The Indo-Pacific has emerged as a composite geopolitical region at the core of the international system, ever at the throes of crisis. It is a new mental map that transcends the conceptual divisions between the ‘Asia-Pacific’ and the ‘Indian Ocean’ regions, created ever since the Indian Ocean developed as a hub for economic exploration and relentless global commercial activity. Reflecting the growing economic and strategic interdependence of states along the Asian littoral, the narrative of the Indo-Pacific has concomitantly witnessed an increase in great power competition and regional geopolitical rivalry. The region comprises six nuclear weapon states, five critical chokepoints, four major powers, three seriously troubled countries, five disputed land and maritime borders, two hotly contested water bodies and a plethora of sub-regional asymmetric conflicts (Karnad, 2015: 89).
The United States has moved a long way from its erstwhile superficiality vis-à-vis the Indo-Pacific to see the entire Indian Ocean as a part thereof. This squares well with not only the growing geostrategic import of the western Indian Ocean, but also India’s Indo-Pacific Vision (2018), whereby both states have envisaged a free, open, connected, prosperous, resilient, and secure Indo-Pacific region that embraces all in common pursuit of freedom, progress and development (U.S. Department of State, 2024; Ministry of Defence, Government of India Press Release, 2022).
The only constant challenge to this inclusive vision, however, has been posed by an increasingly irredentist China. Since Xi Jinping’s ‘Chinese Dream’, the country has become the chief rule-breaker in the Indo-Pacific. From the construction of artificial islands in contested waters to the weaponisation of trade and the practise of maritime surveillance against global detractors, not least, the absolute disregard for the territorial integrity of Asia-Pacific states, peace has been elusive in the Indo-Pacific. Entrenched challenges, both to the Indo-Pacific and the liberal international order, have impelled the strategic partnership between India and the US, the foundations of which comprise an admixture of steadily convergent maritime geopolitical perspectives and interests.
The present entry is averse to the assertion that only a commonality of geostrategic interests shall prevail upon the future of Indo-US security cooperation in the Indo-Pacific (Pant and Mishra, 2023), arguing instead that the ramifications of contingent interests upon the strategic partnership in question has been undergirded by the durability and convergence of perspectives on sea power. The Indo-US conceptualisations of and forays into the Indo-Pacific emanate from an ideational platform that traces its origins to the confluence of sea-power theories of Alfred T. Mahan and K. M. Panikkar.
Despite their dissimilar epochs, both Mahan and Panikkar were arguing against a similar historical moment of national development of their respective countries: Mahan’s America was isolationist, whereas, Panikkar’s India was non-aligned with negligible naval presence beyond its coasts.
Mahanian principles of sea power lie along the vectors of production, shipping, and alliances. The aspects of Mahan’s theory of sea-power are perpetually relevant vis-à-vis contemporary strides in economic and geostrategic dependence and maritime competition among major powers. Increased economic dependence upon the oceans necessitates a war fleet. It would also be prudent for a maritime state to build alliances and partnerships not only with neighbouring states, but extra-regional ones for ensuring forward presence around the world. Mahan was also concerned about the rise of competing sea powers and its consequent impact on the maritime balance of power. Given the post-Cold War entrenchment of capitalism in the US—enunciated through globalisation processes—its recourse to Mahanian principles of sea power seems inexorable.
India’s maritime perceptions are echoes of Mahanian visions, some of which—before being formally co-opted into its official maritime strategy—found expression in the works of the scholar-diplomat, K. M. Panikkar. Believing that the IOR, along with Afghanistan, Xinjiang and Tibet shall constitute the real security of India, Panikkar advocated the creation of a ‘steel ring’ of air and naval bases at suitable points, undergirded by a strong navy as vital to the security of India, not least, the region we know today as the Indo-Pacific (Panikkar, 1951: 15). To overcome its paucity of military resources, also to contain Chinese footprints, Panikkar recommends India to partner with likeminded extra-regional powers. There is a stark resonance of Panikkar’s ideas vis-à-vis India’s conceptualisation of ‘strategic autonomy’ in its maritime coordination and engagements with great powers.
The identification of convergences among Indian and American maritime perspectives, through the Mahan-Panikkar thought-figures—comprising geopolitics, the acquisition of sea power, and the preponderance of alliances to manage maritime competition among states—lends a better appreciation of the issues and interests at stake vis-à-vis recent Indo-US security cooperation in the Indo-Pacific.
Viewed from a synthetic perspectival lens, both India and the US have an overriding interest in abating further entrenchment of Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific. Since its rise, China has rejected international law. It has also employed ‘debt-trap’ economic development schemes and an irredentist foreign policy towards Asia, and could effectively undermine international institutions through its geoeconomic clout to achieve short-term interests. Despite these, the exclusion of China from the region is far from feasible—given the heavy economic linking of both the US and India to the Chinese manufacturing juggernaut. Ergo, these states have nominally endeavoured to prevent the creation of a Sino-centric and authoritarian Indo-Pacific, instead of a free and open one, by variously attempting to ‘congage’ China—by encouraging its participation in global governance, while countering its maritime ambitions through fresh alliances and formations.
Moreover, India and the US have been furthering their strategic partnership through the creation of newer narratives; through institutional mechanisms of cooperation—such as the QUAD, the I2U2, and the 2+2 framework; not least, by incentivising civilian and military technology cooperation through the India-US Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies (iCET) and the US-India Defense Technology and Trade Initiative (DTTI). The US has endeavoured to strengthen Indian maritime capacity, resulting in bilateral defense trade of over USD 20 billion; India has also been designated as a Major Defense Partner of the US, with other measures including extensive joint military exercises, agreements appertaining to logistics and geospatial information sharing, and intelligence cooperation (Ganguly and Kapur 2023).
Domestically, with elections round the corner in both countries, there may be some trepidation regarding the future of their security cooperation in the Indo-Pacific. These are exacerbated by the purported unpredictability of American foreign policy behaviour if the Republicans come back to power; or, the ramifications of ‘strategic autonomy’ practised by an India that is—apparently—veering towards impassioned nationalism. Insofar as geopolitics, Indo-US relations have been strained as a result of India’s agnosticism towards the Ukraine War, ambivalence towards Iran, and condemnation of the IDF’s brutality in Gaza; also, the purchase of S-400 systems and subsidised crude from Russia. As regards foreign policy, the Biden administration took over two years to appoint an ambassador to India—a lacuna which has not gone unmissed in the latter’s foreign policy establishment; the US has also, concomitantly attempted to re-establish strategic cooperation with Pakistan, thereby fanning the latent mistrust in New Delhi towards its ‘unreliable’ strategic partner. All these only play into the hands of the Chinese and must be avoided if the FOIP vision is to be realised in the near future (Nalapat, 2023: 70).
Such pitfalls may be avoided, regardless of the vagaries of domestic politics, if the US incentivises further military capacity building and co-production of defense technology in India. Supplementary expansion of joint strategic efforts and the operationalization of extant agreements could enhance jointness, maritime domain awareness and intelligence sharing in the Indo-Pacific. Not least, if both states can base their security cooperation upon the positive understanding of convergent perspectives on sea power—through a mutual appreciation of the shared ideational platform—it may help India and the US avoid the downsides of protean power dynamics and international contingencies upon their strategic partnership.
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