India’s Path to Power
Dear Reader,
I hope you are doing well. Over the past week, our researchers discussed India’s cyber capabilities, the need to acquire a submarine deal, the chasm between China’s rhetoric and actions, and much more.
India’s Path To Power: Strategy In A World Adrift
A panel featuring some of the country’s leading thinkers, including Yamini Aiyar, Prakash Menon, Nitin Pai, Ajit Ranade, Sunil Khilnani, Shivshankar Menon, Srinath Raghavan and Shyam Saran will release a discussion document that identifies the key principles that should guide India’s strategic trajectory in the next decade.
The document, titled India’s Path to Power: Strategy in a World Adrift, will be released on 2nd October 2021 at 6.00 p.m. IST. The event will be livestreamed on Zoom. You’ll find the link to register at the end of the section.
The authors of the document believe that the current period of rapid geopolitical change and economic transformation carries risks, but also creates spaces for emerging countries like India to expand its strategic autonomy. However, to leverage opportunities and mitigate risks, critical decisions must be taken now to ensure that the coming decade sets the stage for India’s emergence as a front-ranking power in Asia and beyond. The recommendations in this document are directed towards this objective. Strategic autonomy, openness and inclusive economic growth are the key guiding principles.
You can find the full press release, which identifies some core arguments of the paper, here. It is available in both English and Hindi. For the purposes of dissemination the report will be hosted on www.cprindia.org and takshashila.org.in
A Submarine Deal Is Critical For India
In the wake of the AUKUS security arrangement, which will enable Australia to acquire nuclear-powered submarines, Lt. Gen. Prakash Menon argued in an article in ThePrint that India must also aspire for a submarine deal. This is especially important given the “China Challenge.” Lt. Gen. Menon wrote:
China’s impressive sub-surface naval capability based on submarines is understandably its answer to protecting its trade routes in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR). China presently has six nuclear-powered SSNs and forty-seven modern conventional submarines. By 2030, it plans to expand the SSNs to fourteen while conventional submarines remain the same.
If India aspires to build a capability for a strategic offensive in the IOR, it must enhance its submarine building capability. Preferably, it must have an affordable mix of nuclear-powered and Air Independent Propulsion (AIP) platforms. However, India’s submarine building capability has been marred by a host of unresolved issues. An opportunity may have opened up for India with Australia ditching its submarine building commitment with France.
France is already building six Kalvari-class submarines at Mazagon Dock, Mumbai, a project that has been delayed due to inefficiencies on the Indian side. India should explore the possibility of leveraging France’s loss of order to Australia and expediting its tardy progress in the next generation of submarine-building. It is a strategic opportunity that India must not miss out on and calls for political intervention to break the inertia of our submarine acquisition and production process.
India Must Upgrade Its Cyber Capabilities
In his fortnightly column in The Mint, Nitin Pai highlighted the need for India to increase investment in cyber capabilities. Cyber and information capabilities, Nitin argued, have fundamentally changed the nature of war from being a formal declaration to an ongoing affair. It is global and continues regardless of whether or not states are in armed conflict. We cannot pinpoint the date, month or even the year it started. And, unfortunately, we also cannot say when it will end, if ever. States have no choice but to wage it.
Nitin analysed the various forces and hypocrisies that are at play in the world of cyber offensives and identified two central reasons why India must up its game.
First, India presents attackers with a vast, sprawling target sphere, large parts of which are unguarded and perhaps even unguardable. It is thus not feasible to rely solely on perimeter security—the equivalent of stationing troops all along the border—as a strategy for cyber defence. It becomes necessary to deter adversaries from attacking in the first place. Deterrence in information warfare is a multi-layered concept, but requires the possession of effective cyber weapons to be credible.
The other reason to possess—and be seen to possess—cyber weapons is to ensure a place at the high table as a ‘cyber have’ should countries eventually get down to negotiate digital arms control. The cyber generation must learn from its nuclear predecessor, when India was designated a non-nuclear weapon state in perpetuity for the only reason that it had held off testing a nuclear device before an arbitrary date.
