India in Quad: Breaching China’s oceanic cordon sanitaire

The quadrilateral comprising Australia, India, Japan and the United States is a multilateral ‘experience’ initiating freshness to global security, with China being the main concern. The rise of China in exponential terms, has encouraged the quadrilateral to coalesce and work out common methodologies on security issues. These issues primarily stem from the South China Sea becoming an arena where Beijing has not ruled out the ‘use of force’ to script an oceanic cordon sanitaire with existing international maritime law protocols being consigned to history.

The framework of the quadrilateral is of four wellestablished democracies wanting to pool resources and manpower against a single party state where the Communist Party of China (CPC) controls everything – politics, economy, society and foreign policy. Initiation of an alternate framework of financial structures complemented by the vision of weltanschauung (world view) run into established structures where three of the four members of the quadrilateral are heavyweights. The fourth member, India, is perhaps the most zealous in the quadrilateral to raise China as being a central ‘spoiler’ needing collective redressal. Recent tensions between China and India have drawn global attention to the two nuclear powers in a situation where retreat by one side is gloated by the other as a defeat inflicted.

US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo with Indian External Affairs Minister, S. Jaishankar

The emergence of China as a determinant globally, especially East Asia, puzzles, frustrates and encourages the quadrilateral to construct the wherewithal to defang the aggressive intent of China in matters pertaining to security as also the manipulation of existing economic arrangements to expand global influence. The ministerial meeting held in Tokyo in early October 2020, was a strong indication of Asia-Pacific security being the focus of attention and speculation on whether an Asian NATO is being planned. The meeting in Tokyo did not allege or accuse China by name, yet, it is that country which is responsible for the quadrilateral to be convened.

In all the members of the quadrilateral, domestic issues play a role in how foreign policy is conducted. The United States is most concerned about the Asia-Pacific going the way of Beijing through economic and financial allurements. Sanctions on bilateral trade with China by the Donald Trump administration owe their origin to campaign promises made at home to create jobs lost and to recreate manufacturing as economic hub. To Japan, the looming presence of China in economic and strategic terms has eroded post-war buzz making Japanese economy a precursor to produce consumer goods adopting a supply chain mechanism, replicated by others, including China. Beyond its economic success, Japan has created structural institutions like the Asian Development Bank (ADB), which, though based in Philippines, is run by Japanese financial largesse. China’s creating a financial architecture with New Development Bank (NDB), Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the Silk Road Fund, pose existential nightmares to established multilateral financial institutions, beginning with ADB. Australia, finds China difficult to decipher owing to its growing interference and influence and greed for resources like iron ore, gas and coal that comprise a significant part of their bilateral trade. To India, China is a threat – security primarily. The quadrilateral is an insurance policy against adventurism favoured by Beijing and will act as deterrent enabling sequestering China in its global schema of emerging as the central axis.

“New Delhi is crafting a new foreign policy where being an active member of quadrilateral attracts financial capital to India along with deeper security engagements, especially in the maritime realm”

Not surprisingly, economics as a determinant plays a significant role in the quadrilateral. For Australia, its largest bilateral trading partner is China with 2019 revealing USD 219 billion plus in trade with trade surplus favouring Canberra. For Tokyo, China is its second largest trading partner and Tokyo’s trade surplus with China (USD 28.6 billion / 2017) is half of Australia’s (USD 53.6 billion / 2017). The United States and India, on the other hand, have growing trade deficits with China. In 2017, trade deficit with China was USD 275.8 and India was USD 52 billion. Washington and New Delhi have synchronised ‘economic strangulation’ by China as decisive in bridging erstwhile hesitancies and adopting realpolitik to counter China.

Seminal to India’s active participation in the quadrilateral are embedded issues with strong domestic variables. First, China’s annual trade surplus has stymied domestic economic manufacturing succumbing to cheaper imports from China. Second, the methodology adopted by China in forcefully expanding its geographical space, violating bilateral compacts and understandings since long, have not found a quiescent New Delhi. Third, China’s stitching together an opposition against India in South Asia has not been ignored in New Delhi, wanting to checkmate China in its illusory fancies of being the central pole in global affairs. Fourth, China has not taken kindly to India ignoring the ‘One Belt One Road’ and ‘Maritime Silk Road Initiative’ that creates a China centric order. Fifth, and most importantly, New Delhi is expressing its international stature by announcing its tradition of being a successful multi-party democracy, abiding by international norms and never expanding territory, instigating civil strife or giving shelter to secessionists. New Delhi is crafting a new foreign policy where being an active member of quadrilateral attracts financial capital to India along with deeper security engagements especially in the maritime realm. To China, the quadrilateral, if a success, would derail China’s plans to control and dominate global trade from South China Sea to the entire Indian Ocean. The latter is where India has interests in maintaining extremely close relations with Sri Lanka, Maldives, Mauritius, Seychelles and Madagascar. These island countries have been paid lavish attention by Beijing with even respective domestic politics being influenced.

The quadrilateral is hence, India’s departure from the past and making a future more secure, for itself and the world from shenanigans featuring Chinese characteristics.