The impending removal of the piracy High Risk Area off the coast of Somalia presents an ideal opportunity for India, in partnership with the wider Indo-Pacific maritime community, to delegitimise China’s naval presence and strengthen regional mechanisms for ensuring maritime security.
Russia’s new maritime doctrine, the first policy document in Russia’s national security domain since the Ukraine conflict, reveals a bolder and more assertive Russia, and presents several opportunities for cooperation with India.
Ensuring maritime security and freedom of navigation in the Indian Ocean and the wider Indo-Pacific region is key security imperative and one of the key objectives of India’s engagement with the US and other partners.
Colombo Security Conclave, a maritime security oriented sub-regional grouping, is emerging as a promising platform through which India can demonstrate its commitment and credibility for becoming the ‘Preferred Security Partner’ for the smaller nations in the Indian Ocean Region.
The Indo-Pacific construct has significantly enhanced the strategic salience of both India and Australia in a multipolar region. While the two nations have considerably deepened their strategic partnership, there is scope for much more improvement in several sectors.
By enabling access to logistics and support facilities at each other’s bases and ports, RELOS would enhance strategic cooperation between India and Russia, and promote their future manoeuvres in the Arctic and the Indian Ocean Region.
India–Russia cooperation in the Indian Ocean and the Arctic, including the Russian Far East, could give strong thrust to their deepening engagement. However, there is a need for heavy lifting from both sides to achieve the desired potential.
As the bulk of India’s foreign trade transits through sea, it turns sea lines of communication through the Indian Ocean strategically important for India. The newly independent India did not pay adequate attention to this factor. Consequently, within two decades of independence continuous flow of unprotected large volume of India’s sea trade had become a strategic target for its adversaries. In this context, during the 1971 India–Pakistan war, India efficiently protected its vital sea lanes, ensuring that goods and commodities continued to reach Indian ports.
India had all of two weeks to achieve the politico-military end state of liberating Bangladesh, before the international community intervened to impose a ceasefire. Speed and tempo of operations were imperative.Indian Armed Forces exploited the special operations capabilities to ensure an early fall of Dhaka. The airborne assault at Tangail, the audacious helilift of troops across the mighty Meghna by General Sagat Singh with effective support from the Mukti Bahini contributed to the early fall of Dhaka with most defences still intact.
