CHAPTER 7
INDIA AS A MARITIME POWER?
Andrew C. Winner
India is not the first country that comes to mind as a likely Asian maritime
power. While Indian national security officials and thinkers have begun
to speak the language of maritime power, one searches in vain for a formal
Indian maritime strategy document. In 2000, one well-respected Indian
maritime analyst called for the Indian government to develop and pro-
mulgate a maritime security policy as a precursor to a maritime strategy for
the IN (Indian Navy) and the national security apparatus.^1 In 2005, the Indian
CNS (chief of naval staff) stated in a speech that a maritime strategy was
indeed under development, but nosuch document has yet been issued
publicly.^2
A very brief IN vision statement did appear in May 2006. That four-page
document consists of a colorful cover, a half page of introduction (complete
with a colorful map of the Indian Ocean), a classic corporate-style ‘‘vision
statement,’’ and some general guiding principles that provide the reader
little insight into how the IN—or indeed the Indian nation as a whole—is
seeking to use the maritime realm to advance its security.^3 The IN did release
anIndian Maritime Doctrinestatement in April 2004, but this document—
asshowninmoredetailbelow—isextremelylimitedinbothscopeand
depth.^4
To be sure, the lack of a formal document outlining a nation’s maritime strat-
egy does not mean a government is unserious about using maritime power to
achieve national objectives. Nor does the lack of such a document mean that a
state cannot become a maritime power. One can argue that the United States
has not had a formal, publicly promulgated maritime strategy since the mid-
1980s, when the Reagan administration unveiled its vision of how to defeat the
Soviet Union at sea. Since that time the U.S. Navy has published various other
documents that could be called strategies (although none were), while other