THE QUADRILATERAL "QUAD" -AN EXISTENTIAL STRATEGIC IMPERATIVE FOR INDO PACIFIC SECURITY

The Quadrilateral  more commonly designated as the 'QUAD" is a coalescing of four Major Nations of the Indo Pacific comprising the United States, India, Japan and Australia which first conceptually emerged in the first decade of the 21st Century in face of growing China's propensity for aggression and brinkmanship in Asia Pacific. 

The  QUAD slid out of strategic consciousness of the four Major Nations thereafter due to a combination of factors of US strategic distractions in Middle East and Afghanistan and more significantly because the 'China Threat' had still not becoming unmanageable, besides India's hedging strategies not to ruffle China.

The second decade of the21st Century especially after 2012 alarmed Major Powers of the Indo Pacific when China more noticeably switched over to 'Hard Power' strategies in pursuance of Chinese President's 'Great China Dream.' and the enunciation of China's Maritime Strategy 2015 which laid bare China's ambitions of projecting the  new-found  Chinese Navy power "in distant seas".

The maritime ambitions of China with the exponential expansion of Chinese Navy were no longer confined to domination of the South China Sea but to establish a significant naval presence in the Pacific Ocean and Indian Ocean, positioning China as the contending potential Superpower against the United States in a China-crafted new bipolar world order. 

China's underlying intentions on the above centred on challenging the United States dominance in the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean challenging the power status quo as the 'Revisionist Power' against the United States but also to subdue India and Japan as Asia's 'Emerged Powers' in contention with China both because of territorial disputes and geopolitical factors centring on Asian leadership.

China's other intention was to challenge the US-Japan military alliance and also nip in the bid the substantially evolving US-India Strategic Partnership.

Japan and India tied to the United States strategically grossly altered the balance of power against China in the Indo Pacific. Australia in the South Pacific with strong strategic links to the United States closed China's growing intrusive presence in the South Pacific island nations.

China attempted to turn the Western naval flank of the United States by seizing military dominance of the South China Sea, potential strangulation of Japan's sea-lanes of survival and establishing an intrusive Chinese Navy presence in the Indian Ocean to coerce India away from the US-India Strategic Partnership.

China's above militarily destabilising potential moves rang alarm bells in Washington belatedly to the China Threat in Indo Pacific and so also in New Delhi, Tokyo and Canberra.

Thus in middle of the present decade the QUAD was more purposefully resurrected  by the four Major Powers of the QUAD with serious discussions to make it more integrated and substantial.

Towards the  above end one lately has witnessed Joint Naval Exercises held bilaterally and multilaterally besides bilateral Joint Army and Air Force Exercises.

There is a wide ranging consensus in Asian Capitals, and moreso in South East Asia that China is not amenable to political  dialogues and adjustments on conflictual issues, a lesson slowly dawning on ASEAN countries most critically affected by Chinese aggression in South China Sea.

The alternative option to manage the growing China Threat is to put into create strong bilateral and multilateral groupings like the QUAD in the Indo Pacific whose potential China cannot ignore.

In 2020, peering into the future, contextually, in relation to the growing and menacing China Threat which could provoke ignition of existing flashpoints in the Indo Pacific, all of China's making, strong imperatives exist to transform the QUAD  into a strong, credible and potent existential strategic counterweight to deter China's propensity and impulses to dominate the Indo Pacific.


 

SOUTH KOREA PERSPECTIVES ON INDO PACIFIC SECURITY NEED RESEST

South Korea in 2020 would be ill-advised to let its historical animosity of Japan's colonial rule till 1945 distort its Indo Pacific security perspectives when geopolitical realities indicate the rise of a military threatening China intent on disrupting regional peace and security.

South Korea as in 1945 or in 1950 or thereafter had to survive in a hostile security environment with three Communist neighbours---China North Korea and Russia.

South Korea's security environment in 2020 has become more turbulent and conflictual largely due to China and North Korea's disruptive policies. Can South Korea be oblivious to the negative effects of these two Communist Nations on South Korean security?

South Korea could withstand Chinese and North Korean aggression propensities because of its security links with the United States and Japan hosting an even larger US Forces Forward Military Presence than that of S0uth Korea.

South Korea's phenomenal economic miracle could take place because of massive Japanese infusion of FDI and technologies. This was a reality recognised by South Korea's first military ruler President Park who prevailed over his countrymen to put animosities aside and let Japanese FDI flow-in.

