A number of foreign policy experts have listed Afghanistan on the to-do-list of President-elect Joe Biden, though only next to China. These analysts have viewed things through American prism; how soon American troops would return home from the war-torn country where nothing is stable except the instability, and also how that will help the new administration to establish its good foreign policy credentials.
America has no other interest. It is plain and simple. India cannot sit pretty in this kind of situation unless its strategic interests are served. The country has an interest in ensuring that things stay under control in Afghanistan and its influence in the region doesn’t suffer any erosion.
America will serve its strategic interests only for it will help India only in as much of space where it could without getting involved directly into any conflict situation. At best, it will offer mediation and that any self-respecting sovereign country like India will never accept .
Each anti-China statement from Washington is seen as an endorsement of the Indian stand against Beijing’s belligerence and aggressive expansionist policy. There are other dimensions too. Simple aggressive statements by Washington are not going to help India to see back of Chinese troops from Ladakh. The US has its own reasons to prick China. Its anti-China stand against Beijing’s expansionist policies is not India-centric. Its anti-Beijing narrative anti-China stance fits into its worldview wherein China is seen as an aggressor, be it what it is doing in South China sea where reefs have been militarised or where it is threatening Japan over Senkaku islands, encroaching Bhutanese villages. Therefore, it is necessary to understand that anti-China statement will not ease situation for India in Ladakh where China has amassed tens of thousands of its troops.
America will say and do only as much its institutions permit. Joe Biden, as per the rules of the constitutional democracy demands, owes accountability to other institutions too. He is unlike his outgoing predecessor Donald Trump who gave a damn to the democratic institutions. There are consequences, Trump must have understood it by now.
China and Afghanistan have figured on the foreign policy agenda of the Biden administration that will start functioning from January 20, 2021. But the importance of these issues varies.
China poses an altogether different problem for Washington where it has to navigate the trade issues and check its growing influence in the markets across the continent. There is not going to be any direct or indirect military confrontation between the two countries.
In Afghanistan, the US is trying to wriggle out of the situation of its own creation. It had attacked Afghanistan in October 2001 in less than a month after 9/11. It thought that its aerial bombing has done job for it. Far from it, the things have lingered on till date. There were more complications. One after another experiment was undertaken to find a way out, but without success. A lesson, which is universally true, must have been learned by America, never enter a land where neither geography and demography is known to you.
Satellite images are not the true reflection of the ground situation nor drones achieve the political and strategic objectives. What they had thought was an opening turned out to be a dark alley. That explains why the war went on for 19 years and it is continuing.
Whatever America may decide to do vis-à-vis Afghanistan, it will affect the geo-political landscape of South Asia. With China supporting Pakistan to the hilt, because of its huge investment there, it will strengthen Islamabad’s hold on the levers with which it controls affairs in Afghanistan. Pakistan’s relations with Afghanistan are rooted in history. Pakistan controls levers of Taliban that controls most parts of the country. The Ashraf Ghani government in Afghanistan is having very limited influence, that became clearer when despite Doha agreement of February this year, Taliban did not downscale the violence. That has all the parties worried.
India is worried, too. No doubt Pakistan’s influence will grow because there will be less of American oversight. China is fully backing Islamabad. China will have its own share in the whole scene that will emerge. It wants complete security of its assets in Balochistan and for that it is committed to help Pakistan in all manners. Chinese footprints are deepening in the area and it would not like those to overrun by any quarter. Pakistan’s support is crucial to its long-term strategic goals that it seeks to achieve trough One Belt Road Initiative. This will push the scale of balance of powers in the region .
India facing tough situation on borders with China and locked in daily skirmishes at the Line of Control needs to devise its own strategy to stay in control of things. It will have to sort out the problems within, and in that context, it’s very crucial that Jammu and Kashmir is stable.