A Biden White House unlikely to roll back US policies on India, China: Experts

Even as opinion polls suggest that Democrat nominee Joe Biden is likely to emerge as a big winner in this year’s US presidential election and speculations about which way India-US ties will go in such a scenario, experts said that the ties between the two countries will continue down the same path "because the width and depth of US-India relations have reached certain critical mass that the relationship will hopefully always be on an upward trajectory," writes senior journalist Aroonim Bhuyan.

New Delhi: Even as opinion polls and other models are predicting a victory for Democrat nominee Joe Biden in this year’s US presidential election amid a trade war between Washington and Beijing and speculations about which way India-US ties will go in such a scenario, observers believe that a probable new White House administration under the former US Vice President will not go back the path that current President Donald Trump’s administration has taken on these issues.

While the India-US bilateral relationship has been on an upward trajectory for around two decades now, Washington has taken a strong position over Beijing’s bid to emerge as the number one world power ever since President Xi Jinping took charge. Opinion polls suggest that Biden is likely to emerge as a big winner if the US goes to the polls right now.

According to the latest Financial Times poll tracker based on data from Real Clear Politics, Democrat candidate Joe Biden can win 308 electoral college votes out of 538 while Trump can manage only 113. The winning candidate needs to win 270 of the 538 votes.

Meanwhile, distinguished history professor Allan Lichtman of the American University, Washington DC, has also predicted that Biden will emerge the winner this year’s election. Lichtman made his prediction based on the "keys" model that he developed taking into account 13 historical factors. He is renowned for making accurate presidential poll result predictions in the last four decades based on his model which is separate in methodology from opinion polls.

The predictions come amid strong criticism of Trump’s handling of the Covid-19 crisis and his call to defer the polling date set for November 3, something unprecedented in US presidential election history, on the grounds that postal voting due to the pandemic will lead to inaccurate results.

However, experts believe that even if Biden wins the election, the probable new occupant of the White House is unlikely to roll back the Trump administration’s policies when it comes to its relationship with India or its stand on the trade war with China and Beijing’s belligerence in the South China Sea and increasing footprint in the Indo-Pacific.

"India-US relationship has reached a threshold position," Pinak Ranjan Chakravarty, former Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs, told ETV Bharat.

India and the US share a Global Strategic Partnership that enjoys bipartisan support in both countries. It is based on shared democratic values and increasing convergence of interests on bilateral, regional and global issues.

The US has also made India a major defence partner, bringing New Delhi at par with Washington’s closest defence and diplomatic allies.

According to Robinder Sachdev, founder member of the US India Political Action Committee, if Biden comes to power, ties between the two countries will continue down the same path "because the width and depth of US-India relations have reached the certain critical mass that the relationship will hopefully always be on an upward trajectory."

"Now how much angle is that upward trajectory may change, you know, in some administrations it may shoot up, in some administrations it may continue down the same path but not with so much of intensity and so much of acceleration," Sachdev said.

However, at the same time, he said that one must also keep in mind that there is an election due to both the upper and lower houses of the US Congress. While the House of Representatives, the lower house, is controlled by the Democrats, the Senate is Republican-controlled.

"If the Senate also comes back as a Democrat majority and Biden is in the White House, then I think US-India relations will hit a sticky path because there are some issues on which several of the Democrats are critical of India and controlling the House and the Senate will give them a lot of leverage," Sachdev said.

"Remember that in the US system, the President, of course, holds all the aces but the House and the Senate together is the house of cards in terms of you know they can put in a lot of lacunae and they can put in a lot of riders and conditions, they can bring in bills and resolutions and attach some amendments to some other bills."

The US seeks an expanded trade relationship with India that is reciprocal and fair. In 2019, overall US-India bilateral trade in goods and services reached $149 billion. US energy exports are an important area of growth in the trade relationship.

However, what is widely being speculated is the nature of the US’ relationship with China in case Biden enters the White House.

According to Chakravarty though, Biden will not be able to roll back the US stance on China as the Covid-19 pandemic which originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan has become a major factor.

Besides that, there is an ongoing economic conflict between the US and China after President Trump began setting tariffs and other trade barriers on China with the goal of forcing it to make changes to what Washington says are "unfair trade practices".

Among those trade practices and their effects are the growing trade deficit, the theft of intellectual property, and the forced transfer of American technology to China.

"This time China has become a strategic challenger and Biden can’t wish it away," Chakravarty said.

The former diplomat also pointed out that China has taken certain actions under the shadow of the pandemic "but broadly the American policy has been set."

Another factor that is affecting US-China relations is Beijing’s growing influence in the Indo-Pacific, a region that spreads from the east coast of Japan to the east coast of Africa.

India, along with the US, Japan and Australia, is part of a quad that ostensibly is working for peace and prosperity in the region raising the hackles of Beijing.

Also, China’s growing belligerence in the South China Sea where it has territorial disputes with several countries is also drawing international concern.

Referring to the US National Security Strategy released in 2017 that described China as a "revisionist power", Chakravarty said that Trump has changed Washington’s policy on the South China Sea and today supports the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

"The (India-US-Japan-Australia) quad will go farther down the road and China will protest," he said.

According to Sachdev, the Trump administration’s position on China and world geopolitics will keep on getting more and more intense and aggressive.

"That itself will change the world geopolitics up till November," he said.

"Because, you see, once you have gone down a path, some things will become irreversible… Whichever incumbent, whichever president comes, be it Trump or Biden, in a broad sense he will continue the anti-China policy."

Stating that the US was of the view that China would become a world economic power or world technology power by 2050 or 2060, Sachdev said Washington had just been trying to delay the rise of the Asian giant as a superpower in the past.

"Now, what has happened under the Trump administration is that America has come around to believing that we should not only delay the rise of China but we must deny the rise of China so that China should never rise to number one," he said.

"So, that is the big battle that Trump has initiated with China. Now, a Biden administration, if it takes power, would also, more or less, can be expected to continue on the same line because once America has tested this point that, okay, we can not only delay but we can deny China the chance to become number one, so let us continue down that path."