A few months ago, we also made a video on the importance of a robust cyber strategy. You can watch it below:
The Geopolitics Of Technology Standards
On September 24, President Biden, PM Modi, PM Morrison and PM Suga met for the first in-person Quad summit. In its wake, Arjun Gargeyas wrote an article analysing the geopolitics of technology and the role the Quad might play in it. A technical standard serves as a means for governance in the realm of a wide range of technologies. The control of critical technologies and their supply chains remain essential for all States to project their geopolitical influence. However, having a grip on the governance mechanism of these critical technologies in the form of technical standards can prove to be a gamechanger in the geostrategic field. He argued:
A bridge between technology and foreign policy by the State must be created as they complement each other in the current political climate. There have already been calls, by academics and experts from both the European Union (EU) and Australia, for their foreign ministries to play an active role in the AI standardisation process.
The creation of a working group within the government on technology standardisation can help streamline the process of the State’s involvement in the standard-setting process. This can be an intra- or inter-agency group which would be responsible for the assessment of different standards across technology domains. The group can comprise a mix of industry experts in the respective technical fields and bureaucrats who have considerable expertise in dealing with international technological forums. This can provide a perfect balance when dealing with the intricacies of emerging technologies. The group can then recommend to the government which standards seem suitable to adopt for the country.
Can India Fill The World's Vacancies?
Many developed countries in Europe and Asia have an ageing population and a shortage of skilled people to fill vacancies in the workforce. India has a very young population with over 18 million people reaching the age of 18 each year. Can we find ways to encourage and facilitate the emigration of a few million people each year from India to fill the world’s vacancies? Sridhar Krishna and Aarushi Kataria talked about the history of human migration and the benefits and challenges of migration on the 29 September episode of All Things Policy. Listen now!
The Chasm Between China’s Rhetoric And Action
Last week, China’s ambassador to India, Sun Weidong, commented on the state of India-China relations, criticizing India on various fronts for the tense relationship between the two countries. Breaking down his statements, Manoj Kewalramani, in an article in Firstpost, identified the growing disconnect between the rhetoric aired by Chinese officials and Beijing’s actual actions. He wrote:
For Sun, Indian policy was increasingly “losing sight of the forest for the trees”, by focussing primarily on the boundary issue. Sun argued that “peace and tranquility in the border areas is important, but it is not the whole story of the bilateral relations.” He called on both sides to “place the border issue in an appropriate position in bilateral relations” and move the current situation from “urgent dispute settlement to regular management and control.”
It is worth noting here that in the same week, Sun’s colleague Qin Gang, China’s ambassador to the US, speaking at an event on China-US ties, emphatically stated that “there isn't any example in the history of international relations where the political relationship between two countries is in competition or even confrontation but other spheres remain safe and sound.” One wonders why Beijing seems to believe that what's good for the goose isn’t good for the gander.
Similarly, Manoj analysed several other such statements, revealing China’s attempt to have its cake and eat it too. Read the full article for how Indian officials have been responding to this, and what all of it means for the future of India-China relations.
India’s Global Outlook Survey
We have extended the deadline for the India’s Global Outlook survey to October 15, 2021. The survey is a unique exercise in understanding how Indians view the world and India’s role in it. The survey consists of 26 questions covering domains like India’s bilateral and multilateral engagements, national security concerns, economic diplomacy and attitudes towards the use of force. Do take it at the earliest, if you haven’t yet done so.
What We Have Been Reading
The last book we recommended was Liberalization, Hindu Nationalism and the State: A biography of Gujarat I hope you have been enjoying reading it. This week’s book, recommended by Suyash Desai, is India Versus China: Why They Are Not Friends, by Kanti Bajpai. Suyash said:
This is a timely book to understand the ongoing China-India border problems and the relationship between the two neighbours more broadly. Prof Bajpai’s 4P framework identifies deep-seated differences in the two countries’ perceptions of each other, territorial perimeters, strategic partnerships with big powers and the asymmetry of power as reasons for the China-India contest. Interestingly, he skips Pakistan as the fifth ‘P’ and believes that it’s more an effect than a cause of China and India’s problems. These four factors are intertwined, thus creating a dyad of complications between the two neighbours.
That’s it from us this week. Take care and stay safe!
Regards,
Atish Padhy,
Assistant Manager, Digital Properties,
Takshashila Institution