Abstract
The theory of international relations (IR) is less than a century old as a field of academic study; so it is younger than several other social sciences. It should not be surprising, then, that it has neither the rigour nor the predictive force of the far older natural sciences. In fact, it is a good deal less clairvoyant than other social sciences like economics. Hypotheses are adopted, gain popularity for a while, and then are discarded by practitioners or simply pushed out by the force of events. Liberalism did well for a few years after 1918; then came Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, so it had to be discarded. Realism and then neorealism were good explanations for the Cold War, but then the Cold War came to an end, so they had to be replaced.
Then came globalisation which could be based on neorealism or neoliberalism or both; since it brings about the convergence of economies, production, finances, so it also brings about the convergence of radically different IR concepts towards a unified discourse of truth. Now even that is being discarded as localisations gain in importance. It is tempting, given all these theory’s ups and downs, to treat the field as just one event after another, but there is also the fact that without some theoretical grounding, however rudimentary, such a recital would rapidly lose meaning. So, it is even more tempting to attach oneself to a theory, however inadequate, while explaining events.
In the case of India–Iran relations that dilemma is imminent. Close civilisational ties between the two go back over the millennia, and were particularly intense during the centuries of Moghul rule in India. In the post-1945 era, both economics and geostrategy seemed to augur close relations. But in practise, these relations have alternated between friendly and close, on the one hand, to deep mutual suspicion bordering on hostility on the other, with substantial periods of relative indifference in between.
In the search for a theoretical framework which might explain this roller coaster ride, Sujata Ashwarya begins with neorealism or structural realism, the theory that while states pursue power to promote their national interests, the structure of the international system imposes constraints on the possibilities available. Then, there are relationships and interactions. Whereas structure explains the contours of the international system, relationships constrain or bind state behaviour through affinities, alliances, arms races and adversarial positioning. These are ties that shape action and choice. The latter, interactions, comprise the policy choices, the actions taken by states vis-à-vis other states; it is a process variable to explain what states do as contrasted with why they do it. With these modifiers, neorealism seems adequate to explain the ups and downs of the India–Iran bilateral relationship. Although not fully adequate, since there were, through all the years, actions on either side which appeared autonomous, unrelated to relationships and structures. For example, despite India’s unrestrained criticism of Western sponsored military pacts and Iran having joined them in 1955, the Shah of Iran was on a state visit to India a few months later, while in 1959, Jawaharlal Nehru reciprocated with a visit to Iran.
Anyway, Ashwarya’s central thesis is built on the assumption that the Cold War was the major structural determinant of the international system until it ended in 1991; the structural change caused by its demise and the resulting unipolarity led major powers like India and Iran to seek internal and external balancing to strengthen their position in this now unbalanced world order. So, the bilateral relationship gained traction. This thesis is developed in two elaborately argued chapters, one dealing with the years of the Cold War, the second with the years after. There are also two further chapters which broadly find reasons to approve Indian diplomacy’s tightrope balance. One explains the intricacies of relations between the United States, India and Iran as the first decade of the new millennium saw the contrasting and complementary policies of each of them towards the nuclear ambitions of the last two. The next one covers the way India balanced its relations with Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia, which the three were, of course, deeply suspicious of each other and by implication of anyone trying to befriend any of the others.
