From India’s perspective, there is already a hedging quality in India–US relations, notwithstanding that New Delhi has made it clear to the United States that it does not wish to be a pawn in any balancing game against China, or any other country.

This hedging quality is evident in the evolving strategic relationship, which, significantly, was initiated in 1991 by the then Commander-In-Chief, Pacific Command (CINCPAC), and which has since developed powerful military–strategic overtones, with the apparent agreement of India.

While there are many voices and motives in Washington directing the nature of the Indo–US rapprochement, at the heart of the relationship is the United States’ desire to create of India a major Asian military power capable eventually of helping to balance China’s rise. It is important to recognise that this ambition does not necessarily imply that Washington believes it can win and maintain India as an ally, but rather that it will unsettle the power equation for China to have another Asian power—and one that is already in competition—rising rapidly in military capability.

The supposition here is twofold: first, a powerful India will be a more benign and pro-United States presence in the region than a powerful China; and second, if the United States refuses to give India what it wants—strategic parity with the P5 nuclear states—then others, such as Russia, will.

This desire on the part of the United States is a major factor behind the Indo–US nuclear agreement, which is not to say that other motives are not also present. The reason why the nuclear agreement is important is that it will be difficult for the United States to support and build Indian power in some key technologies—for example, ballistic missile technology, anti-ballistic missiles and space—without first bringing India into ‘the nuclear tent’.

This, then, is the deal—and where it cannot be done directly with US support, it can be done through the surrogacy of Israel, which has drawn increasingly close to India on high-tech military exchanges.

That this interpretation is correct is suggested by statements by the Bush Administration of unambiguous support for India’s rise as a major Asian military power made at the time when the nuclear deal was first mooted. According to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s policy adviser, this shift in US policy is motivated by the fact that the United States’ ‘goal is to help India become a major world power in the 21st century’. He added, ‘We understand fully the implications, including military implications, of that statement’<?lb?>(Rajghatta 2005). ^[6]

It is also explicit in the type of technologies being transferred to India—through the United States directly and through Israel. These include an ABM system probably based on the Israeli Arrow 2, in turn developed jointly with Boeing with US technology. While Arrow 2 is an anti-tactical ballistic missile, Arrow 3 will have an anti-MRBM capability. India is also to launch Israel’s new spy satellite in early 2009; a quid pro quo could be assistance with India’s own military satellite program, which will be especially important for its naval targeting in the Indian Ocean and, eventually, a more sophisticated ABM capability. Israel has also sold to India, with US permission (previously denied to China), the Phalcon AWAC system. The United States has also directly sold sophisticated targeting radars and large naval vessels. The United States is also in the market for India’s new strike-fighter project.

While the transfer of military technology is important, the deepening military-to-military relationship also brings with it the exchange of military doctrine, inter-operability and intelligence. This is very much an evolving, multifaceted relationship, albeit one focusing on maritime warfare. At its heart is a 10-year defence agreement signed in 2005 and a program of ever more sophisticated exercises, especially in the maritime sphere.

None of this indicates, however, that India will enter any US ‘sphere’ or abandon its important relationships with other powers, especially Russia. While there have been recent hiccups in the arms sale relationship between India and Russia to do with late delivery, escalating costs and poor supply of spare parts, the relationship is still of considerable importance to India and will not be easily discarded.

Indeed, from India’s point of view, it can continue to conduct its strategy of ‘playing both ends against the middle’, as it has attempted to do, with varying levels of success, as a central plank of its foreign policy over many years. Within this pattern, however, it will likely ‘tilt’ somewhat towards the United States—the exact reversal of the situation during the Cold War.

As time goes on, and given the hypothesis of a China that rises more rapidly than India, this ‘tilt’ could increasingly take on an element of power balancing, whether New Delhi feels comfortable with that role or not. Nor is this label likely be used in New Delhi.

Of course, it needn’t happen that way, but the drivers of a more successful outcome will have far less to do with Sino–Indian relations and far more to do with Sino–US relations and US–Russian relations. Should competition between China and the United States intensify, China’s rise in Asia is unlikely to be an easy one.

As a ‘swing’ state in Asia—to use the term of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)—India is therefore likely to be courted by a number of other rising powers. It will make the best it can of this situation in order to acquire the means to military and economic power itself—whether it be Russian energy and platforms or US/Israeli high technology.