Paper no. 2661	07-Apr.-2008
EUROPEAN UNION – INDIA STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP REVIEWED  By Dr. Subhash Kapila  Introductory Observations  The European Union (EU) – India Strategic Partnership has been in formal existence since 2004 and has been evolving substantially thereafter.  However the EU-India Strategic Partnership has not received the public prominence as it seems to get overshadowed by India’s pre-occupations with managing its long-standing and time tested strategic partnership with Russia and giving impetus to its evolving strategic partnership with the United States.  Nevertheless, it can be analytically stated that in terms of substantial progress, formulation of multi-dimensional blueprints for joint development of the strategic partnership and moving forward and establishment of institutional mechanisms to carry the blueprint further, the EU – India Strategic Partnership scores heavily in comparison with the Russia-India Strategic Partnership and the US-India Strategic Partnership.  This has been made possible for two very good reasons.  Firstly, as opposed to the strategic partnerships with Russia and USA, there are far more issues that unite the European Union and India than divide them in terms of political, economic, strategic and security perceptions.  Secondly, India seems to be more comfortable with the EU-India Strategic Partnership as its strategic power differentials do not stand out as glaring as in India’s strategic partnerships with Russia and the United States.  Yet a more significant reason is that while India’s engagement with Russia and the United States commenced meaningfully in 1947 onwards, after its independence, India’s engagement with the major countries of the European Union, namely, Britain, France and Germany has been long-standing and pre-dates 1947.  Britain ruled India for nearly two hundred years, France had colonial settlements in India for about the same time and Germany though without any colonial linkages to India was strong in the cultural fields with eminent German scholars steeped deeply in Ancient Indian history, Sanskrit epics and literature.  Each of these three major countries of the European Union had therefore deep and positive imprints in India.  This is a strong contributory factor to the evolution of a substantial EU-India Strategic Partnership and imparts a promising future. The EU-India Strategic Partnership is a multi-dimensional partnership and the Joint Action Plan formulated covers cooperation in every conceivable area in the realms of political, economic, scientific and technological, cultural and strategic cooperation.  For those interested in full details of the EU-India Joint Action Plan, the same can be found on the European Union's website.  The Joint Action Plan and the Annual EU-India Summits (the 8th Summit was held in New Delhi on November 2007) proceedings, when perused would highlight how painstakingly the details have been worked out in all dimensions of cooperation. In terms of recognition of the European Union as having potential to emerge as a powerful voice in international affairs, India was one of the first countries to accord diplomatic recognition with it, then known as EEC.  However, it took the European Union nearly 30 years to recognize a similar potential of India.  China was the big fascination for the European Union and it is only at the turn of the millennium that India started figuring in the strategic calculus of the European Union.  By 2005, a senior EU official declared that: “You look at India and you see the future.  By 2030 India will probably have overtaken as the world’s most populous country.  It will be the world’s largest democracy and the world’s third or fourth largest economy” and further that “yet China will not be alone in reshaping the global economic order.  In India there is an economy with the potential to match it”. The European Union’s interest in India was not only restricted to the economic sphere.  There was a growing European Union interest in India’s emergence as an important political actor on the international scene and also India’s strategic potential. This impelled the holding for the first time in May 2006 of the European Union – India Strategic Dialogue.  It has now emerged as a useful institutionalized mechanism for the European Union and India to discuss and exchange views on (1) Security situation and security challenges existing at the global and regional level (2) Counter-terrorism responses, cooperation and intelligence sharing (3) Conflict-resolution initiatives in the world’s troubled regions and attempt coordination of responses (4) WMD proliferation and (4) Furtherance of democracy and human rights as basis for political stability in troubled regions. In January 2008, in an address in New Delhi entitled “Re-visiting EU-India Relations: Prospects for Deepened Strategic Partnership to Face Global challenges” the EU Commissioner (Minister-Level) for External Relations in his enumeration of the prospects and challenges indicated an implicit emphasis in the security dimensions of the EU-India Strategic Partnership. In terms of a review of the EU-India Strategic Partnership this Paper would like to confine itself to a review of the strategic significance and strategic implications of the EU-India Strategic Partnership. The following aspects will therefore be reviewed: Strategic Significance of the EU-India Strategic Partnership EU-India Strategic Partnership: The Global Implications EU-India Strategic Partnership: The Regional Implications EU-India Strategic Partnership: Future Prospects Strategic Significance of the EU-India Strategic Partnership Geo-strategically, the European Union – India Strategic Partnership is a very significant one in that it binds as strategic partners the European continent with India as an Asian power with sub-continental proportions and an India emerging as a global power. In geo-strategic terms, both the European Union and India carry great significance which cannot be ignored in the global strategic calculus.  Before the United States appeared on the international scene forcefully in 1945 after the end of World War II, the international strategic and political affairs were controlled by the major countries of the European Union. The integration of the European countries into a European Union has consolidated the combined strengths of the European nations in a most comprehensive manner namely strategic, political and economic.  The common EU currency the Euro has emerged as a strong global currency tempting oil-rich countries and China to switch their financial reserves from the dollar to the Euro in a bid to embarrass United States financial power globally. Strategically, the European Union countries are the pillars of the Atlantic Alliance and NATO led by the United States.  