During the Cold War years, Pakistan was the crucial factor for almost two decades. Iran and Pakistan were members of the Baghdad Pact, which India saw as inimical to its interests. There were other factors as well: Iran was deeply suspicious of the Soviet Union, with which India developed close relations; India’s and Nehru’s closeness to Nasser and Egypt, which openly supported revolution in the region and which the Shah, of course, opposed; his promotion of Islamic causes to counterbalance the ideology of Arabic solidarity, which India did not like. But then, there was superpower détente and full throated Iranian support for India when China committed aggression in 1962. But then came the India–Pakistan war of 1965, and Iran was even more forthright in its support for Pakistan, though later the Shah made efforts to convince India that this should not be an obstacle to better relations. Then, in the latter half of the 1960s, came a number of developments that favoured better relations: Israel’s victory in the 1967 Arab–Israel war reduced Egypt’s appeal and encouraged Iran to develop regional ambitions; when in 1968 Britain announced withdrawal from the east of Suez, Iran could take that ambition even further; then the year 1969 brought the Nixon doctrine, United States disengagement from the region, and Iran saw this as yet another pointer towards expanding its own influence; when Pakistan drew closer to China, Iran was suspicious, leading to a more positive view of relations with India; and within India there was criticism of policies towards West Asia, as being too one sided in supporting Arab causes, also a good sign for India–Iran relations. This led to joint ventures, to a first meeting of the India–Iran Joint Commission for Economic Cooperation (in June 1969), to an expansion of trade.
The roller coaster continued, however. In 1971, India and Pakistan were at war and Iran leaked military supplies to the latter and later expressed concern about the possibility of Pakistan breaking up further, while the Shah openly declared he would not tolerate this. But then, by the mid-1970s, India was dominant in the region and Iran made efforts to mend ties.In 1974, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was in Iran; a few months later, the Shah was in India, laying a stronger basis for economic cooperation, including the proposed formation of an India Ocean Economic Community, supported by India but opposed by Pakistan. Then came the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan; India’s somewhat half-hearted opposition, which led to more suspicion, this time by the Islamic regime that had replaced the Shah in February 1979. In any case, the new regime was soon embroiled on several fronts, a war with Iraq, the confrontation with the United States, a slumping economy, and so relations with India on the economic front suffered through the 1980s.
With the end of the Cold War, India’s policy shifted to the achievement of major power status based on pragmatism rather than ideology, and on hard political calculations based on self-interest. The result was a boost in relations with Iran as there were high-level visits from India; the prime minister in 1993; the vice president in 1996; the prime minister in 2001 during which an important document, the Tehran Declaration, was signed; and there were return visits by Iranian President Rafsanjani in 1995; by his successor Khatami as Chief Guest for Republic Day in 2003, during which the New Delhi Declaration was signed, which launched strategic cooperation between the two. In Central Asia and in Afghanistan, the two countries saw common ground for cooperation. Iran acknowledged the importance of India’s role in the former, while the common concern regarding terrorism and the possible resurgence of the Taliban brought the two together on Afghanistan. A North–South transportation corridor was envisaged to connect India with Central Asia as well as Afghanistan through Chabahar port in Iran, which would comprise rail and road links. There was some progress in defence and strategic cooperation, though United States’ opposition to this limited the scope. However, trade did expand substantially during the two decades that followed the end of the Cold War, buoyed by India’s imports of crude oil and despite US sanctions. The author’s general conclusion is, however, and rightly, that from India’s viewpoint, the geopolitical reasons are as important as the economic ones for this expansion in the relationship.
The next chapter explains the way India balanced its booming relations with Iran with the growing Indo-US partnership, given the deep suspicions that the United States harboured regarding Iran’s nuclear and regional ambitions. This assumed particular significance once India and the United States announced their intention to cooperate in nuclear energy specially, of course, but also in defence technology, in arms supplies, through joint exercises. The way India steered its relations with Iran through the maze of US suspicions was an object lesson: a balancing act (to change the metaphor momentarily) that kept its relations with both of those two mutually suspicious powers from running aground. The author does some astute steering herself in describing the intricacies of the diplomacy.
