ILLUSTRATIVE IMAGE
Submitted by Dr. Binoy Kampmark
The feeling from Rory Medcalf of the Australian National University was one of breathless wonder. “The US government,” he wrote in The Strategist, “has just classified one of its most secretive national security documents – its 2018 strategic framework for the Indo-Pacific, which was formally classified SECRET and not for release to foreign nationals.”
Washington’s errand boys and girls in Canberra tend to get excited by this sort of thing. Rather than seeing it as a blueprint for imminent conflict with China, a more benign reading is given: how to handle “strategic rivalry with China.” Looming in the text of the National Security Council’s US Strategic Framework for the Indo-Pacific (SFIP) is a generous doffing of the cap to Australia’s reckless, self-harming approach towards China. As an unnamed senior US official (of course) told Axios, the Australians “were pioneers and we have to give a lot of credit to Australia.” Australian senior intelligence advisor John Garnaut is given high praise for his guiding hand. When war breaks out between Beijing and Washington, we know a few people to thank.
The SFIP, declassified on January 5, is very much a case of business as usual and unlikely to shift views in the forthcoming Biden presidency. The timing of the release suggests that the Trump administration would like to box its predecessor on certain matters, notably on China.
In a statement from National Security Advisor Robert C. O’Brien, the SFIP “provided overarching strategic guidance for implementing the 2017 National Security Strategy within the world’s most populous and economically dynamic region”. The National Security Strategy, in turn, recognised “that the most consequential challenge to the interests of the United States, and those of our allies and partners, is the growing rivalry between free and repressive visions of the future.” Beijing is cast in the role of repressive force in “pressuring Indo-Pacific nations to subordinate their freedom and sovereignty to a ‘common destiny’ envisioned by the Chinese Communist Party.”
The imperium’s interests, according to the SFIP, must be guarded (“strategic primacy in the Indo-Pacific region”); a “liberal economic order” must be promoted while China is to be prevented “from establishing new, illiberal spheres of influence”. North Korea is deemed of high importance in terms of whether it threatens the US and its allies, “accounting for both the acute present danger and the potential for future changes in the level and type of threat posed” by Pyongyang. The US is also to retain “global economic leadership while promoting fair and reciprocal trade.”
One of the “top interests” of the US in the Indo-Pacific is identified in pure power terms: retaining “economic, diplomatic, and military access to the most populous region in the world and more than one-third of the global economy”. Washington is keen to preserve “primacy in the region while protecting American core values and liberties at home.” But there is the spoiling presence of China, aspirational superpower, and keen for its bit of geopolitical pie. “Strategic competition between the United States and China will persist, owing to the divergent nature and goals of our political and economic systems.”
China is ever the cheeky opportunist, seeking to “circumvent international rules norms to gain an advantage.” Beijing “aims to dissolve US alliances and partnerships in the region” exploiting “vacuums and opportunities created by these diminished bonds.” With this in mind, US defence strategy should be “capable of, but not limited to: (1) denying China sustained air and sea dominance inside the ‘first island chain’ in conflict; (2) defending the first-island-chain nations, including Taiwan; and (3) dominating all domains outside the first island-chain.”
The document also acknowledges an untidy region of shifting power balances and increased defence spending, which will “continue to drive security competition across the Indo-Pacific”. Japan and India are singled out for special mention in that regard. A measure of angst is registered: “Loss of US pre-eminence in the Indo-Pacific would weaken our ability to achieve US interests globally.”
The authors of the SFIP are unashamed about the fistful of principles that will maintain US power, the sort that masquerades in popular language as the “liberal rules-based order”. Desirable objectives include the US being the “preferred partner” of “most nations” in the region; and that these powers “uphold the principles that have enabled US and regional prosperity and stability, including sovereignty, freedom of navigation and overflight, standards of trade and investment, respect for individual rights and rule of law, and transparency in military activities.” No wobbling will be permitted; allies will have to get in line.
