ASIA: The US and India - despite vociferous denials by both - are subtly forging military and security alliances aimed at containing China, writes Rahul Bedi, in New Delhi.
Last September's horrific suicide attacks on the United States have, ironically, turned out to be a strategic bonus for Washington, helping the eagle spread its wings and extend its military presence across Asia.
Through a complex web of alliances, ostensibly to fight the scourge of Islamic terrorism - backed by economic sops and clever strategic agreements - the world's lone superpower has manoeuvred itself not only to exploit the vast energy resources of the Central Asian Republics (CARs) but also to encircle China, its potential economic and military rival.
A year after September 11th, US military presence is palpable not only in Kabul, Islamabad and strategically located CARs like Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan - vital to US oil conglomerates anxious to begin laying pipelines to the Arabian Sea - but to varying degrees in India, Sri Lanka, Nepal and, to a lesser extent, in Burma. Further east, the US military is combating al-Qaeda cadres in the Philippines, besides bolstering its presence in Indonesia and the South China Sea.
And, whilst seizing the opportunity to obtain its long-term energy and security interests, the US has changed all rules of engagement. In its military alliances, especially in the CARs, it has either downplayed or ignored the lack of human rights considerations amongst its newfound allies.
Desperate for an alternative to the turbulent Arab states for its petroleum needs, the US has emerged as the leading foreign investor in Central Asia's energy sector, openly declaring that it wants to promote political and economic stability in the area. Loosely translated, this means it wants peace to ensure profit.
Washington's opening gambit immediately after September 11th was, predictably, in the CARs whose strategic location was vital in executing its campaign against the Taliban. The CARs, on the other hand, aware of their geographical importance, also sensed an economic opportunity, and so a partnership of convenience was cemented. And though US officials stress that their presence in the CAR states is not an extended one, Washington's support of their authoritarian regimes, its economic and military largesse, and the fact of its building near-permanent bases, seem to suggest otherwise.
Washington has also made assurances of more military aid to the region - and of moneys to acquire US weaponry, with a view to bolstering the US's military industrial complex which was rapidly shrinking before September 11th. "The moment [September 11th\] was greedily seized upon by Washington to re-enter, without any opposition, its old Cold War stomping ground in Asia for maximizing profit," a Western diplomat in Delhi said.
While Islamabad and Kabul remain crucial to US interests, Washington and Delhi - despite vociferous denials by both - are subtly forging long-term military and security alliances aimed at containing China. Such a partnership suits India, which has termed China its "number one enemy", despite the recent flurry of diplomatic overtures to Beijing for peace and tranquility.
Last December's meeting of the Defence Policy Group and the subsequent signing of the General Security of Military Information Agreement by Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes in Washington, ensured the sharing of military intelligence between India and the US.
In April India bought eight US-built Firefinder weapon-locating radar for $146 million in the first major American defence contract in over four decades, while Washington cleared the sale of 20 other military items to Delhi. It is also offering India a range of military hardware such as multi-mission maritime reconnaissance aircraft and Harpoon anti-ship missiles.
In trying to "surround" China the US has a willing ally in India's military. A recent Indian navy analysis pinpoints China's nuclear capability and modernised navy as its primary concern in the 21st century. In the report "Strategic Review - The Maritime dimension", the navy declared that the power vacuum in the Indian Ocean region in the 21st century could only be filled by India, China or Japan either by "complete pre-eminence or by a mutual stand-off". In either case, the situation entails serious security implications for India, an insecurity that Washington is now fully exploiting.
China is rapidly modernising its navy with a view to increasing its presence in the Indian Ocean by 2020. The People's Liberation Army Navy has the second-largest navy in Asia, after Russia.
And, in keeping with China's revised doctrine of waging "modern warfare under high-technology conditions on the high seas" it is focusing on developing a "blue water" naval capability centred around at least two aircraft carrier battle groups for the Indian Ocean and the Pacific. Beijing has also declared the navy its senior service.
India, on the other hand, claims that as part of Beijing's "encirclement policy", China is establishing a signals intelligence facility on Great Cocos island, 40 nautical miles from the Andaman Islands, to monitor shipping in the Malacca Straits and frequent missile tests off Orissa's east coast.
For over $2 billion China is also modernising Burmese naval bases on the islands of Munaung, Hainggyi, Katan, Zadaikyi and Mergui to ultimately utilise them for operations in the area as part of plans to extend into the Indian Ocean besides building roads and airports. The Chinese are also constructing a road and waterway link from southern Yunan province to Yangon port in Burma to provide Beijing access to the Indian Ocean through the Bay of Bengal, obviating the need to cross the Malacca-Singapore Straits.
