[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 101 (Thursday, June 26, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4134-S4135]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                    U.S.-INDIA STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP

  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, next week I look forward to traveling to 
India, where I look forward to meeting with Prime Minister Modi, his 
national security team, and other Indian leaders. I am excited to be 
returning to New Delhi, and I am so hopeful about what the Prime 
Minister's election could mean for the revitalization of India's 
economy, its rising power, and for the renewal of the U.S.-India 
strategic partnership.
  National elections in India are always a remarkable affair. Over 
several weeks hundreds of millions of people peacefully elect their 
leaders--the largest exercise of democracy on the planet. But even by 
Indian standards, the recent election that brought to power Prime 
Minister Modi and his party, the BJP, was a landmark event. It was the 
first time in 30 years that one Indian political party won enough seats 
to govern without forming a coalition with another party. This gives 
the Prime Minister a historic mandate for change, which Indians clearly 
crave.
  I want Prime Minister Modi to succeed because I want India to 
succeed. It is no secret that the past few years have been challenging 
ones for India--political gridlock, a flagging economy, financial 
difficulties, and more. It is not my place or that of any other 
American to tell India how to realize its full potential. That is for 
the Indians to decide. Our concern is simply that India does realize 
its full potential, for the United States has a stake in India's 
success. Indeed, a strong, confident, and future-oriented India is 
indispensable for a vibrant U.S.-India strategic partnership.
  It is also no secret that India and the United States have not been 
reaching our full potential as strategic partners over the past few 
years, and there is plenty of blame to be shared on both sides for 
that. Too often recently we have slipped back into a transactional 
relationship, one defined more by competitive concession seeking than 
by achieving shared strategic goals.
  We need to lift our sights again. To help us do so, I think we need 
to remind ourselves why the United States and India embarked on this 
partnership in the first place. It was never simply about the 
personalities involved, although the personal commitment of leaders in 
both countries has been indispensable at every turn. No, the real 
reason India and the United States have resolved to develop the 
strategic partnership is because each country has determined 
independently that doing so is in its national interests.
  It is because we have been guided by our national interests that the 
progress of our partnership has consistently enjoyed bipartisan support 
in the United States and in India.
  This endeavor began with closer cooperation between a Democratic 
administration in Washington and a BJP-led government in New Delhi. It 
deepened dramatically during the last decade under a Republican and a 
Congress-led government. It reached historic heights with the 
conclusion of our civil nuclear agreement--thanks to the bold 
leadership of President Bush and Prime Minister Singh. This foundation 
of shared national interests has sustained our partnership under 
President Obama, and it is the common ground on which we can build for 
the future as a new prime minister takes office in New Delhi.
  When it comes to the national interests of the United States, the 
logic of a strategic partnership with India is powerful. India will 
soon become the world's most populous nation. It has a young, 
increasingly skilled workforce that can lead India to become one of the 
world's largest economies. It is a nuclear power and possesses the 
world's second largest military, which is becoming even more capable 
and technologically sophisticated. It shares strategic interests with 
us on issues as diverse and vital as defeating terrorism and extremism, 
strengthening a rules-based international order in Asia, securing 
global energy supplies, and sustaining global economic growth.
  India and the United States not only share common interests, we also 
share common values, the values of human rights, individual liberty, 
and democratic limits on state power, but also the values of our 
societies--creativity and critical thinking, risk-taking and 
entrepreneurialism and social mobility--values that continue to deepen 
the interdependence of our peoples across every field of human 
endeavor. It is because of these shared values we are confident that 
India's continued rise as a democratic great power--whether tomorrow or 
25 years from now--will be peaceful and thus can advance critical U.S. 
national interests. That is why, contrary to the old dictates of 
realpolitik, we seek not to limit India's rise but to bolster and 
catalyze it--economically, geopolitically, and, yes, militarily.
  It is my hope that Prime Minister Modi and his government will 
recognize how a deeper strategic partnership with the United States 
serves India's national interests, especially in light of current 
economic and geopolitical challenges.
  For example, a top priority for India is the modernization of its 
armed forces. This is an area where U.S. defense capabilities, 
technologies, and cooperation--especially between our defense 
industries--can benefit India enormously. Similarly, greater bilateral 
trade and investment can be a key driver of economic growth in India, 
which seems to be what Indian citizens want most from their new 
government. Likewise, as India seeks to further its ``Look East'' 
policy and deepen its relationships with major like-minded powers in 
Asia--especially Japan, but also Australia, the Philippines, the 
Republic of Korea, Singapore, and Vietnam. Those countries are often 
U.S. allies and partners as well, and our collective ability to work in 
concert can only magnify India's influence and advance its interests.
  Put simply, I see three strategic interests that India and the United 
States clearly share, and these should be the priorities of a 
reinvigorated partnership:
  First, to shape the development of South Asia as a region of 
sovereign democratic states that contribute to one another's security 
and prosperity; second, to create a preponderance of power in the Asia-
Pacific region that favors free societies, free markets, free trade, 
and free comments; and, finally, to strengthen a liberal international 
order and an open global economy that safeguards human dignity and 
fosters peaceful development.
  As we seek to take our strategic partnership with India to the next 
level, it is important for U.S. leaders to reach out personally to 
Prime Minister Modi, especially in light of recent history. That is 
largely why I am traveling to India next week, and that is why I am 
pleased President Obama invited the Prime Minister to visit Washington. 
I wish he had extended that invitation sooner, but it is positive 
nonetheless. When the Prime Minister comes to Washington, I urge our 
congressional leaders to invite him to address a joint session of 
Congress. I can imagine no more compelling scene than the elected 
leader of the world's largest democracy addressing the elected 
representatives of the world's oldest democracy.
  Yet we must be clear-eyed about those issues that could weaken our 
strategic partnership. One is Afghanistan. Before it was a safe haven 
for the terrorists who attacked America on September 11, 2001, 
Afghanistan was a base of terrorists that targeted India. Our Indian 
friends remember this well, even if we do not. For this reason I am 
deeply concerned about the consequences of the President's plan to pull 
all of our troops out of Afghanistan by 2016, not only for U.S. 
national security but also for the national security of our friends in 
India.
  If Afghanistan goes the way of Iraq in the absence of U.S. forces, it 
would leave India with a clear and present danger on its periphery. It 
would constrain India's rise and its ability to devote resources and 
attention to shared foreign policy challenges elsewhere in Asia and 
beyond. It could push India toward deeper cooperation with Russia and 
Iran in order to manage the threats posed by a deteriorating 
Afghanistan. And it would erode India's perception of the credibility 
and capability of U.S. power and America's reliability as a strategic 
partner.
  The bottom line here is clear: India and the United States have a 
shared interest in working together to end the scourge of extremism and 
terrorism that threatens stability, freedom, and prosperity across 
South Asia and beyond. The President's current plan to

