Polaris  

…and India’s relative insulation from it.

As Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s plane touches down some 30 km away at Andrews Air Force Base, I find his arrival provides a perfect moment to evaluate not the significance of his visit—about which much has already been written—but rather the context of Indo-U.S. relations more broadly. The debates about India’s rise, and its implications for American policy, have been raging for many years now. Will India be able to sustain the high rates of economic growth of the past decade? Will it be equitable growth? What are the regional implications of a stronger India? What kind of power might India be? But equally important for the bilateral relationship is the future of the United States.

In the past few years, it has become fashionable to question the United States’ ability to retain its preeminent role in the global system. This can take the form of a recognition of the ‘rise of the rest,’ to calls for a necessary G2, from fears of a new Cold War to early conclusions regarding the United States’ preordained replacement as numero uno.

The onset of American declinism is a peculiar phenomenon, and one that is not entirely new. Alan Dowd has done a fantastic job of documenting the persistence and durability of this strain of thinking within the United States over the past three centuries (see here and here).  Many believed, erroneously as it turns out, that the United States would never recover from the Great Depression of the 1930s. Three decades later, the United States, torn by race riots and an enormously unpopular war in Vietnam, was seen as having overstretched itself. Perceived vulnerabilities exposed by Moscow’s military preponderance and the 1973 oil crisis, among other things, prompted Henry Kissinger to consider withdrawal from Vietnam, detente with the Soviet Union and rapprochement with China. In the 1980s and early 1990s, it became fashionable to consider Japan the next great challenger to American supremacy. Even after the end of the Cold War, debacles in Somalia and Rwanda in the 1990s led to people questioning America’s self-described position as ‘leader of the free world.’ And only a few years ago, several American thinkers were still predicting the that a united Europe would soon upstage the United States. 

As Dowd ably demonstrates, it is too soon to write off the United States as a declining power, despite the events of the last two years. Where he appears to err, though, is in assuming the opposite conclusion is foregone. Where do Indians stand on this question, and what conclusions do they reach? Logically, most arguments can be attached to one of four admittedly broad categories. 

First, there are those who see American decline as greatly exaggerated and argue that American hegemony serves as a stabiliser to the world order. Thus Indian objectives cannot be attained without closer cooperation with Washington. In other words, resistance is futile. This interpretation is popular among many Indian liberals, who have not only seen and experienced the benefits of closer cooperation with the United States, but believe that the American economic model is sustainable and also transferable to India. “Where did four decades of estrangement with the United States get India?” they ask rhetorically. 

Second, there are those who agree that American decline is exaggerated but argue that the United States’ unparalleled power is fundamentally destabilizing. The Cold War era, marked by bipolarity, provided greater strategic stability than the two decades following. Advocates of this thesis point to the 2003 invasion of Iraq and Washington’s support for Pakistan as indicative of the damage that an unfettered United States, propelled by its narrow self-interests, is capable of causing. It is therefore in India’s best interests to work towards balancing the United States, in conjunction with other powers. A bipolar or multipolar world is, in sum, desirable to restrain American actions, for the greater global good. 

Third, there are those who see American decline as ongoing or imminent, and also undesirable because (a) the alternatives appear less desirable on balance, and (b) the United States is seen as providing certain vital public goods, thereby indirectly helping India’s rise. To stave off American decline, it is in India’s best interests to support the United States strategically and economically, particularly in dire circumstances. This, advocates argue, would enable a rising India to rise in the United States’ slipstream. Thus greater economic integration and strategic cooperation between India and the United States is not just desirable, it is in fact vital for the future of both states. 

Finally, there are those who see American decline as underway or imminent, but also desirable. “I, for one, welcome our new imperial overlords,” they crow. The faster the United States declines, the greater opportunity there is for those states that have for too long been victims of Western colonial and neo-colonial powers to replace it, as is their due. 

In addition, there are those who attempt at mixing and matching from the arguments above. This inevitably results in logical inconsistencies. An example: blaming the Indian establishment for the consequence of reaching out to the United States, while calling on the American leadership to watch India’s back. 

For the most part, Indians have been rather insulated from persistent American declinism. India is one of the rare countries where, as of four years ago, a plurality still saw the United States as the most likely land of opportunity. So great is Indian faith in the resilience of American power that it occasionally translates itself into fear of subservience to American interests (including by some rather  unexpected commentators). This, as I have noted previously, betrays a lack of faith in India’s own freedom of decision-making. At the same time, the two other schools of thought—those fearing and celebrating the United States’ imminent decline—retain pockets of influence in Indian thinking. At the end of the day, exactly how we come to view the United States’ future—coupled with what we think about the consequences of that future—must invariably result in a different set of conclusions, calculations and strategies.