The next step in Indo-US ties: Get Delhi to the UNSC
The inaugural 2+2 ministerial dialogue between India and the United States in 2018 barely had enough to show for itself other than the signing of a key defence agreement. Every official involved was just relieved it had taken place at all, plagued as it was by delays and cancellations that had dragged on for nearly a year.
The second, which concluded on December 18, marked the arrival in the truest sense of a platform that is being hailed as the “principal mechanism” for pulling together the growing convergence between the two countries into outcomes. The joint statement for the second ministerial, for instance, was more than twice the length of the first at 2,800 words spread over six pages. Words matter, and, in this instance, they tell a story of a busy relationship that is buzzing, with decisions, initiatives and outcomes.
That the two countries value the format was abundantly clear from the start. Both
Delhi and Washington are extremely selective in the use of this format. India has only two other such ministerial arrangements, and they are both members of the Quad, Australia and Japan (India and the United States are the remaining two). A count was not readily available of America’s 2+2s but, as a senior State Department official said, it considers this format as a “special one reserved for our closest partners”. The India-US 2+2 was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Donald Trump. And they have both demonstrated their personal investment in it by receiving the visiting ministers, in a rare and significant break from the protocol of heads of government and heads of State reserving their meetings only for counterparts.
The most notable part of this busy and buzzy relationship is not, however, initiatives and announcements. There are verifiable outcomes. Take two examples. One, the two countries announced at the 2018 2+2 ministerial they will set up secure communications lines — hotlines, as they are called popularly — for their defence and foreign affairs ministers to pick up and talk at times of crisis. They went operational some months ago. Two, they had fixed the signing of the Industrial Security Annex, an enabling defence agreement that facilitates the sharing of confidential national-security related information between the private sector companies of the two countries, with the overarching goal of enhanced interoperability of their militaries. It was signed on Tuesday and announced as a done deal by Mark Esper, the US secretary of defence.
What next, then? With a record like this on delivering results, is it time they went all-in on United Nations reforms? The US, which reiterated its support for it and India’s claim to a seat on the reformed/ expanded UN Security Council, will have to do the heavy-lifting here as a permanent member. As host and largest funder of the world body, the US has an unmatchable ability to swing it. But the challenge for India is to convince its backers — four of the five P-5 countries, the US, France, UK and Russia — it is worth their effort.