actually brightening.  Now if New Delhi could only get its act together on domestic policy, it would go places.

This commentary was originally posted on Chanakya’s Notebook.  I invite you to follow me on Twitter.

India-US Relations Blog

Afghanistan is Key to India’s Iranian Connection

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Washington grumbles about the Indian relationship with Iran, but the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan leaves New Delhi little choice

The striking juxtaposition this week in New Delhi is a nice illustration of how Tehran has become a complicating factor in U.S.-India relations.  Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was in town to exhort Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s government to do more on curtailing imports of Iranian oil.  All the while, a large Iranian trade delegation was a few miles away striking deals for the provision of agricultural commodities that Tehran is finding harder to purchase.

On the surface, the awkward tableau was reminiscent of the situation three months earlier when the Obama administration moved to enforce new U.S. sanctions aimed at shutting down the Iranian petroleum sector as a means of pressuring the Islamic Republic to abandon its nuclear weapons program.  At the time, reports emerged that India had overtaken China as Iran’s largest oil customer and that a new rupee payments system and barter trade arrangement were being set up for the purpose of circumventing the sanctions regime.  Adding to the perception of New Delhi’s defiance was the announcement that an Indian trade mission would visit Iran to scope out commercial opportunities created by the U.S. and European Union sanctions.  Even if the Americans and Europeans wished to shun business with Tehran, Commerce Secretary Rahul Khullar was quoted as saying, “tell me why I should follow suit? Why shouldn’t I take up that business opportunity?”

These actions caused the Wall Street Journal to editorialize about “Iran’s Indian enablers” who were “turning about to be the mullahs’ last best friend.”  Nicholas Burns, who during the George W. Bush administration did yeoman’s work in bringing about the new era in bilateral affairs, issued a cri de couer:

This is bitterly disappointing news for those of us who have championed a closer relationship with India.  And it represents a real setback in the attempt by the last three American presidents to establish a close and strategic partnership with successive Indian governments.

Others pointed to New Delhi’s actions as evidence that Washington’s efforts to forge a strategic partnership with India were naïve and foolish.

But things have changed over the last few months.  While New Delhi continues to protest publicly the unilateral character of U.S. sanctions, it has quietly taken steps to accommodate U.S. concerns.  According to media reports, the Indian government has instructed domestic refineries to reduce imports of Iranian oil by 15 percent.  As a result, Baghdad has replaced Tehran as the country’s second largest crude oil supplier and Iranian oil now constitutes nine percent of India’s import profile as opposed to 12 percent last year.  Imports of Iranian crude declined by a third in April compared to March’s figures.  And the state-run Indian Oil Corporation, the country’s largest refiner, did not purchase any Iranian crude last month, down from 75,000 barrels per day in March.

During her trip, Mrs. Clinton publicly commended these efforts but also insisted that “India’s role in the international community” obliges it to go further.  To continue pressing this point, Washington is dispatching a special envoy next week to New Delhi.  This visit is significant since the Obama administration will soon begin rolling out punitive measures against foreign entities that have not lived up to Washington’s expectations.  It earlier granted passes to Japan and EU nations but pointedly left out such countries as India, China, Turkey and South Korea.

There is some speculation that India is in danger of being sanctioned for its continued oil transactions with Iran.  But a better bet is that this will not happen.  The rupee-based payment mechanism that India has fashioned to buy Iranian oil is certainly problematic from Washington’s perspective, though it is something U.S. officials can tolerate since it does not entail the exchange of major convertible currencies like the U.S. dollar or the euro.

Moreover, the third round of the U.S.-India Strategic Dialogue is taking place next month and Washington will not want the sanctions issue to derail the momentum coming out of the talks.  Indeed, according to sources quoted in the Indian media, the matter was not a major agenda item in Clinton’s discussions with Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna:

“Both sides referred to it obliquely, but Clinton didn’t even push it.  In fact, she seemed much more keen to talk about possible deliverables that could be achieved when the two ministers meet again for the bilateral strategic dialogue in mid-June.”

In his joint press conference with Clinton, Mr. Krishna once again pleaded that the country’s burgeoning energy security needs – it imports 75 percent of its petroleum requirements – limit how quickly it can break its oil links with Tehran.  Washington urges India to get more of its supplies from Saudi Arabia, which has happened to an extent though New Delhi remains wary of Riyadh given its close friendship with Islamabad.

But there is another factor at work here than just the geopolitics of oil, one that seems not to have been squarely acknowledged during the Clinton visit: A significant reason for New Delhi’s continuing desire to engage Tehran resides in the adverse effect on Indian security concerns caused by U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

With domestic politics largely driving U.S. strategy, key differences are bound to emerge between the United States and India regarding the political endgame that is now unfolding.  Looking toward the exits, Washington will not be overly concerned with the exact details of the country’s future or the viability of the government in Kabul it leaves behind.  In contrast, New Delhi, which has invested heavily in Hamid Karzai’s government, has strong security interests in ensuring that any regime in Kabul is capable enough to be a bulwark against Pakistan as well as a gateway to trade links and energy resources in Central Asia.

India has traditionally relied upon Iran, whose interests in Afghanistan are roughly congruent, to help accomplish these goals.  After the fall of the Taliban regime, New Delhi played a key role in building a transportation corridor from the port of Chabahar in southeastern Iran into Afghanistan.  Late last year, it announced plans to expand this link by constructing a 900-kilometer rail line to Bamiyan province in Afghanistan, where an Indian consortium has won mineral development rights.

Indeed, New Delhi and Tehran may go so far as to revive their cooperation during the 1990s that provided critical support to the non-Pashtun militias battling the Taliban regime.  (Already reports are surfacing that the old Northern Alliance may be reconstituting itself.)  The Americans will surely grumble about the cozying up with Iran, but the geopolitical logic of the Obama withdrawal leaves New Delhi little choice.

India has for some time now telegraphed how the Afghanistan factor looms over its relations with Iran.  Speaking in mid-2010, at a time of renewed U.S. pressure on New Delhi’s bonds with Tehran, Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao (who now serves as New Delhi’s ambassador in Washington) gave a noteworthy address on the relationship.  She highlighted the “unique” civilizational ties and “the instinctive feeling of goodwill” between the two countries.  She spoke of how links with Tehran are a “fundamental component” of Indian foreign policy and how there has been a recent “convergence of views” on important policy issues.  Regarding bilateral cooperation on Afghanistan, she argued that New Delhi and Tehran “are of the region and will belong here forever, even as outsiders [read the Americans] come and go.”

Reinforcing this message, a senior Indian official was quoted in the press at the same time as saying that efforts to tighten relations with Iran were a policy “recalibration” caused by the “scenario unfolding in Afghanistan and India’s determination to secure its national interests.”

The tussle over Iranian sanctions is a harbinger of bigger challenges ahead for U.S.-India relations.  One of the key foreign policy conundrums the Obama administration faces is how to reconcile its approach on Afghanistan, which has the effect of aggravating ties with New Delhi, with its recently-unveiled strategic “pivot” toward Asia, the success of which hinges in important measure on a strengthening of the security partnership with India.  The interplay of two conflicting dynamics in bilateral affairs – growing strategic cooperation in East Asia and unfolding differences over the future of Afghanistan – will be a key factor to watch for in the years ahead.

This commentary was originally posted on Chanakya’s Notebook.  I invite you to follow me on Twitter.