China's Naval Ambitions in the Indian Ocean

Abstract

This article argues that an increasingly sea-power-minded China will neither shelter passively in coastal waters, nor throw itself into competition with the United States in the Pacific Ocean. Rather, Beijing will direct its energies toward South and Southeast Asia, where supplies of oil, natural gas, and other commodities critical to China's economic development must pass. There China will encounter an equally sea-power-minded India that enjoys marked geostrategic advantages. Beijing will likely content itself with ‘soft power’ diplomacy in these regions until it can settle the dispute with Taiwan, freeing up resources for maritime endeavors farther from China's coasts.

Key Words:

• China
• Indian Ocean
• Soft Power
• Energy Security
• Maritime Strategy

Acknowledgments

The views in this article are their own, and not those of the US Navy, the US Naval War College, the Department of Defense, or any other US government agency.

Notes

¹Asia Pacific Research Centre, Energy in China: Transportation, Electric Power and Fuel Markets (Tokyo: Asian Pacific Research Centre 2004), 5.

²See US Energy Information Administration, ‘China’, EIA Country Analysis Briefs, July 2004, <http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/china.html>.

³A RAND study of China's economic vulnerabilities posited a scenario in which a 25 percent contraction in global oil supplies resulted in a sustained tripling of prices over a ten-year period (2005–15). The study concluded that China would suffer an annual reduction of 1.2–1.4 percent to its economic growth rate. The expected consequences of an energy crisis were among the most severe economic setbacks the study considered. See Charles Wolf Jr, K.C. Yeh, Benjamin Zycher, Nicholas Eberstadt and Sung-Ho Lee, Fault Lines in China's Economic Terrain (Santa Monica, CA: RAND 2003), 105–16.

⁴See for instance ‘Mainland May Face a Crippling Oil Shortage by 2020’, South China Morning Post, 26 July 2004.

⁵US Energy Information Admin., ‘China’.

⁶Philip Andrews-Speed, The Strategic Implications of China's Energy Needs (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies July 2002), 25.

⁷Guy Caruso, EIA Administrator, Testimony to US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, 108th Congress, 30 Oct. 2003, 8.

⁸US National Intelligence Council, Report of the National Intelligence Council's 2020 Project: Mapping the Global Future (Washington DC: Government Printing Office Dec. 2004), 50, 62.

⁹David Walgreen, ‘China in the Indian Ocean Region: Lessons in PRC Grand Strategy’, Comparative Strategy 25 (2006), 59. For a Chinese perspective on India's rise, see Deng Ruixiang, ‘Assessing the Question of India's Rise’, Guoji Wenti Yianjiu 1 (2006), 37–42.

¹⁰See for example Zhang Lijun, ‘Analyzing India's Energy Strategy’, Guoju Wenti Yianjiu 5 (2006), 65–66.

¹¹Hou Songlin, ‘India's “Look East Policy” and the Development of Indian-ASEAN Ties’, Dangdai Yatai 5 (2006), 42.

¹²Zhu Fenggang, ‘The Impact of the Maritime Strategies of Asia-Pacific Nations’, Dangdai Yatai 5 (2006), 34.

¹⁴Shi Hongtao, ‘China's “Malacca Straits”’, Qingnian Bao, 15 June 2004, Foreign Broadcast Information Service (hereafter FBIS), FBIS-CPP20040615000042.

¹³Some 80 percent of China's oil imports, accounting for 40 percent of total Chinese oil consumption, passes through the Strait, giving rise to what Chinese President Hu Jintao has called China's ‘Malacca Dilemma’. US Office of the Secretary of Defense, Annual Report on the Military Power of the People's Republic of China, 2005 (Washington DC: Government Printing Office 2005), 33. On China's demand for petroleum, see David Hale, ‘China's Growing Appetites’, National Interest 76 (Summer 2004), 137–47.

¹⁵Zhang Yuncheng, ‘The Malacca Strait and World Oil Security’, Huanqiu Shibao, 5 Dec. 2003, FBIS-CPP20031217000202.

¹⁶Zhu, ‘Impact of the Maritime Strategies of Asia-Pacific Nations’, 36.

¹⁸Ibid.

¹⁷Editorial, ‘US-Indian Alliance Against China’, Ming Pao, 17 Aug. 2005, FBIS-CPP20050817000043.

¹⁹See Qing Tong, ‘2002: Focus on Guam’, Kuang Chiao Ching, 16 Oct. 2002, FBIS-CPP20021018000075.