India, “in cooperation with like-minded countries,” figures as a shining hope. Its rise is deemed essential, serving as “a net provider of security and Major Defense Partner”. What is envisaged is a strategic partnership “underpinned by a strong Indian military able to effectively collaborate with the United States and our partners in the region to address shared interests.”
For its spiky anti-China message, the nature of the economic relationship with Beijing is hard to ignore, provided it is conducted on US terms. The strategy is, to that end, most Trumpian in character, emphasising the need to “prevent China’s industrial policies and unfair trading practices from distorting global markets and harming US competitiveness.”
In what has become a tradition of the Trump administration, the Framework document does not tally with messages from other equivalent national security assessments. The officials of empire are not speaking with a coherent voice. The 2019 Indo-Pacific Strategy Report by the Department of Defense, for instance, makes good mention of Russia as a “revitalized malign actor”. (Pentagon pundits can never seem to give the bear, or their paranoia, a rest.) Despite tardy economic growth occasioned by Western sanctions and a fall in oil prices, Moscow “continues to modernize its military and prioritize strategic capabilities – including its nuclear forces, A2/AD systems, and expanded training for long-range aviation – in an attempt to re-establish its presence in the Indo-Pacific region.”
The authors of the Framework document are, in sharp contrast, barely troubled by Moscow and, surprisingly, sober on the issue. “Russia will remain a marginal player in the Indo-Pacific region relative to the United States, China and India.” Abhijnan Rej of The Diplomat could not help but find this inconsistency odd. “So Russia is a threat in a public document but not one in a classified one?”
As for India, the 2019 IPSR does much to avoid exaggeration and elevation. “Within South Asia, we are working to operationalize our Major Defense Partnership with India, while pursuing emerging partnerships with Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Bangladesh and Nepal.” The Pentagon notes an increase in the “scope, complexity and frequency of our military exercises” with India. But for all that, New Delhi hardly remains a jewel of defence strategy relative to such traditional allies as South Korea and Japan.
The SFIP, in contrast, makes a bold stab at linking the goals of maintaining US regional supremacy with New Delhi’s own objectives. This is bound to cause discomfort in the planning rooms, given Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rhetoric on regional multipolarity. An article of faith in Indian policy on the matter is ensuring that no single power dominates the region. Another potential concern is the prospect that India is being thrown into the US-China scrap.
Medcalf concludes his assessment of the framework document with his own call for what promises to be future conflict. “America,” he insists, “cannot effectively compete with China if it allows Beijing hegemony over this vast region, the economic and strategic centre of gravity in a connected world.” The conflict mongers will be eagerly rubbing their hands.
Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. Email: bkampmark@gmail.com
Seriously, the dumbarse Americunts are morons, India is a shithole while China is the world’s biggest economy and perhaps the strongest military force.
India’s strategic illusions, delusion and hallucinations
New Delhi is headed for trouble in Ladakh and the broader region if it repeats past mistakes on dealing with Beijing
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Dumbass shia stfu…worry about iran
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Have you raped your cow this evening as you normally do?
One thing the Yankees just can’t understand, you can’t dominate the world by writing idiotic and unachievable pamphlets, let alone printing dollars without limits, but the worst will once again be up to the stupid vassals who will have to fight on the front line for bankers’ affairs Jews moving levers from the City of London and Wall Street.
Inferiority complex and caste ridden Indian strategists have been suffering from illusion, delusion, and hallucination since their country’s independence from the British Empire. Their illusions are connected to India’s perception of itself. They harbor delusions in their perception of strategic support made available by superpowers and experience hallucinations when looking toward China.
India remains mired in poverty, its relative power as compared with China has, in fact, sharply plunged. For example, India’s economy is a midget compared with China, whose gross domestic product is roughly US$18 trillion, whereas India’s is less than $2.7 trillion. China’s GDP is about six times as high and its defense spending nearly 3.7 times India’s.
