A new Cold War is brewing in the Indian Ocean, with an informal alliance of the United States, India, Australia, Japan on one side and China on the other. While tensions in the ocean are not yet as pitched as in the hotly contested South China Sea, the potential for conflict is unmistakably rising in the high stakes strategic theater.
More than 60% of the world’s oil shipments pass through the Indian Ocean, largely from the Middle East’s oil fields to China, Japan and other fuel-importing Asian economies, as does 70% of all container traffic to and from Asia’s industrialized nations and the rest of the world.
While traffic across the Atlantic has diminished in recent years and that which crosses the Pacific is mainly static, trade through the Indian Ocean is fast growing. Maintaining the security of that trade and other navigation is the ostensible reason for the annual Malabar naval exercises between India, Japan and the United States.
For the first time in modern history, China is making its own inroads into the Indian Ocean region to protect its trade routes and energy supplies. Although this may appear innocuous on the surface, it is has put China on what could become a collision course with the US and its regional allies — hence the new informal, anti-China oriented alliance in the region.
Strategic ripples are gathering. At Obock in Djibouti, situated on the Horn of Africa and overlooking the southern gateway to the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, China has established its first foreign military base, ostensibly to fight piracy.
Yet the facility is located next to a key US military facility, also in Djibouti. More importantly, it is also close to other bigger US bases in the region, including a huge facility at Diego Garcia just south of the Equator in the Indian Ocean, as well as US installations in Gulf countries.
![-FILE PHOTO 08OCT02- A U.S. B-2 Spirit bomber, part of the 509th Bomb Wing at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri, stops for refueling at the U.S. military base on Diego Garcia in this file photo taken October 8, 2001, following an air strike mission over [Afganistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.] The United States is preparing to deploy heavy B-2 bombers to Britian and the Indian Ocean Island of Diego Garcia, if necessary in time to lead an attack on {Iraq], the officer in charge of the fleet said on October 30 2002. (CREDIT : REUTERS/U.S. Department of Defense/Senior Airman Rebeca M. Luquin/Handout) EDITORIAL USE ONLY - RTXLL8Y](https://i0.wp.com/static.atimes.com/uploads/2017/06/US-Diego-Garcia-B-2-Bomber-November-2-2002.jpg?resize=780%2C423)
China’s main regional rival, India, has always considered the Indian Ocean as its “own lake” in South Asian sphere of influence. As such, New Delhi is known to be extremely worried about China’s growing forays into the region, especially as security officials have observed Chinese submarine activity uncomfortably close to its Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
In 2001, India created a new Far Eastern Naval Command (FENC) based on those archipelagos to protect its interests in the region. The plan for its establishment was reportedly hatched in 1995 after a closed-door meeting in Washington between India’s then prime minister P. V. Narasimha Rao and US president Bill Clinton. The plan was finalized when Clinton visited India in 2000.
As Indian journalist Sudha Ramachandran wrote in Asia Times on October 19, 2005: “FENC will have state-of-the-art naval electronic warfare systems that can extend as far as Southeast Asia.” FENC is also India’s first and only joint command that includes the army, the navy and the air force with two naval bases, 15 ships, four air force and naval air bases, and two army brigades.
Australia, which controls the strategically situated territories of Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, appears equally concerned about China’s recent emergence in the Indian Ocean. Australia’s signals intelligence facility on the Cocos closely monitors movements in the maritime region.
If superpower rivalry between the US and China, or increased tension between China and India, comes to a head in the Indian Ocean, then Australia will be well-placed to defend its interests and aid allies.
And then there is France, which does not take part in joint naval exercises but is a US partner in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). While the least prominent of the regional powers, because of its possession of small islands scattered across the maritime region, its exclusive economic zone in the Indian Ocean measures 2.5 million square kilometers.
Apart from its overseas departments of Mayotte and Réunion, France controls the huge, non-inhabited island of Kerguelen and nearby Crozet Archipelago and Ile St Paul et Ile Amsterdam, as well as smaller uninhabited islands around and east of the African island nation of Madagascar.
There is a satellite tracking facility on Kerguelen and about a hundred “scientists” based on the Crozet Archipelago and St Paul-Amsterdam on a rotation basis. The French military also has an infantry regiment on La Réunion, and the French Foreign Legion is present on Mayotte to help guard its far-flung regional interests, many rooted in its past colonial era.
China’s new and highly touted “One Belt One Road” (Obor) initiative, unveiled in October 2013 to extend the region’s infrastructure and promote more trade, underlines Beijing’s intention to become a global power. “The Silk Road Economic Belt” alludes to the old Silk Road, which in ancient times connected the East and the West along trade routes from Europe through Central Asia to China.
But given conflicts and political instability in countries along that route, “the Maritime Silk Road” through the Indian Ocean is bound to become the more important of the two initiatives.
Not since Zheng He, a Muslim eunuch from China’s southwestern province of Yunnan, sailed his fleets through the Indian Ocean in the 15th century — and then explored and mapped the region in a bid to impose imperial control over trade, win favor with the areas’ peoples, and extend the empire’s tributary system — has China been as present in the region.
That empire eventually fell with wars at home, and in subsequent centuries China was not even remotely a naval power. The republic, which was established in 1912, concentrated mainly on riverine warfare and was no match for the then Imperial Japanese Navy, which fortified Tokyo’s occupation of Chinese territories in the 1930s and 1940s.
Reuters/Soe Zeya Tun
Until the late 1980s, the navy of the People’s Republic of China, was also a brown-water force, meaning it did not have the deep water reach of the US and other naval powers. It was not until the 1990s, following the fall of the Soviet Union and a shift towards more assertive foreign and security policies, that China’s leaders looked past land border disputes and turned their attention towards the oceans.
