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A club for hemming China in
On Monday — the day that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told reporters that Canada is interested in joining the AUKUS defense alliance — documents were released at a public inquiry that showed that Canada’s intelligence agency believes China “clandestinely and deceptively interfered in both the 2019 and 2021 general elections.”
Also on Monday, as Chinese ships carried out exercises in disputed waters in the South China Sea, the US, UK, and Australia announced that they were talking to Japan about inviting that country to participate in Pillar II of the security pact.
China’s growing military and political belligerence is rattling other countries, and they are responding by drawing together in a way that would have been out of the question a decade ago.
Neighbors under pressure
Pillar I of AUKUS, which was announced in 2021, is a collaboration between Australia, the Americans, and the Brits aimed at adding a powerful new capacity to Australia’s military: nuclear-powered (though conventionally armed) submarines. This is a huge spend for Australia — $368 billion over 30 years — that carries an inherent political risk. And to make the deal, Canberra had to blow up relations with France by abandoning a deal to buy French subs. The Aussies only did that after a year of tense political and economic confrontations with China that left decision-makers in that country gravely concerned about its future in a neighborhood dominated by Beijing. Australia’s back was against the wall.
Like Australia, Japan is being driven to closer cooperation with the United States by its concerns about an increasingly powerful and assertive China. Japan’s trade-focused economy depends on international shipping passing freely through the South China Sea, for instance, where China has been clashing with the Philippines.
So Tokyo has reason to be interested in Pillar II of the AUKUS arrangement, which focuses on defense technology sharing, including quantum computing, hypersonic missiles, artificial intelligence, and electronic warfare — all areas where China presents a technological challenge, and where Japan could offer expertise.
With China rapidly expanding its military, Japan has decided to break with its post-war pacifist tradition and dramatically increase defense spending.
Northern lightweights
Canada is also opening its checkbook, but at a much smaller scale, which would explain why the AUKUS partners are making a point of talking about doing business with Japan, rather than Canada.
Nobody is talking about adding other countries as full members, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Tuesday, but proceeding on a project-by-project basis.
Historically, Canada spends little on defense, falling well short of the 2% of GDP that NATO members have all agreed to spend. In an increasingly dangerous world, though, pressure is mounting for Canada to step up, and on Monday, Trudueau’s government did roll out a five-year plan to bring defense spending up to 1.76% of GDP by 2030, up from 1.38% last year.
Allies welcomed the announcement, but there was nothing significant enough to make Canada a much more desirable partner for AUKUS, says Eugene Lang, a former Liberal defense official turned Queens University professor. Officials are interested.
“I just don’t know that we're doing anything to get their attention,” he says. “What they're doing in AUKUS is investing in developing brand-new technologies. To my knowledge, Canada has not got any specific money set aside for any of that.”
University of Ottawa Professor Thomas Juneau, who has interviewed allied officials about Canada’s potential role in AUKUS, found that Canada is increasingly seen as a free rider in defense and intelligence circles. It’s not surprising that Japan was invited before Canada, he says.
“It's really normal for AUKUS to bring in Japan before Canada because Japan is not only a much bigger country than we are, but it's right next to China.”
Wolf warriors
On the other hand, because of its Five Eyes intelligence-sharing experience, Canada could more easily cooperate with AUKUS than Japan, says Graeme Thompson, a senior analyst with Eurasia Group.
And while it may not be spending enough money to be taken seriously, the Trudeau government has moved to be more circumspect in its relationship with China, limiting Chinese investment in critical minerals and being cautious about research projects.
“The scales have fallen from a lot of politicians’ eyes in the West,” Thompson says. “The question remains, how do you have constructive diplomatic and economic relations with Beijing, while at the same time competing with them geopolitically and seeking to build up and maintain deterrence?”
China will object to the new alliances being organized around it, but don’t expect Beijing to stop buying sabers and rattling them.
“China has a rising economy, so the idea that its rising economic power wouldn't come with rising geopolitical ambition is a fantasy, and we've kind of believed in that fantasy for a while, not just in Canada but in other Western countries,” says Juneau.
“But it was a fantasy all along.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi of the Republic of India during Modi’s Official State Visit to Washington DC.