Has China contributed in any meaningful way to South Korea's security? Has China ever assisted South Korea in its economic miracle?

Has China behaved like a responsible Major Power in the region to restrain its protégé and nuclear proxy North Korea to desist from its provocative stances towards South Korea and its security?

Has China contributed in any way to the materialisation of South Korea's national dream of Korean Reunification?

All the answers to the above questions are negative and the logical next question is as to what draws South Korea to a political outreach to China bypassing and being insensitive to United States and Japan's interests?

While South Korea has a Mutual Security Treaty with the United States and hosts nearly 40,000 US Troops as Forward Military Presence on the Korean Peninsula, some South Korean Presidents in recent years perceptionally steered closer to China giving China a handle to sow divisions and mistrust between South Korea and the United States and with Japan.

Since both Japan and South Korea are tied to United States with respective bilateral Mutual Security Treaties, the natural course of events should have been the evolution of a "United States-Japan-South Korea Strategic Triangle' as an existential counterweight to China's bid to destabilise the Western Pacific to its strategic advantage.

The above evolution could not emerge in my opinion due to South Korea's misgivings about Japan.

Having been posted in Japan on a military diplomatic assignment for nearly four years in the 1980s with concurrent accreditation to South Korea I am deeply convinced that the strategic moment has arrived in 2020 for forging the "United States-Japan-South Korea Strategic Triangle".

South Korea owes a deep debt of honour to the United States which while leading UN Forces retrieved South Korea from Communist China clutches when China and North Korea military forces had reached the beaches of Pusan at the Southern-most tip of South Korea.

General Douglas MacArthur in a legendary military offensive drove back Communist China's massed armies all the way to Yalu River on the borders of China. That US President Truman faltered in not allowing General MacArthur to cross into China, retrospectively, can be stated as leading to the rise of a threatening China even much more in the second decade of the 21st Century.

South Korea needs to recognise that if Communist China could launch a military offensive against United States in South Korea in 1950, with US as the victor of Second World War and then the only nuclear weapons Power in the world, what China can do in 21st Century with modernised and expanded Armed Forces with nuclear stockpiles and ICBMs at their disposal.

South Korea's security historically and geostrategically is linked indivisibly with United States and Japan and certainly not linked with Communist China which has created North Korea as China's nuclear proxy at South Korean capital Seoul's doorstep.

South Korea should actively ponder on reset of its perspectives on Indo Pacific security when in 2020 no space exists for South Korea to adopt independent policy thrusts towards China which are not synchronised with the United States and Japan's stances towards China.

Moreso, now with China heading towards an inevitable looming armed conflict with the United States.

RUSSIA'S ABORTED STRATEGIC PIVOT TO ASIA PACIFIC- THE CHINA FACTOR

Russian President Putin in the APEC Meet at Vladivostok in September 2012 had indicated Russia's intention for a 'Strategic Pivot to Asia Pacific' presumably as a response to US President Obama's decision of United States earlier declaration of a 'Strategic Pivot to Asia Pacific'.

The United States declaration incorporated the American response to the growing Chinese military aggressiveness in the region and more pointedly in the South China Sea where China then perceived that United States' power was on decline and therefore openings were presented to China to dent United States image as the Nett provider of regional security in the Asia Pacific. 

Analysed by me then was that Russian President Putin's indication could be a potential strategic game-changer even though the Russian President had not spelt out any military blueprint like the United States assertion that it was 'Rebalancing US Forces in Asia Pacific".

Even if the Russian President's assertion was political signalling it was a welcome signal that a resurgent Russia desired to be politically and economically integrated in Aria Pacific, especially to lure Japanese investments in Russia's Pacific littoral and Siberia.

The Russian President's assertion was promising in that it was the first indication of Russia moving out of China's shadows to which President Yeltsin had consigned Russia to in earlier years.

Subsequently, however, follow-up Russian moves indicated that the 'China Factor' had come into play to decisively abort any genuine desires for a 'Russian Strategic Pivot to Asia Pacific' or even the initiation of an independent Russian line in Asia Pacific. Russia had obviously buckled under China's pressures.

Geopolitical readings of those years would indicate that Russia could not ignore China's sensitivities on any enhanced Russian profile in the Asia Pacific which could dwarf China's growing signature and footprints in the then Asia Pacific and China's yearnings to be geopolitically be considered as United States equal.

Russia for last two decades has been deferring to China despite Russia's resurgence under President Putin for two main reasons--namely, China's billion dollars purchases of Russian armaments and oil and gas; and secondly, because the 'Cold War Gladiators' on Capitol Hill in Washington had failed to recognise that the 'China Threat' to the United States was a more challenging and deadlier one than the 'Russian Threat' to United States.

