India Will Not Become A Great Power by

India Will Not Become a Great Power by Loudly Proclaiming its Intentions - The Wire Page 1 of 13
BOOKS
India Will Not

Become a Great
Power by Loudly
Proclaiming its
Intentions
BY SHIVSHANKAR MENON ON 22/11/2015 10 COMMENTS
Instead, she will be a great power through

building her own strength and capabilities and
continuing to show wisdom and good sense in
her choice of engagements abroad
https://thewire.in/16049/india-will-not-become-a-great-power-by-loudly-proclaiming-... 05-02-2017
The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70) and the Indian
navy fleet oiler INS Shakti (A57) conduct a refueling at sea exercise
Malabaro 2012. Credit: U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist
Seaman Apprentice Andrew K. Haller/Released
When Bharat Karnad asked me to speak at the launch of his

latest book, Why India is not a Great Power (Yet), he knew
that we have not always agreed on issues, to put it politely. He
told me that I figured extensively in it and that I may not like
what I saw. He was correct. I did not like what I saw about
myself in the book; nor did I recognise myself in it.
Nevertheless, this is an important book which raises and

discusses issues of primary importance to Indias foreign and
security policy issues which deserve much more serious
discussion and examination than they have received so far in
the country.
Karnads argument is straightforward, familiar to his friends

and stated clearly in the Introduction. It is that independent
India is a reticent state, has consistently underperformed and
has consistently declined as an independent player in the
international arena. This is primarily because of its over-
bureaucratised and super fragmented system of government,
the hollowness at the heart of its defence, its hard power
deficit, and its lack of vision or, as he says, that it may be a
strategically dim-witted lug. He thinks that Indias China

policy in particular is pusillanimous.
Fortunately, international conditions for Indias rise couldnt

be more propitious. For India to be a great power, Bharat says,
we should embrace the following agenda:
Choose sides in dyadic situations: siding with the

United States against China; with Russia against China;
with South East Asia, East Asia and Australia against
China; and, Iran, Russia and China against the US and its
allies in West Asia. As a result, India will be the regional
and international balancer in two formations, a middle-
Asian quadrilateral and a security diamond of India,
Japan, the US and Australia.
Define its security perimeter in terms of an Indian
Monroe Doctrine, and assume the role of gendarme in
the area bounded by the East African littoral, the Caspian
Sea, the Central Asian republics, South East Asian nations
and Antarctica; and, cobble together a pan-Asian maritime
security system on Chinas sea border.
Incentivise Indias immediate neighbours, including
Pakistan, with generous economic terms that plug into
Indias economic and industrial engine, establishing Indias
economic preeminence to complement its role as security
provider.
Build up strategically-oriented, conventional military
forces able to take the fight to China in Tibet and the
distant seas, and to prosecute expeditionary missions
from Subic Bay to Central Asia to the Gulf, and establish
foreign military bases in Vietnam, Central Asia and
Mauritius
Reorient her military effort from Pakistan to
China, forming two additional offensive mountain strike
corps.
Erect a consequential private sector led defence-
industrial complex.
Resume thermonuclear testing, and place nuclear

munitions at Chinese points of ingress along the border
with China.
Prosecute a tit-for-tat policy with China, nuclear
arming Vietnam as payback for China arming Pakistan.
Karnad concludes by saying that unless there are drastic

changes, Great Power-lite is all that India can realistically
hope for.
Just this summary will give you an idea of the sort of robust ,
assertive and thrusting policy that the author wants, and of the
host of issues that he raises and considers in this book. There
is much that can be said on its military aspects, on what
Karnad has to say about Indias military infirmities and
strengths, the hollowness of hard power and how it is
configured and used, and on the alleged lack of vision and
plans for its use.
In the limited space I have, I would rather focus on what the

author says about India as a great power. There are two main
aspects to this. One is what is a great power. The other is why
and how India should become one.
What a great power does and doesnt do
Bharat Karnad defines what separates a great power from

others thus:
With a modicum of economic strength, and natural

attributes of size, population and location apart, what
separates great powers and would be great powers from
the rest are a driving vision, an outward thrusting nature
backed by strong conviction and sense of national destiny
and matching purpose, an inclination to establish distant
presence and define national interests within the widest
possible geographic ambit, the confidence to protect and
further those interests with proactive foreign and military

policies, and the willingness to use coercion and force in
support of national interests complemented by
imaginative projection and use of both soft power and
hard power to expansively mark its presence in the
external realm.
And yet, has it really been so in history? I do not think so. This
is a description of how empires or hegemons behave as they
wane: of the British Empire at the end of the 19th century and
after the Boer War, of the US since its moment of unmatched
preponderance just after World War II, of Rome after Marcus
Aurelius, of the Qing after Qian Long, and so on. And frankly
speaking, what happened in history when they did adopt such
policies? Did they arrest or significantly postpone their
decline? The record is mixed. The most successful at managing
decline were the British. Others who followed the kind of
assertive policies that Karnad advocates before they had built
the power base to sustain it saw their relative position decline
rapidly. And some saw calamity as did Wilhelmine Germany
and militarist Japan, which chose to stress adventurist power
projection and said so.
Peter
Gordon
Bharat Karnad
Why India is not a Great Power (Yet)
New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2015
has noted how (http://english.caixin.com/2015-09-

