The US and the Pacific

(upbeat music) - The low deserts in beautiful Tempe, Arizona, this is politics and the past with Robert Ferguson, brought to you by the Center for American Institutions. Today I am joined by a very special guest, and because of technology amazingly, we can do this podcast literally from other ends of the world. This is awesome. A Kreeti Sethi is a doctoral candidate at JNU in Delhi, India, and more importantly, she is taking time out of a busy wedding planning schedule in order to be here. A Kreeti, congratulations. - Thank you so much, Rob. - Thank you. - A Kreeti, when is your wedding? And what's the state of the, what's the state of the front at planning at this point? - I think less than 14 days left. Yeah, I think 14 days to go. Yeah. (laughing) And it's been quite a-- - 14 days to be honest. - I can imagine. Now my understanding of Indian weddings that 14 days, the actual wedding might last 14 days. - Oh, no. Luckily for me and my family, I think two days are enough. So we are trying to squeeze in as many traditions and rituals as possible in two days. - You know, again, thank you very much for taking some time out. And again, I know I cannot imagine how hectic your life is right now. So thank you very much. - And once again-- - No, no problem at all. No problem at all. Thank you. - So, A Kreeti, you're a PhD candidate and you're in international affairs, correct? Or is it political science? - It's international relations. My specific area of interest is US. So I'm in the American center of GNU New Delhi. - Okay. So how big would the American center be at GNU? - So GNU is one of the foremost university that introduced international relations to the Indians. So it has been running for quite some time. If you may look into it, the alumni of GNU who have graduated in IR, that alumni is vast, our current foreign minister, current finance minister, all of them are GNU alumni. And American studies specifically is one of GNU's key areas which they try to cement. And now because of that, a lot of private universities are also adopting this study. So it's been quite interesting that way. - Interesting. And I mean, I think this is something that I think is so interesting being a Canadian, although I'm studying, although I studied in the United States and work in the United States, I just imagine you get such a different perspective on the United States and are able to study it from so many different angles when you're in Delhi versus when you're studying it somewhere in Washington DC. What's your sense? Like what, when you're studying the United States at American foreign policy from somewhere on the other side of the world, how do you think that would relate? I know you've never studied it in the United States, but just as a sense, how do you think that would be different from somebody analyzing it and studying it in the United States? - I think it's different because whatever country a scholar is from, that countries geopolitics influences your study irrespective. How an American treats the American studies will be very different from how an Indian looks at it. Our strategic culture has influenced how we look at the world. In a lot of aspects, we find certain similarities, but we are also very quick to understand the differences or the difference of opinion. We hold about probably some really big, important issues. So I think it helps us understand the world better when you are not one of the states, student involved if you're getting what I mean. So as an Indian, probably I'm able to see the foreign policy a little more objectively in certain aspects. I think that stands true for every person in the world. If you're looking at something as a third person, there is a certain element of objectivity. So I think that element helps us to understand this field a little better maybe. - Yeah, well, differently, anyway. And I mean, and I think that that's one of the things that you recognize if you're, I think what I speak to people who've studied the United States from outside the United States, is there very, they're able to understand effects and consequences? - Yeah, absolutely. - Perhaps it at least a sharper and more acute way than sometimes when you're studying from things in the United States, when you're focused so much on process in the United States when you're studying these things. So, well, anyway, I wanted to bring you on for a couple of reasons, but one of the things is that you're doing a really interesting dissertation. And I was hoping that you could talk a little bit about that. We're at this really interesting inflection point in American foreign relations in the world, frankly. And, you know, your work is related to that. So, a Crete, can you tell me a little bit about what your dissertation? - Absolutely, so my research looks at how the US Japan Alliance evolved between the late 1990s and 2019, particularly in response to changes in the East Asian security architecture. I focus on two key drivers, number one, China's growing assertiveness, especially in the East China Sea, which involves Japan and North Korea's nuclear program. How these two developments have pushed both countries to rethink how the alliance functions. So, in my thesis, what I argue is that this led to a kind of reset in security cooperation. You can see that clearly in the revised defense guidelines, especially in 2015, which expanded Japan's role and made the alliance more operationally integrated. What's interesting is that even during periods of political tensions like under the Trump administration, as we are seeing, the alliance actually became more institutionalized and strategically important. So, overall, I show that the alliance has shifted from what was once a somewhat constrained Cold War era arrangement into a more proactive debtorings-oriented partnership, which is at the center of Indo-Pacific. - Right, interesting. Okay, so how would you describe the US-Japan relationship in the 1990s? Or maybe, actually, you mentioned the Cold War. Let's talk about during the Cold War. How would you describe the relationship during the Cold War? - So, I think, immediately after the war, second world war, the US occupation began. The SCAP at that time demilitarized Japan under Article 9 of the Constitution. That is when the San Francisco Peace Treaty also, you know, helped in ending the war. It was in 1951. And US-Japan Security Treaty allowed US bases for Japan's defense, especially during the Korean War, which was at that time very important for the US, for their Asia policy in general. So, in the early alliance phase, which I would say, what, 1950s to '60s, I think the treaty entered into force. Japan, at the time, did establish certain police policies, but Treaty of mutual cooperation and security was also signed in 1960. And it replaced the previous 1951 treaty. At that time, there were certain obligations, which both the sides fulfilled. US was taking full charge of Japan's security needs while Japan was trying to mobilize itself economically after the war and try to build itself again. And this was also the time when US had absolute control over its bases in Japan. During the '60s and '70s, That is when the Vietnam era adjustments started happening. When US opened relations with China that was a shock for Japan because up until then, Japan was unaware that US is being flexible about its Asia policy. But despite that, Japan worked its way around and the relationship came into full momentum. But even at that time, Japan was at the back front when it comes to security. US was taking proper care of Japan as Japan was trying to fulfill its burden sharing responsibilities. Again, things became intense between both the countries during the 80s and 90s because of the economic friction as Japan started growing economically. US worries came into picture. That was when everyone started declaring that Japan might one day surpass America in terms of economics. But luckily, despite all of that, their security relations didn't necessarily impact. So they were able to keep both these aspects of the relationship independent, which was very impressive. Even though they were institutionalizing the relationship, the friction sustained. This was also the time when phrases like Japan adrift, Japan passing, Japan bashing all of that started coming from Washington, DC. Because the worries were real, especially in the automobile sector. And I think it was only around the Clinton administration. It was only around when I think the first Taiwan-State crisis happened when the world saw Chinese military modernization, the proof of Chinese military modernization happening in that part of the region when North Korea backed out of NPT. Those were the times when everyone realized, okay, the Asian security architecture is changing and it's evolving. And Americans in Washington, DC saw a fresh impetus for the relationship. And that's when they realized that, okay, there are far more reasons for both the sides to converge. And that is when I think Joseph Nye and Richard Amitage were at the forefront in taking the relationship out from the past and giving it new direction. So I think the relationship has survived quite a lot if we look at it. And it is trying to make sense of the relationship even now, despite whatever that is happening in the world geopolitically. Yeah, okay, that's a great summary. I mean, I never occurred to me to think about what would Japan's response to when the United States decided to acknowledge China? I never thought to ask that question. So that's interesting. And it is, of course, in some of my own research, I look at the 1950s and that economic tension between the United States and Japan is already starting to exist in the textile sector. And so the fact that the automobile sector, kind of, electronics comes next, and then the automobile sector comes next. There is this sort of 40-year economic rivalry almost between the United States and Japan. And so, and yet, the United States is occupying Japan as basis in Japan. And so it is an interesting relationship that they managed to get these kind of compartmentalized. Despite the fact that there's a domestic population in the United States that was more controls on US Japanese trade because they feel themselves being displaced. Interesting. Okay, so