It should be noted that China inflicted severe casualties on India in the 1962 Sino-India war at a time when India and China were comparable in economic terms. For instance, the GDP per capita of India and China was $82.19 and $89.52 respectively in 1960. Today China has a first world military while is geared up for WW2 with antiquated kit, corruption and growing political instability and insurgencies spanning from Kashmir to Assam, and China’s all weather brother Pakistan breathing down its neck. Western policy makers are suffering intellectual diarrhea from the Raj.
West puts too much emphasis on India because of its lucrative arms market.
Other than that india and indians are useful idiots they can use for now. Or they already did?
Despite US and western strategists’ hubris that poverty stricken India was a partner in containing China, and that somehow US was a global superpower, it has a history of inability to set priorities and make decisions on the issues of foreign policy and security. US has repeatedly failed to enjoy “full spectrum dominance.”after the fall or the USSR and is now heading in a downwards trajectory with US decline accelerating.
West is in irreversible decline as power shifts to Eurasia and is grasping at straws.
20 chinese miners are still stuck in a mine.Probably theyyl die
Wishing death upon others is a very crass juvenile thing and bad karma.
10 future patanjali eater died in a hospital fire. And god knows how many perished today.
So the U.S. is encircling four adversaries with a military that has to defend it’s own Capitol building from the American people.
Moreover, they are being counter-encircled in turn.
In Asia, the Chinese are circling outside US bases via the BRI in central asia and island bases in the SCS.
In the middle east, Iran, Hezbollah and the Houthi are circling around US bases in the gulf region.
And in Europe the rolling thunder of the Russian Army would throw them back into the Atlantic before a of ‘hot’ hostilities week of fighting was over. They would have to resort to tactical nuking of the territories of their very own Nato allies… Not exactly security for the oinks.
India is fucked. China controls India via the Tibetan water sources:
“China has claimed express ownership over Tibet’s waters, making it an upstream controller of seven of South Asia’s mightiest rivers – the Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Irrawaddy, Salween, Yangtze and Mekong.
These rivers flow into Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam, and form the largest river run-off from any single location.
It is estimated that 718 billion cubic meters of surface water flows out of the Tibetan plateau and the Chinese-administered regions of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia to neighbouring countries each year.
Nearly half that water, 48%, runs directly into India.”
Hear that? HALF! Maderchots!
Should China decide it needs that 48% at the wrong time for India …
India needs to set its priority straight.
Get proper unified strategy, and work on it. Make Public diplomacy a main focus.
This would mean engaging in positive attitude with smaller neighbor’s in its vicinity. Like Bangladesh, Maldives, Nepal and Srilanka.
Currently, india is in a hard place and a rock.
They can’t afford to antagonize US, because they will lose a huge chunk of trade privilege’s and software export.
However, antagonizing China would mean losing more lands and neighbor’s good will (whatever left of it) as well as steady stream of Brahmaputra river. Also Indian Ocean will become PLAN’s place of maneuver via its neighbors.
Not to mention China dominates india’s domestic market. Whether India agrees or not!! This poses a indomitable challenge for Delhi.
This is not 2006 anymore! Forgo flashy and explosive reforms to appease regional outsiders. Meaning EU and US.
Unfortunately, when you have a government composed of mostly Hindu nationalists who think ideologically and not strategically, there is no hope for India.
Contrast this with Xi Jinping, a trained chemical engineer with a lifetime in professional government in al levels of the state, whose approach is based on data and analysis rather than appeasing a particular ideological group.
Appeasing groups be it minority or majority has been a major flash points in india’s political history.
India is the only country in the world which I would term it as “Woke”. Feelings and emotions rules every level.
This digressive attitude will only lead india to deeper abyss.
China is supposed to be our Big Enemy. Meanwhile we are all getting this information on devices that were made there. Methinks we are being played for fools.
Turnbull is out,which puts a bigger dent in their bent strategys,all ready massive free trade policys adapted by all major players other than usa and india,cia stinktanks are yester years nothing burgers! Good update,stay safe: