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Myanmar plays off India and
China
By Sudha Ramachandran
BANGALORE - Even as counter-insurgency
cooperation between the armies of India and
Myanmar has grown in recent years, collaboration
between the navies of Myanmar and China - India's
rival - on issues impinging on India's national
security interests is moving far more rapidly, and now a
Sino-Myanmar joint intelligence operation is
underway near India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
Last month, reports suggested that India
and Myanmar were considering upgrading their
counter-insurgency cooperation from coordination
to joint operations. With the Myanmar army
seemingly unable to use military equipment
supplied by India to fight anti-India rebels
taking sanctuary in Myanmar, India apparently
asked the Myanmar junta to consider inviting Indian
troops to Myanmar to deploy the equipment in
operations that the Indian and Myanmar forces
would use against the rebels.
Even
as India awaits the invitation from the junta,
the latter has stepped up its interaction with
the Chinese. According to the Public Affairs
Magazine, Myanmar's navy "is conducting a survey near
the Andamans to set up a patrol base and a small
port, but officials and diplomats suspect
an intelligence operation is underway both to map
the Andaman Sea at the behest of China and to
study deep-water movement of big ships". Given
the undemarcated sea boundaries between India
and Myanmar, encroachments - accidental and deliberate
- into each other's waters do take place. But this
time it seems intentional. According to the the
report, "The present activity appeared inspired by
Chinese intelligence requirements in respect of
the Andamans and the surrounding waters."
Myanmar-China cooperation in the waters
around the Andamans is not new. It has been an
issue of concern for India for several years now
and was, in fact, among the main reasons why India
decided in the mid-1990s to correct its
pro-democracy tilt in Myanmar and court the
generals instead.
The Andaman and Nicobar
Islands are scattered across 750 kilometers north
to south in the Bay of Bengal. This chain of
islands separates the Bay of Bengal from the
Malacca Strait. While it is more than 1,200
kilometers from India, it is just 90 kilometers
from Indonesia and 50 kilometers from Myanmar. Its
strategic significance to India lies, among other
things, in its proximity to the Malacca Strait.
Besides, Myanmar's Coco Islands lie about 45
kilometers to the north of the Andaman Islands.
Myanmar's military government leased the
Coco Islands to the Chinese in 1994. China has a
maritime reconnaissance and electronic
intelligence station on the Great Coco Island and
is building a base on Small Coco Island. The
significance of these facilities for China stems
from the fact that the Coco Islands are located at
a crucial point in traffic routes between the Bay
of Bengal and the Malacca Strait and lie very
close to India. India's first joint services
command, the Joint Andaman and Nicobar Strategic
Defense Command, is headquartered in Port Blair in
the Andaman Islands.
The Coco islands are
an ideal location for monitoring Indian naval
facilities in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and
also movements of the Indian navy and other navies
throughout the eastern Indian Ocean. India
believes that the Chinese are using the Coco
Islands to keep an eye on India's missile-testing
facilities at Chandipur-on-Sea located in the
eastern coastal state of Orissa.
According
to Indian defense analyst Rahul Bedi, "China is
reportedly training Myanmar's naval intelligence
officials and helping Yangon execute surveys of
its coastline contiguous to India." Drawing
attention to the "burgeoning naval cooperation"
between the two countries, he writes that China is
helping Myanmar modernize its naval bases at
Hianggyi, Coco, Akyab, Zadetkyi Kyun, Mergui and
Khaukphyu. It has provided help in building radar,
refit and refuel facilities that are expected to
support Chinese submarine operations in the
region.
"China's interest in the region is
part of its Offshore Defense Strategy," said
Lawrence Prabhakar, associate professor at the
Madras Christian College and research fellow at
the maritime security program at the Institute for
Defense and Strategic Studies in Singapore. The
offshore active defense strategy envisages the
setting up and operating out of a number of island
chains. It is believed that the Chinese navy - the
People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) will expand
its operations to bases in Myanmar. These bases
will provide the PLAN with direct access to the
Malacca Strait and the Bay of Bengal.
The
Chinese, points out Prabhakar, are keen to secure
the sea lanes of communication (SLOCs), which are
pivotal to China's maritime trade and energy flows
from the Persian Gulf to southwest Asia. "They are
interested in developing naval capabilities in the
Indian Ocean region and with this in mind are
developing access and basing facilities in Gwadar
[Pakistan] and Mergui, Hianggyi, Coco, Akyab,
Zadetkyi Kyun, Mergui and Khaukphyu Yangon and
other ports in Myanmar as that would open the
Irrawady River for Chinese inland commerce through
Myanmar, with its sea access to the Bay of Bengal
and Indian Ocean. This is an effort to develop an
alternate route complementing the sea access via
the Malacca Strait," he told Asia Times Online.
Bedi points out that China is working hard
at securing a corridor to the Indian Ocean from
southern China via Myanmar, in addition to the
established route via the Malacca Strait. "As a
first step in this direction China has already
constructed a highway from Kunming, capital of its
Yunan province to Shewli on the Myanmar border.
According to a proposal that is being reviewed by
Myanmar's military junta, Beijing wants to extend
that road link to Sinkiang for access to the
Irrawady River flowing through to Yangon, and into
the Andaman Sea. Once completed, Chinese barges
would transport Chinese goods down the Irrawady to
Yangon and transfer them onto waiting Chinese
ships."
India's interest in the Bay of
Bengal stems from the fact that this is its
backyard. The Andaman and Nicobar archipelago is
vital for India's outreach and defense, points out
Prabhakar. Piracy, maritime poaching, gun-running
and narcotics trafficking in the waters here
threaten India's interests. Besides, India has to
secure its SLOCs in its Eastern seaboard to
Southeast Asia via the Malacca Strait and also its
strategic nuclear and missile installations along
its east coast that are vulnerable to Chinese
surveillance.
To protect its interests in
the region against China's rapidly growing
presence here, India has increased naval-air
surveillance of Chinese ship movements. "It has
also conducted joint exercises with Southeast
Asian navies in the Andaman Sea, especially with
the Royal Malaysian Navy and the Republic of
Singapore Navy. They are meant to enhance India's
cooperative maritime security with Southeast Asia
- China's backyard," said Prabhakar.
While
India and China seek to enhance their security by
stepping up their presence in the Bay of Bengal
and wooing countries like Myanmar, the latter is
gaining by cooperating with both its big-power
neighbors, bargaining with them and getting itself
a good deal in the process. In return for Chinese
investment in its economy and massive arms
transfers and training to its armed forces,
Myanmar is making gains with China in the
naval-maritime front. With India, Myanmar is
getting technical assistance and investment in
infrastructure development as well as securing its
border with India. In return, it is helping the
Indian army fight insurgency in its troubled
northeast.
While taking what it can from
its powerful neighbors, Myanmar has sought to use
them to counter the other from gaining an
excessive hold over its economy, polity and
society. The India-China battle for influence in
the region has provided Myanmar with a win-win
situation.
Sudha Ramachandran is
an independent journalist/researcher based in
Bangalore.
(Copyright 2005 Asia Times
Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us
for information on sales, syndication and republishing.) |
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