Great Decisions Analysis examines topics in the news based on the FPA's renowned Great Decisions series
May 29, 2008
As India's political and financial powers grow, the nation will attempt to use its newfound leverage to spread and defend its interests regionally and worldwide. This changing policy can be witnessed by India's recent diplomatic and strategic movements in Central Asia. In the past few years, the Indian government has increased its contacts with the region's leaders, become an observer to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), set up its very first military base in a foreign nation, Tajikistan, and signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Turkmenistan regarding major gas procurements. India's growing interest in Central Asia and the prospects and challenges for its present and future engagement in the region will be an intriguing geopolitical event to watch. Also of interest is what the Central Asian states have to gain in such a relationship and what India's growing regional influence means to U.S. interests and policy in the region.
India's Interests in Central Asia
India is a rising great power and with this comes not only an increasing ability to protect and advance ones interests internationally, but also heightened responsibility, for maintaining its still tenuous hold on its growing strength needs constant attention. For instance, as India's economy prospers, it continually requires more and more natural resources. On the same note, its expanding economy and international reach provide more targets for terrorist activities and more contact with hostile great powers, such as China. These new prospects and challenges can be seen in India's current Central Asian relations and strategy.
India has many reasons to desire greater influence in Central Asia as it holds strategic, military, and economic interests for the nation. The Central Asian states of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan are energy-rich and India is energy-poor. India's thriving economy, averaging about 8-9 percent GDP growth a year, doubled its oil consumption between 1992-2005 and it predicts to double this again by 2030. The state currently imports 70 percent of its oil and 50 percent of its gas and if this demand cannot be met its economy faces collapse. Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan can provide gas and oil and Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan hold great hydroelectric potential for New Delhi.
The Central Asian states strategic location also makes it vital for India to have at least a solid presence in the region, as they are sandwiched by Russia, China, Iran, Pakistan, and the increasingly unstable Afghanistan. India cannot afford to be left out in the cold while China, Russia, Pakistan, and even the EU devour Central Asia's resources and cement strategic bases. India knows that they are both too late and too weak to dominate the region, but they must do whatever they can to make sure that no other state or grouping accomplishes this as well. The region is vital in India's own fight against terrorism, as it holds several Islamic terrorist groups that may find their way to India's homeland or local interest holdings, such as future pipelines or bases. As recently as last week, India suffered a terrible terrorist attack in the tourist city of Jaipur which killed around 80 people. Combine this terrorist element with the fragility of some of the dictatorial leaders in the region and the instability of the Afghanistan and Pakistani governments and one can easily see the threat this can bring to India's present and future interests and security. In connection with the regional stability issue, India would also desire a greater amount of transparency and openness regarding the Central Asian states' governments. India is a thriving democracy surrounded by dictators and it would not be naïve to think that it would appreciate similar accountable governments nearby.
India's Growing Influence in Central Asia
During the Soviet Union's period of domination over Central Asia, India was too weak to promote more than simple security interests in the region and largely bowed to Russia's will. As India's role on the world stage grows, however, it has forged a more proactive policy towards the Central Asian region and is gradually increasing its footprint. After the United States' overthrow of the Taliban, India has used this new opening and removal of the former hostile regime to spread its influence in the country and beyond. As part of its efforts, India's government offered support to Afghan's Northern Alliance and has provided Afghan women and children with aid to build schools and hospitals. Part of New Delhi's assistance to the Northern Alliance included a military hospital in Ayni, Tajikistan, which would later be converted into India's first military base outside of its national borders in 2003. The Indian Air Force (IAF) holds a fleet of MiG-29 fighter planes, and presumably a small fleet of helicopters, at the base which is located near the Tajik-Afghan border. The Ayni base is reportedly close to main staging areas for militant Islamic jihadist groups and also in range of Chinese/Pakistan military cooperation activities. This base may not be anything close to the military holdings sustained by Russia throughout the years in the region or of China's upcoming strategic elements, such as their request for a military presence inside of Kyrgyzstan, but it provides India a strategic foothold in the region from which they can expand their influence. For example, in 2006 Tajik's President Rakhmonov visited New Delhi to cement the base agreement and signed new pacts regarding strengthening cooperation in energy, science and technology, and culture exchanges, as well as announced the creation of a joint working group on counter-terrorism between the two sides.
Last April, India's Vice President Hamid Ansari visited both Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan to discuss energy cooperation with much success. Turkmenistan and India signed a framework MoU for cooperation in the oil and gas sectors, creating an opening for Indian companies to enter the nation's hydrocarbon market. Also during these talks, the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline was discussed and it appears that this long sought after project may finally be coming to fruition. The project would cost around $7.6 billion dollars and run for 1,680 kilometers from the Turkmen city of Dauletabad through Afghanistan's Herat and Kandahar provinces, into Quetta, Pakistan, and proceed to its final destination at the Indian border town of Fazilka. The project would provide Afghanistan's government much needed revenue from transit fees, Turkmenistan another way to diversify its gas market, and Pakistan and India valuable energy to fuel their economies. However, this project and many others of the same ilk in Central Asia face considerable challenges. The costs, for one, are enormous and there are still logistical difficulties to be worked out. The region is full of difficult terrain to traverse and a scarcity of ready transport slows down many such projects. Most pipelines that do not go directly towards Russia face instability in many of the states they pass through, and TAPI is no exception with security being weak in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. These pipelines would be major targets for the Taliban and other insurgents.
Another difficulty New Delhi encounters in trying to acquire or position CA natural resources towards its borders is the fact that they are rather late in the ‘game' and must compete with several other significant buyers. Russia has for years held a monopoly on Central Asian gas and oil and almost all pipelines from the region flow to the north. China and the EU are also aggressively courting Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan's energy supplies and they have the money to persuade a deal in their favor. However, Ansari-Berdymuhamedov's MoU, and the less successful but still substantial meeting with Kazakhstan's government, is a major step for India's influence and interests in the region. Vice President Ansari concurs, stating that, “India considers Turkmenistan an extended neighbor, a natural ally and a key partner in Central Asia.”
India's Future in Central Asia and Implications for the U.S.
The Central Asia states were born into precarious and vulnerable positions, having to work hard to keep the many great foreign powers that surround them from dominating their policies and lives. It is safe to say that in this case more hands in the cookie jar favors these small states holding strategic resources. India's growing presence offers such states another customer to turn towards, helping them diversify trade and diplomatic partners. Democratic India should be seen as less a threat to their sovereignty than the likes of Russia and China. Furthermore, India's bustling economy can provide the mostly underdeveloped countries of Central Asia assistance in railway, hydroelectric, and information technology sectors.
What should the United States think of India's growing influence in a region that is vital to our own interests in many ways, specifically regarding Afghanistan's stability? India's strategy in Central Asia complements U.S. interests fairly well. The U.S. desperately wants to keep Russia or China, or both through the SCO, from dominating the region, and welcomes India's encroachments. India and the U.S. also share a desire to curb terrorist elements in Central Asia and should be able to work together fairly easily in this regard. Lastly, the U.S. policy of democracy promotion has taken a hit in the last few years and it would gladly like to share the responsibilities of this strategy with India in Central Asia. Whether New Delhi is willing to put much behind this type of policy is debatable, but at the very least it can provide the Central Asian dictatorial governments and people an example of a close by, prospering, stable democracy.
India's relationship with the Central Asian region is still developing and faces many challenges, but its growing presence offers much promise for the interests of the region's states, the U.S., and itself.
Patrick Frost is FPA's Central Asia blogger. He can be reached at pgf216@nyu.edu.