Nepal cannot afford to ignore the new angles the incoming U.S. administration could reset in our geopolitical triangle
By Sanjay Upadhya
Foreign Minister Upendra Yadav can hardly be accused of gratuitous exuberance in having described Barack Obama’s election as the 44th president of the United States as a matter of joy for people everywhere wallowing in discrimination and deprivation. The general international reaction to the first African American’s rise to the most powerful job in the world has been far more adulatory.
Ithe absence of a record going beyond Obama’s four years in the U.S. Senate – much of it spent on campaigning for the presidency – there is precious little that would help explain the president-elect’s worldview or governing style. Clearly, the new administration will be pre-occupied with restoring America’s economic health. Yet foreign policy and national security are not about to diminish in importance. America’s international challenges have not subsided because of the global economic crisis.
Implicit, thus, in the enduring bout of Obama-mania – both at home and abroad – is relief at the departure of the gung-ho American unilateralism of the last eight years. Difficult as it might seem now, however, it is important to remember that George W. Bush arrived in the White House as a critic of his predecessor’s penchant for international nation-building missions. Of course, the 9/11 attacks changed all that. And this fits into the wider issue of how different Obama can really be vis-à-vis the rest of the world.
A change in tone, while certainly helpful, would hardly be enough to bring transformations of substance. For one thing, there are core U.S. national interests that no rhetorical tempering can dilute. Campaign promises, furthermore, are aimed at electrifying voters. Once they have affirmed their mandate, expediency gives way. Circumstances change and unforeseen events happen. Compromises with legislators, the bulk of who face the voters every two years, become crucial. If Obama ends up backtracking on key campaign promises sooner rather than later, he will certainly have conformed to presidential tradition.
America And The World
Having inherited a major – and deeply unpopular – war, Obama already is saddled by one of the most difficult challenges an incoming president could expect. His campaign promise of withdrawing troops from Iraq would now have to be balanced against its wider regional repercussions. With allies as mutually antagonistic as Saudi Arabia and Israel anxious not to see Iran fill the vacuum, Obama knows how carefully he must tread.
A politically resurgent Russia, a quiet but assertive China, and a budding alliance of left-wing governments in Latin America, among other things, have exacerbated U.S. foreign policy challenges burdened by the war on terrorism. Traditional allies, too, pose a challenge. The European Union, economically and politically resilient, has embarked on autonomous policy-making for much of the Bush years and seems to have become used to it.
The day after Obama’s election, Russian President Dmitri Medvedev announced that Moscow was deploying missiles in its European exclave of Kaliningrad in response to the U.S. deployment of ballistic missile defense systems in Poland. Such Russian assertiveness may not be enough to consolidate a Cold War-like transatlantic alliance. E.U. countries, after all, have the motive and opportunity to strike their own deals with Russia, especially on energy imports, and thrive.
China’s growing influence in everyday American life has become apparent during the financial crisis. More and more Americans recognize how Beijing’s purchases of bonds have been propping up the economy. Also apparent for an increasing number of Americans is the rapid growth in China’s conventional military capabilities, including its blue-water navy and submarine forces. Experts see Beijing potentially challenging Washington’s predominance in the western Pacific for the first time since 1945. China’s expanding strategic nuclear forces and its ballistic missile forces gives it a stronger capability to project itself on the international stage.
Obama has spoken admiringly of China’s domestic achievements and potential contributions to world peace. Indeed, Beijing’s cooperation on North Korea has helped ease the nuclear crisis while its reluctance has compounded the problem in Darfur. Yet there are nativist members of the Democratic Party, beholden only to their voters, firmly focused on the issues of Taiwan, Tibet and human rights. Balancing the U.S.-China relationship will remain tough, to put it mildly, for the incoming administration.
In the Middle East, the Bush administration made a monumental policy shift. The fact that most of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudis or Egyptians forced ordinary Americans to take a fresh look at these traditional U.S. allies. Bush’s policy of democratizing the Arab regimes as a precondition to stemming radicalism has been discredited by the Iraq imbroglio. Still, Obama would have a hard time repudiating that doctrine, especially in view of the U.S.’s own democratic traditions.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict would put Obama to a peculiar test. While the president-elect is perceived as a sympathizer of Arabs, his victory owed much to crucial support from traditionally pro-Israel constituencies. Perceptions of pro-Arabism, on the other hand, could harden Israel’s own attitudes and approaches, especially concerning the Gaza, West Bank as well as Lebanon, Syria and Iran, portending greater regional instability.
South Asia: Spotlight And Skepticism
By promising to focus America’s attention and resources on the war in Afghanistan, Obama has signaled an energetic involvement in South Asia. The capture of Osama bin Laden would make no significant dent against Al Qaeda or its allies. In search for demonstrable success, Obama would be tempted to open dialogue with Taliban elements, especially those interested in joining the political process. And that brings Pakistan center stage.
