China’s self-serving paranoia on ‘Malabar’ Gurpreet

It is impossible for even a super-power to secure its vital interests using its own resources alone. The maritime forces of a developing country like India will undeniably encounter capability constraints. Therefore, the need to secure its legitimate interests and a normative responsibility towards regional stability have been the principal drivers for India seeking security links with other countries. In mid-August 2007, China’s joint military exercise within the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), termed ‘Peace Mission 2007’, is said to have been driven by a similar need, that is, combating terrorism. Paradoxically, while that exercise was held on an unprecedented scale — it saw six SCO countries (including Russia) participating in it and the involvement of a number of military personnel and heavy weapons — few in India even took note of these exercises, much less raise an alarm over them.

Joint exercises constitute a means to build inter-operability and evolve common standard operating procedures (SOP) between two military forces, so that their assets can be used in a complementary fashion in adverse contingencies. When the tsunami occurred in December 2004, for instance, the naval forces of the countries in the region had to work together. Exercises with technologically advanced countries also help to fill capability voids. This applies both to China and to India. An exercise provides a ‘near-combat’ environment necessary to assess the worthiness of potential acquisitions.

India began to conduct joint exercises in the early nineties, beginning with Southeast Asian countries. However, the imperatives of the post-Cold War security scenario compelled it to expand these bilateral linkages to the US, China, Japan and Australia. Although ‘Malabar-2007’ will be India’s 13th exercise with the US, it will be the second with Japan, and only the first with Australia. Significantly, the navies of India and China have already conducted three exercises (since 2003), although their scope was different. For example, in contrast to the complex Indo-US exercises involving carrier operations, the Sino-Indian exercises were pitched at a basic level (search and rescue, communication drills and so on). Contrary to the common perception this difference is not due so much to the level of trust prevailing between the two sides as much as to other factors like familiarity achieved in past exercises, the take-off level and, most essentially, commonality of language for communications.

The relatively large participation in ‘Malabar 2007’ is therefore attributable to factors such as these. The focus of this exercise is to respond to sea-line security, which is very critical in the area due to high incidence of piracy. In fact, there is a widespread fear that the increasing violence and better coordination among the miscreants involved in pirate attacks may be a precursor to maritime terrorism, particularly in the Straits of Malacca. And therein lies a potential for security cooperation between India and China as well, considering the convergence in terms of security and navigational safety in the Straits. There could be other avenues as well, like disaster relief and UN operations. Sino-Indian military exercises are therefore necessary not only to foster inter-operability but also as a confidence-building measure.

The writer is with the IDSA, Delhi