Russia ratified the Reciprocal Exchange of Logistics (RELOS) agreement with India in early December, practically on the eve of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit, which is why news of the move was largely lost in the media shuffle.
As the name implies, RELOS grants each country’s troops, ships and aircraft logistical access to the other’s facilities, but it does not provide for permanent military bases on the other’s territory. The purpose is to ease the organization of joint exercises, with a view toward holding them more frequently.
In practice, the Indian armed forces could begin drilling in the Arctic and become a more regular sight in the Russian Far East while Moscow’s forces may be seen more often in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR). This would informally expand each side’s presence in thesse areas, serving as a symbolic joint display of their rising influence across Eurasia.
As explained here ahead of Putin’s trip, Russia and India envision midwifing tri–multipolarity as a stepping stone toward complex multipolarity, or “multiplexity”, and RELOS is one means to that end.
To elaborate, Russia is unlikely to grant China the logistical access to its military facilities that it has just extended to India, as doing so could lend false credence to pernicious Western media speculation that they’re mutual defense allies. Such perceptions could, in turn, frame Russia as an intractable foe of the US.
By contrast, India has sought to bridge the divide between Russia and the US since Narendra Modi’s ascent to the premiership in May 2014, which coincided with the deteriortion of ties between Washington and Moscow.
Although Russia’s relations with the US unexpectedly deteriorated over the summer for the reasons explained here, they’re far from irreparable, and the renascent Russian–US “New Détente” set into motion by Trump’s 28-point Russian-Ukrainian peace deal framework can help improve them.
As detailed in the recent analysis about “How A Rapprochement With Russia Helps The US Advance Its Goals Vis-a-vis China”, the US doesn’t want Russia becoming disproportionately dependent on China.
That scenario would turbocharge China’s superpower trajectory by granting it effectively unlimited access to Russian resources and thus intensifying its systemic rivalry with the US.
This scenario could be averted through a post-Ukraine Russian-US strategic partnership centered on energy and critical minerals cooperation. Trilateralizing such an arrangement through India’s inclusion would help Russia avoid dependence on the US while further reducing the already remote risk that Russia could weaponize its control over these resources to exert pressure on the US.
RELOS fits into this framework by serving as a friendly military complement to the expansion of Indian economic influence in Russia’s resource-rich Arctic and Far Eastern regions.
The resulting increase in Indian naval transits through the South and East China Seas en route to more frequent drills with Russia could be framed by India as a nonprovocative response China’s expanding naval influence in the IOR, without worsening tensions. That approach, in turn, might also please the US.
The new US National Security Strategy calls on India to play a greater role in the South China Sea, a move New Delhi has been reluctant to make to avoid provoking Beijing. However, increased naval transits through those waters could represent a compromise that helps repair ties with the US.
In this way, RELOS can bolster Russia’s Sino-Indian balancing strategy while also facilitating its “New Détente” with the US, though doing so would require unprecedented coordination among Russian, Indian and US policymakers.
This article was first published on Andrew Korybko’s Substack and is republished with kind permission. Become an Andrew Korybko Newsletter subscriber here.
