India, ASATs, and the Regional Balance: An Australian Perspective

Abstract

This article discusses the implications of the development of ASAT technologies by India from an Australian perspective. It sets these developments within the context of the future of US engagement in the Pacific in the next 30 years, and especially the way in which China and the US manage their relationship as the relative strength of the former grows and the latter declines. How India responds to and seeks to influence these shifting forces will be determined largely by how India perceives and seeks to assert its place in the region. Australia's approach to space is changing, with 2009 considered to have been a tipping point. Some description of this changing context is provided as background to and rationale for the article's conclusion, which is that the development of ASAT capabilities by India is considered a natural technology progression and a somewhat less important factor in India's emergence as a regional power with the capacity to participate in and influence grand strategy.

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to acknowledge those organizations that sponsored and organized the space security conference hosted by the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi in January 2011. Personal thanks go to Victoria Samson for her encouragement and support and to the Secure World Foundation for funding my travel to India to attend the conference and present this article.

Notes

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4. White, “Power Shift,” p. 31.

5. White, “Power Shift,” p. 31.

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8. Kaplan, “Center Stage for the Twenty-first Century,” p. 19.

9. Heidelberg Institute for International Conflict Research (HIIK), The Conflict Barometer 2009, quoted in Christian Bouchard and William Crumplin, “Neglected No Longer: The Indian Ocean at the Forefront of World Geopolitics and Global Geostrategy,” Journal of the Indian Ocean Region Vol. 6, No. 1 (2010), p. 39.

10. Holmes and Yoshihara, quoted in Kaplan, “Center Stage for the Twenty-first Century,” pp. 17–18.

11. Kaplan, “Center Stage for the Twenty-first Century,” p. 17.

12. Bouchard and Crumplin, “Neglected No Longer,” p 41.

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14. Jessica Guiney, “India's Space Ambitions: Headed Toward Space War?” JCDI Policy Brief (Washington DC: Centre for Defense Information, May 2008.)

15. Guiney, “India's Space Ambitions: Headed Toward Space War?”

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18. Samson, “India's missile defense/anti-satellite nexus.”

19. Australian Department of Defence, Defending Australia in the Asia Pacific Century: Force 2030 [Defence White Paper] (Canberra, Australia: Author, 2009).

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21. Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, AUSMIN 2010 Joint Communiqué (Canberra, Australia: Author, November 8, 2010.)

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24. The fundamental force structure determinant for the Indian Armed Forces, including the military space program, is the prospect of war with Pakistan. India would seem to be applying space technologies developed in the context of potential conflict with Pakistan to China. Longer range missiles are being developed and tested; however, there is no evidence of development or deployment of an operational capability.

25. Stephen Smith, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade. Statement to the House of Representatives (Canberra, February 9, 2010).

26. Rod Lyon, “The India—China relationship: A tempered rivalry?” Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Policy Analysis, No. 61 (May 2010), p. 4.

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