India and the US talk China
In 2018, the two countries launched the “2+2 Dialogue” to boost defense cooperation and align policy objectives in the Indo-Pacific. India is still reeling from a skirmish in June 2020 — along the 2167-mile unmarked and disputed Himalayan border it shares with China — during which India’s military performed poorly and 20 of its soldiers died. Relations between the two nuclear-armed countries have since soured, giving the US and India a common cause in deterring Chinese aggression.
China has taken the US and India from distant allies to close partners — with the two conducting joint military exercises, working to strengthen the Indo-Pacific Quad alliance, and hosting each other for glitzy state visits. The US has even shown a willingness to overlook India’s human rights transgressions and prioritized deepening ties over Canada’s calls for the US to respond to India allegedly killing a Sikh community leader on Canadian soil.
The meetings are expected to solidify ongoing deals for the US and American companies to produce engines for Indian fighter jets and supply MQ-9 predator drones. , and build semiconductor manufacturing.
India-Canada: Trudeau's "perverse politics" threatens relations, says Samir Saran
India-Canada relations have hit a crisis point following Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s bombshell allegation in September that India was responsible for the murder of a Sikh leader, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, in British Columbia last June. The fallout was swift: India’s foreign ministry dismissed the accusation as “absurd,” both countries expelled top diplomats, and tensions have escalated significantly.
“Friends don’t do this in public,” Samir Saran, President of the Observer Research Foundation think tank tells Ian Bremmer on GZERO World, “This was something that should have always been in the private mode.”
Relations between the two countries were already tense before the allegations. India has long been pushing Ottawa to be more assertive in curtailing the Khalistan movement within Canada–a separatist movement with the goal of establishing an independent Sikh state in India’s Punjab region.
The Khalistani movement is considered a terrorist organization by the Indian government, and Saran explains it's so problematic to the Indian public that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has broad support to respond forcefully to Canada’s allegations, even within the political opposition. But despite the growing tension, Saran believes there will always be a link between the two democracies.
“I don’t think this is about India or Indians having any problems with Canada,” Saran says, “I think it’s the Trudeau government’s perverse politics being brought into the spotlight in this part of the world.”
Watch the full interview: Can the India-Canada relationship be fixed after a suspicious murder?
Catch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
- Can the India-Canada relationship be fixed after a suspicious murder? ›
- India fires fresh salvos in dispute with Canada ›
- Canada-India relations strained by murder allegation ›
- India and Canada expel diplomats, US treads carefully ›
- Ian Explains: Why India-Canada relations are tense over a mysterious murder ›
Can the India-Canada relationship be fixed after a suspicious murder?
In September, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau leveled a bombshell accusation in Canada’s House of Commons: He announced there were “credible allegations” India was involved in the killing of a Sikh separatist leader and Canadian citizen, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, in British Columbia in June.
New Delhi immediately dismissed the claims as “absurd” and demanded any evidence be released publicly, which Canada has yet to do. But the diplomatic fallout was swift: Canada expelled the head of India’s security service in Canada, and New Delhi demanded dozens of Canadian diplomats leave India.
On GZERO World, Ian Bremmer speaks with Samir Saran, President of the Observer Research Foundation, a top Indian think tank, to discuss the fallout from the shocking allegations, the history of the Khalistan separatist movement within Canada, and where the two countries go from here, given their strong diasporic and economic links.
“I don't think this is about India or Indians having any problems with Canada,” Saran tells Bremmer, “I think it is Trudeau's government's perverse politics that is now being brought into the spotlight in this part of the world.”
Saran also unpacks the paradox of India’s relationship with China, its second-largest trading partner, as tension continues to rise on the Himalayan border.
Catch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
Podcast: Death and diplomacy: A look at India-Canada tensions with Samir Saran
Listen: The GZERO World Podcast takes a look at an international murder mystery that dominated headlines in September: Canada's allegation that India was involved in the assassination of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia in June. New Delhi has dismissed the accusation as “absurd” and demanded any evidence be released publicly, which Canada has yet to do. But the diplomatic fallout has been swift: Canada expelled the head of India’s security service in Canada, and New Delhi demanded dozens of Canadian diplomats leave India.
