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In the blue corner stands (or rather sails) the Oceanic alliance, sometimes known as the Quad, which is holding the Malabar 07 naval exercises in the Indian Ocean. Traditionally a joint exercise for the Indian fleet and the U.S. Navy's Pacific command, this time the U.S. task force of two aircraft carriers, the Nimitz and the Kitty Hawk, will be joined by seven Indian warships, an Australian tanker and frigate and by a frigate from Singapore.
The term "the Quad" comes from Tokyo, where Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has launched Quadrilateral Initiative to forge closer strategic ties among Japan, the United States, Australia and India, and to get their armed forces accustomed to working together.
This week's naval exercises cover the Indian Ocean from the Indian coast to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which command the approaches to the Straits of Malacca of Singapore. Through these narrow waters pass almost two-thirds of China's foreign trade and more than three-quarters of its oil imports, a reminder -- were China to need one -- that a navy that commands the Indian Ocean has its thumb on China's windpipe.
To anyone who recalls the Cold War and George Orwell's visionary novel "1984" with its dark prophecy of an endless war between Eurasia, Eastasia and Oceania, this putative emergence of two armed camps is deeply troubling. And it comes at a time when China is being accused of hacking into Pentagon computers and when Russia has resumed patrols of its strategic bomber fleet. And bear in mind that the 2005 SCO summit called for a withdrawal of all U.S. military forces from Central Asia.
But despite U.S. and European concerns for Russian rearmament and President Vladimir Putin's much more assertive role in world affairs, this is far from being the cast of characters for a new Cold War. Putin himself publicly dismissed any comparison between the SCO and the old Warsaw Pact military alliance as "improper either in content or form."
And China and Russia have rather different strategic goals, not least because of Russian nervousness that Siberia is rich in raw materials and almost empty of people, while China needs raw materials and has 1.3 billion people.
Moreover, India is far from being a full-heated participant in any grandiose Western geopolitical scheme to lure it into the role of balancing China's rising power in Asia. The current Indian coalition government of Manmohan Singh, which depends on communist votes, cannot even get its nuclear cooperation agreement with the United States through Parliament because the communists object.
India's communists organized a protest against the Malabar naval exercises this week, brandishing banners that read "U.S. Imperialists Go Back," as party stalwart Jyoti Basu told them, "This is an extremely important battle, not only against America but also against the central government in New Delhi, which is handing over our country to imperialist forces."
Australia, while a close and traditional U.S. ally, has its own rather special relationship with China, symbolized this week by the signing of an agreement under which PetroChina will get a million tons of natural gas from Australia's vast Gorgon field. China is also taking the lead in building the US$3 billion Oakajee port and rail project in Western Australia. The Australian mining giant BHP Billiton noted this week that China is its biggest customer.
An eminent-persons group convened by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, by the Confederation of Indian Industry and by the Japan Institute of International Affairs has produced a thoughtful report on the way ahead for trilateral cooperation between the United States, India and Japan. It stresses their cooperation "should not be seen as targeted at China but rather as a stabilizing factor in broader regional dynamics ... a magnet that attracts other like-minded states, rather than a wall that drives them toward neutrality."
It also recommends that this trilateral group should be enlarged to include Australia (thus making the Quad) and that the four governments should start holding regular formal discussions at a higher level than the informal assistant secretary of state discussions held on the margins of other regional meetings. They also propose summits between heads of government on the sidelines of G8 and U.N. meetings.
The Quad is already a strategic reality in the Indian Ocean this week. And Australia has signaled its readiness to join the United States and Japan in building and financing a missile defense system for the Pacific region. Ostensibly aimed against the threat from a rogue state like North Korea, it also serves as both a warning system and as a subtle deterrent against China.
The vogue term for this in Washington is "hedging," or taking out some timely insurance against China becoming a threat in the future, while trying to steer the Beijing leadership toward cooperation and integration into a global security system, much as it has been integrated into the global economy.
But there lies the rub. The global economy is already creaking under the strain of China's growth rates, its hunger for raw materials and commodities, and its massive US$1.3 trillion foreign currency and securities reserves. Building a global security system that can absorb China, while not bringing about the same Chinese suspicions and resentments that the "hedging" is supposed to avert, will be tough, particularly as China watches the balancing coalition of the Quad being constructed against it.
