A Seat for my head....

For all those who have heard Linkin park’s ‘A place for my head’ my apologies for suiting the song to match the matter id like to discuss here, that being India’s bid and attempts to acquire a permanent seat in the UNSC.

It’s better to be the King of Hell than a slave in Heaven

The above line completely sums up our attitude towards life in general and power in particular.  The strange allurement of power is enough to overshadow the rather blurry line between good and bad, right or wrong.

The world changes a little everyday, amounting to a lot. The past month that I was having my examinations I was not aware of the little changes, now as I reflect them they seem to have amounted to a lot. One of the things was the visit of a state president which was celebrated like diwali in our country.

Mr. Obama came, danced, spoke and must have signed like a million negotiations, but to top that, it has seductively given us hopes for more to ensure that India has all the more reasons to look up to the US.

As the decade comes to a close we find that the most amazing change in the world politics has been the shift of the power locus from the perennial west (Europe, America and Russia, which operates from Europe) to the east. Many factors can be attributed to it. While initially there was only Japan that formed a legitimate balance of the locus towards the east over the past decade much more has changed. Let me list down the factors as I find them important:

1.      We have the Japanese Economy and technical expertise.

2.      The rapid rise if China as a world power, both militarily and economically.

3.      The 9/11 which was the biggest attack on the Giant of the power locus from an outside country.

4.      The recent meltdown which has precariously placed the European and the world economics on a melting ice cube.

5.      And of course the west itself came to the east in Iraq and Afghanistan which was always supposed to bring the locus with it.

In this entire shift I haven’t included any Indian factor because seriously I have no idea how they would be placed in the above list. While time and again India has proved its world leading capabilities but it has failed to resolve regional issues, where even ‘smaller’ nations have been effectively able to contain its rise of power. As the second largest growing economy it commands a special place in the world scheme of things but again it has not been able to reach a condition where it can forge the scheme of things.

I am not disparaging India but in the present system we find it more and more as ‘a potential nation to contain China’. For all those Harry potter fans remember the Order of the phoenix where Dumbledore explains the prophecy to Harry. He clearly talks that Harry was ‘chosen’ by Voldemort, and it wasn’t something that Harry did. This may be related to that in a vague way. India’s rise though not entirely dazzling is seen as a potential enough to balance the power equation of Asia, so that the region is not dominated by Chinese policies.

Okay so why did I take you through all these lessons?? Simply because of the latest ‘gossip’ or topic of speculations in the world politics, that being of India acquiring a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has once again been seductively used by Mr. Obama’s US.

The need for the reform in the UNSC (in form of expansion of course) has been around for some time, specifically because of greater representation of Asia as power shifts there and representation for South America and Africa. While the latter have met with emphatic bids by Brazil and South Africa respectively, the Asian club is in a fix.  The reasons are not hard to understand: China for one would like to continue with its exclusive membership (again China was chosen because of Japan, an axis power of the world war two. Here again we find similar situation of Voldemort and Harry for all those who felt bad at my initial comments). Then again we have Japan as a strong contender, because of its strong economy and strong US ties. And we also have countries like Germany, Australia who fulfill all the requirements for making it to the club, minus regional imbalance which seems to be in the Asian continent only.

Russia along with UK and France has long accepted the importance of Indian presence in the UNSC but of the five US and China have had reservations. China because of the reasons mentioned above and US because it’s assumingly please Pakistan policy (again as an effective anti–India measure. The US seems to be great at playing nations against each other). The recent global meltdown has made Indian importance to the world economy all the more important and the US seem to have mellowed its reservations about a permanent UNSC seat to India.

While the recent visit and the seduction of the US for support of India’s bid has been seen as a ‘historic affirmation of the US-INDO friendship’ (as is every state visit) and a ‘diplomatic victory’, its time we think what is in it for us?

It is very clear that US intends to use India as a fulcrum in levering it with China, as it uses Pakistan against India and India’s bid over Japan stems from the global meltdown in economics. While India has shown its capability as a world leader and forge some of the most important results its regional disputes have remained largely the same and unresolved. While a seat in the UNSC would definitely stamp India’s growing image as a world leader, if it is not able to live upto the standards, it would thwart India’s image for future. As a country we are still struggling to meet with development issues and despite the robust economy we have a debt raising to $223.9 billion.Our armed forces are still struggling to catch up with the neighbors, (estimated time for that is 2015), and most importantly it is still not self sustaining in terms if military technology.

 Responsibility comes at a great price and strong shoulders are needed to support that, for that I believe we are still in the developing phase.

Even a normal sized person seems like a midget in an exponentially large chair. Maybe India needs to inflate its ass more to fit in that chair.

Better enter the game late but as a player than early and be used as a pawn.