Beijing has also supplied Burma with arms worth $1.6 billion since 1992, and is believed to be training some 300 Burmese air and naval personnel.
China's hold over Burma's military junta also led to US pressure on Rangoon to release the country's opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi last month. The 56-year-old Nobel laureate, whose National League for Democracy swept the 1990 elections, was never allowed to assume office by the military junta and placed under house arrest.
To further complicate the security situation, China's military and nuclear ally Pakistan also has close links with Burma, having developed a close security and diplomatic relationship with the military junta after it seized power in Rangoon in the late 1980s.
And at a time when the Burmese military administration faced sanctions and was considered an "international pariah", Pakistan supplied it with several shiploads of ordnance and other military hardware worth nearly $3 million.
Burmese military officers are presently attending Pakistan's military staff college at Quetta in Baluchistan province, while others are reportedly undergoing training to operate howitzers and a range of tanks, like the T69s, T63s and T53s which Rangoon recently acquired from China.
Pakistan is also believed to be training Myanmar Air Force (MAF)officers to operate the two-seater Karakoram-8 jet trainers that double as ground attack aircraft, of which Burma has acquired 14 since 1998.
While the K-8s are built in China, Islamabad has a 25 per cent interest in the project, thereby complementing Pakistan's level of involvement in Burma's overall defence establishment. The MAF also has a proliferating fleet of Chinese F-7 interceptors and A-5 ground attack craft that Pakistan also operates.
Burmese naval officers are also reportedly being trained in Pakistan.
Last December two Pakistani nuclear scientists, anticipating questioning by US officials about their alleged links with the Taliban, sought sanctuary in Burma, intelligence sources said. Suleiman Assad and Mohammad Mukhtar, both in their late 50s, arrived in Rangoon via Bangkok and were reportedly "secreted" away by the military administration in Sagaing, a Mandalay suburb in central Burma.
Western and Indian intelligence sources said Assad and Mukhtar left Pakistan when the US was investigating two other Pakistani nuclear scientists for their links with the Taliban and possible help they may have provided it to build a " dirty bomb " or crude radiological weapon capable of being detonated conventionally by explosives.
Meanwhile, the Bush administration has asked Congress for $20 million in unspecified, non-lethal military aid for Nepal that includes body armour, night vision devices and varied equipment for the grossly under-equipped, near medieval Royal Nepal Army (RNA) that is desperately battling the Maoists.
Working in tandem with the British, whose association with Nepal dates back to 1815 and who continue to recruit Gurkha soldiers, albeit a token number, are around 40 US "low-profile advisers", a euphemism for security specialists, recently posted in Kathmandu. These undercover advisers are reportedly helping the Nepalese army and the near-defunct National Intelligence Directorate (NID) to modernise in order to ably counter the Maoists. The US ambassador to Kathmandu, Michael Mallinowski, was earlier posted in Peshawar.
The RNA, which has never fought a war or been involved in counter-insurgency operations, desperately needs revamping, while the NID, which was used principally to gather information on Nepalis and to harass them during the Panchayti Raj decades earlier, are incapable of adapting themselves to deal with the kingdom's "red menace".
"From the US, we need material assistance such as weapons, equipment and training to fight the terrorists, and financial assistance to fight budgetary constraints," Prakash Sharan Mahat, adviser to Nepal's caretaker Prime Minister, Sher Nahadur Deuba, said recently.
More than 3,000 people have died in six years of fighting in Nepal - more than one-third of them since the Maoists walked out of peace talks with the government last November.
And, under the so-called Operation Balanced Style US Sea Air Land Forces, specialists have begun training the Sri Lankan army and navy while police teams are being sent to the US for anti-terrorism courses with emphasis on bomb disposal.
The military co-operation has also been extended to the island's air force, which operates a wide range of Israeli-made combat aircraft. With an eye on eastern Sri Lanka's Trincomalee port as a staging point for its assets based at Diego Garcia, Washington has also pressured the Tamil Tigers to persevere in the peace offensive.
Trincomalee is one of the world's biggest natural deep-sea harbours that "controls" the Indian Ocean. Through a combination of diplomacy, bullying and astute bargaining over several years, a paranoid India somehow managed to prevent outside powers from having access to Trincomalee.
One of the key clauses of the 1987 accord that led to the Indian peacekeeping force arriving in Sri Lanka declared that Trincomalee would not be controlled by any foreign power "inimical" to India.
But with the US now India's most coveted ally, Delhi is unlikely to object to Washington neatly tying up all the strategic bonds to fully dominate the Asian region.