{"id":35621,"date":"2018-11-01T11:06:53","date_gmt":"2018-11-01T05:36:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=35621"},"modified":"2018-11-01T11:06:53","modified_gmt":"2018-11-01T05:36:53","slug":"redrawing-the-arc-of-influence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/redrawing-the-arc-of-influence\/","title":{"rendered":"Redrawing the arc of influence:\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/todays-paper\/tp-opinion\/redrawing-the-arc-of-influence\/article19513055.ece\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Redrawing the arc of influence<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Indian diplomacy needs to display higher levels of sophistication for New Delhi to play a global role. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Context:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s foreign visits has been extremely impressive, and he has managed to inject a degree of dynamism into a system accustomed to a more leisurely pace.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Recent Visits:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>U.S. visit:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Both sides mainly focus on counter-terrorism and the defence security partnership, avoiding contentious trade-related issues.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Israel visit:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the case of Israel, this being the first ever visit by an Indian Prime Minister to that country.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Israel achieved a major propaganda scoop by getting the Indian Prime Minister to visit the memorial of Theodor Herzl, founding father of the Zionist movement<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The main focus of the visit was on defence cooperation, joint development of defence products and transfer of technology.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Both countries also expressed a strong commitment to combat terror.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Importance \u00a0of China for Israel<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">China is a bigger investor and trading partner of Israel than India.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">India and Israel decided to set up a $40 million Innovation Fund to allow Indian and Israeli enterprises to develop innovative technologies and products for commercial applications.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Israel-China comprehensive innovation partnership which has an outlay of $300 million.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">India and Israel also have differences over China\u2019s BRI.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Key points:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> China in Asia is already exercising some of the political and economic leverages that the U.S. previously possessed.<\/span><\/li>\n<li>China has a significant presence in East and Southeast Asia, is steadily enlarging its presence in South Asia, and is also beginning to expand into West Asia.<\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">China\u2019s influence in Iran today appears to be at an all-time high, whereas India\u2019s influence seems to be diminishing<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">India has refused to be inveigled by China\u2019s blandishments, including the BRI.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Few other countries in Asia are willing or in a position to tangle with China.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A divided ASEAN again has provided China with an opportunity to demonstrate its economic and military muscle.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Most countries in the region also demonstrate a desire to join China-based initiatives.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Even in South Asia, despite India\u2019s commanding presence, China has been successful in winning quite a few friends among India\u2019s neighbours such as Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka and the Maldives.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong> India-Russia:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Russia is undergoing a strategic resurgence of sorts, sustained in good measure by the close relations recently established with China.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Buoyed by developments in the Ukraine and Crimea, and the uncertainties surrounding U.S. commitment to NATO, the new Russia-China \u2018strategic congruence\u2019 is certain to impact Asia.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The problem for India and Indian diplomacy is that at this time India-Russia relations appear less robust than at any time in the past half century<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u00a0India\u2019s \u2018Act East and Look West\u2019 policies have given a new dimension to Indian diplomacy in both East and West Asia.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In both regions, especially in West Asia, Indian diplomacy still lacks the nimbleness required to deal with fast-changing situations.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In West Asia, despite its long time presence in the region, a 9-million strong diaspora, and the region being its principal source of oil, India is not major player presently.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Both Russia and China have overtaken India in the affairs of the region. This is particularly true of Iran where the Russia-China-Iran relationship has greatly blossomed, almost marginalising India\u2019s influence.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>In West Asia:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">India\u2019s absence from, and its inability to play a role in, West Asia, even as the region confronts a split down the line between the Arab and the non-Arab world is unfortunate.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There is the possibility of a series of confrontations between an increasingly powerful Shiite Iran and a weakening Saudi Arabia.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The most recent challenge is the one posed by Qatar to the existing order in the West Asian region.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The fallout of all this will impact India adversely and Indian diplomacy\u2019s inability to make its presence felt will matter.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">An additional concern for India would be that growing uncertainties in the region could further fuel radical Islamist terror in the region.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Conclusion:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Indian diplomacy presently need to do is to look out ways to steer amid an assertive China, a hostile Pakistan, \u00a0an uncertain South Asian and West Asian neighbourhood and an unstable world.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Redrawing the arc of influence:\u00a0 Indian diplomacy needs to display higher levels of sophistication for New Delhi to play a global role. Context: Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s foreign visits has been extremely impressive, and he has managed to inject a degree of dynamism into a system accustomed to a more leisurely pace. Recent Visits: U.S.&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/redrawing-the-arc-of-influence\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Redrawing the arc of influence:\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[555],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35621","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-test-1","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":"","cached_date":1704845079},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35621\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}