How The India-US Ties Will Pan Out Under Trump - The President And The Dealmaker

It is possible to make some prudent postulations on the future course of India-US relations. Some clues and indications are discernible on the direction that Trump and his cabinet might take, particularly on ties with India, over the next four years.

At the outset, it needs to be recognised that no matter what we might have been led to believe or think, ties with India do not fall in the top rung of priority for the United States. That place is occupied by China, Russia, Middle East, jobs, economy, immigration, terrorism etc.

At the same time, it needs to be recognised that the India-US partnership has been one of the few spheres that has been a bright spot and successful area for the USA on the foreign policy front in recent years. It can be clearly stated without much fear of contradiction that India-US relations enjoy bipartisan support in the US Congress and across the board among US citizens as well as among Indian political parties and people. India has the largest Caucus comprising more than 300 members in the US House of Representatives which promotes relations between the two countries.

The three most recent presidents viz Bill Clinton and Barack Obama (Democrats) and George W Bush (Republican) have all worked assiduously to take the relationship to ever newer heights. On the Indian side also, if former prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had characterised the two countries as ''natural allies'' and Prime Minister Narendra Modi termed the connect as an ''indispensable partnership,'' Manmohan Singh had staked the survival of his government on the India-US civil nuclear deal and termed this as the biggest achievement of his 10-year rule.

President Obama termed India-US ties as the “defining partnership of the 21st century”. Both Obama and Modi invested considerable energy and political will and capital in the relationship by meeting nine times and holding three summits during the two and a half years since Modi came to power in May 2014.

Today, the India-US bilateral cooperation is broad-based and multi-sectoral, covering trade and investment, defence and security, education, science and technology, cyber security, high-technology, civil nuclear energy, space technology and applications, clean energy, environment, agriculture and health. Vibrant people-to-people interaction and support across the political spectrum in both countries nurture the bilateral partnership.

Donald Trump will hence be inheriting a vigorous, vibrant and multi-faceted relationship between India and the US. To get a feel of how he will approach it and take it forward, it will be useful to browse through some of the comments made by him during his election campaign.

While reading these statements it should, of course, be kept in mind that oratory and rhetorics resorted to by candidates during election campaigning cannot be taken as policy. Candidates competing for victory are prone to make rather extreme proclamations during campaigning, but they tend to revert to somewhat centrist positions after assuming office.

Another complication in assessing what President Trump is likely to do arises from the fact that he is a business tycoon who has never held a public office in his life before. Nothing much is hence known about his views on major international issues as there are no official statements made by him on the floor of either the Senate or the House or votes on any contentious or polarising issues that he has participated in. In addition, Trump has been seen to change his statements and position rather frequently and tailor his responses to the audience that he is addressing.

With the above caveats and reservations in mind, let us look at some of his more significant statements on India:

Indian and Hindu community will have a true friend in the White House.

I have great respect for Hindus. I have so many friends that are Hindu and they are amazing entrepreneurs. I have jobs going up in India right now. I have great respect for India. It’s an amazing country.

I look forward to working with Prime Minister Narendra Modi who has been very energetic in reforming India’s bureaucracy. Great man. I applaud him for doing so.

I am a big fan of Hindu. I am a big fan of India.

I’m involved in two massive developments in India…and that is because I have great confidence in India. Generations of Indian and Hindu Americans have strengthened our country…your values of hard work, education and enterprise have truly enriched our nation.

I presume everywhere in the speech Trump said ''Hindu,'' he really implied ''India.''

It would be clear from the above that he has not had a foul word or adverse remark to make against India during all of his campaigning.

The issue of job losses in the United States has consistently surfaced as a contentious and divisive issue in previous US presidential elections. In the current elections also, factory closures and ''stealing'' of American jobs has featured extensively. Trump has however trained his guns mostly at China and Mexico for taking away American manufacturing jobs and blamed them for shutdown of industries. Very rarely has he criticised the off-shoring of software and IT jobs to India.

He has referred to the issue of H1B visas on a few occasions. Indian industry, particularly in the IT sector like Infosys, Wipro, TCS etc who are active in the USA has already started taking additional measures to employ more Americans in view of some comments by Trump in recent days. Jeff Sessions, Trump's nominee for US Attorney General (AG) told a Senate committee at his confirmation hearing on 10 January 2017 that he would take measures to curtail the “misuse” of H-1B visas. This could impact Indian IT companies that use these visas in large numbers. As a senator, Sessions has been in the forefront of a campaign against the H-1B programme, and as AG, he will be able to interfere with it in several ways. It is however expected that as in the past the issue of H1B visas will recede into the background after the din and fury of the election subsides.

I feel reasonably assured that in the near future, the US government will be persuaded by its industry and will realise that the competitiveness of the US industry is critically dependent on the presence of experts and professionals in the US on H1B visas.

If however Trump acts on his promise of bringing down the corporate tax rate in US from 35 per cent to 15 per cent, it could encourage and attract some US companies currently based in India (and elsewhere) to relocate to the US. This could have an adverse impact on the ‘’Make in India’’ initiative of the Indian government.

