Three years ago, U.S.-India relations were in tatters over the arrest and strip search of an Indian diplomat in New York for visa fraud and underpaying her housekeeper. Modi wasn't even permitted to enter the U.S. then, censured for failing to stop the 2002 mass killings of Muslims in the Hindu-majority state he led at the time.
With the Indian leader's election in 2014, the tide has definitively turned -- thanks to determined effort, a growing strategic alignment and the striking odd-couple chemistry between the barrel-chested, bear-hugging Modi and his cool, often restrained American counterpart, President Barack Obama.
Secretary of State John Kerry has said that the U.S. may now do more with India on a government-to-government basis than virtually any other nation. Modi's visit is meant to celebrate that achievement and cement it as this U.S. administration prepares to give way to a new one in 2017.
"This trip is both a love fest and a sales pitch," said Michael Kugelman, a senior associate for South Asia at the Wilson Center.
Modi's goal -- and Obama's -- will be "to highlight the rapid progress made in U.S.-India relations in recent years and to underscore the importance of maintaining the current momentum in relations against a backdrop of changing U.S. leadership," Kugelman said.
Points of friction remain
There are points of friction between the world's two largest democracies, to be sure, with India chafing at U.S. pressure to do more on climate change and human rights, while U.S. lawmakers complain about India's slavery, its loose approach to intellectual property and limits on foreign investment.
But both sides emphasize that the story of the last few years has been one of constructive progress and shared priorities. That's a function of China's rise, the threat of terrorism and the Obama administration's decision to focus resources and attention on Asia. It also reflects the both leaders' recognition that their countries will benefit from closer alignment.
Numbers back the narrative. U.S.-India trade has soared from $60 billion in 2009 to $107 billion in 2015, while American defense contractors are now selling India $14 billion worth of equipment, an increase from $300 million less than a decade ago.
Defense and security cooperation in particular are "an area of extraordinary progress and ambition in both countries," Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Nisha Biswal told a Senate committee in May. She said the two countries' military exercises had grown in scope and complexity. Unspoken but implicit was the fact that they've grown more important, too.
As China increasingly takes steps to establish claims to contested areas in the South China Sea -- through which about half the world's merchant ships sail -- the U.S. has been placing increasing emphasis on the need to maintain freedom of navigation.
"India has an important role to play as a net security provider and guarantor of an open and rules-based maritime order across the Indo-Pacific," Biswal said.
India also provides a counterweight to China by offering the region another model of development and progress, said Sen. Bob Corker, the Tennessee Republican who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
"It is essential that Washington and Delhi stand together to uphold democratic values, principles and norms in the Indo-Pacific, particularly as China seeks to gain greater influence in the region," he said at the May hearing.
China spurs U.S.-India ties
The visit coincides with Kerry's trip to Beijing to attend a strategic and economic dialogue the U.S. holds annually with China. Despite a roster of serious issues to resolve, including tensions over the South China Sea and Chinese hacking of U.S. businesses and government agencies, this year's meetings produced an anodyne closing statement hailing points of agreement and cooperation between the U.S. and China after two days of talks -- papering over differences on several issues, particularly the South China Sea and Chinese regulatory barriers on foreign companies.
The forces drawing India and the U.S. together go beyond China, though. Both countries see a destabilized Afghanistan and terrorism in Pakistan and beyond as sources of concern. Kugelman says that increasing U.S. impatience with Pakistan's tolerance for certain militant groups also benefits ties between the U.S. and India, which views the Muslim country on its border as its biggest foe.
Pointing to the U.S. drone strike inside Pakistan that killed Taliban leader Mullah Mansour, Kugelman said, "I think what we're seeing in the last few months is the case of the U.S. losing patience with Pakistan."
He points to the close ties between Pakistan and China as another factor. "The Obama administration is very intent on completing this rebalancing to Asia," Kugelman said. "That entails a very significant role for India, and there's simply no role for Pakistan because Pakistan is a very big ally of China."
As a result of all this, "suddenly India begins to look like a better partner for the U.S., and the U.S. looks like an invaluable partner for India," said Sadanand Dhume, an American Enterprise Institute expert on India.
The U.S.-India relationship has been on a relatively steady upward trajectory since 2000, when then-President Bill Clinton visited India, said Arun Singh, India's ambassador to the U.S.
He said that former President George W. Bush transformed the relationship further with the landmark civil nuclear agreement in 2008.
But under the tenure of Obama and Modi tenure, that dynamic has been turbo-charged. Obama has made two visits to India, the most by any sitting president. Obama has backed India's inclusion on the UN Security Council and in multilateral export control regimes, said Singh, who noted advances made in defense, trade and economic partnerships as well.
Meanwhile, Modi's current visit will mark his seventh meeting with Obama in the U.S. and abroad, according to Ashley Tellis, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
India reorients
Over the course of those visits, the Indian leader has made a deliberate shift, said Dhume. "What Modi has done is made clear that a large country with a tradition of non-alignment is, under this prime minister, moving decisively toward a deeper relationship with the U.S.," Dhume said.
India had historically allied itself with the Soviet Union and then Russia, along with Brazil and China, as part of a group of countries that wanted to stay out of the U.S. orbit.
The bilateral relationship has gotten an extra boost from the chemistry the two leaders share. Raymond Vickery, who worked on U.S.-India trade as an assistant secretary of commerce under President Bill Clinton, attributed its roots to their similar backgrounds.
"Both Obama and Modi have spent most of their lives as outsiders," said Vickery, a global fellow at the Wilson Center. "They've both come to power with a common vision of being able to have a U.S.-India relationship that's worldwide in scope."
Modi, he said, is a "really down to earth guy who tries to answer your questions, he doesn't just try to come from talking points, and he comes with a very modest background."
U.S.-India ties aren't dependent on personal chemistry, though, Dhume said. The long, slow deepening links between the two countries is about "the importance of India, much more than the importance of Modi," he said, referring to its strong economy, positive trade and defense relationships and its status as a democratic model for the region and counterweight to China.
"India matters, no matter who is the leader," Dhume said.
Source ↔ Download MP3 Free
