Indian Defence Review

This will require greater engagement with Russia over the serious concerns it has about US/NATO policies towards it, including installing a missile defensive system in Eastern Europe. Separately, the Russians have cobbled together the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a security organization grouping the Central Asian states as a riposte to US penetration of the region. Oddly, because of the previous status of these countries as part of the Soviet Union, the European security orientation of this region has not vanished. It is, in fact, evidenced by its linkages to NATO and Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), with Kazakhstan’s ambition to be the next chairman of the OSCE. India, along with Pakistan, Iran and Outer Mongolia, has observer status in the SCO. There is the Russian hype that the SCO can, when mature, be the kernel of an Asian Collective Security System, a kind of an Asian NATO, but founded on superior principles — more democratic and without the overriding writ of a single power.

South–East Asia was the first to evolve a security framework of its own in Asia — the ASEAN Regional Forum. India is a member and so are the US and Russia, not to mention China, Japan and South Korea. The management by South-East Asian states of their security environment has been a remarkable success. These countries are diverse ethnically, religiously, linguistically, culturally and economically. They do not have a common history, with most of them having been colonized by different countries in the past. Amongst them are those that have fought the US bitterly and those that have security arrangements with the US. Some of these countries have Islamic orientation and others feel threatened by Islamic elements. Some have regimes that are anathema to the West and yet the organization can absorb the strains arising from that in their overall relations with the West. The ASEAN is creating a peaceful space for itself in which they can maintain their economic prosperity, insulated from great power rivalry.

This fits in well with our ‘Look East Policy’ and our growing engagement with the region. As we have no intention, or capacity, to dominate the region, our interest is to prevent it moving into China’s orbit as China continues its scorching growth, develops its military strength, seeks to protect its sea lanes through the Malacca Straits and leverages its ground strength in these countries by way of local Chinese communities already economically dominant in some countries. We have a growing commonality of interest with Japan, increasingly vulnerable to China’s mounting strength. Japan, of course, relies on the US for security, but this has made it a politically feeble. Japan’s political and military ambitions are not contrary to our interests; they are a problem for China. The security cooperation agreement we have recently signed with Japan is a step in the right direction.

The outstanding territorial differences between Japan and Russia handicap the former in increasing its independent role in the region. Japan has less diplomatic weight in Russia on this account as it might have had otherwise. This increases China’s relevance to Russia in developing its eastern Siberian and far-eastern territories, especially their oil and gas resources. The harnessing of these resources for China’s future growth is not desirable from the Japanese or Indian points of view. We are partners in Sakhalin 1 and could team up potentially with Japan in developing hydrocarbon resources in that area, provided Russia-Japan relations improve.

Japan faces a major security problem, and so does South Korea, because of North Korean nuclear and missile capability. Just as China gave Pakistan nuclear and missile capability to corner India, it is entirely possible it has given this capability to North Korea to corner Japan. US and Japan have become dependent on Chinese goodwill to resolve this problem, giving time to China to leverage US and Japanese strengths for accelerating its rise as a power. As it grows stronger, China can dispense with the North Korean card. Russia is cooperating in eliminating North Korean capability because of its deleterious impact on the non-proliferation regime, of which it is a staunch supporter.

In the emerging security landscape in Asia, the most important development is China’s inexorable rise. This is already changing the balance of power in Asia. A growing power may attract apprehensions, but it also attracts engagement. China’s double-digit growth rate for well over a decade has integrated it with the global economy far more than India is. It is commonly accepted that China will become the world’s second leading power by 2020, when China expects to achieve its goal of becoming a middle-income country. As China’s interests stretch across the globe, it will want to develop the means to protect them. It is inconceivable that China’s economic rise will not be accompanied by the expansion of its military capabilities. Many in the West believe that China so far has been restrained in the military domain and the expansion of its nuclear arsenal has been slow. On the other hand, the Chinese are seen to be developing certain advanced technologies such as anti-satellite capability, additional nuclear submarines for which a large facility at Hainan is being built, apart from building an aircraft carrier and testing a submarine-launched ICBM.

China may be inviting engagement and economic bonding, but not political trust or mutually supportive alliances. It has many problems with countries in the region, but its strategy is to neither create a confrontation with others over them, nor resolve them. It is belligerent over Taiwan, yet has built a strong economic relationship with it. With Japan, the underlying tensions are high, yet Japan is the largest foreign investor in China. China has built a strong economic relationship with Australia, which is making Australia well-disposed politically to China too, reflected in its decision to take no further part in the Quadrilateral Initiative comprising of US, Japan, Australia and India. China’s policies are astute and it is getting away with its pretensions of “peaceful rise”. It is too big a country to ignore, too successful economically not to attract partners, too financially strong, with reserves of 1.9 trillion dollars not to have clout, especially now with a financial crisis confronting the world, and too old a civilization not to respect. Its management of the Olympic games has marveled many; its success in winning the largest number of gold medals has demonstrated its capacity to achieve goals it sets for itself, and is a kind of psychological warfare against traditional big powers.

In search for raw materials and markets, China is going into all corners of the globe. It has expanded its presence in Africa from where it has begun to procure oil and commodities. To protect its lines of communication, it is pursuing the famous “string of pearls” strategy of seeking port facilities in countries across the Indian Ocean. For the time being the Indian Navy is the dominant littoral navy in this area. We have to make an assessment of China’s strategic aims and whether in the foreseeable future, it will have the ability to pose a challenge to us in the Indian Ocean, considering that to maintain a credible force so far away from its own territory will not be easy; more so as it will have its hands full in contending with the challenge of the US 7th Fleet, as well as Japan and Taiwan.

The US will remain a part of the security landscape of Asia. It is part of US’s declared strategy not to allow a rival power to emerge. US engagement with China is to control its behaviour, give it incentives to work within the US created international system and not aspire to wreck it. The mutuality of interest created between the two is a disincentive to rocking the boat by either side. US has seen that within the framework of this arrangement, it can continue to arm Taiwan and ensure its security, maintain and even strengthen its defence arrangements with Japan and be present militarily in the Korean peninsula, besides being present in South-east Asia as an insurance against any Chinese attempts at hegemony. US and China have found it possible to work together to attempt to denuclearize North Korea, though China’s real calculations, given its record of transferring nuclear and missile technology to Pakistan and its presumed knowledge of the North Korea-Pakistan missile versus nuclear know-how equation, should invite distrust. China is, at one level, not averse to the USJapan Defence Pact as it constrains those in Japan in favour of building an independent defence capability.

For us, the US presence and role in South-east and Far East Asia have a positive security dimension as it keeps China in check. We have no reason to be averse to the US-Japan-Australia security cooperation in that region. One of the unspoken reasons for US’s decision to bend its nonproliferation policy to accommodate India is to prepare for the emergence of a better balance in Asia consequent upon the rise of China. To this extent India can profit from its engagement with the US without creating overt tensions with China, Russia may not be too concerned. It has its own longer-term concerns about China; its decision to give a degree of strategic reach to the Indian armed forces has a China dimension, apart from purely commercial interests.