²⁰See Wang Jisi, Ni Feng and Zhang Liping, ‘Impact of US Global Strategic Adjustment on China’, Zhongguo Shehui Kexueyuan Yuanbao, 7 Jan. 2004, FBIS-CPP20040121000126.

²¹See Dan Jie and Ju Lang, ‘Russian Strategic Bomber to Fly to China’, Jiandai Wuqi, 1 March 2005, FBIS-CPP20050328000206.

²²Jiang Hong and Wei Yuejiang, ‘100,000 US Troops in the Asia-Pacific Look for “New Homes”’, Guofang Bao, 10 June 2003, 1, FBIS-CPP20030611000068.

²³He Yijian, ‘The United States Is Busy Deploying Troops in Asia’, Liaowang, 13 May 2002, 54–55, FBIS-CPP20020521000054.

²⁴Li Xuanliang, ‘US Military's ‘New Guam Strategy’, Liaowang Dongfang Zhoukan, 18 June 2006, 18–19, FBIS-CPP20060619718001.

²⁵The participants at a recent conference on ‘Maritime Implications of China's Energy Strategy’, held at the US Naval War College, Newport, RI, on 6–7 Dec. 2006, generally disparaged the US Navy's ability to sustain an effective blockade of Chinese energy supplies.

²⁸Hu Jintao, “‘Constantly Increasing Common Ground’: Hu's Speech to Australian Parliament’, 24 Oct. 2003, <http://www.australianpolitics.com/news/2003/10/03-10-24b.shtml>.

²⁶‘Premier Wen's Several Talks During Europe Visit’, Xinhua, May 16, 2004, FBIS-CPP20040516000069. Wen sounded similar themes during a spring 2005 trip to South Asia. See Xiao Qiang, ‘Premier Wen's South Asian Tour Produces Abundant Results’, Renmin Ribao, 13 April 2005, FBIS-CHN-200504131477.

²⁷Reporting on the efforts of Yao Mingde, the official in charge of organizing activities to commemorate the treasure voyages, the official news service Xinhua observed that ‘Zheng He's fleet surpassed all other marine navigators of his time in scale, sophistication, technology and organizational skills in his seven sea trips, which were a great event in the world's navigation history’. ‘China Launches Activities to Commemorate Sea Navigation Pioneer Zheng He’, Xinhua, 29 Sept. 2003, FBIS-CPP20030928000052.

²⁹Zheng Bijian, ‘China's “Peaceful Rise” to Great-Power Status’, Foreign Affairs 84/5 (Sept./Oct. 2005), 18–24. Zheng is a close advisor to President Hu.

³⁰See for instance ‘China Celebrates Ancient Mariner to Demonstrate Peaceful Rise’, Xinhua, 7 July 2004, FBIS-CPP20040707000169.

³¹Xu Qi, ‘Maritime Geostrategy and the Development of the Chinese Navy in the Early Twenty-first Century’, trans. Andrew S. Erickson and Lyle J. Goldstein, Naval War College Review 59/4 (Autumn 2006), 53–4. Xu's article originally appeared in China Military Science, China's foremost journal of military affairs.

³²Xu, ‘Maritime Geostrategy’, 52.

³³Chen Jian and Zhao Haiyan, ‘Wen Jiabao on Sino-US Relations: Cherish Harmony; Be Harmonious But Different’, Zhongguo Xinwen She, 8 Dec. 2003, FBIS-CPP20031208000052.

³⁴‘Kenyan Girl Offered Chance to Go to College in China’, Xinhua, 20 March 2005, FBIS-CHN-200503201477.

³⁵Matthew Wheeler, ‘China Expands Its Southern Sphere of Influence’, Jane's Intelligence Review, 1 June 2005.

³⁶Bates Gill and Yanzhong Huang, ‘Sources and Limits of Chinese “Soft Power”’, Survival 48/2 (Summer 2006), 24–5; Andrew Erickson and Lyle Goldstein, ‘Hoping for the Best, Preparing for the Worst: China's Response to US Hegemony’, Journal of Strategic Studies 29/6 (Dec. 2005), 965–6.

³⁷Sheng Ding and Robert A. Saunders, ‘Talking Up China: An Analysis of China's Rising Cultural Power and Global Promotion of the Chinese Language’, East Asia 23/2 (Summer 2006), 3–33.

