Those observers who’ve finally come around to appreciating India’s balancing act in the New Cold War must do their utmost to understand this policy as it objectively exists instead of mistakenly interpreting it according to their own preconceived notions.
It's more honest to call a spade and spade and stop with the disingenuous language. India's self-styled "principled neutrality" is a euphemism for "Playing All Sides Against Each Other."
That is, India is essentially imitating the same game that Turkey is playing in the Middle East/Caucuses.
On the one hand, India plays America against China in order to extract concessions from China on the border dispute and other issues.
On the other hand, India plays Russia against America in order to extract concessions from America on economic and strategic issues.
And on the third hand, India is tacitly playing France, America, and Israel against even its closest ally of Russia in terms of arms sales.
One noteworthy issue is that India's importation of Russian arms has been significantly decreasing the past few years. From 2012-2016, Russian arms consisted of ~69% of all Indian imports. But from 2017-2021, Russian arms imports fell to 46%--the difference being supplanted by France, America, and Israel. That is, the Indians have been diversifying away from Russia towards these three other nations as a source of weapons.
India reduced arms imports from Russia, while China’s dependency increased
Furthermore, on the United Nations resolution vote demanding that Russia pay war reparations to Ukraine for the current conflict there, India only abstained (while China voted no).
UN calls for Russia to pay reparations. How did countries vote?
My friend, with whom I share interest in alternative i.e non MSM news tipped me with your authorship which I find a lot of understanding, in particular the pisce on activist state of play.
A few other sources point to PM Modi being a good guy, and it’s nice to see the play off with USA & Russia.
However what is out of kilter is what Zahid Hamid refers and also objectively the Modi concept of Hinduvita and the troubles in India and it’s policy in Kashmir, which is at odds with its Kingmaker strategy. Of course I’m talking about it’s tensions with Pakistan, and Hamid says plans for War with Pakistan.
What happened to the World Cup song of better together, all the religions lived in peace for over a thousand years. So war with Pakistan is done with great peril when wars in the past can’t be won with might alone. You don’t pick a fight with the strongest player.
It's more honest to call a spade and spade and stop with the disingenuous language. India's self-styled "principled neutrality" is a euphemism for "Playing All Sides Against Each Other."
That is, India is essentially imitating the same game that Turkey is playing in the Middle East/Caucuses.
On the one hand, India plays America against China in order to extract concessions from China on the border dispute and other issues.
On the other hand, India plays Russia against America in order to extract concessions from America on economic and strategic issues.
And on the third hand, India is tacitly playing France, America, and Israel against even its closest ally of Russia in terms of arms sales.
One noteworthy issue is that India's importation of Russian arms has been significantly decreasing the past few years. From 2012-2016, Russian arms consisted of ~69% of all Indian imports. But from 2017-2021, Russian arms imports fell to 46%--the difference being supplanted by France, America, and Israel. That is, the Indians have been diversifying away from Russia towards these three other nations as a source of weapons.
India reduced arms imports from Russia, while China’s dependency increased
https://www.thehindu.com/data/data-india-reduced-arms-imports-from-russia-while-chinas-dependency-increased/article65248748.ece
Furthermore, on the United Nations resolution vote demanding that Russia pay war reparations to Ukraine for the current conflict there, India only abstained (while China voted no).
UN calls for Russia to pay reparations. How did countries vote?
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/11/15/un-calls-for-russia-to-pay-reparations-how-did-countries-vote
It will be interesting to see how long India--like Turkey--can play this geopolitical game of playing each against all.
Interesting points and well documented.
My friend, with whom I share interest in alternative i.e non MSM news tipped me with your authorship which I find a lot of understanding, in particular the pisce on activist state of play.
A few other sources point to PM Modi being a good guy, and it’s nice to see the play off with USA & Russia.
However what is out of kilter is what Zahid Hamid refers and also objectively the Modi concept of Hinduvita and the troubles in India and it’s policy in Kashmir, which is at odds with its Kingmaker strategy. Of course I’m talking about it’s tensions with Pakistan, and Hamid says plans for War with Pakistan.
What happened to the World Cup song of better together, all the religions lived in peace for over a thousand years. So war with Pakistan is done with great peril when wars in the past can’t be won with might alone. You don’t pick a fight with the strongest player.