when the Clinton administration, particularly under a Nye and Armadage, kind of shifts this relationship, and especially after, again, you mentioned the North Korea leaving the non-proliferation treaty and then the South China, sort of the Taiwan Strait crisis. So can you go into a little bit the first Taiwan Strait crisis and how that changes, maybe changes the relationship or changes the perspectives? I think so what happened was that was around, I think 1990, I might be messing my timeline, but it was the early 90s to mid 90s. And I think that was the time when both of these things happened simultaneously. And I think during the Taiwan Strait crisis, that is when the world took notice of China's military capabilities and then missile capabilities. Because up until then, everyone knew that China is rebuilding its military and China is strengthening its military. But before that, nobody had seen a proof. But the proof happened when the Taiwan Strait crisis happened. Similarly, everyone was aware that North Korea has missile ambitions. But nobody had seen. So after they left NPT and they started testing their missiles and few of them actually landed in the Sea of Japan. Those were the warning signals. And that is when the alarms went off, not only in Tokyo, but also in Washington, DC. And that is when they realized that the security alliance is not prepared to handle these new threats which are coming from the Asian region. So I think that was the turning point which made a lot of policy makers in Washington, DC to think about the relationship beyond the economic friction. Because up until then, the whole relationship was framed from the lens of Cold War politics. It was still the 1990s. The world did not know what awaited. And I think for the first time, the relationship understood that this is where we need to head. And now they understood that these are the new threat perceptions that are coming. So that helped in terms of molding the relationship for the future. So what did that new relationship start looking like? In the sense? Oh, in the sense of so what starts to change between the United States and Japan? Obviously there's some closer integration, but what does that actually mean? I think so at least my hypothesis discusses that the alliance has always been viewed as an anomalous alliance where people view that Japan is constitutionally constrained because of article nine, which basically means that Japan will not take up arms and pursue war to defend itself. It also talks about asymmetric burden sharing. It talks about how Japan utilizes America's nuclear umbrella and forward deployment in a certain crisis. If there happens to be one, how Japan is only limited to homeland defenses and how alliance is basically more about the hub and spokes alliance of America. It's just part of that system rather than an integrated command system. And all of these factors basically is the reason why for decades this relationship was viewed from that lens that there is something anomalous or because of lack of a better word, I would say some even viewed it as abnormal because that's not how modern relationships in it from a realist perspective worked. What started changing is that the alliance became even more integrated post 1990s and the threat perceptions made the policy, the alliance managers to look into the tactical and strategic aspects of the relationship. So now they talk about interoperability. Now they are having conversation about joint commands. Now they are talking about an actual scenario building. If certain crisis breaks down in certain parts of the region, how will both the forces come together and how they share intelligence. So for example, the second time the defense guidelines, the last defense guidelines was reviewed in 2015 and the reason why that happened was because of the Senkaku daio island dispute, that is the East China Sea dispute. And the second was again, the North Korean missile treaty program, all of that. That is when since then it's particularly even before that, for that motto. America has made it very clear that Senkaku daio island come under the ambit of the alliance treaty. That means that if a scenario comes where an actual war breaks out, Americans will defend or help defend Japan, including the Senkaku daio islands, which is telling because that wasn't always the case. So what I'm trying to say here is that the security changes in the region, they escalated at a very fast speed. All these changes that have happened in the alliance, they have happened from the 1990s to 20th century. 