India's policy of nonalignment with a tilt toward Moscow contrasted sharply with Japan's role as the bastion of U.S. forward deployment in the Asia-Pacific. The Japanese were irritated at perceived airs of sanctimonious superiority among Indians; the latter were unimpressed by Japan's materialistic drive to economic growth. The persistence of poverty in India and the successful drive to prosperity in Japan changed the basis of the bilateral relationship. Today, Japan is the biggest aid donor to Asia and India.

Japan remains critical of India's protectionist and nuclear policies. Japanese investors are discouraged partly by the social and political instability of South Asia, and partly by the complex and restrictive foreign capital laws and the miles of red tape that confront investors.

The Indian economy has been opening to domestic and international competition since 1991. Indian officials point to a vast middle class which offers a stable and expanding market; an abundance of technical and managerial skills; and the easy availability of Indian partners who no longer spend most of their energies in getting round an over-regulated system. India also has a proven record in adapting management styles to match new technology.

India can be a useful conduit for Japan to outflank uncomfortable historical memories in Southeast Asia. Japanese interests and capabilities are so much at variance with India's that New Delhi has never vied to compete with Tokyo for influence in Southeast Asia. Not sharing East Asia's baggage of bitter wartime memories, India is more relaxed at the prospect of a militarily more powerful Japan.

While Japan has worked for the antinuclear cause from within the Nonproliferation Treaty, India has been its most prominent critic. Indians underestimate the depth and breadth of Japanese revulsion to nuclear arms and the sense of sadness and betrayal that the land of Buddha, Gandhi and Nehru should embrace nuclear weapons. Indians have more of a point in saying that each country has to make its own decision on reconciling tensions between commitments to international idealism and the requirements of national security. Japan has not been immune to this dilemma on the nuclear issue.

Tokyo's security planners awoke to the potential for limited military cooperation with India after a Japanese cargo ship captured by pirates in the Indian Ocean last year was rescued by Indian naval forces. India could be helpful in safeguarding critical sea lanes for the passage of oil across the Indian Ocean.

The competition between New Delhi and Tokyo for permanent membership of the U.N. Security Council could be converted into cooperation, to mutual advantage. Their credentials and political constituencies are complementary, not competitive.

Japan is an industrialized non-nuclear country whose status as the world's largest aid donor contrasts sharply with constitutional restrictions on the use of military force abroad. India, a developing country with nuclear weapons, has contributed more personnel to U.N. peacekeeping than any other country. While Japan relies principally on economic instruments to pursue foreign policy, India has developed diplomatic tools to offset lack of economic muscle in world affairs.

The prospects of both succeeding simultaneously by helping each other's candidacy would be greater than that of either acting singly for just one more permanent seat.

Both are mature liberal democracies, even if one is more volatile and the other more predictable. They come together in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Regional Forum in Asia. Although there are many differences between Japan and India, they should at least explore the prospects of working together on the bigger world stage.

Ramesh Thakur is vice rector of the United Nations University. These are his personal views.

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