Out of the twenty seven European countries, twenty-three are concurrently members of NATO also.  By virtue of the EU-NATO countries linkage the Western world in international politics and strategic terms emerges as an unbeatable combination with the combined strengths of EU and USA.  It is the European Union that adds and reinforces the United States clout. India’s geo-strategic significance lies in its sub-continental proportions acting as a bridge between the Middle East and South East Asia.  Its strategic salience is heightened by its national power attributes and its resurgent economy which in the next 20-30 years could overtake or equal China.  Its nuclear weapons arsenal and the size of its conventional military forces makes it an important factor to reckon with in the global and Asian military balance. In geo-political terms, the European Union-India strategic Partnership encompasses the combined political weight of the Western World and the emerging global power of India.  India does matter today not only in South Asia but also as the dominant maritime power in the Indian Ocean region.  Its intended area of influence stretches from the Red Sea of the Straits of Malacca and encompasses Central Asia. Geo-economically, the significance of the European Union-Indian Strategic Partnership assumes global economic connotations when India as a virtual economic superpower in the making plugs-in into the combined economic strengths of the European Union and the individual economic strengths of EU’s major countries.  This is a complementarity which works both ways. Lastly in terms of strategic significance, India as the largest democracy in the world and the really prominent one in Asia, through this partnership joins hands with the largest cluster of democracies in the world and integrated as the European Union combined together it become a powerful voice. Overall, therefore, the European Union-India Strategic Partnership is a mighty strategically significant one in the most comprehensive contemporary connotations of a strategic partnership. EU-India Strategic Partnership: The Global Implications In terms of global implications, the EU-India Strategic Partnership has to be viewed at two levels.  The first level is viewing in terms of the global balance of power and international alignments.  The second level is viewing the EU-India Strategic Partnership in terms of multi-lateralism in the global strategic field. In terms of the global balance of power and international alignments it does in a sense group India with the Western Powers, both individually and collectively.  Individually, India has established strategic partnerships with the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany and their allies in East Asia, like Japan, Australia and Singapore. In the collective sense, the EU-India Strategic Partnership joins India at a different level with the United States and the NATO countries.  As stated earlier twenty-three out of the twenty-seven countries of the European Union are NATO member countries. This may not have been the intended aim or stated aim of India in entering the EU-India Strategic Partnership, but by deductive analysis the linkages do work out that way.  In terms of achievement of multi-lateralism in the international order, the EU-India Strategic Partnership heralds bright prospects.  Both the European Union and India lay great stress on the imperatives of multi-lateralism in the international order.  For the European Union and India this is not some idle precept.  It is a dynamic precept in operation in their respective national existence and social structures. The EU-India Strategic Partnership in terms of their existing multi-lateralist political functioning can extend this experience and wisdom to the international order in conflict resolution initiatives across the world and softening tensions. In actual strategic and political practice, both the European Union countries and India have despite any strategic partnerships with third countries adopted independent stances on global issues. The most significant observation that emerges from the EU-India Strategic Partnership though not analytically argued so far or politically stated so far is that there is an incidental strategic convergence between the European Union and India on the place and role of Russia in the international order.  Russia figures highly in both European and Indian perceptions in political, economic and strategic terms.  India’s strategic partnership with EU therefore does not impinge on Russia-India Strategic Partnership. Summing up the global implications of the EU-India Strategic Partnership, it needs to be recorded that this partnership adds a “third pole” of multi-lateralism in the US-Russia and the US-Russia plus China line-up in the global strategic order. EU-India Strategic Partnership: The Regional Implications The regional implications of the EU-India Strategic Partnership need to be examined at three different yet inter-connected levels.  These three levels are firstly its implications in relation to China, secondly in relation to its implications for West Asia and South East Asia,and lastly in relation to South Asia. China has been brought in for discussion in the regional context as China’s strategic impact is more relevant to India, South East Asia and West Asia, and South Asia.  It is in these regions that China impinges heavily on the strategic interests of the Western world and on India too. China to begin with was the focal point of the European Union’s strategic interest till a few years back.  The EU now divides its strategic attention between China and India.  India is receiving more weighty strategic attention from the European Union for reasons that it offers better chances of convergence of strategic interests and India’s rise to global power status would be a benign one. The EU-India Strategic Partnership has the potential to have a major impact on China as in European Union perceptions and those of its major member countries, India is perceived as the only country in Asia with the strategic, political and economic power potential to act as a counter-weight to China.  