Indian Ocean is not India's Ocean

The famous phrase attributed to a Chinese defence official years ago, had sent shock waves down the spines of the South Block (India's equivalent of the pentagon) mandarins. Finally, the chinese had openly declared their intent to control the vast Indian Ocean, thereby controlling the sea-lanes to and from south east asia and the middle east.

South Block went into a tizzy. They were not sure if this was an open official statement of the Chinese government or perhaps the personal opinion of a defence official. Far worse, it could be China's way of testing the waters, testing the reaction of India and India's security and defence establishment.

For reasons obvious, the Indians did not react. They played down the remark. This has been typical for quite sometime now. Whenever there is an off the cuff remark from China attributed to some top chinese government source, India blindly downplays it. Perhaps India does not know how to react or probably they don’t want to wake a sleeping dragon!

The previous government of India defense minister had once stated that China was India's enemy number one and that china was slowly but surely encircling the country. Though many security experts agree, this open statement by the top defence official was totally undiplomatic and unbecoming of a country aspiring to be among the biggies.

And where did India site the Chinese encirclement - in the Myanmarese island of coco’s. The Indian's were paying for their mistake of ignoring the junta in Myanmar and supporting Aung Sang Sui Kyi. Please don’t mistake me. I have all respect for the lady. But surely, India should first protect its interest before running around supporting movements in other countries and that too at the cost of India's interest.

So they pointed at Coco's island and screamed that china was slowly but steadily encircling India. That china was slowly but steadily reaching into the Indian ocean.

Lets get things straight. The danger from china in the Indian Ocean is not as huge as its being portrayed. The general public in India were fed with nonsense like the Chinese navy would surround the country on the Indian Ocean side and so threaten even the south indian land mass. This is ridiculous.

The New York times published a report recently titled "Chinese navy buildup gives pentagon new worries" outlining how the chinese navy is upgrading and expanding itself. The report citied US officials closely monitoring the build-up, as saying that it has been quite impressive.

Years ago when Taiwan had elections, China menacingly lobbed missiles over taiwan to threaten her from moving too close to independence. At that time, no one believed that china had a strong enough navy to invade taiwan, especially with the clinton administration sending in a detachment of the 7th fleet as a show of force. But today, china has moved considerably to plug those gaps. Though it may be decades before china could pose a challenge to the US Seventh fleet in the pacific, they are moving in that direction.

Added to this is the suspicion with which japan and korea (south) view the chinese buildup. It won’t be too long before Japan shakes off its WW 2 constitution’s restrictions on its defence capabilities. Once that’s done, china will have 2 headaches in the pacific. One, the us support of taiwan and two a resurgent japan. This is bound to keep china completely hands full in its primary naval theatre. It would be a very long time before she is able to build up forces on two fronts - indian ocean and the pacific. Her prime directive will be to establish her supremacy in and around the china sea.

For India, the Indian ocean is her primary naval theatre. The Chinese will not be able to threaten her as much as other navies in the area could. But by concentrating on the chinese naval threat in the Indian ocean, India forgets that there are other countries that are playing it out right at her doorstep and she is unable to do anything about it.

It has taken a very long time for India to establish the andaman and nicobar far eastern theatre command. There were reports that australia was not too enthusiastic with this Indian expansionist attitude!!

Countries like Indonesia and Australia are the potential competitors wishing to carve up the Indian ocean for themselves. And of course there is the us fifth fleet sitting pretty. For now, the us controls everything that goes on there and can project its power at moments notice.

India should be worried about the threat from the other navy's criss-crossing the indian ocean rather than make a hue and cry over just the Chinese threat.

Yes, china could be part of the threat but not entirely.

Indian ocean has to become india's ocean, not just in name but in sphere of influence.