For them Russia was the perennial enemy of the United States and China was amenable to be absorbed as a responsible stakeholder in Asia Pacific security.

The converse was more truer in the perceptions prevailing in Asian capitals then and now.

In 2020, what is visible is that because of the latter factor of the United States of giving primacy to China over Russia in its Asia Pacific policy formulations Russia stood pushed into China's strategic camp.

In terms of balance of power in the enlarged Indo Pacific today the visible picture is that the China-Russia Strategic Nexus has concretised as a powerful existential counterweight to the US-led Quadrilateral comprising United States, Japan, India and Australia.

However, as an analyst and keeping the history of China-Russia transactional relations, and their contentious differences and misgivings between these two mighty neighbours, I have reservations that in the event of a United States-China military conflict whether Russia would actively join hostilities against the United States.

Retrospectively, even if Russia seriously pursued its original intention of a credible 'Strategic Pivot to Asia Pacific' would Russia contextually have delinked itself from China to pursue a Russia-Centric Asia Pacific Pivot?  The answer emerges as negative till such time China provoked an armed conflict with the United States.

Geopolitics also makes 'strange bedfellows' and the China-Russia relationship is certainly one notable one.

Peering into the future, one can advance the assessment that Russia would no more be tempted to a Russian 'Strategic Pivot to Asia Pacific' and rather prefer to watch amusingly as China keeps increasingly stepping into the minefield of a provocative armed conflict against the United States.

In the scenario above, no guesses need to be made as to who will be the ultimate winner.



 

SOUTH EAST ASIA'S CRITICAL ROLE IN INDO PACIFIC SECURITY

South East Asia geostrategically located astride the South China Sea maritime expanse which provides the maritime linkage between the Pacific and Indian Oceans is destined to play a crucial role in Indo Pacific Security in the 21st Century.

From the middle of the first decade of the 21st Century with the exponential and threatening military rise of China, the South East Asian countries have been engaged in beefing up their Navies perceiving that the China Threat as manifested in the South China Sea aggressions earlier against Vietnam and the Philippines now also encompasses Malaysia and Indonesia and more could follow.

Besides this regional context, there is the global context where South East Asia comes into focus with its geostrategic location astride the South China Sea. 

This pertains to the 'China Challenge' to the United States which stoutly maintains that the waters of the South China Sea are "Global Commons" as an international waterway and thus cannot be under illegal sovereignty claim of China or China can be allowed to impede free and unrestricted navigation both by sea and the skies above the South China Sea.

The South China Sea in 2020 portends to be the theatre of possible armed conflict between China and the United States with the sabre-rattling that China has commenced on all its peripheries.

Contextually, the South East Asian countries cannot escape the realities that geography has endowed on this immensely geostrategically significant region.

The developing conflictual scenarios edging towards an armed conflict between the United Sates and China due to China's provocative moves would leave no political or strategic space to South East Asian countries to sit on the fence as passive spectators.

ASEAN as the regional political grouping which for decades sought to engage China in dialogues and discussions by inviting China to be participating in various ASEAN mechanisms needs to do some soul-searching in relation to its future linkages with China.

What is unmistakeably clear in 2020 is that China had a certain credibility as long as China professed and acted as per its 'Soft Power' strategies. With switchover to China's 'Hard Power' strategies ASEAN nations like Vietnam and the Philippines were claimed as China's first victims of aggression. Moves have now become visible of China to move against Malaysia and Indonesia.

ASEAN should also not forget the historical context of China covetous design and strategies against South East Asia and claim this crucial geostrategic region as China's backyard. The China-inspired Communist insurgencies in Burma and Malaya were the opening moves.

Various security groupings emerged in intervening decades like SEATO and FPDA. Besides these security mechanisms
 ASEAN played around with ZOPFAN as a nuclear free Zone of Peace, Freedom & Neutrality in South East Asia.

ASEAN was lulled into complacency in the last decade of the 20th Century by Chinese duplicitous diplomacy as a responsible stakeholder in South East Asian security. China's cards are now lying open on the cards table and it doses not augur well for South East Asia.

In the contextual developing scenario with marked conflictual overtones it is a strategic imperative both for South East Asian countries to individually and also as ASEAN as their regional grouping to join the dots of China's military intentions in the South China Sea and its impact on their security.

