It is difficult to understand just how drastically different the world is now, in early 2024, compared to what it was just four years ago, in early 2020. An emerging global pandemic originating from an embarrassed and secretive China exposed just how reliant many of the West’s critical supply chains—for everything from medicines to offshore manufacturing—were on Beijing. Russia had yet to fully reinvade its neighbour Ukraine, despite many alarming calls from Eastern European partners, fearful of Putin’s murderous ambitions to carve Europe up once more.
While Iran was reeling from the targeted strike in January 2020 of the all-powerful commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Qassam Soleimani, for his decades-long role in targeting US military personnel and interests across the Middle East, the Trump administration in Washington was enjoying some success in curtailing Iran’s destabilising nuclear proliferation and wider terrorist-supporting activities, where other administrations had failed. Now, having largely crushed the murderous and evil Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, Islamist terrorism is once more threatening peace in the Middle East, as a rejuvenated Iran, enjoying billions of dollars of assets which were once frozen, now seeks to militarise the region in pursuit of its strategic aims of destroying Israel and ejecting America from the Middle East.
Industrialised total warfare is raging in Europe once more. On the other hand, China is seeking to leverage the Global South to remake the global order in its image, in the process threatening its neighbours from New Delhi to Tokyo. And then there is Iran, which is once more seeking to destabilise the Middle East and sow chaos in the region. In the midst of this, Britain must turn to existing strong alliances and partnerships to weather these stormy times. There are not many as strong as the relations that Britain has enjoyed with India, which itself has undergone a decade of transformation under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. India is arguably London’s closest ally in the Indian Ocean and the western Indo-Pacific regions, one of the most strategically vital maritime routes in the world.
While it is of course important to acknowledge that the relationship with India has not always been as harmonious as it is today, Delhi nonetheless remains one of our closest natural allies and trusted partners, sharing many cultural and historical ties which have led to a forged relationship between the powers not found in many other partnerships, making ours a unique one steeped in history, common values, shared interests and respect. Given the many varied yet often interlinked threats facing both of our nations (supply chain reliance, energy insecurity, authoritarian threats to our democratic institutions, to name but a few), as we begin to charter a route through the challenges stated earlier and opportunities (including a strengthened domestic economic forecast combined with many post-Brexit trading opportunities) that 2024 is already presenting, both London and Delhi have a powerful opportunity to increase cooperation in several notable areas, particularly in trade, and defence and security.
While the details of a potential free trade agreement are being worked out by representatives of both governments, it is hopeful that a final agreement is not long away, with many previous obstacles overcome through hard diplomacy and compromise. Given the many seismic events threatening the prosperity and security of both nations, and broader global insecurity, attention must now turn to mutual cooperation in defence and security, where there is already a rich history of collaboration. This was recently demonstrated by India’s Minister of Defence Rajnath Singh’s visit to the UK in January 2024, the first defence ministerial visit in twenty-two years, poignantly signifying a ‘reset’ in bilateral defence ties.
From New Delhi’s perspective, the last few years of the relationship have been marked by Britain’s disastrous so-called ‘Golden Age’ relations with China under the Cameron–Osborne years of the last decade, as well as the activities of pro-Kashmiri independence movements and pro-Khalistani extremism in the UK. Given this, India chose to instead deepen defence and security ties with France, the US and, notably, Russia—a concern for London as the British government has taken a lead in supporting the European ally Ukraine in its war against Russian aggression.
Despite these concerns, British and Indian strategic priorities have convened in the last four years, with a shared unease of China’s belligerent actions in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea, and disruptions to global energy supplies and more recently to global shipping lanes. Accordingly, in May 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the then Prime Minister of the UK Boris Johnson launched the 2030 Roadmap for India–UK Future Relations, a ten-year strategic plan for bilateral cooperation along five pillars, including defence and security, while elevating the relationship to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. Subsequent meetings between the two National Security Advisors, in 2022 and then again in 2023, helped solidify trust and advance progress in this emerging bilateral security relationship.
All of these agreements and meetings culminated in Defence Minister Rajnath Singh’s London visit at the start of 2024, which resulted in, amongst other announcements, the signing of a Letter of Arrangement between India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation and the UK’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory. This letter of agreement focuses on next-generation defence capabilities, including several new joint initiatives on logistics exchange between the armed forces of the two nations. Britain also announced plans to send the Littoral Response Group to the Indian Ocean later this year, and plans to deploy the Carrier Strike Group to train alongside Indian forces in 2025.
Given the converging strategic interests of the two nations, the revived partnership between them should concentrate on solidifying military cooperation using existing channels of communication and by sharing best practices. This would mean the UK joining Indian maritime deployments and anti-piracy operations across the Indian Ocean, including a strengthening of the ongoing MILAN multilateral Naval exercise hosted by India. Similarly, India could contribute to the US- and UK-led operations in the Red Sea, where its Navy is already heavily deployed to the east, by providing intelligence and helping combat piracy. Increasing practical bilateral military exercises and deployments should also help the UK make a sound military aspirational case for joining the armed forces of India, the US, Japan and Australia—the so-called Quadrilateral, or Quad—in the separate annual military Exercise Malabar.