There are other trade issues like IPRs, pharmaceuticals, immigration etc on which India and the US differ, and which are being discussed in separate international fora. These issues could also come under the gaze of Trump. He is a businessman. He is a deal-maker. He could feel tempted to apply pressure on India (and other countries) to get a better business deal for America. This approach might yield dividends in the short term but in the medium and long term, such a transactional attitude is bound to be counter-productive.

Modi is reported to have said at a meeting just after the US presidential election that he is looking forward to working with Trump with whom he has good relations and feels that the Republican administration will be well inclined towards India. Modi said that there was no reason to be apprehensive about any dramatic change in bilateral relations. He is also reported to have remarked that Republican Administrations on the whole have been friendlier to India. Most recently, speaking at the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi on 17 January 2017, Modi remarked: ''In my conversation with President-elect Donald Trump, we agreed to keep building on these gains in our strategic partnership.''

Trump's relations with Pakistan are also likely to have a strong impact on India. His strong statements against terrorism make it likely that he will apply additional pressure on Pakistan to stop supporting and providing sanctuaries to terrorists. He referred to this in his inaugural address when he said: “We will reinforce old alliances and form new ones - and unite the civilised world against radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth.” Pakistan being the epicentre of terrorism could come under significant pressure. This could be beneficial for India.

Several of Trump’s statements like the one made after Osama bin Laden's killing in 2011 were highly condemnatory of Pakistan saying that it is no friend of the USA as it took billions of dollars from America while it continued to help its enemies and got US soldiers killed. He has also commented adversely against nuclear weapons in Pakistan. He stated at one of his election rallies that he would like to get the help and support of India to deal with the problem of a ''semi-stable, nuclear armed Pakistan”.

As far as Trump's ties with China are concerned, the beginning has not been reassuring or encouraging. Even before assuming office, a spat between China and Trump and his transition team has taken place on the issue of Trump’s telephonic conversation with the Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-Wen, the first time since 1979 that a US president has spoken to a Taiwanese leader. It is not clear whether this interaction took place as a result of ignorance on the part of Trump on the sensitivity of China on the one-China Policy or it was a well thought through move to apply pressure on China to get a better trade deal.

During the campaign, Trump had called China a ''currency manipulator'' and a ''thief'' for stealing American jobs. In trade and economic terms, the US and China are joined at the hip with total bilateral trade standing at $680 billion with an adverse balance of trade for the USA being around $380 billion. In addition, China has invested $1.25 trillion of its foreign exchange reserves in US government bonds. Because of this deep and close economic partnership, it will be difficult for the US to take any precipitate action against China. However, ''America First'' and ''Making America Great Again'' are slogans on which Trump has been voted to power and he will not be able to open factories and create jobs in the US without applying significant pressure on China.

Trump's move out of Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) on the first day of his presidency could prove to be a mixed bag for India. US jettisoning the TPP could make available more strategic space to China, which would be to India's detriment, particularly if China decides to replace the US in that agreement.

Also TPP is not a purely economic agreement. It has wide-ranging geo-strategic implications. Moreover, if Obama's Pivot to Asia is dumped, it will be a shot in the arm for China and will result in making China even more aggressive in Asia and elsewhere. Thereafter China will face no opposition to extend its unrivalled sway over the South China Sea (SCS). Trump has stated that he will invest more in building a stronger and more powerful navy. If so, it will have to be placed in the Pacific and in the vicinity of SCS. More clarity would need to emerge on these opposing assertions, hopefully within the coming days.

At the moment, there are a large number of imponderables as far as US relations with China under the Trump Presidency are concerned. It will be prudent to wait and watch rather than come to any hasty conclusion, which might need to be revised in a hurry in the near future.

If relations between USA and Russia improve, it could have the (un) intended effect of loosening the Chinese grip on Russia. Over the last two years, Russia has been forced into the arms of China as a result of sanctions following developments in Ukraine and Crimea. However, notwithstanding improvement in US-Russia ties, it is possible that Russia may have gone too far in its economic, security and strategic linkages with China that it might be well nigh impossible for it to extricate itself from China's vice even if it wants to.

It was earlier being thought that Russia's anticipated proximity to the US could help in strengthening ties between India and Russia as the latter had appeared to drift farther from former because of India's perceived closeness to the US. This now appears increasingly doubtful. With every passing day it is becoming more obvious that Russia is getting increasingly meshed and clasped in a Russia-China-Pakistan nexus, which will have to be accepted by India and managed in the best way possible.

In conclusion, it appears highly likely that in strategic, political, security, defence and economic terms, relations between India and the US will continue their upward trajectory under President Trump.

India's ties with the US in the coming years are best captured by the comment of Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar who said at the recently held Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi on 18 January 2017: ''Our ties with the United States have been steadily growing and today cover vast areas of collaboration. We established early contact with the Trump transition team and see a strong convergence of interests and concerns.''