Ian Bremmer speaks with Samir Saran, President of the Observer Research Foundation, a top Indian think tank, to unpack the fallout from the shocking allegations, the history of the Khalistan separatist movement within Canada, and where the two countries go from here, given their strong diasporic and economic links. Saran also discusses the paradoxical nature of India’s relationship with China and tensions on the Himalayan border, India's role in the BRICS partnership as a leader of the Global South, and the feasibility of India's ambitious goal to get 50% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030.
Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're published.
Ian Explains: Why India-Canada relations are tense over a mysterious murder
On June 18th in a Vancouver suburb, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Sikh leader and Canadian citizen, pulled his grey pickup truck out of a parking space at his local temple. In security video viewed by The New York Times and The Washington Post—but not yet released to the public—a white sedan can be seen cutting off Nijjar’s truck as two men in hooded sweatshirts emerge from a covered area and fire a reported 50 bullets into the pickup truck’s driver’s seat, killing Nijjar instantly.
And then, weeks later, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made a bombshell accusation on the floor of Canada’s parliament. “Over the past number of weeks," Trudeau announced, "Canadian security agencies have been actively pursuing credible accusations of a potential leak between agencies of the government of India and the killing of a Canadian citizen, Hardeep Singh Nijjar. Any involvement of a foreign government in the killing of a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil is an unacceptable violation of our sovereignty.”
Just to give you a sense of how serious this announcement was, imagine if the journalist Jamal Khashoggi had been an American citizen, and the Saudis had killed him in New York, Ian Bremmer explains on GZERO World.
Canada is home to the largest Sikh community outside of India. Sikhs are a religious minority that makes up less than 2% of the Indian population. A militant wing of the community has long called for the creation of a Sikh state called Khalistan. In 1984, Sikh bodyguards assassinated India’s Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Nijjar, a supporter of the Khalistan movement who migrated to Canada in the 1990s, was accused by New Delhi of involvement in terrorist acts in India, an accusation he and his supporters have denied.
It’s a challenging time for Canada–India relations, to be sure. Trudeau raised Nijjar’s assassination with Modi at the G20 summit in early September. The answer he got in private was unsatisfactory, and he decided to go public. All of this puts the US in a tough spot: Washington has been cultivating India as a much-needed partner against China. But New Delhi has now allegedly ordered the murder of a Canadian citizen in Canada, one of the US’s closest allies. It’s a staggering violation of international law and norms, especially between two democracies. And it’s a position the Biden administration never expected to be in.
Catch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
- India and Canada expel diplomats, US treads carefully ›
- India fires fresh salvos in dispute with Canada ›
- Canada accuses India of assassination ›
- Canada-India relations strained by murder allegation ›
- India-Canada standoff heats up while US seeks a compromise ›
- Podcast: Death and diplomacy: A look at India-Canada tensions with Samir Saran - GZERO Media ›
India-Canada standoff heats up while US seeks a compromise
Hi, everybody. Ian Bremmer here. And a Quick Take to kick off your week.
India and Canada. Not the two countries that you expected to be getting into a big public fight. But that is exactly where we are. And the Americans are uncomfortable. And sort of in the middle of it, though I'm about clearly on Canada's side. Give you a little background.
So largest Sikh population in the world outside of India is in Canada. They are politically active and relevant. They're concentrated in a few key voting areas. And while they tend to vote conservative, all three parties interested in being aligned with them. Most of them, of course, perfectly fine from a political perspective. But there also is a small group of radicals who support secession of their homeland from India. Radical organizations, some of which have been supportive of and engaged in terrorist activity in India. The Indian government has been public and very critical that the Canadians are allowing big Sikh demonstrations. Canadians say, “Hey, we have, you know, sort of freedom of speech. What do you want us to do, close down these demonstrations?” Indians, “Yes, we would actually appreciate that.” And also that they've been harboring radicals and terrorists and they need to take action against them. Then the Canadian government found out that one of the leaders of a radical Sikh institution, who is a Canadian citizen who was assassinated in Canada, found out from the Americans that the Indian government was behind the assassination. And indeed, there were recordings of Indian agents talking about this apparently before and after.