Concurrently to strengthening existing military collaboration, an earnest review is now required to explore how best to rejuvenate defence industrial relations. This vital and as-yet missing component of the bilateral defence partnership will help to further deepen ties between London and New Delhi. In this age of increasing geopolitical risk and tension, likely interstate conflict and costly supply chain disruptions, prudent nations like the UK and India are likely to seek to rely on trusted alliances and partnerships in an ever-increasing capacity.
Seeing Modi’s ‘India-first’ trade policies aimed at reshoring India’s manufacturing base, including the flagship 2014 ‘Make in India’ programme, there remains plenty of scope for collaboration between Britain and India on defence industrial issues. For instance, even 2020’s ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ (‘self-reliant India’) policy, aimed at supporting India’s defence-industrial base, seeks foreign technology collaborations with friendly nations like Britain. So far there have been no joint programmes under this framework. This becomes an increasingly missed opportunity for Britain, which would like to see India reduce its reliance on Russian military imports in the light of Russia’s war against Britain’s ally Ukraine.
Exasperating the British reluctance to engage harder with India’s defence industrial base are Treasury concerns over India’s financial regulatory standards, amongst other fiscal worries. However, neither the US nor France, with the current governments of either not particularly well-known for financial risk-taking, sees comparable quibbles over Indian financial practices or standards when it comes to their far more developed and matured defence industrial ties. The UK government should order an independent review looking into Treasury concerns on these matters, with an eye for increased financial engagement going forward should such concerns be potentially unfounded or less severe than currently thought.
British defence manufacturers should be seen to have a greater footprint and engagement in India. Britain should be seen to be willing to increase investment in India’s defence industry, where appropriate. India, in turn, should appreciate that it is no longer in their strategic interest to rely so heavily on outdated, and now evidently outperformed, Russian military imports and industrial partnerships. In its place, New Delhi will find a welcome and willing partner in the UK, ready and able to further foster an already burgeoning and history-rich cultural and diplomatic relationship. The strengthening of their ties would help both nations further develop their respective defence base—for the common good of each party and the security of their people. A new decade of opportunity between the two allies is within grasp and must now be seized.
Robert Clark is a Fellow at the Yorktown Institute in Washington, DC and a Senior Fellow at Civitas in London. Prior to this, he served in the British military. This article is extracted from an essay by Robert Clark published in the book Indian Renaissance: The Age of PM Modi, edited by Aishwarya Pandit.
A Lesson in History
In 2014, India was at a crossroads, emerging from a phase of economic sluggishness and policy stagnation. India was categorised as part of the ‘Fragile Five’, a term denoting emerging markets with poor economic indicators such as sluggish growth, rampant inflation, low foreign exchange reserves, huge corruption scandals and weak fiscal health. The country faced numerous challenges, including infrastructural deficits, sociopolitical complexities and a legacy of financial imbalances such as substantial bad loans and a significant current account deficit. The population of India grappled with issues like poverty, limited access to healthcare and inadequate education infrastructure. Narendra Modi’s ascendancy to the Prime Minister’s office brought with it a promise of change, a vision of India that was not only economically vibrant but also socially inclusive, corruption-free and globally influential.
Before him, for over sixty years Indian state had demonstrated very little implementation capabilities. Over the last forty to fifty years, previous governments had given up on creating even basic infrastructure due to rampant corruption and huge time and cost overruns. The state (central and state governments) demonstrated that they had very little capability on the ground. For this very reason, in 2004, the government led by Dr Manmohan Singh began talking about public–private partnerships for infrastructure and social sector projects, assuming that the private sector would create the infrastructure capabilities. It didn’t help develop infrastructure or reduce corruption in social sector schemes from 2004 to 2014 and instead increased the leakages with very little to show in terms of achievements.
Bank balance sheets had gone bad due to lending to public–private partnerships where a large part of the money was siphoned off and not used for the intended purpose. Corruption scandals were rampant, and the concept of accountability and shame had disappeared from Indian governance. Corruption scandals of more than Rs 1,00,000 crores were being reported with no one in charge almost daily. Indian governance had started getting known as announcement-based governance where implementation of projects and schemes had very little relevance. Media and the public were made to believe that creating policies and announcing schemes was the end goal of governance. Large sums were earmarked and spent on social projects. Only a small percentage, if at all, of the announced social schemes and infrastructure projects were implemented correctly and on time. Media hype was created for announcing policies that appeared good and later, after a few years, the same policies were announced with minor modifications as even more fantastic policies.
In the absence of any way to govern effectively, the governments started announcing rights, such as the Right to Information and the Right to Food, without having the ability to ensure that the benefits of these rights reached the general population. Instead of improving governance, its capacity, capability and accountability—all hard work—governance by announcements only came to be the rule. The pacification of special interest groups by making announcements and earmarking carve-outs for such groups became the norm and this came to be considered governance. Democracy and government became all about managing special interest groups and their specific interests.