25, whereas the overall alliance, if we go back to their history from 1950s to 1990s, that was a lot of decade of institutionalizing it without yet having strong conversions of strategic ambitions and strategic goals. So that says a lot about how the geopolitics has heavily influenced the relationship. Yeah, I mean, I think that makes a lot of sense. And I, you know, it's sort of this recognition post-Cold War that the United States was going to have to rely on Japan for asking us of the Pacific security infrastructure. It wasn't going to be just, you know, Japan, you do what we say, right? It was, we cannot actual, the United States itself, cannot, you know, requires, as you mentioned, the hub and spoke kind of nature of the US alliance system, required a certain degree of empowerment to Japan and the fact that there was going to have to be more of a partnership when it came to confronting the emerging North Korean and Chinese threat. But of course, Japan was constrained by, it has been constrained by Article 9. Can you go, you know, can you talk a little bit about more about how Article 9 has made the interpretations of Article 9 have maybe changed in the last 20 years? Yeah, yeah. So I think because, well, within Japan, the idea of being a pacifist nation is very important and very integral to their strategic outlook. Japan prides itself to be a pacifist nation and it has been, a lot has to do with their memory of being the only state that has suffered a nuclear explosion. So because of all of that, the political fraternity and most importantly, the public is extremely sensitive and understandably so. However, a lot of right wing factions and right wing political school of thoughts within Japan have started pushing for better security and defense preparedness. Shinzo Abe, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe played a monumental role for that. He brought in a lot of changes. I think, I think around, I'm so sorry, I'm forgetting the dates, but he brought in a lot of important changes which helped expanding the understanding of the constitution and it made room for the alliance treaties to be to evolve. For example, before that their understanding was that only the areas, images to the Japanese parameter are considered the area which Japan should be, you know, be bothered about. And again, there were a lot of constitution constraints. However, there was structural shift. Now, the 2015 guidelines, for example, talks about situations in areas surrounding Japan that automatically extends the circumference of their understanding in terms of where the threat perception comes from and what directly impacts Japan, which wasn't the case in the past. One could not have thought of such understanding coming from Japan a few decades before if you ask me, but all of that happened because the right in Japan, the right wing politics in Japan, they argued about it. And to be fair, their arguments landed very well in Japanese diet because of whatever that was happening around them because every few days you're hearing in the newspaper that a missile from North Korea is landing in your backyard, just few kilometers from your coast. So all those things helped the public to understand that these changes are important and integral. Or for that matter, the kind of friction Japanese and Chinese faced at the peak of East China Sea disputes, which was 2014, early 2010s to mid-2000s, 2010s. And now it's again back in the news. If you look at the news, the Senkaku, the oil and dispute is again back in the news. So I think all these developments helped the Japanese public and the Japanese politics understand that and change for need is definitely necessary. Yeah, I mean, I think it's sort of this notion where let's just say hypothetically, China had invaded and reintegrated Taiwan back into mainland China. I mean, if you're a Japanese person, that is fundamentally reshaped your security concerns. And your strategic environment. And so the idea that constitutionally, you could not really do anything about that or participate in doing anything about that until your home islands were under threat is that, you know, that's a difficult notion to swallow because obviously, you know, if the people's Republic of China controls Taiwan, that fundamentally reshapes everything if your Japanese, your strategic environment. So, or, and, you know, it's not like in the Cold War before, where you had sort of the split on Sikalan Island between the Soviets and the Japanese, right? Where that was sort of a more obvious, you know, that was a constitutional threat that could be, or that was a threat that could be that Article 9 could accommodate. But Taiwan is a deal that Taiwan has got to island are different. So, yeah. Okay, so under Shinzo Abe, you start to see this, I hesitate to call it a remobilization because I think that goes too far. But yeah, it does. What starts, yeah, what changes under Shinzo Abe and how does that, what actually changes and the best of the infrastructure path? Actually, there were many. For example, there's now because of whatever, so first, there's so many. I'm trying to gather my thoughts. One of that is that he started structurally realigned their security and defense structure. He started the NSS, which was in the case in the past, the National Security Strategy. He started doing those annual reports, which was in the case in the past. He aligned a lot of security meetings, which weren't that frequent and often in the past administrations. He basically, I think weapons, weapons exports, that wasn't the case. They never did that in the past, but they started interacting with weapons, exports, and imports more actively. The budget, the defense budget, there has always been a cap, never beyond 