[[Page S4135]]

disengage from Afghanistan is a step backward from this goal, and thus 
does not serve the U.S.-India strategic partnership.
  For all of these reasons and more, I hope the President will be open 
to reevaluating and revising his withdrawal plan in light of conditions 
on the ground.
  Another hurdle on which our partnership could stumble is our resolve 
to see it through amid domestic political concerns and short-term 
priorities that threaten to push our nations apart. For most of the 
last century, the logic of a U.S.-India partnership was compelling, but 
its achievements eluded us. We have finally begun to explore the real 
potential of this partnership over the past two decades, but we have 
barely scratched the surface, and the gains we have made remain fragile 
and reversible, as our largely stalled progress over the past few years 
can attest.

  If India and the United States are to build a truly strategic 
partnership, we must each commit to it and defend it in equal measure. 
We must each build the public support needed to sustain our strategic 
priorities, and we must resist the domestic forces in each of our 
countries that would turn our strategic relationship into a 
transactional one--one defined not by the shared strategic goals we 
achieved together but by what parochial concessions we extract from one 
another. If we fail in these challenges, we will fall far short of our 
potential, as we have before.
  It is this simple: If the 21st century is defined more by peace than 
war, more by prosperity than misery, and more by freedom than tyranny, 
I believe future historians will look back and point to the fact that a 
strategic partnership was consummated between the world's two 
preeminent democratic powers: India and the United States. If we keep 
this vision of our relationship always uppermost in our minds, there is 
no dispute we cannot resolve, no investment in each other's success we 
cannot make, and nothing we cannot accomplish together.
  I thank my beloved friend from Michigan for allowing me to speak, and 
I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan.
  Mr. LEVIN. Madam President, I thank my good friend from Arizona for 
not only his remarks but also the thoughtfulness of his remarks on the 
U.S.-India relationship. I listened to them carefully and am glad to 
join in and look forward to his report. We have had a historic 
relationship with India as the two preeminent democracies, and we have 
a great opportunity to build on this relationship. I know my friend 
from Arizona has contributed vitally to that effort.

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