This counter-weight perception is not perceived necessarily in military terms only but rather in political and economic terms. While China has made its displeasure and strategic concerns amply clear on the US-India Strategic Partnership it has yet to come out vocally on the EU-India Strategic Partnership. China has also been unhappy with the European Union countries for not lifting the arms exports ban on China in deference to United States pressures. The European Union and India have substantial strategic interests in West Asia and desire that attempts be made for conflict-resolution initiatives to succeed in Lebanon, in Palestine, in Iraq and on US-Iran confrontation over the nuclear program issue. China’s role in West Asia has not been a benign one. China perceives West Asia with its military linkages to Muslim countries of the region as a counter-strategic pressure point against the United States. The EU- India Strategic Partnership combining the traditional influence of European nations with the Gulf oil-rich monarchies and India's  evolving strategic influences with these countries can act as a positive influence in the region to counter-act China’s military diplomacy in the region. In South East Asia, in recent years India's “Look East” policy has brought valuable results in integrating Indian and South East Asian strategic interests. The European Union countries too had strong strategic and economic interests in the region but these got diluted due to United States and West’s strategic distractions in the Middle East. The EU-India Strategic Partnership provides the potential for jointly extending European Union and India's strategic interests in South East Asia and fill the vacuum created by lack of US interest on the region lately. In South Asia, the major countries of the European Union like UK, France and Germany had more than a proportionate strategic interests.  Till lately this was at India’s expense whether it pertained to Pakistan, Sri Lanka or Nepal. Possibly, this was an extension of falling in line with US policies in the region till the advent of the US-India Strategic Partnership. A major implication of the EU-India Strategic Partnership that would logically arise is that the European countries would increasingly recognize India's  role as the regional power in South Asia and further that India would expect that the European Union as a “strategic partner” would be responsive to India's  strategic sensitivities in South Asia and contiguous regions. EU-India Strategic Partnership: The Future Prospects The European Union more specifically and India too at the highest levels have publicly affirmed that the EU-India Strategic Partnership enjoys bright future prospects. One should not take this as just one more instance of political rhetoric. As earlier stated in the Paper the future prospects of the EU-India Strategic Partnership are bright because there are more strategic issues that unite the European Union and India than those that can divide them. More importantly, the EU-India Strategic Partnership has evolved naturally from an economic dimension to begin with and then graduated to the political and strategic dimensions to now emerge as a “comprehensive strategic partnership”. The EU-India Strategic Partnership scores heavily over the Russia-India Strategic Partnership and the US-India Strategic Partnership for a host of reasons, some of them being the following: India's political and economic engagement with European countries predates its engagement with Russia and the United States. Similarly, India's military-to-military contacts both in terms of defense equipment acquisitions and training pre-date its military contacts with Russia and the United States. Both of the above therefore provide a useful foundation for further and future strengthening of the EU-India Strategic Partnership. The EU-India Strategic Partnership as compared to India's strategic partnership with Russia and USA can be said to be more equitable as glaring power differentials do not exist between EU and India. Russia and United States strategic policies are more determined by their global strategic interests in which at times India's strategic interests get marginalized and thereby leading to political irritants. On the other hand, the European Union's strategic focus and policy perceptions will continue to be determined by regions contiguous to India and where both EU and India seem to have a convergence of strategic interests. Multi-lateralism as a foreign policy precept is vocally espoused by both the European Union and India. This itself provides a solid foundation for bright future prospects for the EU-India Strategic Partnership in a challenging global security environment. No strategic partnership would be devoid of challenges and despite all the positive factors enumerated above a major challenge would need to be faced squarely more by India than the European Union as their strategic partnership moves into the future. Analytically, it can be asserted that India's political leadership tends to view “strategic partnerships” only in terms of political economic, science and technology and cultural relations. India's  political leadership tend to view the terms “strategic partnership” term in terms of “long range” time-wise rather than viewing “strategic partnerships” in the perspective of “security threats” and “security cooperation”. This may lead to a European Union perception that India’ s sole interest in an EU-India Strategic Partnership is confined to viewing it as one more “political label” adding to its quest for global power status. The European Union's hopes and expectations from an EU-India Strategic Partnership would seem to focus on expecting India to play an active and assertive role in the security management of India's contiguous regions where both the European Union and India seem to share strategic convergences. The European Union would therefore legitimately expect that arising from the EU-India Strategic Partnership, India's  active security roles in its contiguous regions would be determined by India's  national security interests and not by domestic political compulsions which are not the concern of the European Union. Concluding Observations The European Union with its geographical enlargement alongside NATO's geographical enlargement is increasingly acquiring a far more important say in global affairs and in India's contiguous regions. The EU-India Strategic Partnership is therefore a significant and strategically relevant partnership for India's emerging strategic profile. The EU-India Strategic Partnership is a partnership between equals and being an equitable relationship it facilitates a smoother functioning and an easier path to work out strategic convergences between the European Union and India in terms of strategic management. However, the future success of the EU-India Strategic Partnership would depend heavily on how much India can invest strategically in this partnership in terms of playing active and assertive security roles in regions in which both the European Union and India have vital strategic and security interests.    (The author is an International Relations and Strategic Affairs analyst.  He is the Consultant, Strategic Affairs with South Asia Analysis Group.  Email:drsubhashkapila@yahoo.com)
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