Defence Cooperation & Foreign Policy

The Defence in India is undoubtedly a powerful instrument for advancing national interest. India has a large army, a credible nuclear deterrent, an established missile capability and a powerful navy. Behind the debate on ‘military diplomacy’ lies a strong sentiment in our armed forces that their role in formulating our security policies is limited. Indian military circles hold the view that enough importance is not attached to military diplomacy in our foreign policy.

Recent Developments

Obsolete Weaponry as a Gift to Friendly Countries

In a bid to boost defence cooperation, the government has asked the armed forces to compile a list of obsolete military equipment that can be “refurbished at minimal cost” and gifted to “friendly” countries. The latest proposal by the government is akin to the Excess Defense Assets (EDA) programme of the United States.

  • Apart from the strategic significance, the government hopes to create a base “to expand export of newer defence platforms, which have been made in India, to these countries”.
  • A number of friendly foreign countries have projected a requirement for second-hand military equipment for their armed forces on a gift basis.
  • These requests have come from some countries of the Indian Ocean Region, some African countries, Central Asian Republics and the Asia-Pacific region.
  • Fulfilling the requests would open the way for deeper strategic engagement with these countries, but also pave the way for long-lasting partnership through deploying training teams, offering special courses in India as well as supply of spares, repair work being carried out in India over the long term.

India’s Reconnection with Europe

President Ram Nath Kovind visited three European states — Cyprus, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic. His trip was part of a notable effort by the government to put Europe back at the centre of India’s global consciousness.

  • India’s diplomatic mind space is occupied mostly by Pakistan, China, and the United States. Thanks to the institutionalised high-level interaction with Asia, India’s relations with the ASEAN have become a part of the foreign policy discourse. Thanks again to annual summits, Japan has become an important element of India’s international relations.
  • But Europe as a collective has drawn little attention. The problem is not just with the government, but also the so-called strategic community. The present Government’s outreach to Europe is likely to emerge as a major contribution to India’s foreign policy.
  • India’s accumulated neglect of Europe meant there were many countries that few Indian leaders or senior officials had not visited for decades. The smaller countries of Europe, in particular, got the short shrift. The government has made amends by launching an expansive engagement with European countries at the political level.

European Outreach by the Present Government

  • The President had earlier travelled to Greece and outlined a comprehensive new Indian approach to Europe. His predecessor, Pranab Mukherjee and Vice President Hamid Ansari had undertaken important trips to the region after the NDA government came to office. Ministers and senior officials too have stepped up travel to and engagement with Europe.
  • The last four years have also seen a major diplomatic push to clear the underbrush that was preventing a rapid advance in the engagement with Europe. Unresolved issues with key countries in Europe had injected much negativity to India’s relations with key European countries.
  • In what could turn out to be a potential game-changer, the present Government has laid the foundation for a strong strategic partnership with France.
  • Beyond the bilateral, the NDA government sought to intensify engagement with the European Union. Although the two sides had unveiled a strategic partnership way back in 2004, the movement was too slow. If India seemed unwilling to think strategically about Europe, Brussels too took a bureaucratic view of India. That is changing now.

EU’s India Strategy

  • The EU is currently mapping out an “India Strategy” that is expected to lay out an ambitious new agenda for the relationship. India, on its part, is attaching a new strategic salience to the relationship with Europe. As the President put it in a speech in Athens in 2018, “Europe is irreplaceable in India’s determination to achieve the goals it has set itself.”
  • As the world’s second-largest economic entity and a major source of capital, Europe is a natural partner in India’s economic transformation. But India has a lot of catching up to do with Europe — from trade liberalisation to educational exchanges and climate change to security cooperation.

Trilateral Indo-Pacific Compact

  • India held the trilateral dialogue with Australia and Japan, where all three sides highlighted the growing convergence of their interests in the Indo-Pacific region and underscored their shared commitment to peace, democracy, economic growth and a rules-based order in the region.
  • India and Australia also held their first ‘2+2 dialogue’ and agreed that a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific is in the long-term interest of all countries in the region.
  • While India already has a ‘2+2 dialogue’ with Japan, it has also agreed to start a two-by-two ministerial dialogue to enhance “peace and stability across the Indo-Pacific region”.

Defence Cooperation by India

  • Defence cooperation is an ideal tool to advance the national foreign policy objectives by building bridges of friendship, preventing conflicts, building mutual trust and capacities on a global basis. The process signals the political commitment to develop cooperative relations and dispel mistrust and misperception on issues of common military interest. The evolving geostrategic realities necessitates that policy guidelines be formulated for integrated inter-ministerial planning on issues concerning the external security of the country. As India grows in stature, it needs to utilise defence diplomacy to the fullest extent to enhance its national interest.
  • After the Cold War, India’s foreign relations have become multi-directional and diversified. New geo-strategic realities necessitate improvement of relations with the major powers, such as the US, EU, Russia, Japan and China and pursuance of an active ‘Look East’ policy in the extended neighbourhood, especially ASEAN countries.
  • Towards usage of a nation’s ‘soft power,’ as part of defence diplomacy, role of international defence cooperation in gainfully supplementing diplomatic initiatives is increasingly being acknowledged the world over.

