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Why Soviets Signed
11
Friendship
11
Pact With India
The Soviet Union scored its second major diplomatic
triumph in three months on August
9.
Within 24 hours of his arrival in New Delhi, Soviet
Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko had signed for the
U.S.S.R. a new treaty of mutual "friendship, Peace and
Cooperation" with India. Under terms of the treaty - which
could profoundly alter the power balance in Asia - each
nation would consider an attack on one as an attack on the
other.
On May 27, the Soviets concluded a similar 15-year
"Friendship and Cooperation Treaty" with Egypt.
The timing of the Soviet diplomatic thrust was both
dramatic and deft. India's arch-rival Pakistan has been threat–
ening war over New Delhi's support for East Pakistani
rebels. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi appealed to both Mos–
cow and Washington for help. The Kosygin Government
responded. The Ni.xon Government felt it couldn't.
The treaty therefore gives India what she feels she badly
needs - a major power ally in any conflict with ber Mos–
lem neighbor. Meanwhile India-U. S. relations are at an
aH-time low. Continued American arms aid to Pakistan has
aroused deep bitterness and a sense of betrayal in India. Top–
ping this off is the new thaw between Washington and Com–
munist China - Pakistan's friend and India's number two
source of worry.
The Nixon Administration already has informed New
Delhi that it cannot count on U. S. support if a dash with
Pakistan brings China into the conflict. Washington, which
has poured about $10,000,000,000 worth of aid into India–
more than into any nation - has thus been cast in the
position of a faithless friend.
To the alert Soviets, the opportunity to develop closer
bonds witb India - and gain a major ally in its struggle for
position against China - could not have been better timed
had they engineered it themselves.
Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, who signed the
treaty in New Delhi, termed the agreement a "very important
act." He told newsmen that ''we in the Soviet Union attach
great significance to it."
The cautiously worded pact says nothing of
direct
Soviet
intervention in the event of conflict, but it does indicate that
India can rely on a steady flow of Soviet arms.
Russiao arms usually also mean Russian advisers - as
the Egyptians have found out. There are already a number of
Russians in India and most certainly there will be more.
Probably, too, there will be an expansion of port privileges
for the growing Soviet fleet in the Indian Ocean.
This fact alone makes the pact worthwhile to Kremlin
strategists. But the Soviets have also gained another im–
mensely important advantage.
It has largely beeo overlooked that the treaty is mutual.
The Indians are now as committed to helping the Russians
against the Chinese as the Russians are to helping the Indians
against the Pakistaois. This balances considerably the dis–
parity in numbers between the Russiaos and the Chinese.
There now are 550 million Indians, who have a common and
well-armed frontier with China, aligned on the Soviet side of
Moscow's dispute with Peking. The treaty calls for con–
sultations to "remove" any threat to peace in event of attack
on either party to the treaty.
After he returned to Moscow, Mr. Gromyko admitted
that Soviet fear of China was one of the main reasons for
concluding the treaty with India. He told the Supreme Soviet
that the pact is important "in the light of the situation south
of the bordees of the Soviet Union."
Moscow and Peking nervously share a 4500-mile-long
border, bristl ing with weapons and guarded on both sides by
growing numbers of troops.
India has, in effect, abandoned its traditional policy of
"non-alignment" and has been thrust into the middle of big
power politics. It is possible that New Delhi
in
its anxiety to
obtain support against Pakistan has downgraded this aspect
of the "friendship" treaty. Sorne Indian critics of the hastily
conceived pact believe the government grasped at Soviet help
out of sheer anxiety and will regret its wide-ranging com–
mitments to the Soviets in the end.
On his retirement from office, former Netherlands for–
eign minister to the Soviet Union, G. Beelearts van Block–
land, filed a sensational report regarding Soviet foreign
policy.
One of the worst things a country can do, he warned, is
to sigo a treaty of friendship with the Soviets, because friend–
ship according to Soviet ideas includes doing what the Soviets
expect of that friend. The closer the "fri"!ndship," the more
delegations going to and fro, the more Soviet pressure and
intecference occurs.
Far from being a true "peace" pact in worldwide terms,