A Base Away From Home

Context: China is trying to assert its primacy in Asia and the Indo-Pacific region while pushing out the US & India.

Impact of Foreign Military Base by China in India

• Permanent naval presence of China in the Indian Ocean will profoundly alter India’s security environment.
• Pakistan is likely to emerge as the most important vehicle for Chinese naval power projection in the Indian Ocean, with significant implications for India’s military planning.
• Security establishment began in 21st century to note India’s growing strategic interests beyond borders. 
• Seeing naval power growth of China into the Indian Ocean, India began to recognise the need for military access to strategic locations in the Indo-Pacific. But due to political reasons, India lost much time in the first decade of the 21st century. Now, India has stepped up its military diplomacy.
• Opposing foreign military bases became an essential part of India’s non-aligned foreign policy: In fact, absence of foreign military bases was long considered as the main criterion for admitting a nation to the non-aligned movement. 
• Military isolationism had become a conscious ideological choice for India in 20th century.

Reason behind China’s foreign military expansion

• China claimed in the past that it was quite different from the West and had no interest in projecting power to distant seas or foreign military bases. 
• It actively campaigned against foreign military presence in Asia. 
• As a defensive power in 2nd half of 20th century, China’s priority was to fend off external threats to its sovereignty and consolidate its communist revolution.
• China’s attitudes towards foreign military presence began to change as it rose rapidly to become a great power in the 21st century: It led to a systematic debate within the Chinese security establishment. 
• Interests beyond its borders: China affirmed that its large, globalised economy and growing reliance on foreign markets and resources have created interests far from China’s borders.
• China went about cautiously in establishing foreign bases: China knows the term “military base” is politically loaded and is careful to avoid using it. 
• Military imperative for bases must be balanced against the inevitable politics of nationalist resentment in the host countries. 
• China’s focus was on building dual-use facilities rather than explicit military bases on foreign soil.
• Dual-use approach to gaining strategic access on distant shores benefited immensely from its expansive foreign port construction in the last two decades.
• Strategic location is one of the prime considerations for bases: But location does not automatically translate into military access just because China wants it. 
• A lot depends on the nature of the overall relationship with the target nation: It means cultivating special relationships with the political elites and strengthening ties with the military establishments in a potential host country. 
• Arms transfers and military diplomacy become an integral part of China’s quest for foreign bases.
• China continues to campaign against US military presence in Asia and its strategic partnerships: Expanding its own military reach while trying to push America out of its front yard is part of the effort to establish Chinese primacy in Asia and its waters. Its approach to the US is like its India strategy.
• China saw the value of US military presence in 1970s: Containing “Soviet social imperialism” and “latent Japanese militarism”. So, with improving military capabilities political ambitions China is also trying to push America out of Asia once again.

Conclusion: India is securing access in the Indian Ocean as well as developing deeper strategic partnerships with the US and its regional allies. But, due to so many delays and the growing gap between India’s and China’s strategy, there is a serious problem to India in the not-too-distant future.

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