Benefits to Foreign Policy Goals

  • Enhancement of Security in the Immediate Neighbourhood: Measures to build capacity and enhance capability have helped tangibly in improving combined ability to respond to natural disasters and mitigating turbulence in neighbouring countries like Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka. Such activities with littoral states like Maldives, Seychelles, and Mauritius have not only also benefited India in enhancing its surveillance capability over its Extended Economic Zone but have also helped in significantly countering the sea ward threat from piracy.
  • Strengthening India’s Regional and Broader Global Links: Defence cooperation activities, by building mutual trust and understanding, have played a key role in strengthening India’s linkages and building ‘Bridges of Friendship’ with countries in its neighbourhood as also with key global powers.
  • Capacity Building of Own Armed Forces: Exposure to technology, organisations, doctrines, concepts, skills including Special Forces culture and working ethos of countries with wide spectrum of technology, sharing combat experience, such as through interaction with US CENTCOM experienced military leaders, and peacekeeping experience, especially of NATO countries, are important areas which enable capacity enhancement of own armed forces.
  • Boost to Defence Industry: Military-technical cooperation combining provisioning of arms and equipment to partner nations, technology access and investments are important in inter-state relations Military-technical cooperation encompassing provisioning of arms and military equipment to partner nations, access to technologies and investments in the defence sector are becoming very important in inter-state relations. Export and import of defence equipment has both security and commercial dimension. The scope of cooperation with Russia has expanded with start of large scale Sukhoi licence production programme, under HAL.

Defence Cooperation with Immediate Neighbourhood

Afghanistan

  • Currently developing its national military and engaged in military relationship with the USA, the NATO and coalition partners exclusively. India has agreed to provide Afghanistan further assistance to strengthen its security forces as the two strategic partners decided to deepen security cooperation and resolved to work closely to deal with the challenge of cross-border terrorism from Pakistan. India has given four military helicopters to Afghanistan and imparted training to hundreds of Afghan security personnel.

Bangladesh

  • India and Bangladesh in 2017 signed three Memoranda of Understandings on (MoU) for defence co-operation. MoU was signed for defence cooperation framework pact to bolster military supplies and technology transfer from India to Bangladesh. A second MoU was signed between the Defence Services Staff College, Wellington (Nilgiris), Tamil Nadu, and the Defence Services Command and Staff College, Mirpur, Dhaka for enhancing cooperation in the field of strategic and operational studies.
  • Both countries also agreed to enhance cooperation in the fields of national security, development and strategic studies through coloration between the National Defence College, Dhaka, and the National Defence College, New Delhi. Both governments also agreed on cooperation in peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

Bhutan

  • The recent standoff between Indian and Chinese troops in Doka La (Doklam) is a rare insight into India’s very special relationship with Bhutan, which includes military responsibilities towards it. Under the 2007 India-Bhutan Friendship Treaty, the two sides have agreed to “cooperate closely with each other on issues relating to their national interests. Neither Government shall allow the use of its territory for activities harmful to the national security and interest of the other.”

Maldives

  • Maldives has major military relations with India while nominal military relations with other Asia-Pacific nations and the USA. China, it appears, is wooing the Maldives in an endeavour to obtain a naval base on one of the islands of Maldives. A defence cooperation pact and five other agreements to expand bilateral ties were inked between India and Maldives in 2016.

Myanmar

  • India has assured Myanmar that it will further step up military ties, ranging from arms supplies to joint training and exercises, as part of the overall thrust in upgrading the defence, diplomatic and economic relationship between the two countries. This was relegated by the visiting PM to Myanmar in July 2017.

Nepal

  • India has a major military relationship with Nepal. Nepal’s military relationship with China is slowly developing. Which is a challenge for India.

Pakistan

  • India and Pakistan took part in a joint military exercise for the first time, courtesy the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). The exercise, was aimed at countering terrorism and conducted in Ural region of Russia.
  • Support to Joint R&D Projects: Given our woefully inadequate R&D base, we shall continue to suffer from lack of contemporary and state-of-the art technology. To this extent, we must establish meaningful bilateral relations with developed nations especially the comparatively apolitical ASEAN region, Japan and South Korea. Thus, we can not only duplicate our technology intake from the West but also establish a related indigenous R&D infrastructure for the future.
  • Confidence Building and Deterrence: Defence cooperation activities signal our political commitment to develop cooperative relations, promote military transparency, reduce misperception and promote perception of common interests. Consequently, defence cooperation becomes instrumental in dispelling mistrust, providing transparency, building confidence and helps to prevent conflict. Defence cooperation activities undertaken with China have helped to reduce the peer conflict to building mutual trust.Conduct of multilateral joint exercises by Indian Navy with navies of US, Australia and Japan have amply showcased feasible trends in partnerships with India, which could emerge as and when needed, and thus may act as a deterrence to our potential adversaries like China.

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