The Growing Entente between India and Japan

Thomas F. Lynch

Security, Asia

The Indo-Japanese strategic and defense relationship exhibits the most regional potential toward growing enhanced capacity and capability in support of long-term and enduring U.S. economic, humanitarian and security objectives.

The India-Japan agreement for cooperation on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy went into force in July 2017. It was first such pact ever by Japan with any country not party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty—an extraordinary exception from the only country ever to have been attacked with nuclear weapons.

Although noteworthy, Japan’s nuclear exception was not surprising. It was another milestone in a series of historic accommodations and strategically significant activities between Tokyo and New Delhi demonstrating the steady growth of a substantive and significant strategic bilateral partnership.

This emerging strategic relationship between India and Japan is significant for the future security and stability of the recently coined “Indo-Pacific Region.” It also is a critical development for both Beijing and Washington. India possesses the most latent economic and military potential of any state in the wider Indo-Pacific area. For Japan, an expanding partnership with India serves as a hedge against a China acting to challenge the existing post-World War II, rules-based, international and regional order. Together, the two countries will have much to say about the future trajectory of China’s ascent. They also will have a significant voice in defining and establishing the rules of the Indo-Pacific Region, shaping how that enormous geopolitical space will evolve over the coming few decades.

India and Japan share complementary, but not identical, strategic visions. New Delhi and Tokyo both seek to manage—and minimize—the potential negative impacts from the rise of China in accord with their own strategic perspectives. Japan perceives China’s increasingly assertive actions to be a great and growing strategic threat. India, for its part, is concerned about China’s increasingly worrisome behavior, but finds itself relatively more dependent upon China for economic growth and less worried about China’s immediate physical threat than Japan. As a result, India has been—and will continue to be—less vocal in complaints about Chinese behavior, preferring to warn Beijing with subtle signaling and actions.