1% because the right wing, the Shinzo Abe school of thought from the right wing has argued so much that now we are looking at the possibility of Japan having 2% of its GDP as its defense budget, which was unthinkable at one point. So, the chain started happening from there. So now in many ways, Japan is being proactive. Now the current Prime Minister is talking about counter strike capabilities, which was unheard of. So, all of those changes began from Abe. Major ones, I would say. I mean, I'm sure you can trace back few before him also, but he was one of the main leaders who I would say brought the change. Yeah, this is an enormous cultural and strategic shift for Japan. I don't think from this side of the world, it's sort of hard to conceptualize what a significant shift that is, where for 70 years, 60 years anyway, Japan was not only constrained diplomatically and legally, but there was a significant attempt by not only the United States, but Japanese governments in order to create, as you said, the sort of pacific society. Much like what happened in Germany. But those pacific societies can't last forever as new threats emerge. Or in the case of Germany, maybe old threats re-emerge, but the, as those threats emerge. And, you know, if this isn't the Cold War, the United States, domestic population won't accept the sort of global security hegemonic position that would accept during the Cold War. And so these partners have to be brought in. And now it is, I mean, we see World War II veterans, but they're not many around anymore. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's a, yeah. Sorry about that. No, no, no. I was just saying that I think if I have to, if I have to talk from a strategic standpoint, a conceptual standpoint, I think what the shift that happened in Japan was that from being a pacifist or a passive pacifist state, are they ushered in era where they became proactive pacifist, which was in the case in the past. And I think that soft narrative helped transitioning the audience towards whatever they are now heading towards because they could not have taken that extreme step anyway. It would have been a very big shock for the public. I think they tried to make arguments that up until now they only spoke on the lines of defending ourselves or defending ourselves as Japanese nationals. But then now they started talking about what it is like to support allies, like the US, which again, they wanted to show that we want to be someone who is taking care of the burden sharing argument because up until now, one of the arguments which came from Washington, BC, and there is a lot of merit to it also that there's asymmetry. The burden ends up falling more on America. So I think they prepared, they understood the geopolitical challenges that faced them, that they are in a new world now and the threat perception is a lot. It's right next to their borders or maritime borders. And they had to reframe passivism in a way, where it wasn't necessarily about non-involvement, but it was more about conditional engagement that we have to engage, but let's decide the conditions for it. I think that's what Shinzo Abe really did. And I think they are still trying to do. Yeah, I mean, this is, that's an enormous task. Right? You can have the democratic society. You can impose a new security structure without that. Even if you weren't an autocratic society, I mean, you need to shake the population in order to accept it. We saw that with the Meiji Revolution in Japan, right? That you couldn't the reason we call it a Meiji Revolution is it's not just industrializing. It's a massive, social, cultural shift. And what we're talking about here is not probably quite on the scale of that, but it's still significant. It's a different way of thinking from the last three generations. Whereas, you know, you compare that to South Korea. And in South Korea, even though there's a symmetry and the United States has had bases there ever since the Korean War, South Korea has felt itself in a war since 1950, since 1950. Yeah. Yeah. Right. That's a very, yeah. Because they've been in one. So that's a very different cultural space to be in, social space to be in, where you're doing prescription. And you're all day, you know, so much of your life is, I don't, I mean, not 24 hours a day or anything like that. But your life is sort of understood with this neighbor that you're having a conflict with. And if something changes in that, there's an expectation that you're going to have to pick up a rifle and do something about it. Whereas in Japan, that has not been the case. And I think in the United States, because it's on the other side of the world, it's easy to get those two societies a little bit confused in your heads. Yeah. And it's saying, okay, why are Japan and South Korea not doing the same thing? And it's like, no, no, this is this is very different history here. And say, what I want, a completely different history with Taiwan. And so, all right, I think, you know, I do really want to get into what's going on in India. So I'm going to, I'm going to do a hard, I'm going to exercise my, my moderators are augmentive and do a