And that was shared with all the five eyes. So the UK and Australia and New Zealand, I'm not privy to this intelligence. I don't have those clearances. But leaders that I've spoken to in those countries tell me that this evidence is rock solid. So look, Trudeau very concerned about this. I mean, imagine if Khashoggi was an American citizen and gunned down in New York, right? I mean, this is clearly a big deal domestically for Trudeau wants to find a way to find an off-ramp. So back in August, he sent his national security and intelligence advisor to Delhi. She's the equivalent of Jake Sullivan in the United States. The meetings go absolutely nowhere. Indian government takes no responsibility, refuses to talk about it. Then when Trudeau himself goes to Delhi for the G-20, I had heard that the meeting between Trudeau and Modi was shockingly bad. I heard that read out from a number of people. I was very surprised because the topics they were discussing weren't so chippy. And that's because Trudeau was actually bringing this up. And Modi said, “Absolutely not. We have nothing to do with it and how dare you bring this up? And you're, by the way, harboring all these extremists and we're really angry at you.”
At that point, Trudeau decides to go public because this information is going to end up public in the criminal case around the murder and, you know, now you've got a problem. So the Indian government is, you know, taking no prisoners on this issue. They're condemning the Canadians. They have, you know, gotten rid of a Canadian envoy. They've suspended visas from Canada to India. And clearly, the trade relationship, which isn't huge, it's actually pretty small, but nonetheless would be at risk. And so too, Canada's Indo-Pacific strategy, which they announced a great fanfare a year ago, spent a lot of time writing it up. It's pretty thoughtful because their China relationship is easily as bad as America's China relationship. Frankly, it's worse and the Canadians don't have as much leverage and well you can scratch the Indo from the Pacific strategy right now. Meanwhile, Modi is enormously popular for telling off the Canadians.
First of all, it is not making all that much news. It's mostly below the fold in Indian newspapers in Canada, of course, has been leading all the coverage. In India itself, yes, big Sikh population. But those Sikhs are primarily affiliated with a political party that is in alliance with Modi's own BJP. And they strongly oppose these secessionist movements and the radicals and the terrorists that have been involved in it. In fact, you know, informally you hear people when they find out that the Indians might have actually done this such an assassination, they're kind of proud. They're like, wow, we're like Israel. Who knew that, you know, we defend our national security so well? And the Congress party, which is the main opposition party to Modi strongly supporting Modi on this issue. So it's a serious impasse. It is one that is not going to get resolved any time soon.
The Americans are trying to work a compromise because what the Canadian government wants is, you know, not for Modi to say, “I'm personally responsible and I'm really sorry,” wants to do an investigation, find out who was responsible for it,have a head or two roll, even if they're junior and then put this behind them. Modi has absolutely zero interest in doing that, especially with the Canadians. And it's unclear how public the Americans are going to get on this issue precisely because the India relationship has been a big win for the United States. And indeed, Biden was planning on going to India for their national day coming up in a couple of months as the principal guest. This could put a spanner in that. So watch it all very carefully. But that's where we are in India-Canada. A lot to pay attention to and not easy to resolve.
Hope everyone’s doing well. I'll talk to you all real soon.
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- Ian Explains: Why India-Canada relations are tense over a mysterious murder - GZERO Media ›
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Joe Biden speaks during a joint news conference with South Korean President Yoon Suk-youl in Seoul.
In Asia to fix imbalance, Biden talks both guns and butter
In his first presidential trip to Asia, where he is visiting South Korea and Japan as well as huddling with Quad partners, Joe Biden isn’t expected to sign any major trade deals or defense agreements. But America’s commander-in-chief is going to be in China’s neighborhood, shoring up new and old alliances in the region, reminding Beijing that checking the PRC is very much on Washington’s agenda, despite the administration’s attention being taken up by domestic politics and the war in Ukraine.
Shadows loom. Just before Biden arrived in South Korea, China announced war games in the disputed waters of the South China Sea. The military exercises will continue through most of his visit. Meanwhile, amid reports of North Korea’s plans to conduct a missile or even a nuclear test (the country’s first since 2017) during the trip, South Korea announced there could be a schedule change if Pyongyang engages in “provocation” (the possibility of a nuclear test has been assessed as “low” by Seoul, but that of an ICBM test launch is “imminent”). Reiterating that he’s ready for contingencies, and reflecting the frustrating position that his administration finds itself in for restarting talks with Pyongyang, Biden had a succinct message for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un: “Hello. Period.”
