Tillerson Knocks China, Courts India Ahead of South Asia Trip

desicanuk

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Tough words for “One Belt, One Road” and praise for a deepening defense partnership.
BY EMILY TAMKIN, ROBBIE GRAMER | OCTOBER 18, 2017, 3:41 PM

Just ahead of his first official trip to India, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson offered a “love letter” to New Delhi while taking direct aim at China’s ambitious plans to further deepen its influence throughout Asia.

Tillerson, in a rare public speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on Wednesday, touted the U.S. relationship with India as a cornerstone of the liberal international order and called it a key part of U.S. efforts to shore up its position in the Indo-Pacific region.
“Our nations are two bookends of stability — on either side of the globe — standing for greater security and prosperity for our citizens and people around the world,” Tillerson said.

“The very international order that has benefited India’s rise — and that of many others — is increasingly under strain. China, while rising alongside India, has done so less responsibly, at times undermining the international, rules-based order even as countries like India operate within a framework that protects other nations’ sovereignty,” Tillerson said.

“I think it’s a love letter,” Bharath Gopalaswamy of the Atlantic Council told Foreign Policy. “It’s signaling a very strong, solidifying partnership.”

Tillerson’s words built on efforts during the Obama administration to deepen economic and defense ties with India, seeing it as a potential counterweight to a rising China.

But he also had words for India’s strategic rival, China, and particularly for Beijing’s biggest project, the sprawling “One Belt, One Road” plan to invest huge sums in Central and South Asia to connect China to Europe by land and by sea. Those projects, including everything from energy pipelines to railroads to power plants and ports, are meant to let China use its financial leverage to increase its diplomatic heft from Sri Lanka to Serbia.

While the Obama administration largely welcomed those efforts as a way to bring economic development and stability to a chaotic part of the world, Tillerson said China’s expansion produces more debt than development for those on the receiving end.

“It is important that those emerging democracies and economies have alternative means of developing both the infrastructures and the economies. We have watched the activities and actions of others in the region — in particular China,” Tillerson said, adding that the United States has started “a quiet conversation” with countries in the regionon how to do things differently. China, he said, offers an example of “predatory economics.”

That represented the administration’s most direct repudiation of the One Belt, One Road strategy so far, said Alyssa Ayres of the Council of Foreign Relations. By zeroing in on how China hopes to expand its influence — through debt burdens that essentially put developing countries and some of their biggest assets in hock to Beijing — Tillerson was echoing concerns that India has raised about China’s geoeconomic expansion in its backyard, especially in Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

India’s been talking about those concerns for a while, Ayres said, and “Tillerson’s picking up on it as a core issue.”

The problem, Ayres and others said, is that the United States in years past has tried and failed to advance its own development plan for a “New Silk Road” in Central Asia — with nothing to show for it. Washington long tried to nudge Central and South Asian countries toward closer economic ties in the hopes that development would dampen conflict in the region.

Tillerson didn’t make clear what strategy the Trump administration may have in mind to push back against Chinese economic influence, especially given Beijing’s no-strings funding for all sorts of regimes.

The United States will “need to come up with something very specific and detailed” to counter China’s “question-free access to financing that suits the interest of countries in the immediate moment,” Ayres said.

Tanvi Madan of the Brookings Institution said Tillerson’s speech represented at least the beginning of a new policy for the region, but it needs to be backed up by concrete steps.

“The region will judge the administration’s commitment in terms of what it does,” she said. “But there’s clearly been at least a shift in rhetoric over One Belt One Road.”

The Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C. said that Beijing upholds the global rules based-order, adding in time-honored Chinese diplomatic fashion: “We are fully committed to forging a fair and just world order together with the rest of the world, providing the greatest good for the greatest number of people through win-win cooperation.” The Embassy also responded to Tillerson’s more confrontational approach to China, saying, “The track record demonstrates that China and the U.S. are better together. We hope the U.S. side can work in the same direction with China to ensure the healthy and sound development of the China-US relationship.”

In terms of defense ties, Tillerson built on growing U.S.-India military cooperationthat ramped up late in the Obama administration, calling the two countries “bookends of stability” in a troubled part of the world. He stressed growing defense cooperation between the two countries, and especially the annual three-way military exercises including Japan that are at the center of U.S. efforts to push back against China in the greater Indian Ocean area.

But a potential problem is that India has for decades gone its own way in terms of foreign policy — and even with a more pro-Western leader in Prime Minister Narendra Modi, that old notion of “nonalignment” or “strategic autonomy” remains alive and kicking among many Indian policy mandarins. Even in recent years, for example, India has redoubled defense and economic ties with Russia, even while it spurned the U.S.-led trade pact Trans-Pacific Partnership.

That calculus may slowly be changing in part in response to China’s economic and military transformation, said Milan Vaishnav of the Carnegie Endowment.

“What is changing is that the United States has grown into the role of a preferred partner — and the feeling is mutual.”


Emily Tamkin is a staff writer at Foreign Policy covering ambassadorial and diplomatic affairs in Washington. @emilyctamkin

Robbie Gramer is a diplomacy and national security reporter at Foreign Policy. @robbiegramer


http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/10/18/tillerson-knocks-china-courts-india-ahead-of-south-asia-trip/
 

prohumanity

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Chinese media say that US-India relationship is too much noise but has no real substance. This might be true to some extent. Russia remains the largest defense partner of India even at present with 60% weapons supplied by Russia. US probably has supplied less than 10%. Israel of course remains second largest partner of India.

As we speak..Joint Russia -India military (all three wings) exercise INDRA-2017 is going on near Vladivostok.
Russia is still well respected in India and vice versa. Not easy to make Indians hate Russia. Indians are neutral or mildly antagonistic towards China esp. due to growing China-Paki Axis.

Current Indian govt. is most likely to maintain strategic autonomy with balancing the ties with both rival camps.
Trust towards USA is gradually rising but still well below what is needed for a strong relationship. Memories of US supporting Pakistan against India and turning a blind eye to Paki sponsored terrorism in India is still fresh in most Indian minds. It will take time to build trust ...its not going to happen in a year or two.
 

IndiaRising

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in the end, everybody looks out for their own country. instead of being too dependent on foreign powers, you should first look to increase your own strength. strategic alliances only bring benefit if you happen to be the dominant partner
 

angeldude13

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Why do words are given so much emphasis in Geo-politics when they don't mean anything in reality?
 

prohumanity

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Let me translate in Americanese language what it all means. US is trying to play India card to scare China into giving business concessions to US mega corporations.
At the end of the day, you will see that wooing India was a tactical move and without any substance.
The real goal is press China into tough negotiations...making China scared of this imaginary US-India axis.
Its all about unlimited profits for US companies...all politicians are in pockets of these corporations...
No principles, no values, no morals....only pathological greed and unlimited profits..these two words define today US of A.
 

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