'Strong India is a win for US': Trump's South Asia man reveals Washington's China calculus

US President Donald Trump's top diplomat in South Asia has said that a strong and independent India is a strategic win for the United States.  

Paul Kapur, Assistant Secretary at the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs, has said that an India that can be independent and stand up for itself and preserve its freedom of action "actually works to our strategic advantage and promotes our strategic interest because what we're trying to do fundamentally is not to keep China out of the region but to prevent China or any single hegemon from taking over or imposing coercive leverage on the region." 

"So an India that is able to be independent and preserve its freedom of action takes a huge swath of the Indo-Pacific off of China's plate. And almost by definition, it prevents it from becoming the dominant power in the region," Kapur said during a Foreign Affairs Subcommittee hearing on US policy in South Asia. 

When asked whether China has a true blue-water navy, Paul, who has taught at the Naval War College and was also a visiting professor at Stanford University, said: "They (Chinese) have blue-water capabilities."

A blue-water navy is a navy that can operate far from its own country for long periods, with the ships, bases, and supplies needed to stay deployed around the world. By contrast, blue-water capabilities mean a navy has acquired some long-range assets and can operate in distant waters, but may lack the scale or permanent global presence.

The subcommittee then turned to China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and how it was performing in South Central Asia. 

To this, Paul said that the BRI is about enabling the Chinese to get influence over regional countries through development. "Well, when India develops its economy and its infrastructure, and its military, and can maintain its freedom of action, it prevents the Chinese from using the belt and road strategy in a big swath of the Indo-Pacific."

So, is India replacing the Belt and Road Initiative in some places? a member asked. Trump's South Asia diplomat reasoned that if Belt and Road doesn't take root in India, "that means that there's a very large part of the Indo-Pacific that is not under Chinese sway."

When pressed further on BRI's impact beyond India, Paul said that at this point Washington's goal is to ensure that an India that can stand up for itself, be independent - and of course it is - but the more wherewithal that it has economically, militarily in terms of its defense, its technology, the better it can maintain its independence."

The subcommittee member said that India is an important ally in Washington's move against China. Responding to a lawmaker, Kapur said New Delhi does not need to act far beyond its own region to advance US interests. "An independent, strong, prosperous India takes a big swath of the Indo-Pacific away from China, and that is actually a strategic win for us," he said.