³⁸Shannon Tow, ‘Southeast Asia in the Sino-US Strategic Balance’, Contemporary Southeast Asia 26/3 (2004) 434–59; Denny Roy, ‘Southeast Asia and China: Balancing or Bandwagoning?’Contemporary Southeast Asia 27/2 (2005), 305–22; and Evelyn Goh, ‘Great Powers and Southeast Asian Regional Security Strategies’, Military Technology (Jan. 2006), 321–3.

³⁹The term first appeared in a Washington Times article after originating in a Booz-Allen study commissioned by the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment. See Bill Gertz, ‘China Builds Up Strategic Sea Lanes’, Washington Times, 18 Jan. 2005, <http://www.washtimes.com/national/20050117-115550-1929r.htm>.

⁴⁰See for example Christopher J. Pehrson, String of Pearls: Meeting the Challenge of China's Rising Power Across the Asian Littoral (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College July 2006); Lawrence Spinetta, ‘Cutting China's ‘String of Pearls’’, US Naval Institute Proceedings 132/10 (Oct. 2006), 40–2; Sudha Ramachandra, ‘China's Pearl in Pakistan's Waters’, Asia Times, 4 March 2005, <http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/GC04Df06.html>; Hideaki Kaneda, ‘The Rise of Chinese “Sea Power”’, Philippine Daily Inquirer, 22 Sept. 2005, 11.

⁴¹Author discussions with Indian analysts, Institute for Defence Studies & Analyses, New Delhi, 6–16 Nov. 2006.

⁴²Lee Jae-Hyung, ‘China's Expanding Maritime Ambitions in the Western Pacific and the Indian Ocean’, Contemporary Southeast Asia 24/3 (Dec. 2002), 553–4.

⁴⁴Islamabad and Beijing are jointly studying a pipeline project connecting Gwadar with the western Chinese province of Xinjiang. See ‘Gwadar-China Oil Pipeline Study Underway’, Pakistan Observer, 4 Sept. 2006, <http://pakobserver.net/200609/04/news/topstories12.asp?txt=Gwadar-China%20oil%20pipeline%20study%20underway>.

⁴³With 12 berths in place or in planning, and with the capacity to receive deep-draft merchant ships, the port facility could easily play host to Chinese warships. See Government of Pakistan, Ministry of Ports and Shipping, presentation on Gwadar Port Project, <http://siteresources.worldbank.org/PAKISTANEXTN/Resources/293051-1114424648263/Session-VII-Fazal-Ur-Rehman.pdf>; Government of Pakistan, Board of Investment, ‘Gawadar’, <http://www.pakboi.pk/News_Event/Gawadar.html>; <http://siteresources.worldbank.org/PAKISTANEXTN/Resources/293051-1114424648 263/Session-VII-Fazal-Ur-Rehman.pdf>; Government of Pakistan, Board of Investment, ‘Gawadar’, ‘About Gawadar’, Gawadar Port Website, <http://www.gawadarport.com/main/Content.aspx?ID=1>; Tarique Niazi, ‘Gwadar: China's Naval Outpost on the Indian Ocean’, China Brief 5/4 (25 Feb. 2005), <http://www.jamestown.org/news_details.php?news_id=93>.

⁴⁵Alfred Thayer Mahan, ‘The Strategic Features of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea’, in idem, The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future (Boston: Little, Brown 1897; reprint, Freeport: Books for Libraries Press 1970), 283–92.

⁴⁶For a similar argument, see Yan Xuetong, ‘The Rise of China and Its Power Status’, Chinese Journal of International Politics 1/1 (2006), 5–33.

⁴⁷Zhang Wenmu, ‘China's Energy Security and Policy Choices’, Shijie Jinji yu Zhengzhi[Global Economics and Politics] 5 (14 May 2003), 11–16, FBIS-CPP20030528000169.

⁴⁸Liu Xinhua and Qi Yi, ‘China's Oil Security and Its Strategic Options’, Xiandai Guoji Guanxi[Contemporary International Relations] 12 (20 Dec. 2002), 35–46, FBIS-CPP20030425000288.

⁴⁹Ni Lexiong, ‘Sea Power and China's Development’, Liberation Daily, 17 April 2005, 4, US-China Economic and Security Review Commission Website, <http://www.uscc.gov/researchpapers/translated_articles/2005/05_07_18_Sea_Power_and_Chinas_Development.pdf>.

⁵⁰Ni, ‘Sea Power and China's Development’, 7.

