The Indian Ocean Region in India's strategic futures: looking out to 2030

Abstract

The Indian Ocean has found renewed emphasis in strategic geopolitical discourse and will play an increasing role in global security considerations in the coming decades. From the arc of Islam and Africa on its western reaches to Australia on its east, the vast expanse of the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) and its adjacent waters are considered to be the theatre of conflict and competition in the twenty-first century. The geopolitics of the IOR will have wider implications on the transformations taking place in Asia, the global economy, and key global relationships.

Along with the global economic balance shifting eastward, the US has shed its fixation with the Atlantic has turned its focus to developments in Asia. A paradigm shift from the assumed stability of the world order, propped up at the end of the Cold War, to the change in global power distribution currently underway has thrown Asia, and concomitantly, the IOR into sharp relief. Though geopolitical movements, amidst the rise of China and India, have set the context for viewing the importance of the IOR in a new light, the strategic imperatives of several enduring trends make the region a hotbed of global challenges.

Keywords:

• geopolitics
• piracy
• terrorism
• maritime boundary
• energy
• environment

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Ms. Bhavna Tripathy for her assistance in writing this paper.

Notes

1. ‘The Indian Ocean Region's littoral states are: Bahrain, Bangladesh, Burma, Comoros, Djibouti, East Timor, Egypt, Eritrea, France (Reunion and Mayotte), India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kenya, Kuwait, Madagascar, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritius, Mozambique, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Seychelles, Singapore, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tanzania, Thailand, United Arab Emirates and Yemen. The hinterland states loosely defined as adjacent to, or dependent on, the Indian Ocean are: Afghanistan, Bhutan, Botswana, Burundi, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Malawi, Nepal, Rwanda, Swaziland, South Sudan, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe’, in ‘Fact sheet: the Indian Ocean Region and Australia's national interests’ (2012).

2. ‘These states are: Somalia, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Kenya, Burundi, Burma, Ethiopia’, in ‘Fact sheet: the Indian Ocean Region and Australia's national interests’ (2012).

3. A case in point would be the role played by Kenyan Defense Forces (KDF) on reducing the number of successful hijackings and geographical spread of piracy in the western Indian Ocean by deploying forces to secure Somalia's coastal economic zones. Kenyan troops entered Somalia in October 2011 to begin a coordinated attack against Al-Shabaab. Although the KDF has succeeded in curtailing piracy off the coast of Somalia, Kenyan efforts in Somalia have attracted criticisms of being driven by national economic interests. The KDF has also been accused of human rights violation in its treatment of Somali refugees. For further reading, refer to: ‘Kenya's Somali adventure’, retrieved from http://100r.org/2011/12/kenyas-somali-adventure/.

4. The Al-Qaeda Manual was seized by British authorities during a raid on an Al-Qaeda member's home in Manchester, England (http://www.justice.gov).

5. Information in this section is largely based on the excellent overview of the trafficking situation in the IOR in Herbert-Burns (2012).

6. Afghanistan is the world's largest producer of opium and most of the heroin consumed in Europe and Eurasia comes from this region. Pakistan is a producer and an important transit area for Afghan drugs bound for Iran, Africa, Asia, western markets, and the Gulf states. Iran is a consumer and a primary transhipment route for southwest Asian opiates to Europe (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook).

7. UAE pipelines, currently nearing completing, are designed to carry oil from fields in the Abu Dhabi desert to Fujairah, a major bunkering port, thus avoiding passage through the Strait of Hormuz. Naval traffic through the Strait of Hormuz is vulnerable to threats of an Iranian blockade. Currently, more than 85% of oil exports moving through the Strait are destined for Asian markets (‘UAE readies oil export’, 2012; ‘Countering disruptions’, 2012).

8. Maldives has banned coral mining from any house reef and has designated areas for coal mining. (http://www.coral.org/node/127; Naseer, 1997; Ali & Hameed, nd).

9. According to estimates, Sunderbans, mangrove forests covering parts of India and Bangladesh, would be swamped if sea level rises by another 60 centimetres (Rabbani et al., 2010).

10. Crude oil pipeline linking Kyaukpyu Port to Kunming and Shwe gas pipeline from to Kunming (Shivananda, 2012).

11. For more information on the CMF and individual task forces, see http://combinedmaritimeforces.com/about/.