By then, China was also becoming an economic power that needed a strong military, including a navy, to protect its trade and other maritime interests. Today, as China’s forays in the Indian Ocean and countering joint naval exercises show, potential great power battle lines are forming.
While the situation is still far removed from open confrontation, the Obor initiative and China’s new military facility at Obock are threatening to break the calm. And while China is in the Indian Ocean to stay, the emerging alliance designed to counter that influence may not for much longer remain informal and hidden behind joint naval exercises without any officially stated geopolitical purpose.
Convergence of interests is inevitable especially given China’s gorwth in economic, Geo political and military spheres and the differing opinions on South China Sea.
As the Arabs traditionally control trades and religious transmission to the Indian Ocean, the Wahhabis can be utilised by the West for the Indian Ocean geopolitics but, incidentally will incite IS type Jihad against the West as well.
The differing opinions on the South China Sea posed a difficult question to the world community. China claims she owns almost 90% of the sea which claim means China’s territorial waters in the SCS is about 1,000 mile wide, while all the other littoral countures have only a12 nautical mile wide territorial waters. Do you agree China should have such a wider territorial sea? Besides, will China extend her claim to other seas? Will other countries follow China’s example and claim thousands of nautical miles as their marine territories?
Nuke China now to prevent WWIII.
China has 2 cards to play they can push pakistan to nuke India and north korea to nuke Japan or they may prop up some communist militia only thing is the brown man,japanese,koreans will suffer while the yellow man & white man will be safe in his gilded golden towers
The US needs to go home and leave Asia to Asians. Our wars of hegemony and imperialism throughout the world are proof that our goals within Asia are not worthy. OBOR allows China a route avoiding the Malacca straits, as well as participation by other nations that will bring about prosperity and progress. We, the US offer only death and destruction, with the blood of millions on our hands.
Another turd pie from chef bertil
"Will other countries follow China’s example and claim thousands of nautical miles as their marine territories?"
Well if they have money bags as big as China’s and know how to use it to smack the other claimants silly with $$$ sign twirling around their heads forgetting all about the issue then, maybe, yes? 😉
China is not alone in using money to "buy" this way
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/06/egypt-lawmakers-approve-island-transfer-saudi-arabia-170614142446099.html
On a more serious note China’s claim was "valid" until 1987 when UNCLOS was signed, or until 2016 when UNCLOS finally clarified its position on maritime claims depending on how you see it. Its a new international law asking China to adjust to it rather than often misinterpreted China expanding claims. Befor that 12 nautical miles of national sea territory was the norm and beyond that its free for all. Vietnam, Phillippines both also have just as ridiculous "sea" boundaries all those decades except they didnt get blown out of porportion by Media like China did.
Plus China always maintained a position of negotiations with other claimant states throughout and no one was forced to sign into stone any thing.
What’s even more funny is, do you know what didn’t happen for all 7 years of flare up in SCS due to UNCLOS? For full 7 years US screams at China citing UNCLOS but could not ratify UNCLOS treaty itself for all 7 years. Well there goes the "leading by example" leadership.
Mean while, the other supposed "law abiding leader" Japan, was busy chasing whales, Can’t even abide by a simple whaeling ban LOL
https://news.mongabay.com/2016/03/japan-kills-333-whales-including-200-pregnant-females/Wu
Your Chinese history about Chinese navy is exagerated or even false as compared with the history you quoted from the author.
I doubt the Indians who are very good only in talking will be able to stop the Chinese from coming to the Indian ocean. However if the West encourages the Wahhabi Jihadists to attack the Chinese vessels coming to their ports to collect the oil they purchased, it will be a whole different geopolitical game. In any case, the West will also have to bear a lot of the pains as the Wahhabis are intended not only on attacking China but more so, in taking over the West eventually.
Actually I see very little in the way of Xi needs for what the Indians possess, On the other hand, if CIA and NATO can turn their Wahhabi Jihadists or moderate bros as called in the Western mainstream media to destroy or disrupt the Chinese shipping in the Indian Ocean the Uncle Sam can effectively deny the Xi dude of the Oil and natural resources from the Middle East and Africa.
Drop dead loser!
You like the Commie Chinese that much, go there and live with them….
Quang Nguyen you sound lik an israhelli shill
Quang, I have lived with the Chinese, people are people everywhere, and no one deserves to be murdered or forced out of their homes, their families and communities destroyed because bully’s want to steal and control their resources. My nation is doing that to everyone. Your suggestion of nuking anyone, is reprehensible.
My dear, one has to have a brain to understand that the killing of inncoents is wrong, first!
Wood Wu it’s a simple question of how much one can get away with.
let’s answer your quesiton with a few questons:
do you agree USA broke the internationla law by lyng twice about Iraq and invaded Iraq using lies?
Do you agree USA has the right to establish miliotary bases anyplace it chooses and to place military equplemt there that clearly isnt defensive but offensive in nature?
Do you agree USA has th right to occupy Afganistan for amost 20 eyars now under the pretence of fighting Taliban, then Ali Queda and now
ISIS?
Do you agree USA has broken international law numerous timess an
commited war crimes by bombing Syria, a sovern country?
Do you aree Saudi has commited war crimes by invading Yemen?
Do you want USA to be tried in the court of internatinal crime for using phosphorus a few weeks on MOsul?
If the situation was reversed and CHina was in USA’s place being able to control UN and media and present itself as the good guy" while USA was in CHina’s place trying to assert its right, will you be askign the exact same questions?
Geoff Perkins yes obvious shill is obvious.
Maybe they should nuke you first, the one with the bigest mouth.
Hopefully everyone will carm down and find a propper salution!?
Quang Nguyen Welcome to Chinese family….