Driving Naari Programme launched in Chandigarh
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Turkey has chosen to bite the bullet by going ahead with the purchase of S-400 missile defence systems from Russia despite dire warnings from the Pentagon and the freezing of the supply of advanced F-35 fighters. India, facing the same predicament, has to soon decide which way it will swing with regard to the S-400 deal it has signed with Russia.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is Asia’s leading democrat-nationalist, choosing to crack down hard on separatism and moving the country to the brand of religious nationalism that has been politically rewarding. Erdogan took the US removal from the GSP in his stride, kept the Americans at bay when he cracked down on the Gulen and despite being a NATO ally, asserted the country’s right to choose its defence vendors by persisting with the S-400 deal.
Despite cast in the same mould as Erdogan, PM Modi has opted not to indulge in sabre rattling despite the US having affected India’s interests on a wide variety of fronts. Apart from the withdrawal of GSP, India is in imminent danger of having higher tariffs slapped on its remaining exports to the US, forced to turn off the oil tap from Iran and is getting coerced into an exclusive buyer-seller relationship with the US military-industrial complex.
Juxtaposed against the economic pain and narrowing of choices for energy and defence equipment, PM Modi’s time for pussyfooting around the increasingly demanding US is about to end. Less than a week from now, he will come across Russian President Vladimir Putin in Bishkek who will seek definitive answers. Now that the elections are over, PM Modi has no fallback option to delay the decision. On the other hand is the US siren call: a production line of US fighter jets in India, an alternative to the S-400 and the carrot of transfer of high-end technology.
But PM Modi is not exactly in Erdogan’s shoes. Turkey doesn’t face any existential threat from an emerging power that India does. It also does not need the American helping hand to inveigle countries away from China as is India’s case with Sri Lanka, Maldives, Afghanistan and Mauritius.
Yet Modi will dent his big brother image in the neighbourhood if he puts off the purchase of the S-400. This has implications in the balancing between India and China performed by countries in the region. They would be inclined to opt for the master (the US) instead of the camp follower (India) if New Delhi fails to exert its right of choice on oil and defence equipment. That moment of reckoning is close.
By the end of the month, Modi would have confabulated with both Donald Trump and his Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. With External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar by his side, Modi has a tightrope walk ahead in the coming weeks.