⁵¹Liu Jiangping and Feng Xianhui, ‘Going Global: Dialogue Spanning 600 Years’, Liaowang 5 (1 July 2005), 14–19, FBIS-CPP20050719000107.

⁵²Liu and Feng, ‘Going Global’.

⁵³For a good recent overview, see Donald L. Berlin, ‘India in the Indian Ocean’, Naval War College Review 59/2 (Spring 2006), <http://www.nwc.navy.mil/press/Review/2006/spring/art3-sp06.htm>.

⁵⁴See for example Devin T. Hagerty, ‘India's Regional Security Doctrine’, Asian Survey 31/4 (April 1991), 351–63; John W. Garver, Protracted Contest: Sino-Indian Rivalry in the Twentieth Century (Seattle, WA: Univ. of Washington Press 2001), 31; C. Raja Mohan, ‘Border Crossings’, South Asia Monitor (May 2006), <http://www.southasiamonitor.org/2006/may/news/17view2.shtml>.

⁵⁵Government of India, INBR-8, Indian Maritime Doctrine (New Delhi: Integrated HQ, Ministry of Defence (Navy), 25 April 2004), 63.

⁵⁶ Indian Maritime Doctrine, 63–4.

⁵⁷Ibid., 64.

⁵⁸ Indian Maritime Doctrine, 64–5.

⁵⁹Ibid., 65–7.

⁶⁰Richard Olney to US Ambassador to Britain Thomas F. Bayard, 20 July 1895, in Ruhl J. Bartlett (ed.), The Record of American Diplomacy: Documents and Readings in the History of American Foreign Relations, 4th ed. (New York: Knopf 1964), 341–5. The classic account of the Monroe Doctrine is Dexter Perkins, A History of the Monroe Doctrine (Boston: Little, Brown 1963), 228–75.

⁶¹James R. Holmes, ‘[Theodore] Roosevelt's Pursuit of a Temperate Caribbean Policy’, Naval History 20/4 (Aug. 2006), 48–53.

⁶²See for instance Rajat Pandit, ‘India's Chief of Naval Staff –‘Blue-water Navy is the Aim’, Times of India, 1 Nov. 2006, <http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Blue-water_Navy_is_the_aim/articleshow/262611.cms>; Ranjit B. Rai, ‘India's Aircraft Carriers Programme: A Steady Sail Towards Blue Water Capability’, India Strategic, Oct. 2006, 42–4; ‘Extending the Navy's Reach: Navy Chief Speaks to India Strategic’, India Strategic, Oct. 2006, 23–33.

⁶³Barry R. Posen, ‘Command of the Commons: The Military Foundation of US Hegemony’, International Security 28/1 (Summer 2003), 22.

⁶⁴Panikkar extolled Hindu mariners' accomplishments while also paying tribute to Zheng He's voyages. K. M. Panikkar, India and the Indian Ocean: An Essay on the Influence of Sea Power on Indian History (New York: Macmillan 1945), 28–36; K.M. Panikkar, Asia and Western Dominance: A Survey of the Vasco da Gama Epoch of Asian History, 1498–1945 (New York: John Day nd [?1954]), 35–6, 49, 68, 71.

⁶⁵Henry Steele Commager, The Search for a Usable Past and Other Essays in Historiography (New York: Knopf 1967), 3–27. Commager explored founding Americans' quest for common history, traditions, and legends to bind the new nation together.

⁶⁶For a sampling of commentary on the Indo-US relationship, see Stephen J. Blank, Natural Allies? Regional Security in Asia and Prospects for Indo-American Strategic Cooperation (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College Sept. 2005); C. Raja Mohan, ‘India and the Balance of Power’, Foreign Affairs 85/4 (July/Aug. 2006), 17–32; Ashton B. Carter, ‘America's New Strategic Partner?’Foreign Affairs 85/4 (July/Aug. 2006), 33–44.

⁶⁷Author discussions with Indian scholars, Salve Regina Univ., Newport, RI, USA, 19 Sept. 2006.

⁶⁸Bernard D. Cole, ‘The Energy Factor in Chinese Maritime Strategy’, paper presented at conference on ‘Maritime Implications of China's Energy Strategy’, US Naval War College, Newport, RI, USA, 6 Dec. 2006.

⁶⁹Andrew Erickson and Andrew Wilson, ‘China's Aircraft Carrier Dilemma’, Naval War College Review 59/4 (Autumn 2006), 30–7.