Upwardly-mobile instinct: Bangladesh beyond maelstrom

With upward-mobility as an instinct, Bangladesh is poised to climb relatively higher than with any other instinct if, and only if, it seizes the opportunity. That opportunity has been paved by the convergence of one of the dominant instincts of several other "great" and "not so great" powers today upon Bangladesh. Pivotal among those powers for Bangladesh is India, but the trump card might be with the United States. Great Britain (possibly the European Union by default), Japan, and Russia are not that far from the fray. Discussions treat them in that same order.
Whichever way we look at it, India has been our "bottom line" ever since Sheikh Hasina returned to power in 2009: beyond the multiple boundary, economic, energy, and highway agreements concluded with it, either bilaterally or multilaterally, Bangladesh's international salience since the 2014 election has been possible largely, if not exclusively, because India recognized the legitimacy of its results, thus softening particularly western acceptance of them as well. To put it bluntly, without India's rapport with Bangladesh, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry would not have made Bangladesh a direct and growing U.S. national interest.
As observed previously in this series, security as a vital interest has become the dominant U.S. instinct today, even though President Barack Obama did not want it that way when he first campaigned for the White House in 2008. Since then, he has been dragged into Syria, watched Russian adventurism in Ukraine, and locked horns with China, first through his Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which targets China's economic power directly and explicitly, then against Chinese adventurism in the South China Sea.
It is this latter development that potentially threatens U.S. interests. In addition to the TPP economic response, the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QSD, from 2007) with Australia, Japan, and India spells out what emerged as his "Asia pivot" mindset. With both India and Japan opening up or polishing their military arsenals against a Chinese threat, for Bangladesh to sustain economic relations with China, very much like it is becoming with the United States, both the Indian Ocean and the Bay of Bengal will have to reckon high on the interest of each.
China's actions have partly contributed to this outcome. Its "String of Pearls" policy approach in the Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal may have a purely economic footing presently, but both have the infrastructure to be converted into military outposts, a probability not lost on India particularly, but also not on Australia (which is the QSD initiator), Indonesia, and Vietnam generally. The South China Sea square-offs strengthen this likelihood.
Therefore, that Kerry went and concluded a hitherto unthinkable regional defence agreement with India the day after he reversed the U.S.-Bangladesh trajectory in Dhaka should also not be lost to analysts. To begin in Dhaka, he quickly established that the United States sought a new relationship. Unlike Hillary Clinton's May 2012 Dhaka visit as Secretary of State, he did not sit in the airplane to be briefed by the U.S. ambassador on local political rivalries, ultimately resulting in very strained and stalemated discussions with our leaders after she disembarked.
Visiting the Bangabandhu Memorial Museum on Road 32, Dhanmandi, melted the ice: Kerry broke the barrier still clouding bilateral relations, even more, recognized Hasina as the preferred U.S. Bangladesh partner, no less through his Road 32 guest-book comments, then met her to discuss the key issues, before, finally, sealing the hopeful partnership at the EMK Centre with the very man who was his mentor: Edward M. Kennedy, whose name comes as close to Bangladeshis as any freedom-fighter's. His name was resurrected in a way no other person could have done as his junior Senate colleague did: Kerry.
Reading between the lines, one message could be discerned: give us your security support, and we will not push the trade bottlenecks (a meaningless gesture since the increasingly factious Congress determines that); join us in our ocean policy approach as the Chair country of the Indian Ocean Naval Symposium for 2016-8, then we will believe you are treating us as equal to your Chinese interest, which include Bay of Bengal ports as a step towards building highways into China; equally reassuringly, we will not abandon you like other foreigners following the Holey Artisan incident; and, most significantly, the United States will be with Bangladesh, a secular Muslim country, in the war against Muslim terrorists. If this is a correct reading, Kerry's visit stands close to a foreign policy coup, completed, as it was, with the widest of smiles, the warmest of hearts, and the wisest of policy outcomes for two countries suspiciously embracing each other for 45 years.
These feed into, and in fact invite, our own dominant instinct. The upward mobility option can produce the most optimal results for us through four policy pursuits. First, we must embrace the U.S. security instinct, and not juggle relations with China, India, or other countries, simply to combat the terrorism knocking on our doors, which requires more sophisticated training and paraphernalia that only the United States can supply most efficiently. India could do likewise, but there is already too much of India in Bangladesh for the weight to trickle down to the public so easily.
