How Indo-US 2+2 may chart the course for Biden-Xi summit this month

As coincidence would have it, ahead of the expected Biden-Xi summit at San Francisco later this month, the Indo-US 2+2 involving the foreign and defence ministers of the two countries is meeting in New Delhi on 10 November. The question is if the latter would chart the course for the Sino-American summit, where Xi’s presence and bilateral are yet to be confirmed, after Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Li had relatively purposeful discussions with US President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin, among others. Blinken and Austin constitute the American duo in the 2+2 format, and in Delhi, they would confer with the External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh. In the background of the Gaza conundrum, West Asia / Middle East will seek and obtain time and attention at both meetings. Biden and Xi are expected to meet on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit, and are bound to drown the official proceedings at the summit venue. It may thus be good for the Indian Prime Minister to stay away and depute someone else to represent the country at the summit. This is so despite Biden inviting Modi personally while in Delhi for the G-20 summit earlier this year. Even otherwise, it makes sense for Modi to stay away, as after the Biden-Xi summit, the global media amassed at Frisco will be curious to know if there will be another ice-breaking event involving the two South Asian leaders and start interpreting a blinking of an eye here or a twitching of an upper lip there to interpret ‘emerging or re-emerging’ India-China relations in ‘perspective’. Nuanced position The larger issue in 2+2 is, of course, about the more nuanced Indian position on the Gaza conundrum as it has evolved since PM Modi’s first social media message, unilaterally condemning Hamas as a terror group following the unprecedented 7 October missile attacks on Israel. In a way, both sides share near-similar views on the subject, but the US seems to be more pro-Israel with or without Hamas, and India is more pro-Palestine than possibly pro-Israel but minus Hamas. Even with the Brazilian draft at the UNGA mentioning Hamas’ terror attack, the US would have vetoed it. With such a reference, India might not have abstained. Instead, New Delhi may have voted for the resolution. Of course, there would have been other parameters too, guiding the Indian decision. Then, of course, there is ‘Nijjar killing’, which might be an issue in bilateral relations between the two nations. By not playing fair with India and Prime Minister Modi’s government, Canada in particular seemed to have sent out a wrong message to all Indians, particularly when elections are approaching closer in India, the US, and Canada. In India, the US position in particular meant that PM Modi might have been wrong in trusting the US too much and too far where Indian interests were involved. In many cases, it revived forgotten memories of Cold War-era America’s hyphenated approach to India and Pakistan. The choice before the US remains a question. Canada is already a US ally through thick and thin. Despite being neighbours sharing a border, there have not been any hot bilateral issues between them, starting with the trade front. That is not the case with India, as the Indian street opinion is yet to trust the US as blindly as many of them still recall believing the erstwhile Soviet Union in its time. Indian street opinion matters in Indian elections just as American street opinion rules elections in that country. True, foreign and security policy did not rule Indian elections directly in the past, but since the Modi government’s ‘Surgical Strikes’ military operation against anti-India terrorists in PoK, it has thrown up electoral possibilities. Considering that the ‘Nijjar killing’ is all about an anti-India Khalistani terrorist and the common Indian belief that Canada has been sheltering Khalistanis since the mid-air blast of ‘Emperor Kanishka’ in 1985, it may have disturbed the mood of long-time Modi/BJP supporters. But no damage has been done as yet to their vote bank in next year’s Lok Sabha polls, not as yet. No direct role If this is what is about the upcoming US-India bilateral, the two visitors can also be expected to brief their hosts about the recent Washington visit of China’s Foreign Minister Yang Li, preparing for a possible Sino-American summit only two days later at San Francisco. For reasons already outlined, the timing of the summit is more important and urgent, possibly more than the content. Additionally, the US has not been able to push its interests in the all-but-forgotten Ukraine war. In the context of the West seeing China as an emerging global power that cannot be ignored, the more recent Gaza situation is not getting as many friends for Biden’s expected re-election bid this time next year. China has no direct role or interest in either, though on the Ukraine war issue, its pro-Russia position is well known. The problem for President Biden and his counterpart Xi Jinping is even greater in West Asia. The US cannot be seen as ‘letting down’ Israel. The US-Israel relationship has always been a ‘one-way street’. Over