PTI

ASEAN Foreign Ministers at the East Asia Summit Foreign Ministers’ Informal Consultations in Singapore on July 23.

IS India really an “exceptional state”? Why does its “rise” as a major regional and global player evoke “far less opposition” than the ascendance of China at space-age velocity? Or, is India’s “rise” so unique as not to merit “opposition” at all on the world stage? And, what are the benefits that the larger international community will gain by thinking out of the NPT box and allowing robust nuclear commerce with India?

The discriminatory Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) has, for long, divided the world into two categories, of “haves” and “have-nots” insofar as the possession of atomic weapons is concerned.

These and other related issues dominate “the India focus” that is evident across Greater East Asia, especially the major powers in the region, although such attention is largely confined to behind-the-scenes diplomacy.

Greater East Asia is a geopolitical zone that transcends the geographical eastern part of the continent.

Home to the obvious players China, Japan and the two Koreas, besides the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), this geopolitical region includes India, Australia, New Zealand and Russia as the contiguous states and, as a legacy of the Second World War, the United States as “a resident power”.

By early August, with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) having approved an India-specific Safeguards Agreement (ISSA), the behind-the-scenes focus in this region shifted to a meeting of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG).

The prime issue is whether the NSG should allow India, a non-NPT state with atomic weapons, “unconditional” access to equipment, know-how and materials for generating civilian nuclear energy. The question has particular resonance in Greater East Asia, where China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand are NSG members. The other NSG members with an East Asia anchor are Russia, despite not being a member of the East Asia Summit (EAS), and, of course, the U.S.

To put the issue bluntly, can India lay claim to ‘a manifest destiny’ and insist on “a clean and unconditional waiver” from the NSG’s guidelines on nuclear commerce? So far, the region has been familiar with the “successful” evolution of the U.S. on the basis of “manifest destiny” and “the American dream”. The now-bygone Imperial Japan had, of course, tried unsuccessfully to assert its “manifest destiny” before and during the Second World War. At present, some critics believe that China is seeking its own version of “manifest destiny” as a global superpower. A now-resurgent post-Soviet Russia, too, figures in a similar fashion. It is against this qualitative and somewhat historical background that India’s latest efforts to force the world to think out of the NPT box have caught the imagination of the major East Asian powers. In the public domain itself, they have refrained from challenging the “rise” of India and, therefore, its current efforts to woo the NSG by riding on the shoulders of the U.S.

However, a telling comment by a top Japanese spokesman is a give-away regarding the sensitivities, if not really hard feelings, on the part of the NSG members from East Asia or with links to this region. The U.S., which is to pilot the NSG’s formal deliberations in late August, and Russia, with some experience of dealing with India on the civilian nuclear side, are not, of course, covered by the sentiments expressed by the Japanese official, Kazuo Kodama.

In an interview to this correspondent on the margins of the recent series of regional security summits organised by ASEAN in Singapore, Kodama minced no words in putting across reservations in polite but firm language. He took great care to emphasise Japan’s cordial ties with India, both in historical terms and in the present context, and he spoke without at all diminishing the importance of Tokyo’s long-established strategic friendship with the U.S.

In simple but strong political punchlines, Kodama said: “This [India-specific case at the IAEA and the NSG] is the first of its kind. India is not a member of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. And India is a declared nuclear-weaponry state. So, somehow, we are confronted with an exceptional sort of a situation. This is a very important issue not only for India [but also] for the world, Japan, too”.

It requires no great insight to recognise that a staunch U.S. ally like Japan tends to believe that the world is “confronted” with India’s quest for an “exceptional” status, indeed a “privileged” status (as in the words of a non-Indian diplomatic source). It has been amplified that New Delhi’s quest for such “manifest destiny” is important to India, while the same issue is equally important to the wider international community but not in the same light. The unstated indication is one of a clash, or a potential conflict, of interests between India and the rest of the international community. There is, of course, nothing at all in the Japanese official’s remarks that might suggest the possibility of a blanket refusal by Tokyo to toe Washington’s line on India in the NSG.