19/100851854.html) modelling all countries and peoples as if
they were America-in-waiting has led to any number of false
predictions and ineffective and misguided policies.
Where does India stand on the historical curve of power? She

is still rising, putting in place the sinews of power and
accumulating it. She is certainly not in the ranks of the
declining or mature great powers who have followed the
assertive policies Karnad urges.
During the period of their rise, the great powers went through
long extended debates on their role abroad, avoided external
entanglements where possible, concentrated on building up
their internal strength, and projected/cultivated the myth that

they acted abroad only reluctantly or for moral reasons. The
US invoked freedom and human rights, but intervened in
Europe in the two World Wars only after the old established
powers had knocked each other out. The British even claimed
to have acquired two empires in a fit of absent mindedness!
None of them declared their purpose and goals in the terms
that Karnad uses. Deng Xiaopings 24 character strategy of
keeping ones head down etc. sums up the approach adopted
by successful rising powers through history.
The reason for this is simple. Existing power holders do not

share power easily or unless they are forced to by external
circumstance and shifts in the balance of power. It is a
declared goal of US policy to prevent the emergence of peer
competitors in the world. And yet the paradox of power is that
precisely those balance of power strategies that Henry
Kissinger so assiduously learnt from Metternich and Bismarck
have enabled the rise of China to a position where she can
actually consider herself a strategic competitor of the US,
despite their economic interdependence.
Should India therefore adopt Bharats prescriptions? Certainly

not as declared policy.
What India has been doing
As for his detailed policy recommendations, some of the more

eye-catching ones are likely to be controversial and seem
unlikely to be adopted, while others are actually part of the
government of Indias practice though not presented in the
same fashion as Karnad does for their effect on China.
More assertive ones like military bases abroad, providing

security in Central Asia and Antarctica, thermonuclear testing
and force projection sit ill together with his assertions about
the hollowness of Indian military power and the defence
procurement system, and are subject to divided opinion

among our own forces, as he acknowledges in the book.
The book recommends that India declare an Asian or Indian

Monroe Doctrine. An Asian Monroe Doctrine of sorts was
suggested at last years CICA Summit in Shanghai by the
Chinese president when he spoke of Asia for the Asians. The
idea sank without a public trace. No other Asian government
has picked it up. Instead, their actions since have consolidated
their considerable external balancing to Chinas rise witness
the India-US Joint Vision Statement on Asia-Pacific Security
in January 2015, the Japanese Diet passing laws permitting
the deployment of Japanese forces abroad this month, the
increasing defence and security ties among countries on
Chinas periphery, and other developments.
As for the books other prescriptions, it is hard to see how

some differ from the practice (not the rhetoric) of successive
governments of India. For instance, he speaks of the need to
make the extra effort to involve Pakistan in our regional
integration. That is precisely what the previous government
did, when it came closer than ever before to neutralising the
issues that divide us while opening up economic and other
links with Pakistan. That the effort did not succeed was due to
internal developments in Pakistan, not for want of trying here.
Karnad is right in saying that our primary strategic focus
should be China, not Pakistan.
Speak softly, carry a big stick: The LCA Tejas at the Bangalore Air
Show, 2011. Credit: Sandflash/Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
Without entering into a polemic, it was precisely the period of

the UPA, which the author decries as a lost decade, when India
shifted strategic focus from Pakistan to China, when
Indias nuclear weapons programme and deterrence were fully
operationalised, when India accumulated economic power at
an unprecedented rate with GDP growth rates unmatched by
any other Indian government/decade, when the government
decided to raise the mountain strike corps which Bharat wants
more of and strengthened the posture along the China border,
and so on. The verdict on this periods work will come when
India finds that she needs to turn to her economic sinews to
support and sustain her military and political quest as a great
power.
I do believe that speak softly and carry a big stick is likely to

be a more productive policy to deal with the consequences of
Chinas rise and the other changes we see around us. What this
book seems to suggest is to shout loudly and brandish
whatever stick you have, whether big or not! The chapter on
the infirmities and strengths of the armed forces suggest that
Karnad thinks we have a pretty weak or useless stick. Frankly,
the best judges of the size and quality of the stick are the
professionals themselves.
India Will Not Become a Great Power by Loudly Proclaiming its Intentions - The ... Page 10 of 13
What India must do next
I am convinced that India will be a great power if she

continues on her present course. This will not be through her
soft power. Here Bharat Karnad is right, though he sets up a
straw man saying that there are those in the establishment
who think so. I have never heard anyone responsible saying so
or professing this peculiar belief. Nor will it be by others giving
great power status to India, through some mysterious process
of entitlement or accretion. Nor will it be through a variant of
Bismarckian policy, which despite all of A.J.P. Taylors and
Henry Kissingers efforts to convince us otherwise was a
much simpler task than that facing Indian policy makers.
(Bismarck had to deal with one continental system, which by
its nature was a zero sum game. We have to deal with a
complex continental system containing the rise of China, and
simultaneously with an equally complex maritime system
which is a positive sum game.) Instead, I believe that India will
be a great power through building her own strength and
capabilities and continuing to show wisdom and good sense in
her choice of engagements abroad.
To me, the idea of a responsible

power is a red herring. It is only a
way existing power holders use to
encourage conformity with their
wishes and preferences.
Why am I sure that India will be a great power, despite all the
limitations that Bharat Karnad mentions in his book? Because
it is in Indias interest to be a great power. And this brings us
to the purpose of power. Why should we want to be a great
power? Theoretically it could be argued that like post-war
Japan until recently, or Australia and Canada, we should be

satisfied with concentrating on our own economic
development and leave security to others. India cannot accept
that for a simple reason. India, as Karnad says rightly, cannot
rely on others for its security. Its interests are unique, whether
economic, political or security a function of its unique
history, geography and culture. If we wish to abolish mass
poverty, hunger, illiteracy, and disease and modernise our
country, (or, as Gandhiji said so much more elegantly, wipe
the tear from the eye of every Indian,) we can only do so by
becoming a great power, with the ability to shape the
international system and environment to our purposes. India
is and has been an anti-status quo power, seeking to revise and
reform the international order since Nehrus day. That we have
not succeeded is evident. That we need to be a great power if
we want to have a chance of succeeding is also apparent.
There is also a chapter on what sort of power India should be

which bears reading. This is something on which there can be
and are legitimate differences among Indians. But I agree with
Karnad that we are not clear yet in India about this concept.
To me, the idea of a responsible power is a red herring. It is
only a way existing power holders use to encourage conformity
with their wishes and preferences. If you conform, you are
labelled responsible, if not you are irresponsible or a
rogue. We should worry less about the labels and the
attempts by the world to fete us as a great power, and more
about our own accretion of hard power and influence.
So, in sum, I find myself in agreement with Bharat Karnad on

the goal of India becoming a great power but differ with him
on the timing and the route, on how and when that will occur.
This is a book that anyone with an interest in Indias foreign

and security policies should read, and read critically, and think
about. You dont have to agree with all that it says. I certainly
didnt. But I do hope that it sparks the debate in our country

on these issues that we so urgently need.
Shivshankar Menon was Indias National Security Adviser

from January 2010 to May 2014.
Categories: Books (https://thewire.in/category/books/), Diplomacy

(https://thewire.in/category/external-affairs/diplomacy/), External Affairs
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Tagged as: AJP Taylor (https://thewire.in/tag/ajp-taylor/), Bharat Karnad

(https://thewire.in/tag/bharat-karnad/), Boer War (https://thewire.in/tag/boer-war/),
Henry Kissinger (https://thewire.in/tag/henry-kissinger/), Jawaharlal Nehru
(https://thewire.in/tag/jawaharlal-nehru/), Marcus Aurelius
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RV a year ago
I think we should focus on the purpose and not be obsessed
only with hard power. We must build our national power so
that others do not mess with us; but this obsession with
power should have an aim. Becoming a super power cannot

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India Will Not Become a Great Power by Loudly Proclaiming its Intentions - The Wire Page 1 of 13

India Will Not

Instead, she will be a great power through

When Bharat Karnad asked me to speak at the launch of his

Nevertheless, this is an important book which raises and

Karnads argument is straightforward, familiar to his friends

strategically dim-witted lug. He thinks that Indias China

Fortunately, international conditions for Indias rise couldnt

Choose sides in dyadic situations: siding with the

Resume thermonuclear testing, and place nuclear

Karnad concludes by saying that unless there are drastic

In the limited space I have, I would rather focus on what the

What a great power does and doesnt do

Bharat Karnad defines what separates a great power from

With a modicum of economic strength, and natural

further those interests with proactive foreign and military

has noted how (http://english.caixin.com/2015-09-

Where does India stand on the historical curve of power? She

their internal strength, and projected/cultivated the myth that

The reason for this is simple. Existing power holders do not

Should India therefore adopt Bharats prescriptions? Certainly

What India has been doing

As for his detailed policy recommendations, some of the more

More assertive ones like military bases abroad, providing

procurement system, and are subject to divided opinion

The book recommends that India declare an Asian or Indian

As for the books other prescriptions, it is hard to see how

Without entering into a polemic, it was precisely the period of

I do believe that speak softly and carry a big stick is likely to

What India must do next

I am convinced that India will be a great power if she

To me, the idea of a responsible

Japan until recently, or Australia and Canada, we should be

There is also a chapter on what sort of power India should be

So, in sum, I find myself in agreement with Bharat Karnad on

This is a book that anyone with an interest in Indias foreign

didnt. But I do hope that it sparks the debate in our country

Shivshankar Menon was Indias National Security Adviser

Categories: Books (https://thewire.in/category/books/), Diplomacy

Tagged as: AJP Taylor (https://thewire.in/tag/ajp-taylor/), Bharat Karnad

Comments Community 1 Login

Recommend 1 Share Sort by Best

Join the discussion

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