Now, a pivot to Japan

Prime Minister Manmohan Singhrsquos visit to Tokyo takes on an added significance because of New Delhirsquos recent runin with China Indeed there has been some speculation that the muscle flexing in Ladakh was an attempt to signal to New Delhi that Beijing will not lose focus on its border with India because of its confrontation with Japan over the SenkakuDiayou islands The Prime Ministerrsquos decision to extend his trip to Tokyo was revealed on May 4 a day before India and China agreed to maintain status quo ante on the Depsang Plain Given the context there can be little doubt that this was a deliberate signal prime ministerial schedules are not changed so late in the day on a whim Tokyo drift PM Manmohan Singh arrived at Tokyo International Airport yesterday PicAFP Both Tokyo and New Delhi understand that closer ties mdash political economic and military mdash will enable them to gain heft in their dealings with China And both bring important complementalities onto the table Japan has enormous investible funds and technological capabilities both urgently needed by India Manmohan Singh and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe are both committed to closer political relations between the two countries manifested by the institution of annual summits between the two countries which began in 2006 at the time of Abersquos first tenure as prime minister when the two countries recommitted themselves to a ldquostrategic and global partnershiprdquo which was first articulated by Prime Ministers Yoshio Mori and Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2000 There was a time in the 1980s when Japan thought that investing in Chinarsquos development would be a means of moderating Chinese hostility born out of the experience of the country at the hands of Japanese invaders in the 1930s Japanese Overseas Development Assistance ODA was crucial to the first round of foreign investment in Chinese infrastructure and subsequently Japanese companies tens of thousands of them played a major role in the rise of Chinese manufacturing But things began to come apart in the 2000s as China rose its old resentments against Japan resurfaced and the massive antiJapanese protests of 2005 were a sign that Tokyorsquos policy of befriending Beijing had failed This coincided with a switch towards India and Japanese ODA to India increased dramatically and India is currently the largest single recipient of Japanese ODA This period has also seen a sharp rise in Japanrsquos foreign direct investment in India and trade between the two countries has risen sharply and is likely to grow more in the coming years because of the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement that they signed in August 2011 From a policy of using India as a hedge against their Chinese investments many Japanese companies are now placing their primary bets on India A manifestation of the countryrsquos commitment to Indiarsquos growth is manifested by the investments that Tokyo is making to develop the DelhiMumbai and ChennaiBangalore freight corridors and their associated industrial zonesu00a0 India and Japan are not seeking to militarily contain China Both are cautious countries Japan is bound by its pacifist constitution and New Delhi is cautious to the point of exasperation In March for example it pulled out of a trilateral naval exercise with Japan and the United States without any explanation and has made it known that it prefers to exercise bilaterally with countries like the US Japan and Australia Even so both Tokyo and New Delhi are keen to offset Chinese economic and political clout in the IndoPacific region by synergising their relationship It does help that both Tokyo and New Delhi have disputes with Beijing and are perturbed by its rise And both are keeping their powder dry India has been strengthening the forces on its border while Japanrsquos Navy is still superior to that of China The two sides do cooperate on a range of maritime security issues which are important for Japan because a large proportion of its oil imports go past the Indian peninsula and through the Straits of Malacca where the Indian Navy is the dominant force u00a0 Japanese companies may not have embraced India with the passion that they once had for Japan but Tokyo realises the value of Indian ties and the two governments are trying their best to smoothen the course of the relationship which has considerable strategic value Ironically the key lever to the future of the IndoJapanese relationship rests in the hands of Beijing Its increasingly assertive behaviour has persuaded New Delhi and Tokyo to come closer to each other and to other likeminded democracies At the same time it has triggered off a quiet military build up targeting China A little more ldquoassertionrdquo could well push New Delhi towards a closer relationship with the USled alliance in the IndoPacific This is something that the Chinese leadership may like to reflect on But perhaps the Communist Party leadership does not have too many alternatives Stoking the fires of nationalism seems to be an easier way of managing the country than to loosen the reins of the Communist party dictatorshipu00a0 The writer is a Distinguished Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation New Delhi