Abstract
Rudra Chaudhuri’s Forged in Crisis explores the nature of the bilateral relationship between India and the United States, the ideas that have shaped it and the guiding policy outcomes that have resulted. Rather than providing an exhaustive narrative of the political relationship between the countries, the author presents eight essays on not just events of international interest but also what he notes as being points of crisis that have otherwise been ‘under-researched or overlooked’ (p. 4). These crisis points are used by the author to demonstrate the overarching theoretical themes of the work: (i) the use of strategic non-alignment as a mode of diplomatic policy engagement (rather than avoidance) with the international system and (ii) the way that Indian policy makers and leaders have been interested to make decisions based on the balanced mix of ‘ideas and interest’; an intellectual paradigm that takes cues largely from Nehru and his vision of an India that can think for itself as it moved away from its former colonial identity (pp. 17–18).
Forged in Crisis has a consistent historical narrative that flows from just prior to Indian independence through until the US Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement of 2008. The three sections of the book, aptly titled Negotiating Non-Alignment, Negotiating Change and Negotiating Engagement, show an evolutionary understanding of how engagement does not necessarily mean alliance but nor does it mean enmity. Whilst not explicitly doctrinal, the thread of strategic non-alignment is shown in the cases provided to have had influence on the Indian foreign policy throughout the country’s stages of growth and the growth of its relationship with the United States. As Chaudhuri puts it, ‘much like the impossible task of separating India from non-alignment, it is equally impossible to divide ideas and interests’ (p. 257).
Strategic non-alignment and balancing ideas with interest are used in the text to explain a policy position that is built largely on a national identity by which India should remain autonomous and independent, particularly diplomatically. This policy position led to India being largely free of obligations to alliances and voluntarily outside the major power blocs of the Cold War. The overarching argument of Chaudhuri’s thesis is that times of crisis, such as, the Korean War, the 1962 Indo–China border conflict or even the Iraq War, have strengthened a relationship with the United States that has been continually developed and cultivated by leaders on both sides—but not without misunderstanding of intention or political motivation due to India’s staunch reluctance to form an alliance and its reciprocity of relations with the Soviet Union.
While this narrative is structured in a way that is appealing, concise and supportive of the author’s thesis, it should be taken as an opening foray into this new conception of the United States–India relations that is opening the proverbial door for further exploration and more research, rather than as an authoritative guide to Indian foreign policy attitudes. This is not to undermine the work of what is obviously an exhaustively researched and articulated piece of scholarship, but rather to suggest that with the power of hindsight and post-event analysis, a continuity in policy attitudes may be able to be traced in a way that was not obviously evident at the time. Granted, this image of policy confusion is one that Chaudhuri seeks to dispel through his suggested paradigm from the very opening of the book (pp. 1–3) but even so, an image that the exclusive focus on the relationship between the United States and India, with focus on specifically selected crisis events as basis to build the conception of Indian foreign policy attitudes has led to a degree of necessary cherry-picking of crisis events to discuss.
With the rapid economic development of the world’s largest democracy, there has been continual speculation as to what role an Indian superpower could play in the area of great-power politics. The way that India has crafted its foreign policy objectives and motivations, and critically, related to the United States has been an area of discourse that has largely been dominated by simplistic analytical dichotomies framed in a narrative governed by American and British source material. Forged in Crisis successfully provides a refreshing perspective on the diplomatic relationship between the United States and India that is not ground down to simplistic matter of mutual estrangement, and importantly provides what Chaudhuri terms ‘the first “Indian” reading’ (p. 256) of the deeply nuanced history that has developed between the two countries in their dealings from 1947 onwards. Chaudhuri’s closing remark that ‘India will never be an ally of the US’ (p. 259), rather than appearing bleak, brings what is a thoroughly researched and argued thesis to a conclusion that sheds tremendous light on the need for a deeply engaged reading of how one of the most significant powers of the global South views itself in relation to the world and vice versa. India’s desire to be political independent, whilst not directly expressed in written policy, is shown through its reaction to crisis.
Forged in Crisis shows how realism and idealism are tied together to form the nuanced timeline of the United States–India relations, the mix of ‘ideas with interests’ being the expressed key to understanding the policy outcomes that India has strived for. Its accessible narrative style will make it of equal value and interest to those both inside and outside of academia, and its ‘Indian’ approach to Indian politics contributes a fresh and percussive perspective to the growing body of literature surrounding the emerging powers of the global South.