Given India’s extensive relations with Iran, especially in the field of energy supplies, given also its domestic opinion, which was strongly opposed to any toeing of the US line, there were strong reasons for India to maintain its traditional relations with Iran. However, India did not want another nuclear weapons power in the neighbourhood, and Iran was undoubtedly in violation of its obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), so some action had to be taken. India favoured diplomacy, asserting that sanctions would be ineffective and end up hurting the people, not the regime. It also believed that Iran had (and has) the right to a peaceful nuclear energy programme under the NPT regime. But the United States wanted sanctions, following a reference to the United Nations (UN) Security Council and this was just the time India wanted US support most in order to end its own international isolation in the nuclear field: an Indo-US nuclear deal, then being negotiated, was crucially important in this context and the US Ambassador to India made it clear that the deal could die if India supported Iran in any way. Note that an Indo-US joint statement of July 2005 announced bilateral nuclear cooperation; there was not long to go for the vote on Iran in the IAEA. So when the IAEA in September 2005 voted to find Iran in violation of its obligations, India voted with the US; as it did again in February 2006 when the IAEA referred Iran to the UNSC. Thereafter, as UN mandated sanctions against Iran came into force, reinforced by trade restrictions imposed by the US on the one hand and Europe on the other, and there are good descriptions in the book of these various sanctions regimes, India had a hard time ensuring (through a long phase of reduced oil imports from Iran) that its energy economy did not suffer serious setbacks, including by attempting to increase its dependence on natural gas. Overall, as the author rightly notes, India did demonstrate a resolve to protect its interests with both Iran and the United States, and came through pretty much unscathed. The question is whether its policy was anchored in a steady vision of long-term self-interest or was it a much more random series of reactions to daily developments, the deal with the United States, energy supplies, domestic opinion, a movement from one crisis to another which came through looking like well-planned moves? When you are sitting in South Block, as I was for a good part of the late 1970s doing policy planning on relations with Iran and other issues (nuclear matters had not yet come up), it seems a lot more like the latter than the former, but from a longer viewpoint, there is little doubt that the author is right in praising the successful achievement of a fine balance.
The story of India’s relations with Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia is not such a cliff-hanger; it goes on for several years, though nimble footwork has been required from time to time. With Iran, as described above, there have been and are important ties. With Israel, once diplomatic relations were opened in 1992, ties grew apace, with defence cooperation, an agreement on space research, military supplies, science and technology and a broad strategic understanding taking centre position. With Saudi Arabia too, relations are important: it is India’s largest supplier of crude oil and largest source of remittances from abroad plus the fifth largest trade associate. There is also a strategic partnership between the two. The problem is that Israel is deeply suspicious of Iran, regards it as the epicentre of terrorism, is deeply worried about its growing power and regional status, concerned about its nuclear ambitions (there is, every now and then, talk about the possibility of a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities) and in this context, of course, is apprehensive regarding its cooperation with India. Saudi Arabia, too, has been anxious about Iran, particularly since the 1979 revolution: about its nuclear programme which is considered a threat to the region, its aid to rebels in Yemen, its undoubted appeal to all Shia’s in the Arab world, its growing outreach to the Shia community in India. Iran has, of course, been loud in it its denunciation of the Saudi regime, which it thinks is inimical to its interests and has sought to undermine it. On the other hand, Iran seems not particularly worried about Israel’s relations with India; nor does it exhibit much overt concern regarding the way India’s ties with Saudi Arabia have been growing. Here, the author points out that all three countries are vital to India’s diverse interests, and is all praise for our policy: India’s response to all this contention between the three has exhibited ‘classic restraint and balance’.
Finally, note that there is certainly a case for attaching the evolution of India’s relations with Iran to the Cold War, as theory demands, but there were other factors, as the author herself notes (quite unruefully) towards the end. And the detailed description of events in this book shows that these other factors were often more important. There was, most importantly the change in the South Asian regional balance that 1971 brought about (which had nothing to do with the Cold War, really) and which is somewhat under-stressed; so was the 1979 Iran revolution, which had nothing to do with the Cold War, but that event did change the regional politico-strategic structure. These events as also the new issue of terrorism and the older ones of cooperation in economics and technology brought India and Iran closer together.
In conclusion the author recommends, incontrovertibly and for the future, a balanced foreign policy projection through multi-pronged cooperation with states in the proximate neighbourhood as a safe and time-tested option.