the past decades since its inception, Israel has proven time and again that playing tough with allies pays as much in diplomacy as it does against Palestinian and other Gulf-Arab adversaries in the immediate neighbourhood. It may not be true of Europe all the time, but they also know that the US veto against their own sentiments counts even more at the UNSC and other high tables in the global context. The problem with the Biden-Xi meeting discussing the Gaza conundrum as and when it happens is that the US will reiterate its position firmly one more time. Though distanced in space and time from the region, as the US too is physically, China has not developed any specific stakes in West Asia. It can be argued that China is the largest trade partner of most nations in the region, but it is so across the world. Yet, through the past decade and more, China has not developed political and diplomatic stakes in the region as clearly as the US has been doing for decades since the Second World War. Thus, China cannot claim to be belonging there, as the US has institutionalised the thought through decades. Like the US Secretary of State Anthony Bliken, who visited West Asia, or the Middle East, as is known in and by the West, foreign minister Yang Li did not venture out for a status study or to facilitate a military truce first and political negotiations later on. Maybe China has learned from the American experience in that region and is staying away. You are either friends with Israel or not. Being friends with anyone else in the region does not matter. Otherwise, just meander along with statements that mean nothing and which no stakeholder takes seriously an hour after reading them. Containing Russia Hence, after stating their known positions, the two leaders could well end up discussing Ukraine, where both have stakes and influence. Here, the US can be expected to urge China not to move away from ‘evil’ Russia but to use its good offices for ‘containment’ of face-saving ways for the West. Even without the Gaza conundrum, the Ukraine war had begun moving away from front pages and other news pages to the ‘Accidents Section’, where the latest head-count of dead Ukrainians alone got posted every day. The West Asian war has ensured that the Ukraine war does not get even that much space. Having killed Russian President Vladimir Putin a thousand times in the past year-plus and rendered him bed-ridden another ten thousand times, afflicted he supposedly was with cancer today, stomach cramps tomorrow, and a heart attack the day after, the western media is dried of imagination to divine other pestilence that could affect Russia on the war front. For facing the American electorate, Biden and/or his Democrats party need an honourable way out of the Ukraine war, more than even their European allies. Of course, the US will have to statutorily raise Taiwan in all such exchanges, and China too will have to reiterate its statutory position. Nothing moves either way. The chances are that China will continue to provoke Taiwan from its hands that are otherwise empty because the leadership needs a ‘nationalist cause’ to keep the people’s glare away from domestic issues, starting with jobs and incomes. According to western analysts, China cannot continue to spend on BRI any more because no debtor nation has the money to pay back China’s past dues or even the interest. Hambantotas do not crop up everywhere. After a time, China too may not have used too many territorial possessions in other countries. If it had wanted military bases in those countries, being upfront when it put in those investments in those countries could have helped, if at all. It is one subject on which Beijing failed to copy Washington, though in terms of technology, it has been faking American and European successes. Today, no leadership in BRI-indebted countries can guarantee that there would not be a public protest if China were to be allowed to put up a military base. The Cold War conditions do not prevail any more. The new dynamics are still at work. Much as the US and China want to master it and master over it, they have not been able to do so thus far. In the end, it boils down to bilateral economic cooperation, trade, and investments. Despite early boasts, China is finding out that American and other western sanctions on the investment front are hurting the nation more than anything else. Even Western claims over the failure of BRI and a domestic economic crisis in China flow from the overnight drying up of American and European trade and investments. The question then is what price China can give for the US lifting the sanctions without losing face on the domestic front and before European allies, and what it means for Indo-US relations on the one hand and Sino-Indian strains on the other. In particular, having pepped up India as a replacement site for parking big-ticket American and other Western investments diverted from China, how would a Sino-American patch-up on that score would work for India and Indians? Keeping fingers crossed, did you say? The writer is a Chennai-based policy analyst and political commentator. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the writer. 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