hard segue if that's okay. That's all right. All right. So a treaty, how would, let's start with the Indian perspective on maybe the relationship we were just talking about. What is your sense of the general Indian perspective, at least official perspective on, let's start with Japan. Indian perception on Japan. Indian perception on the US. Wherever you want to take it. Okay. I will start with the US. And then I think I'll get into Japan. I think so. Okay. Historically, the relationship between India and US, it transitioned from gold war, a strangement because at the time, US was involved in a heated rivalry with US S.R. and there were blocks. And India was not part of either of them. And India at the time was non-aligned. And that didn't really go well with the Americans. And all of that gold war experience led to a certain estrangement. However, things started changing, I think, from 1991, when India opened its economy, I think liberalization, globalization, privatization was introduced in India. And I think the world started moving towards a post-coral war era. So that gave the room for both the countries to re-engage with each other. And that is when the engagement really started happening. It has now probably, I think it has more or more or less reached to a situation in current times where there is a lot of strategic convergence. However, despite massive strategic convergence, I think it is still constrained by certain asymmetries. And I would not say in terms of capabilities because that's a different conversation altogether. But I think it's more about asymmetry and expectations in terms of what US expects of India and what India expects of the US. And how they look at the world in general and their lens to see. Okay. Now, I'm just going to say, I was hoping you could talk a little bit more about what you mean by convergence. you you you you [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] Yeah, okay. That's interesting. I think there's this, yeah. You know, first, I mentioned earlier, I think, although there's these ties, one of the things that I think also unites India with the United States is they might be the two most, for lack of a better word, heterolistic democracies in the world. They're messy democracies, but I mean, they're both huge democracies and they're both incredibly pluralistic, right? You'd be, I could be proven wrong on this, but if you look at the side, I mean, India's obviously a much larger democracy than the United States is, but both are incredibly pluralistic. Like you can find, I've always joked that in the United States, if you think there's this really crazy idea out there, I can find you 30,000 voters who hold that idea, right? And I mean, like, you know, could be flying spaghetti monster, I could find 30,000 voters who believe in the flying spaghetti monster or something like that, or like there's a cult of the flying spaghetti monster or something, right? And not even be more, might be 100,000 people, and that's not a shot at, that's not me trying to take a shot at the US, it's not at all. It's actually, I think incredibly a beautiful thing about this country that will wildly pluralistic, and India has the same thing, it's an incredibly pluralistic place. And so you can find a critical mass of people who believe anything in India. And so what that means is that we both have to have these domestic institutions that are messy, they're not perfect, they're not even elegant necessarily, but these messy domestic institutions in order to be able to handle what is a messy pluralistic democracy. And so if, you know, there's this notion of the way that we each country approaches the world a little bit from that understanding of the messy, the messy democracy's benefit. And so again, and I think that allows for a kind of a convergence, even if it's not necessarily, obviously India is going to view things very differently than the United States, it's location alone determines that, right? Let alone, you know, the history of British colonialism in India, the, it's own goals, the fact that it shares a border with Pakistan and there's these rivalry, you know, rivalry with Pakistan, but we've seen that the United States and India can be leaders in the region together, we see that with the quad, right? With Japan and Australia and, you know, Japan again, there we go. But there is this goal for a free and open Indo-Pacific that both countries do share. And maybe, you know, maybe this is what I'm getting at in that these messy pluralistic democracies beneath them is both countries, I mean, you mentioned India's a civilizational state. I don't know that the United States isn't a civilizational state in the same way, but they're both aspirational states. And, you know, they both have the huge middle classes that have these grand standard of living aspirations and that can overwhelm its politics sometimes. And I think that gives it a, there's an amazing amount of common ground there. And I know that, you know, so you mentioned the tariff issue. How, what is India's perspective on the way that the U.S. has tried to balance, speaking of balance, India, the India-Pacific