The Russians control 11.5% of
global landmass with the ninth largest population in the world. It has borders
with over 16 independent countries including US, Japan and China. It has
limited natural boundaries protecting the Russian core (Moscow region) except
buffer states like Ukraine or ‘caucus’
countries like Georgia or buffer regions like Siberia. Given the diverse
population in such far flung areas, it manages to keep relative calm. It is
fundamentally an ‘unstable’ kept in some form of stability by strategy
including coercive force of energy or military. It would take great skill and
heft to manage such a situation. It is a country prone to expansion as it seeks
‘geopolitical stability’ and then recoils in itself.
Viswanathan Anand was quoted saying,
“The Soviets included a chessboard along with the bride's wedding trousseau to
ensure that the children knew the rules of the game. For the Soviets, chess was
in their DNA” and he was so intimidated by the chess prowess in the country
that that he thought he could be “checkmated by every cab driver.” This is a result of nothing but their national psyche.
As I have written in my earlier
articles, India’s abundance of agrarian produce, benign weather conditions,
protection of the subcontinent by the mountain ranges in the north and the sea in
the south have all given the country a sense of ‘protective camouflage’ until
it is pried open as by the Mughals and then by the British. It is not my contention
that a similar thing will happen but more to give a sense of history.
The last decade has seen a
significant shift in status quo in our neighbourhood:
- Chinese economic growth, infrastructure and defence build-up;
- Disruption of the Afghan-Pakistan theatre and the convulsion likely post the American exit in 2014;
- Decline in relationships with Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Maldives;
- Then, the changes in the Middle-East driven by the underlying conflict between the Saudis and the Persians (manifesting in Syria, Iraq).
We have not only failed to manage
this change, we have also let down our guard both in terms of economic strength
and defense management. Our economic growth rate is now running sub-5% with a
very weak banking system. Recent news reports of our defense preparedness,
hardware procurement and border infra-management also point in the southerly
direction.
The political capital of the
state has been spent on managing the internal dynamics which broke down as the
schisms with the state and regional parties increased and with it expanded the
cost of political management. Unlike Russia which gives rise to dictators, managing
India’s diversity requires a democratic set-up with credible institutions but
what it dearly needs is the art of strategic management.
India's geography creates the sense of 'self-containment' leads it to exist with itself but we are no longer in 1,000 BC, we are part of the global economic
system and technological advances have reduced the physical space in both the
economic and militarily dimension..
One day everything will be well, that is our hope. Everything's fine
today, that is our illusion” ― Voltaire
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