Question

What was India’s foreign policy towards the US and USSR during the Cold War era? Do you think that this policy helped India’s interests?

Answer 1

As a newly independent country, India became one of the founder members of the Non-Aligned Movement , NAM during the Cold War era that defined much of its foreign policy.

a. India’s foreign policy was based on two broad objectives: to stay away from military alliances and to persuade the newly decolonised countries not to be part of military alliances and escalate tensions.
b. Pt. Nehru acknowledged that the policy of NAM was neither passive nor based on the principle of neutrality.
c. It was felt that India’s alignment with either the US or the USSR bloc would aggravate international tension rather than promote international peace. It was also realised that India could play a positive role in reducing international tension, promoting peace and serving as a bridge between the two blocs.
d. We may cite the example of how Indian diplomats were involved in reducing tensions and mediated between the US and the USSR blocs during the Korean crisis.
e. Indian leadership also encouraged the role of international organisations like UN and regional organisations to play a proactive role in de-escalating tensions between the two superpowers.

It has been argued that this policy of Non-alignment did support India’s interests in the following manner:

a. Like any sovereign country, India had just become independent and wanted to retain its long-awaited freedom and exercise independence of judgement i.e. India wanted freedom to decide on every issue on its merit. Therefore, the policy of Non-alignment helped India to attain this freedom by promoting its own national interests.
b. It allowed India to maintain balance of power and not to be dominated by any of the superpowers.
c. It enabled India to launch economic development plans and to seek much needed foreign assistance from both the blocs. Thus, it was politically desirable not to depend upon aid from one bloc only and profitable to be able to get aid from more than one source, by remaining non-aligned.