Waterworlds

If the Chinese navy had reasons to embroider a recent encounter with its Indian counterpart in the Gulf of Aden,New Delhi had every reason to downplay the incident. Navies track each other as part of their routine,and the Indian navy was simply doing its job in trailing the Chinese warships once they entered the Indian Ocean from the Malacca straits and headed towards the African coast. One would presume the Chinese do the same when Indian naval vessels traverse the South and East China seas. The farther the Chinese and the Indian navies sail from their shores,the more frequent will be their buzzing encounters.

What matters is not the Chinese claim,rejected by our Naval Headquarters,that their ships forced an Indian submarine to surface and retreat. Media accounts from Beijing underline the navys effort to mobilise public support at home for a larger role in the Chinese national security strategy. For the Chinese admirals,the current deployment in the Indian Ocean is a powerful symbol of Beijings global maritime future. Tracking the Chinese navy will never be a problem for our professional sailors. What our navy needs is a new level of awareness and support from the political leadership,the defence ministry and the foreign office. Without an integrated strategy at the highest level,the Indian navy will find itself on the defensive,sooner than later,as China relentlessly projects its military power into the Indian Ocean.

To retain Indias current advantages in the face of Chinas growing military power,New Delhi needs to accelerate the modernisation of the navy and end forthwith the delays in procurement of naval weapon systems. Indian diplomacy must leverage all its resources to arrange access and servicing facilities for our navy to operate in distant waters. Indias reluctance to sign the logistics support agreement with the United States has also limited Indias ability to compete with the Chinese thrust into the Indian Ocean. If the UPA government continues to constrain the navy,Beijing will be happy to surprise us again. The last time it did so was in the 50s when Beijing upstaged India with its road-building in the high Himalayas of Ladakh. Half a century later,China appears all set to disprove New Delhis claim that the Indian Ocean is Indias Ocean.