relationship. , can you explain the Pahal Gamma tax for a second? (footsteps) (footsteps) (footsteps) (footsteps) (footsteps) And I'm just gonna just jump in here. And operations didn't do with the track down the perpetrators in the TLF, I believe, with the group. I am too. (footsteps) (footsteps) (footsteps) It was funny, '25, yeah, of you. (footsteps) (footsteps) [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] >> Why? [BLANK_AUDIO] >> Yeah, I think that's probably true. And I didn't, I wasn't sure how the average Indian person felt about Trump trying to take credit for that. But I do know how Modi felt about it. And he was not happy. And that did put some significant personal strain on the relationship between Modi and Trump. And here's the thing is that India, the United States are going to work together. But they're also going to pursue independent foreign policy. There's never going to be anywhere near the same type of convergence on foreign policy that you might see between the United States and Japan. As you'll see between the United States and India. And again, part of that is, again, India's perception of itself, part of it's the Americans perception of itself. But a big part of it is that the United States frankly, and especially the average person in the United States. However sympathetic and however much they let me like Indian people, doesn't care at all about Kashmir. Right? The average American does not care about Kashmir. And which is, so I think from the American perspective, I think it's mostly, why can't you guys figure this out? Right? And of course it takes two to tango and I'm not, we're not going to, I'm not going to let it get that by any stretch. But I think that's the, whereas for India, it's primary, maybe not its primary, but maybe it's primary. Geostrategic threat is Pakistan. And it's not the United States has, although the United States, Pakistani relationship is a very complicated relationship. And we don't have a million hours on a podcast to talk about that. But the United States, especially when the United States is in Afghanistan, relied a lot on the ISI, the Pakistani intelligence agency. A, B, not, and maybe they should not enough, but they did. And we've seen that in the United American and Iranian relationship, the United States relied on Pakistan a lot as an intermediary. And so there, there's a disconnect there. A very significant disconnect there. And, you know, and for instance, another place you see a disconnect with India and another North American country is Canada. So a creed is gone here and I'm very sorry to, to that, because I think the conversation was interesting. And I, I do feel badly because I had gotten the final word on the India-Pakistan relationship before she disappeared. And I don't think that's fair by any stretch of the imagination. My point was not to have the final word on the India-Pakistan relationship. I was trying to sort of give the American perspective and why there's this sort of sometimes this friction between India and the United States, maybe from the American perspective. And I was going to talk a little bit about the Canadian tension with India at this point, which has to do with diaspora politics. And we don't really have time to get into it. But anyway, the overall point that I was trying, that I think a creed in I were trying to get at is there's a lot of opportunities for convergence. There's a lot of work that goes on already between the United States and India. And they both have the shared geopolitical foe. They both have the shared desire to keep the Indo-Pacific free and open, which is sort of the mantra of the quad, which is a security relationship between the United States. India, Australia, and Japan. And that it's a relationship that I think both countries recognize as important. And the further we get into the 21st century, especially this relationship, this sort of shared synergy on technology, and is going to bear more and more fruits. And as the Indian economy continues to grow and the Indian middle class continues to grow. India is going to be one of the most significant factors in geopolitics. And so anyway, I'm not sure if I think a creed is back here. I've been filibustering, I think, pretty successfully for the last couple of minutes. But what I've sort of summarized by saying is that I'm moving forward for the United States. As India continues to, its economy continues to explode, frankly, not develop, it's explode. And becomes one of the economic leaders in the world if it isn't already. And the opportunities and the necessity of further integration and partnership with India is pretty obvious to me. But it's going to be, you know, relationship's take, that's relationship is going to take time because it's not necessarily built on, it's, it's a pretty new relationship in the world. Anyway, a creed, unfortunately, the technology has failed us a little bit here. So I will just conclude here by saying thank you very much to a creed for taking time out of for busy wedding planning. And thank you very much for those listening. We'll be again, thank you very much. And I will be back later this week. Thank you.