The overall Indo Pacific Security Template can be greatly strengthened if the above dawns on South East Asian countries and ASEAN.

The Major Nations of the Indo Pacific and even Europe are seriously seized with deterring China from its military aggression in South China Sea  and therefore can South East Asian countries now afford to be a divided region when Indo Pacific security of which they are a part, stands endangered by China flouting all norms of international laws and conventions.

The stark realty that South East Asian countries and ASEAN as their regional political grouping has to face is that geographical configurations in relation to the South China Sea and China's unfolding intentions therein leave no scope for "Neutrality" !!!





 

SOUTH CHINA SEA NEEDS JOINT NAVAL PATROLS BY ASEAN NATIONS

South China Sea has been rendered as an explosive flashpoint in the Indo Pacific more pointedly after the advent of President Xi Jinping to power in Beijing. Under his leadership China significantly switched to 'Hard Power' strategies of a combination of muscular diplomacy and outright military aggression as manifested by China establishing 'Full Spectrum Dominance' over the South China Sea vast maritime expanse.

The South China Sea certainly was not historically a China Inland Sea as now China intends to convert it into. The term South China Sea was more of a geographical expression by Western colonial powers denoting the maritime expanse fractionally lying along China's Southern coastline, but not exclusively confined to the Chinese coastline.

In fact, the South China Sea commencing from Taiwan runs all the way to the Straits of Malacca with ASEAN countries having littorals on it.

Authoritative sources define the South China Sea as: "Geographically, the South China Sea plays a significant role in the geopolitics of the Indo Pacific. The South China Sea is bordered by Brunei, Cambodia,  China, Indonesia,  Malaysia. the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam."

Further, the South China sea is an arm of the Western Pacific Ocean and this vast maritime expanse extending from South of Taiwan to the Straits of Malacca is geopolitically described as "Global Commons" as it is of critical importance not only to the ASEAN littoral countries but to all the Major Powers of the world for strategic and economic reasons.

China with a fractional littoral on South China Sea as compared to ASEAN countries has coveted the South China Sea for strategic reasons to deny United States 'Close-In Military Intervention' should hostilities erupt. China also covets the vast mineral wealth and energy resources in which this Sea abounds.

China also intends that with complete military dominance over the South China Sea it can prevent or impede the military switchover of US Navy Fleets from the Pacific Ocean to the Indian Ocean and vice versa. China also intends that with such military dominance it can throttle the 'jugular vein' of staunch US Allies in the Western Pacific like Japan and South Korea.

China has illegally and by force has declared 'Full Sovereignty' over 90% of the South China Sea and established military control in recent years by capturing Vietnamese Islands and Philippines islets. It has also constructed fortified 'artificial islands in the South China Sea.

In 2020 China is in conflict with ASEAN nations like Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei---virtually the whole of ASEAN.

Against this contextual backdrop it becomes incumbent to ask as to why ASEAN as the notable regional grouping in South East Asia of long standing has not taken a united stand against Chinese aggression over the years against most of the ASEAN nations having vital stakes in the South China Sea?

The significant reason for this glaring omission was that China successfully created divides within ASEAN to prevent a 'United Stand' against China  by different inducements. Till recently major ASEAN countries like Indonesia and Malaysia were notable 'Fence-Sitters' in not taking strong positions against China.

In 2020 as China has stamped on the toes of Indonesia and Malaysia also in the South China Sea waters, possibilities now open for ASEAN Nations to adopt strong postures against China's creeping expansion of its footprints in the control of the South China Sea.

The first visible step of ASEAN Nations united resolve is to put into motion "Joint Naval Patrols" of ASEAN Navies in the South China Sea. China needs to be put on notice by ASEAN Nations that individual ASEAN countries are no longer purchasable by China to keep ASEAN divided.

Major Powers Navies are already frequenting the South China Sea by 'Joint Exercises' besides FONOPS by US Navy ships around disputed islands under illegal Chinese occupation and since fortified.

The South China Sea is inevitably headed for a global conflict as China has added too many incendiary overtones to its illegal occupation of ASEAN Nations islands. At some stage the Major Powers will be forced to lift China's illegal sovereignty claims and dominance impeding 'free and unimpeded maritime navigation in the South China Sea

In that eventuality, ASEAN Nations would not have the luxury to be passive spectators in a global conflict over the South China Sea. Strategic prudence dictates that ASEAN Nations "Stand-Up" to China and the best option contextually is to put into operation "Joint Naval Patrols" of ASEAN Navies in the South China Sea.