At one point during the campaign, Obama stumbled by saying he would order unilateral military action inside Pakistan to pursue terrorists, but he quickly recovered. During the presidential debates, Obama spoke of building trust with the democratic leaders of Pakistan while seeking Islamabad’s military support in the fight against terrorism.
India represents a different picture. In the early months of the presidential campaign, Obama praised the world’s most populous democracy and supported the initiatives taken by the Bush administration in bolstering wide-ranging relations with New Delhi. The president-elect is a firm supporter of the Indo-U.S. civilian nuclear co-operation agreement, although strong constituencies in his party oppose deal, saying its undercuts non-proliferation efforts with Iran and other aspiring nuclear-weapons states.
Some Indians suspect Obama considers a resolution of the Kashmir conflict a pre-condition to acquiring the Pakistan army’s full cooperation in the war against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Speculation that Obama was likely to appoint a special envoy on Kashmir, possibly former president Bill Clinton, riled leading Indian analysts. The president-elect’s support for ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which New Delhi has long opposed, brings another imponderable to the equation.
India, too, has contributed to the skepticism. On the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly earlier this year, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh held a high-profile meeting with McCain, without having scheduled a similar engagement with Obama. After his electoral triumph, Obama spoke to Prime Minister Singh, but only days after making a call to Pakistani President Asif Zardari.
Indian officials subsequently explained that delay as part of a scheduling conflict. That explanation did little to quell suspicions, especially considering the preposterousness of the suggestion that Singh could not spare a few minutes for the incoming leader of the world’s sole superpower. Admittedly, the multifaceted ties between Washington and New Delhi run too deep to permit a course change, much less a reversal. But the building sense of caution must be factored in.
Nepal: Continuity Or Change?
Given Nepal’s strategically important location between the world’s two most populous nations – as well as its fastest growing economies – Washington’s engagement in Kathmandu clearly transcends internal changes in either country. Washington has sufficiently underscored its commitment to continued engagement by, among other things, modernizing its embassy in Kathmandu.
Obama has had much of his work done by the man he is succeeding. During his first term, Bush backed Sher Bahadur Deuba’s government and, subsequently, the royal regime against the Maoist insurgents militarily and politically. The perceived pro-Chinese nature of the February 1, 2005 royal takeover shut the door on that cooperation. As the Maoists consolidated their political influence through the peace process, Washington – in close consultation with New Delhi – embarked on a cautious wait-and-see approach on the former rebels.
India and the U.S. can be expected to continue comparing notes on Nepal. Yet New Delhi seems equally mindful of the keenness with which Washington is engaging with the Maoists while the State Department still officially considers them terrorists. For the Indians, though, the larger question has become China’s own ties with the Maoists. Seeking to bolster its position after the fall of its long-time ally, the monarchy, China has been steadily building ties with the Maoists. Viewing India as a pivot ring in a U.S.-led containment against is “peaceful rise,” Chinese diplomats and academics have become increasingly candid in asserting their interests in Nepal. The sustained Tibetan protests in Kathmandu earlier this year has evidently hardened China’s position.
Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s recent public statement acknowledging the strategic challenge China poses for India has sparked a vigorous debate with considerable relevance to Nepal. Indian complaints of Chinese encirclement through the smaller South Asian nations in an effort to spread its influence throughout the region, of Beijing’s reiteration of territorial claims to Arunachal Pradesh and, now, of Chinese complicity in terrorism in the volatile Northeast represent a serious escalation in rhetoric. Chinese interest in the future of Nepal’s military has not gone unnoticed in New Delhi and Washington, which shared traditional ties with the erstwhile Royal Nepalese Army.
The continued participation of the Maoists in the political process, regardless of their longevity in power, has become crucial to India’s own internal efforts to tame the Naxalite insurgency. Yet the emergence of a Chinese client regime in Kathmandu under the Maoists would deal a severe blow to the rationale behind its opposition to the monarchy.
Still sections in New Delhi see Beijing’s assertiveness in Nepal more of a response to growing American influence. The strong pro-Tibet lobby in the Democratic Party as well as Nepal’s record as a key staging ground in that conflict raises a key question. How far amenable would New Delhi be to confronting U.S.-instigated Chinese influence in Nepal should Obama bring back the hyphenated India-Pakistan plank in his South Asia policy? A recent U.S. intelligence report on global trends candidly concedes that New Delhi’s partnerships are aimed at maximizing India’s autonomy, not at aligning itself with any country or international coalition.
Foreign Minister Yadav confidently asserted there would be no change in U.S. policy on Nepal under the new administration. That does not mean Nepal can afford to ignore the new angles Obama’s arrival could reset in our triangular geopolitics.
(A version of this article appeared in the December 2008 issue of Global Nepali)
