In 2010, India saw the kind of attention she has not experienced from the world without losing a Head of Government in office; visits from British and American cousins. For the British it was the first major foreign visit by the new Prime Minister after the obligatory kissing of the Presidential ring in the Washington. For the Americans it was the longest visit by a US President.
Now in 2015, the US is locked into finding a new President and a Nuclear deal with Iran and the UK awaits PM Modi’s visit in November.
So what were the key objectives of the visits from Uncle Sam and his cousin Uncle Cam? Think political for the US and economic for the UK. Why the difference? The US has the will and investment of political engagement in the region to a far greater extent than Britain. Britain does not seek political engagement unless to forward trade or its hand is forced in national security under and American umbrella – as in the case of Afghanistan.
For the UK the authorisation for sale of civilian nuclear technology to India back then was a major win for Serco and Rolls Royce. The British Cabinet decided before the PM’s visit that commercial opportunities outweighed the security risks.
For Britain – their objective was getting off the fence in relation to Pakistan and India and Cameron’s warning to Pakistan certainly got him onto the front pages back then. This was trade based, which is why the political damage was tolerated.
The US sold more armaments to India than Britain ($15billion saving 50,000 US jobs according to the US Administration) – but again this was politics over trade for the US, whereas trade alone for Britain was sufficient reason to celebrate with their smaller orders. Sure US military armaments vendors were delighted, but given US political ambitions of influence throughout the region – this is more significant politically given the scale of sales – both to prize India from the Russian military supply bear grip (freedom gives power to India too from Russia) but also shore up the democracy and doubtless those armaments serve a credible regional threat serving US interests. The US understands the concept of ‘proxy’ after all, whether against Pakistan or China.
In the age of terror and nuclear proliferation, given growing economies have the power, if not the desire as in the case of India, to project political influence backed by their economic enlargement, they are an essential diplomatic tool in a theatre that is a missile’s throw from Afghanistan, Iran, Russia and China.
And India has strong relations with three of those four at least. Indeed measure strength of democracy multiplied by economic weight and you have in India the only democratic capitalist giant in the Asia – a friend of common interest indeed to the Atlantic cousins.
The PM Modi trip is all about trade for the UK.