Context: India’s involvement in the Quad — the forum that also involves the US, Japan and Australia — has been criticised as a deviation from New Delhi’s traditional policy of non-alignment.

Historical trends:

• Over the years, India has experimented with alliances of different kinds – during World War I, some nationalists aligned with imperial Germany to set up the first Indian government-in-exile in Kabul;
• during World War II, Subhas Chandra Bose joined forces with imperial Japan to set up a provisional government in Port Blair; and
• In independent India, Jawaharlal Nehru, who unveiled and championed non-alignment, signed security treaties with Bhutan, Nepal, and Sikkim.
• Also, Nehru, who actively opposed American alliances in Asia, turned to the US for military support in 1962.

Is an alliance with the US on the cards?

• Both countries, are interested in building issue-based coalitions in pursuit of shared interests.

Are alliances essentially instrumental in nature?

• In the past, India’s treaties with Nepal, Bangladesh, and Russia were meant to address India’s security imperatives, while most of China’s alliances were fundamentally transactional in nature.
• Democratic India cannot be as brutally transactional as communist China – however, New Delhi can learn a thing or two from the way Beijing has forged alliances.
• “An India that puts its interests above the doctrine will find coalitions like the Quad critical for its international prospects,”

https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/explained-in-light-of-quad-perspective-on-international-alliances-6704276/

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