ROMEO GACAD/AFP

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma arrive for the opening of the ASEAN Regional Forum in Singapore on July 24.

However, Japan has, despite being a U.S. ally, voiced reservations in a more forthright manner than any other NSG member from East Asia, including China. The conventional wisdom is that China should be more opposed to, or more cautious about, the “rise” of India than any other Asian power. The reason: China is by far the foremost power in Asia, despite being somewhat behind Japan in the technological and economic domains as of now.

In these circumstances, India is seen to bank heavily on the political will and lobbying skills of the U.S. in the NSG. Relevant to this situation are the fineprint of the ISSA, as approved by the IAEA, and the presumptive move by the U.S. to safeguard (in a manner of speaking) India’s vital security interests during the anticipated NSG deliberations in late August. While the exemptions sought by India for its civilian nuclear sector are worthy of a critical evaluation by the NSG members, East Asia is particularly interested in New Delhi’s efforts to keep its defence-related nuclear programme inviolable.

Japan, still a pacifist state as its unchanged legacy of the Second World War, is prone to baulk at this security aspect in the perceived U.S. bid to hold India’s hand in the NSG. In Japan’s perspective, India’s potential “economic gains” from the U.S.-guided engagement with the NSG do not pose any threat to its own status as a developed economy. For China, though, India’s strategic and civilian nuclear programmes are of equal interest and importance, too.

The U.S. and Russia (to a lesser extent) are in a different global league on these matters. In the regional context, Australia is increasingly evincing interest in better all-round ties with India. This is so despite Canberra emphasising its enlightened self-interest in fostering robust ties with Beijing.

In a sense, countries such as Australia do not bracket India and China as passionate competitors. Canberra does not, therefore, see its ties with them in zero-sum terms. At the same time, it is deeply cognisant of its traditional friendship with the U.S., complete with the benefits of America’s nuclear umbrella, as in the case of Japan and South Korea.

Unsurprisingly, in these circumstances, Canberra has expressed willingness to see India’s case before the NSG in a “positive” and “constructive” frame of mind. The question of uranium supplies to India at an appropriate time, now considered unthinkable because of Australia’s passionate adherence to the NPT, has been suitably delinked from New Delhi’s case before the NSG. For Canberra, this move is pragmatism as a free-thinking U.S. ally and as a friend of India, too.

South Korea, among all the NSG members from East Asia, finds itself in the most delicate task of evaluating India’s case without sending any “wrong signal” to Pyongyang. After all, North Korea’s “denuclearisation”, with the NPT as the touchstone, is the negotiation theme in the ongoing Six-Party Talks (SPT). The six parties are the two Koreas, China as the Chair, the U.S., Japan and Russia. India has received some positive signals from South Korea, primarily because of its status as a relatively autonomous but close ally of the U.S. Seoul’s burgeoning economic ties with New Delhi are no less a factor.

While a complex web of factors will influence the course of India’s civilian nuclear odyssey, Pakistan, which does not belong to East Asia and which is fast losing ground to India on the international stage, has begun making noises. It is desperately engaged in trying to hurl egg on India’s face. A top Pakistani official, on a visit to Singapore in late July, told this correspondent that the Pakistanis could not be treated as the world’s only “proliferators” ineligible for treatment similar to India’s at the IAEA and the NSG. The list of “[state] proliferators”, according to him, is long indeed. And, the list, he said, included the U.S. and the United Kingdom, besides India.

The arguments of NSG members and some IAEA Board members, such as Pakistan and others, may be long and complex. However, the NSG’s final say on India will be relevant in sorting out its long-term strategic place in Greater East Asia.

Among the regional players, the voices of Japan and China will be particularly crucial. Some China-watchers, such as C. Fred Bergsten, have floated the idea of a “partnership” between Washington and Beijing as “the Big Two” in the global economic domain. India’s case before the NSG may, on the other hand, reveal the relative positions of the U.S. and China in the global strategic domain.