“India, the second Asian giant, is an essential piece of the multipolar chess game”

2023-07-14 06:00:16

“After devouring a hundred mice, the cat goes on a pilgrimage. » This Indian proverb illustrates quite well the context in which Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to France took place. That the political character raises a whole series of questions, given the obvious drift of the nationalist regime against non-Hindu minorities or fundamental democratic freedoms, is more than legitimate.

But, ultimately, why would it raise more than the large number of leaders warmly received at the Elysée in recent months? Each time, the same questions arise. Should we receive them? Should we refrain from talking about angry subjects? Why do so much honor in particular to the Indian leader on the occasion of the national holiday? The answers aren’t very complicated actually. They simply require everyone to take responsibility.

First of all, it is India which is the guest of honour, well beyond its Prime Minister who, let us remember, was democratically elected in 2014 and then re-elected in 2019. In addition, this visit is part of sixty years of a special relationship between France and the Indian Union, and of a strategic partnership signed in 1998 in a crucial geopolitical context: the end of the Cold War and the alternative between a unipolar world or a multipolar world.

India, the only natural counterweight to China

It is indeed the construction of this multipolar world which has been the keystone of French diplomacy since its unfortunate experiences with the American hyperpower. A demographic, democratic and economic giant the size of India is obviously one of its major pillars. And a partner that is all the more strategic as the evolution towards a doubly bipolar world becomes clearer: Sino-American, on the one hand, and North-South, on the other.

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However, India is the only natural counterweight to China, it is also a recognized leader of the global South, and incidentally an ally of Russia. The same dilemma arises for the criticism concerning the arms sales which would bring such honor to the Indian leader. It was he who actually signed the largest cash contract for Rafale aircraft in 2016, for the trifle of 7.9 billion euros.

However, everyone knows very well that France would not have an independent defense industry if it did not export between one-third and two-thirds of it depending on the area, given the minimal economies of scale in these sectors at high technology. It is of course not the United States who would buy them, nor their allies obliged.

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