Emerging Security Architecture in the Indian Ocean Region: Policy Options for India

Abstract

The Indian Ocean Region has become one of the major spotlights in international security in recent times. With the importance of SLOC which connects the Pacific and the Atlantic and the increasing appetite for energy resource for the booming Asian economy, security in the Indian Ocean is a matter of concern for all stakeholders. However, US military presence in Asia is going to decline in the coming period while China is emerging as a great power in Asia which could amount to creating creeping Chinese expansion in the waters of Asia. The lack of a dominant regional power in the IOR and the retreat of US from the region would lead to strategic uncertainty which will unfold competition for dominance by other powers. It is in this context that the most important priority for the regional countries is the IOR should be free from any sort of power rivalry and needs to ensure freedom of navigation and peace and stability in the region. In order for that to happen, India has to emerge as a credible power in the region and must take a leading role in establishing cooperative security framework in the region bringing all countries of the region on board for effective security architecture in the Indian Ocean region.

Security cooperation in the Indo-Pacific: non-traditional security as a catalyst

“…This exclusion is intentional, and serves to limit analysis to developments originating in ASEAN based processes. This is not to say that NTS issues have not catalysed security cooperation in the Indian Ocean Region, as they most assuredly have, particularly in the realm of maritime security (Cordner, 2010;Paul, 2011;Akaha, 2002), only that discussions of this topic are beyond the scope of this paper.…”