Lessons for India From the Newly Formed AUKUS

The new trilateral security pact between the US, UK and the Australia-AUKUS, which aims to provide Australia with the technology of the nuclear propulsion submarines and other emerging technologies , is being discussed everywhere in the world since the alliance came into existence on 15 September. It is being considered as an another important alliance in the Indo-Pacific region to keep a check on China in order to maintain a free and open Indo-Pacific region. There have been mixed reactions from India over the newly formed AUKUS where some people are happy over it as it becomes another key player in the region whereas some are not happy taking it as a policy failure for New Delhi.

If we see the first view point of it as an another key player in the region against China then it seems that the pact is right in place. But we need to see the other side of the issue also from the perspective of our own country India. The term Indo-Pacific is itself composed of ‘Indo’ showing the importance of India in this region, but the new pact excluded India as it was of no importance to India. The Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) which is already in place for the same purpose including India as the major key player in the region and instead of supporting the QUAD the US decided to go with a new pact for the same purpose. It shows that the Biden administration still does not consider India and Japan as an important countries to whom the China is an immediate threat. The US, UK and Australia are already the part of the five eyes intelligence sharing alliance and these are countries which are also counted in the Anglosphere. Not considering India in this alliance clearly shows how reluctant is the Biden administration in giving importance to India in the global issues instead of the fact that India is the largest democracy of the world and an emerging developed country.

If we see in the recent past, there have been some events where not just US but UK has also shown its true nature regarding India. Recently the United Kingdom had announced that it will not consider the Covishield vaccine of Indian who are entering their country instead of the fact that the vaccine was developed by Oxford–AstraZeneca in their own country. Later on they said that they do not recognise the certification of the Indian Government regarding vaccine which is generated by a digital platform CoWIN. The CoWIN platform of India has played an important role in the administration of the vaccines and maintaining the data online which helped the government in making the ahead strategy for vaccination drive, also the chances of error in such a digital platform where everything is computerised are zero and even some developing countries has appreciated our CoWIN platform and asked the Indian government to help making such platform for their countries also, taking into account of such request the government decided to open source the CoWIN platform. Also during the second wave of the pandemic in India when it started the manufacturing of vaccines, US had stopped the exports of the raw materials required in the production of the vaccine and resumed it later. These instances have shown the mindset of these countries towards India.

Now if we see what India can plan ahead when it has such allies on whom it cannot trust in the situation of need, there are many possibilities which come out. Firstly Indian should continue to maintain its relation with US but should not depend on it for its strategic goals like containing China because US cannot be trusted after the Afghanistan issue, it may leave in future abruptly as it has done in Afghanistan if its interest gets shifted somewhere else. Secondly in order to not depend on any other country, India should focus on its Aatmanirbhar mission to become self reliant. India must focus in the indigenous defence manufacturing which has a very good scope for us as well as for other, like recently India has started the sea trials of its first indigenous aircraft but we should not be satisfied with that only and go ahead with a plan for a second indigenous aircraft. Third, the relations between the France-US and France-Australia have degraded because of the cancellation of the submarine deal by Australia. India must use this opportunity to improve its relations with France and try its best to get the nuclear propulsion technology from France for the Indian Navy because in the long term if the Australia gets the nuclear propulsion technology then it can dominate the Eastern Indian Ocean and reduce the credibility of the Indian Navy in its own region.

There are many aspects which India must look upon taking into account the changing situation and especially the Western countries which can turn around anytime as per their mood which is evident form the fact when these countries can deceive France which is their older ally, then they can also deceive India.