Second, we must nevertheless identify, uphold, even upgrade our own pivot: that is India. Not in the security sense, but through economic and energy exchanges/partnerships, India can meet our immediate upward mobility needs. How we juggle this without subordinating our environmental treasures and consciousness to our spiralling energy needs will eventually speak of the wisdom of our leaders. Bangladesh is an opportunity for India to bring its north-eastern provinces closer to the heartland and unleash commercial flows into eagerly awaiting Southeast Asian countries; but India must also serve as an opportunity for Bangladesh to settle its water-sharing and trade-harmonizing interests. Indeed, as the Himalayan water wars loom (with India contemplating to suffocate Pakistan through Indus River dams, and China doing likewise to India through Brahmaputra dams), we may not have much time before shots riddle this part of Asia.
Third, we must play China the way China is playing us: it completely ignores our domestic security threats from terrorism (much like it does in Baluchistan against nationalists for the same "Strings of Pearl" outcomes, in this case, the Gwador port and highway into China), just as we must ignore its external security calculations. Our infrastructural development priorities far outweigh any concerns with China, which, like the United States, also flipped its 1971 position towards us, but with greater substance than the United States thus far. We must tread delicately so as not to subtract our Indian pivot or to rescind the new-found U.S. embrace. If push comes to shove, that is, the Brahmaputra dams convert our deltaic plains into a desert, we may have no choice but to saddle up in a way we could not with the Farakka Barrage and India.
If all three of these can be consistently, consciously, and convincingly executed, the fourth policy pursuit should not be a problem: cultivate the policy or instinctive interests of Britain, (and thereby the European Union), Japan, Russia, and our Southeast Asian neighbours.
Post-Brexit Britain is more open to the rest of the world than it could have been as a EU member, and particularly to its domain of historical relationship: the British Commonwealth. It may not have been by accident that the British State Minister for International Development, Rory Stewart, forged economic agreements in Dhaka about the time of Kerry's visit. We need to nurture this relationship: as much of Imperial Britain remain in Bangladesh (Curzon Hall, the High Court, tea as an export item, the English language) as the open-ended mutual future. No better a time to explore and cultivate that future now that our emigrants to England no longer remain the "huddled masses" of East London or lubricating "satanic mills" elsewhere, but from more upwardly-mobile positions influence decision-making in Downing Street or Westminster Abbey.
So is the case for post-Brexit European Union. It is our largest export destination, on top of which Bangladeshis living across the continent have also, slowly yet sturdily, been evincing that upward mobility instinct. Brexit does not mean "double-trouble" for us, or even our partners, Britain and EU members. We need Britain and Europe just when their external search for more invigorating partners may be hitting the "over-drive" button.
Japan has been one of our dearest friends, not just after 1971, but throughout 1971, yet, with Italy, it has been the country most victimized by terrorists within our own country. As with Italy and the European Union, we must go beyond, when we step up to the plate, to reassure Japan of foolproof security and continued economic cooperation, particularly to build our infrastructures. Japan is not a country wanting to induce us into any security deals, but nor should it be a country we treat any less amicably than China. In short, the ball is in our court if Japan (and Italy, and thereby the European Union) continue to be as interested in our future as they were in the past; and augmenting our upward-mobility instinct with domestic security measures would be the most optimum passageway in this transnational moment.
In short, our upwardly-mobile instinct may be a brutal competitive instinct within the domestic context within which, unfortunately, winners will take it all; but that it also carries win-win possibilities abroad should neither be underestimated and neglected, nor taken for granted, and thereby muddled up. Making stability in every arena our vital national interest extends our future shadow in all of those arenas, thus providing us the critically needed bargaining chips to negotiate with any and every country/region mentioned. Only with the upward-mobility tendency sinking deeper can we neutralize the maelstrom awaiting us outside our door. It might not be a bad time to enroll in a beginner's course on Theodore Roosevelt's favourite theme: speak softly but [learn to] carry a big [economic] stick.
Dr. Imtiaz A. Hussain is Professor & Head of the newly-built Department of Global Studies & Governance at Independent University, Bangladesh.
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