Sina Delenda Est

India, U.S. and Japan Begin War Games, and China Hears a Message
By HARI KUMAR and ELLEN BARRY

American and Japanese ships during the inauguration of joint naval exercises with India on Monday in Chennai, India. 

NEW DELHI — The navies of India, Japan and the United States began a set of war games on Monday with a particular target: submarines capable of sliding unannounced into the deep waters of the Indian Ocean, silently taking positions near the Indian coastline.
It is not a mystery whose submarines are at issue. 

Last month, the Indian Navy announced a plan to permanently station warships to monitor movement through the Strait of Malacca, where many Chinese vessels enter from the South China Sea. 

And in recent weeks, navy officials here have reported a “surge” of Chinese military vessels entering the Indian Ocean.
Routine maritime exercises have long served as a gauge of India’s uneasy relationship with China, prompting a shrug or a blast of condemnation, depending on the circumstances.
The annual series of naval exercises, known as the Malabar series, began in 1992. 

This year’s event was the largest to date, and the first to feature carriers from all three navies. 

The games are unfolding under tense circumstances, nearly a month into an aggressive standoff between Chinese and Indian border forces in the Himalayas.

On Sunday, the Chinese Embassy in New Delhi took the unusual step of warning its citizens to be especially cautious traveling in India for the next month.
Against that backdrop, the influx of Chinese warships into the Indian Ocean is another indicator of Beijing’s displeasure, said retired Adm. Anup Singh, who has overseen the exercises in the past.
“They are deliberately upping the ante in order to flag their posture to people who are concerned,” Admiral Singh said. 

“The Indians, the Japanese and the Americans. So they deliberately do it as a pinprick.”
Though India’s Navy is dwarfed by China’s, India holds a strategic advantage in the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago, which stretches 470 miles to the northwest of the Strait of Malacca, a “choke point” connecting the South China Sea to the Indian Ocean.
This position, which could be used to put pressure on Chinese supply lines, is an increasing focus of cooperation between India, the United States and Japan. 

Monday’s China Daily, an English-language government newspaper, referred apprehensively to the maritime exercises in an editorial, noting that the Indian Ocean is one of China’s main conduits for trade and oil imports.
“It is China that should feel ‘security concerns,’” it concluded.
China’s submarine fleet has expanded rapidly in recent years. 

The country has assumed control of Pakistan’s Gwadar Port, finalizing plans to sell eight submarines to Pakistan, and opening its first overseas military logistics supply facility in Djibouti.
For Indian leaders, who for centuries have focused on contested northern borders, this has required a sudden shift in attention to 4,700 miles of southern coastline, along which much of the country’s security and energy infrastructure is concentrated.
“This is a tectonic shift in India’s security calculus, that it has to protect its southern flank,” said Brahma Chellaney, a professor of strategic studies at the Center for Policy Research. 

One response, he said, would be “a concert of democracies to rein in these muscular activities.”
Both Japan and the United States have expressed eagerness to team up with India on its maritime frontier. 

Last month, the United States agreed to sell India 22 advanced surveillance drones, which could be deployed to the Strait of Malacca and used to track Chinese naval movements. 

The drones can be used in concert with the American-made P-8I Poseidon surveillance aircraft, which are already staged on the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
The Indian government has signaled that it is willing, after many years of resistance, to expand security infrastructure on the archipelago. 

In May, a wildlife board approved the creation of missile testing and surveillance facilities on Rutland Island, a project first proposed in 2013.
Last year, Japan became the first foreign government allowed to build infrastructure on the archipelago — a 15-megawatt power plant. 

But it is eager to break ground on a range of other connectivity projects, said Darshana M. Baruah, a research analyst at Carnegie India. 

When Mr. Modi visited Japan last year, the two leaders agreed on a plan to develop “smart islands,” as part of a set of projects in sensitive frontier areas.
This week’s naval exercises will involve the United States’ Nimitz, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier; India’s I.N.S. Vikramaditya, a Russian-made aircraft carrier; and Japan’s JS Izumo, a helicopter carrier, as well as 13 other warships and submarines. 

Japan is participating for the second year in a row. 

A decade ago, China was infuriated when the three countries teamed up with Australia for naval exercises, applying immediate diplomatic pressure that prompted Australia to withdraw.
This year, Australian military officials asked for their country to take part as an “observer,” but India rejected the idea.

Chinese Peril

The Real Reasons Behind China's Big Investments In Sri Lanka
By Panos Mourdoukoutas

What’s China doing in Sri Lanka? 

Officially, it’s building the country’s infrastructure. 

Like the ports of Colombo and Hambantota, which have left the country heavily indebted.
Unofficially, China is setting up outposts in the Indian Ocean as part of Beijing’s broader strategy to secure the passage of Middle East oil through the Strait of Malacca and counter American naval hegemony in the region.
China has increasingly come to rely on the Middle East for its oil needs, which must be shipped through the Strait of Malacca to reach its shores. 

This means that Beijing runs the risk of being cut off from Middle East oil supplies should America blockade the Strait -- in the event of a further escalation of South China Sea disputes or an outright war between America and China.
“In the event of war with the United States, Chinese policy planners have long feared a retaliatory US naval blockade of the Strait of Malacca to cut off vital oil supplies,” says Nilanthi Samaranayake. 

“In a 2003 speech, Hu Jintao even acknowledged China’s vulnerability in the Strait. Thus, some American security analysts have argued that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has been actively constructing a “string of pearls in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) to secure the safe passage of oil by Chinese ships, as well as to position China as a countervailing presence to US naval hegemony in the Sea Lines of Communications (SLOCs).”
That could explain why Chinese submarines have begun suddenly and repeatedly showing up in the Chinese-operated South Container Terminal in the port of Colombo.
And why China has been telling India to stay off Sri Lanka.
That’s something investors in Southeast Asian markets should keep a wary eye on, as it opens yet another front between the two Asian giants, which could drag in America.
And that raises the geopolitical risk of investing in the region. 

Though Chinese and Indian markets seem to be ignoring these risks, for now.