The White House has “concerns” about India’s decision to participate in military exercises with Russia in the Far East and the Sea of Japan but the Joe Biden administration has tiptoed around the question on whether it would do anything about it.
The multi-country military exercises — Vostok 2022 — are scheduled to begin on Thursday and go on for a week. The countries include China, giving Japan an added cause for concern.
Asked how the US administration feels about India’s participation in Vostok 2022 — given the Washington-Delhi partnership — White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said: “The United States has concerns about any country exercising with Russia while Russia wages an unprovoked, brutal war against Ukraine. But, of course, every participating country will make its own decisions. And I’ll leave it at that.”
She was asked why the US is not putting more pressure on India — a partner country — when Washington has asked China not to help Russia.
Jean-Pierre replied: “My first sentence there is saying that we have concerns, and any country exercising with Russia while Russia is waging this unprovoked….”
She was cut-off mid-sentence by a supplementary observation from a reporter — “but no plans to take action to do anything about it”.
To this, the spokesperson said: “I don’t have anything else to share. But we have — we have been pretty public — I’ve been asked this question with other countries as well, and we’ve been pretty consistent in our — in our statements.”
The US has since the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war nudged India to take a stand against Moscow at international fora and also cut back on imports from Russia, particularly oil. India has staved off the pressure and increased its oil purchases from Russia manifold, taking advantage of the discounted rates offered by Moscow.
Although this is not the first time India is participating in military exercises with Russia, this year’s participation in the context of Moscow’s conflict with Kyiv is being seen as a political signal of New Delhi asserting its independent foreign policy — a throwback to the Nehruvian practice of non-alignment.
The US is not the only Quad country that has concerns about these military exercises. Japan issued a protest note to Russia in July itself asking Moscow to drop the Southern Kuril Islands from the exercise zone.
“Japan is vigilant as the Vostok 2022 drills are set to take place in areas including the islands of Etorofu and Kunashiri, two of the four northwestern Pacific islands at the centre of the two countries’ long-standing territorial dispute, called the Northern Territories in Japan,” Nippon.com website reported.