New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2018. xii, 256 pp. (Graphs.) £31.99, cloth. ISBN 978-0-19-947933-7.
Over a decade ago many panned the American-coined term “String of Pearls,” describing China’s quest for Indian Ocean military access and bases to surround India. Now this quest is being realized via China’s 2013 Maritime Silk Road (MSR) infrastructure investment program, yielding potential naval bases via “debt trap” acquisitions, overarched by China’s ongoing construction of a global power projection navy and its rapid development of military networks in Africa.
In David Brewsters’ 2018 edited volume, India and China at Sea: Competition for Naval Dominance in the Indian Ocean, a stellar group of experts from India, China, the United States, and Australia have produced a timely, even prescient volume that aids our understanding of the impact in the Indian Ocean region of China’s accelerating quest for global strategic power. It provides a much-needed update on the maritime dimension of the longstanding India-China strategic contest that will benefit students, scholars, and professionals.
Consisting of thirteen well-footnoted chapters, India and China at Sea seeks in three rough parts to examine key questions such as: what are China’s and India’s strategic maritime ambitions, especially in the Indian Ocean and how do they understand each other’s legitimate security roles; what are China’s strategic imperatives and does it have an Indo-Pacific naval strategy; and how will India respond to China’s growing presence and to China’s Maritime Silk Road economic initiative?
While it is not possible to mention all of the excellent contributions in this volume, of note in the first section dealing with contrasting “perceptions” is Brewster’s opening chapter on “A Contest for Status and Legitimacy in the Indian Ocean.” He examines China’s justifications and naval build-up seeking to protect its sea lines of communication (SLOCs) in the Indian Ocean, which many in Delhi view as a challenge to India’s regional leadership and as being “essentially illegitimate” (18), and concludes, “neither side seems able to comprehend the strategic concerns and sensitivities of the other” (34). In his chapter “Managing Maritime Competition between India and China,” Jingdong Yuan offers a frank Beijing perspective list of justifications for China’s growing need for SLOC protection, and acknowledges India’s worries about China’s increasing military presence, but concludes this rivalry can be managed and briefly warns against better US and Indian ties “undermining China’s security interests” (52). John Garver’s useful chapter explores the “Limitations on China’s Ability to Understand Indian Apprehensions,” which he provocatively ascribes to a kind of “autism” (75).
In the second section examining strategic and military imperatives, the chapter, “The Indian Ocean: A Grand Sino-Indian Game of ‘Go,’” by You Ji projects “the Indian Ocean will gradually become a linchpin for China’s new global naval reach” (91). He usefully reviews recent Chinese military strategy/doctrine developments impacting China’s Indian Ocean strategy and possible conflict scenarios and discusses the region impact of China’s aircraft carrier development. Srikanth Kondapalli offers an Indian view of “China’s Evolving Naval Presence in the Indian Ocean Region,” reviewing strategy evolutions, the history of its military build-up, linkages to its East Asian build-up, military-logistic limitation, and how China has pushed Washington and Delhi closer. Kondapalli concludes that despite there being no threat to China’s regional commerce, Beijing is “setting up a different kitchen” in the region (120).
Furthermore, Raja Menon succinctly explores a potential future Indian Ocean-based Chinese military network in his chapter “Scenarios for China’s Naval Deployment in the Indian Ocean,” which also warns of future Chinese debt trap acquisitions. But a unique contribution to the literature is Iskander Rehman’s chapter, “The Subsurface Dimension of the Sino-Indian Maritime Rivalry.” Rehman offers a detailed review of Chinese and Indian nuclear and conventional submarine forces and China’s increasing submarine presence in the Indian Ocean, with the real concern for India being, “whether China will one day choose to permanently forward-deploy submarines in India’s maritime backyard” (144).
A third section usefully examines Chinese and Indian views of the economic dimension of the Indian-Chinese rivalry, represented most prominently by China’s 2013 Maritime Silk Road initiative. In his chapter, “The Maritime Silk Route and India: The Challenge of Overcoming Cognitive Divergence,” Zhu Li offers a Chinese perspective on the history and investment priorities of the MSR, explores the range of Indian positive reactions and negative concerns, but concludes the “Chinese and Indian governments should actively seek common interests in the MSR” (205). Indian concerns, caution, and doubts about the MSR are usefully explored in Jabin T. Jacob’s chapter, “China’s Evolving Strategy in the Indian Ocean Region: Risks in China’s MSR Initiative.”
In the concluding chapter,“India and China: Terms of Engagement in the Western Indo-Pacific,” prominent Australian observer Rory Medcalf states that for India, “the accelerated arrival of China as a security player should be cause for neither panic nor complacency” (232). While noting that China could chose to act unilaterally, he suggests that India enhance its own defence capabilities and seek greater maritime cooperation with democracies and friends, as it looks for opportunities to militarily engage China. India and China at Sea handily advances its objectives and is a recommended resource. For scholar networks concerned with China’s strategic rise in other regions like Africa, Latin America, and Central Asia, India and China at Sea provides a template for consideration.
Richard D. Fisher, Jr.
International Assessment and Strategy Center, Alexandria, USA