Fixing an imbalance. With its military bases and assets deployed across the region, the US continues to exert significant strategic influence. But the US approach to Asia has been critiqued as lopsided and for being too military-centric and not focused enough on trade, especially since the US has lost commercial traction there since opting out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal during the Trump years.
Hoping to change that, Biden’s economic agenda is underscored by his itinerary: His first stop on the five-day trip was a Samsung semiconductor factory in Pyeongtaek, South Korea. Tackling supply chain disruption with the help of the South Koreans is an essential agenda item, but so is getting their business. Biden met with the boss of auto giant Hyundai, another South Korean company that has gotten presidential praise for investing in the US, especially in electric vehicle jobs.
To regain economic traction, Biden will launch the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework as a possible alternative to the TPP — now called CPTPP — but without the unfettered trade and tariff breaks. A framework is not a trade agreement — it’s an agreement about an agreement — and with midterm elections looming and political pressures at home from the liberal, pro-worker wing of his party, it’s unclear how much market access the IPEF will offer to TPP-dominated Asia. Some of America’s traditional partners and allies will surely sign the IPEF, but reports suggest the framework won’t amount to much, at least not at this stage. Biden’s IPEF invitation list doesn’t yet feature Taiwan because including the self-ruled island claimed by China wouldn’t go down well in Beijing.
Reassuring allies is the diplomatic theme of the trip, for many US partners were spurned by the Trump administration’s “America First” approach. But choosing to visit South Korea before America’s more senior partner in the region, Japan, is Biden’s tip of the hat to newly elected President Yoon Suk-Yeol, a conservative who is considered a hawk on ties with China.
Yoon’s government has backed the US in sanctioning Russia, and while his predecessor refused to take sides in the confrontation between the US and China — Washington is Seoul’s only military ally, but Beijing is its largest trade partner — the new president has clearly said that he supports a rules-based “free and open” order in the Indo-Pacific. Yoon has even suggested that the Quad, the security partnership between the US, Japan, India, and Australia, be expanded to include South Korea, and is pushing for increased military exercises.
However, Biden’s also hoping to do some bridge-building — ties between Tokyo and Seoul have worsened, and Biden has stressed that improving the trilateral relationship between the US, Japan, and South Korea is “critically important.” He’ll also break the ice with Australia’s new PM Anthony Albanese, whose weekend victory with promises to restore liberal values Down Under is being compared to Biden’s own election.
There’s also clear signaling to an increasingly assertive China. Biden will re-connect with the Quad — the dialogue between Australia, India, Japan, and the US dubbed derisively by China as a possible “Indo-Pacific NATO” — on the last day of his trip. This is expected to be a show of unity against Beijing’s recent muscular moves: The PRC’s plans for a military base in the Solomon Islands have triggered the US and Australia to declare that they're open to military options to deal with a potential Chinese military threat, even as Chinese troops continue to harden their positions in the heights of the Himalayan territory disputed by India. They’ll also discuss illegal maritime practices by China, convergences on the Ukraine crisis, the global food shortage, and the question of how to deal with a strategically autonomous India, which has yet to condemn Vladimir Putin’s actions or cut trade ties with Moscow. Delhi also recently banned wheat exports, further spiking global food prices.
“The Ukraine crisis is clearly an albatross around the neck of the Quad, in the sense that India knows that the issue will continue to be discussed within the Quad,” says Michael Kugelman, deputy director of the Asia Program at the Wilson Center.
But the Quad is unlikely to push PM Narendra Modi’s government for a tougher stance against Moscow. Instead, Kugelman says, the Quad’s focus is likely to be on humanitarian concerns, where all members are in alignment, and other shared interests, such as pushing a vaccine production plan, exploring emerging technologies and clean energy, are on the menu.
Staring down China, winning over friends old and new, but not in a position to trade much, Biden’s Asian business trip is part blitz, part bluster.
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