Creative conservatism can make our foreign policy more effective

India needs a framework that secures its national interests amid fast evolving geopolitical realities

- NITIN PAI

After this year's shocking turn in India-US relations, many argued that India must tilt towards China to counterbalance America.

It is true that we have ended up becoming geopolitically more dependent on the United States than the US is on us. However, there are at least three problems with the 'tilt to China' argument. One, it is the US that has what India needs for its development and is prepared to trade, albeit with tariffs. China, on the other hand, is bent on exporting only finished goods and does not really believe in two-way trade. Two, Beijing will accept India's tilt only on its own imperious Middle Kingdom terms. And three, India has unresolved direct and indirect boundary disputes with China that put a hard limit to the angle of any tilt that one might conceive.

So the idea that we can use the China card against the US is untenable in practice. What about other centres of power? India's engagement with Western Europe, which finds itself amid its own dilemmas, is constrained by the Russia factor. This will limit ties with Germany, France and the UK even after the Russia-Ukraine war comes to an end. With West Asia, our relationships are circumscribed by the Israel-Palestine and Israel-Arab-Iran factors.