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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 NEW DELHI 000263 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL PTER PK IN
SUBJECT: INDIA AND NATO:  TIME FOR DIALOGUE 
 
REF: 09 NEW DELHI 637 
 
¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY.  Participants in the Fourth India-NATO 
Dialogue, a non-governmental "track II" event held in New 
Delhi February 1, agreed that the time was right to establish 
a regular, sustained, official dialogue between the world's 
largest democracy and its mightiest military alliance.  The 
NATO officials noted a marked change from previous years, 
with Indian participants focused more on what kind of 
engagement to pursue rather than debating the value of any 
relationship with NATO.  Participants expressed interest in 
discussing regional issues such as Afghanistan and Pakistan, 
but they were more animated by the prospect of a broader 
dialogue addressing longer-term strategic factors associated 
with China's rise and NATO's engagement in Central and South 
Asia.  India's senior strategists acknowledged New Delhi's 
instinctive disinclination toward alliances, which they 
tended to associate with the Warsaw Pact, and confessed a 
surprising level of ignorance of NATO's founding principles, 
internal procedures, and diverse associations with 
non-members -- but also a keen appreciation of the value of 
this relationship for India's strategic future.  END SUMMARY. 
 
India-NATO Dialogue:  Godzilla and King Kong 
- - - 
 
¶2. (SBU) Participants in the Fourth India-NATO Dialogue held 
in New Delhi January 1 agreed that the time was right for 
regular, official dialogue between the world's largest 
democracy and its mightiest military alliance.  The fourth 
installment of this non-governmental "track II" dialogue 
sponsored by the United Service Institution of India, the 
Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, and the Konrad 
Adenauer Stiftung, brought together retired senior Indian 
officials and strategic affairs commentators with current and 
former NATO officials to discuss the regional strategic 
environment and global challenges.  Chairman of the Political 
Committee in the NATO Parliamentary Assembly Karl Lamers 
outlined NATO's work on a new strategic concept, its first 
update since 1999, which would address many new threats 
shared by India, such as counterterrorism, nuclear security, 
cyber security, energy security, and water issues.  Head of 
the Planning Section of the Operations Division Diego Ruiz 
Palmer discussed NATO's operations in Afghanistan, but also 
stressed that NATO maintained over 40 partnerships outside of 
Europe with countries as diverse as Japan and Colombia. 
Deputy Head of the Secretary General's Policy Planning Unit 
Michael Ruhle emphasized the value of dialogue "despite 
lingering doubts," citing NATO's institutionalized 
relationship with Russia and its political dialogue with 
China and noting NATO's "flexible menu" of options for 
engagement. 
 
¶3. (SBU) A consensus quickly emerged among the Indian 
participants that regular, sustained, official dialogue with 
NATO was in India's interest.  Participants remarked that 
this consensus contrasted starkly with the tone of previous 
years, which one participant characterized privately as "like 
King Kong and Godzilla eyeing one another suspiciously across 
the room."  Jawarhalal Nehru University Professor Radha Kumar 
observed that official dialogue with NATO would have been 
inconceivable due to the presence of the Communist Party of 
India-Marxist (CPI-M) in the governing coalition, which was 
no longer the case. 
 
Issue-based Dialogue:  Afghanistan, But Also China 
- - - 
 
 
NEW DELHI 00000263  002 OF 003 
 
 
¶4. (SBU) Participants focused more on what kind of engagement 
was most appropriate rather than whether engagement would be 
useful.  Some participants suggested that India's 
relationship with NATO should develop through a discussion of 
issues rather than on the basis of a "formal affiliation," 
but they accepted the need to institutionalize the dialogue 
in some form.  While participants acknowledged that dialogue 
would be particularly useful in light of NATO's role in 
Afghanistan, they agreed that the scope of the engagement 
should not be limited to a single issue.  The Indian 
participants were also aware of NATO's growing relationship 
with Pakistan, but did not appear concerned by this 
development, nor did they view developments in Pakistan and 
Afghanistan as the most compelling reason for developing 
their own relationship with NATO.  Rather, they seemed more 
swayed by India's interest in addressing longer-term 
strategic factors associated with China's rise and NATO's 
engagement in Central and South Asia. 
 
East-West Masala 
- - - 
 
¶5. (SBU) In a particularly lively session, professor at the 
German Federal Armed Forces University Carlo Masala 
challenged the participants to explain how India had 
justified waiting so long to engage NATO.  He explained that 
the invocation of the Article V mutual defense provision in 
the NATO Charter following the 9/11 attacks forced the 
Alliance to focus on global threats, many of which India 
shared.  India was also in the midst of a strategic 
transformation, witnessing a historic power shift in Asia 
while at the same time managing its own rise as a power. 
Under these circumstances, India needed to diversify its 
relationships, especially with democracies, which shared an 
interest in managing power shifts peacefully.  Masala added 
that NATO had experiences that might be usefully shared.  For 
instance, he noted that Asia lacked a conventional arms 
control regime, an area where NATO had deep experience from 
its relationship with the Warsaw Pact.  NATO had been 
networking with the other key players in the region for some 
time -- including China, Japan, and Russia, as well as 
Pakistan -- but Masala wondered aloud how India could 
continue to remain aloof. 
 
¶6. (SBU) Masala's remarks were met by a stunned, sympathetic 
silence from the crowd of famously loquacious and contrarian 
pundits.  The chair of the session, former Foreign Secretary 
Salman Haidar, closed the session observing that it was 
"evident India had much to learn about NATO."  He concluded 
that "some form of dialogue should be institutionalized," and 
that over time "the substance of our relationship will grow." 
 
Not the Warsaw Pact 
- - - 
 
¶7. (SBU) In another noteworthy session, Indian participants 
grudgingly acknowledged an entrenched antipathy toward 
alliances, as well as a principled assumption that relations 
with the NATO members, particularly the United States, 
rendered direct relations with NATO redundant.  Commodore 
(ret.) C. Uday Bhaskar said India preferred relationships 
with political rather than military entities.  His repeated 
assertion that the United States determined NATO's agenda met 
with an impassioned correction from Former Chief of Staff of 
the German Armed Forces and Former Chairman of the NATO 
Military Committee General (ret.) Harald Kujat.  Kujat 
explained that the Alliance was originally established as a 
political association until galvanized by the Korean War. 
 
NEW DELHI 00000263  003 OF 003 
 
 
Conceding that the United States played a justifiably 
important role, he stressed that NATO was a community of 28 
sovereign democracies that operated according to a 
well-established set of rules and principles that applied 
equally to all member states. 
 
¶8. (SBU) Several Indian participants stressed that 
self-reliance was an important lesson of India's 
post-independence history, which had contributed to its 
instinctive disinclination toward alliances.  A sympathetic 
participant cautioned that Indians would continue to view 
NATO as primarily a military organization, but allowed that 
the opportunity to better understand its structure would help 
open eyes to opportunities for cooperation.  Former Foreign 
Secretary M.K. Rasgotra, who closed the conference, confessed 
privately that Indian officials had secretly hoped that NATO 
would disband following the disintegration of the Warsaw 
Pact, and found it more convenient to maintain the fiction 
that it was no longer relevant.  He observed that Indians 
seemed to think of NATO as a direct analogue to the Warsaw 
Pact, with which they were more familiar during the Cold War, 
which explained their surprising lack of awareness of its 
founding principles, procedures, or diverse associations with 
non-members. 
 
ROEMER