Foreign Correspondence

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Myanmar plays off India and China


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By Sudha Ramachandran

Aug 17, 2005

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.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/GH17Df01.html