fielding warfighting capabilities able to dominate Pakistan’s navy, supporting joint
warfare against this traditional antagonist. If Indian naval forces were capable of
defeating Pakistan, they would presumably suffice for other clashes in India’s
immediate environs. While China is India’s neighbor, it might not qualify as
being in the nation’s immediate neighborhood as defined by Mohan. Accordingly,
it will be examined below in the discussion of the outer circles.
The second goal, vetoing detrimental actions by outside powers, is more chal-
lenging, both in general and from a strictly maritime perspective. Outside powers
likely to infringe on India’s interests in its immediate neighborhood are few and
far between. Western nations with significant power-projection capacity—the
United States and, to a lesser degree, France and the United Kingdom—and
China probably exhaust the list of such powers. Russia could return to this
category but probably will not for the foreseeable future. Discerning specific
circumstances under which India wouldneedtovetoWesternmilitaryaction
in its waters is difficult to imagine, but not impossible. China, by contrast,
might render assistance to Pakistan insome form or another during a future
Indo-Pakistani conflict. New Delhi might also see the need for a general naval
hedge against China’s rise, but this would fall into one of Mohan’s outer circles.
For the IN, vetoing detrimental actions would consist of sea-control and
sea-denial operations in Indian littoral waters. Close proximity to Indian
territory would make this far easier than asserting sea control on the high seas.
Land-based assets would be readily available, as would ships, carrier aircraft,
and submarines. Indian military forces, moreover, would presumably be more
familiar than any adversary with their home waters.
Mohan’s middle circle (largely a maritime milieu) consists of what he calls
India’s ‘‘so-called extended neighborhood,’’ covering a rather large, amorphous
area that encompasses the rest of Asia, as well as the Indian Ocean littoral.
He posits that India’s strategic goals within this vast, differentiated region are to
‘‘balance the influence of other powers and prevent them from undercutting’’
India’s interests. The ‘‘interests’’ here are ill-defined in Mohan’s work, aside from
assessing how India should respond to the rise of China. With regard to the sea,
the author discusses how India could involve itself more vigorously in peace-
keeping and humanitarian missions if it resolves its problems with Pakistan.
Again, several maritime considerations are at work in this second circle. One is
the safety of commerce, particularly energy-laden shipping from the Persian Gulf
(part of the Indian Ocean littoral) to India. Protecting merchant vessels from
pirates in the Straits of Malacca and off the Horn of Africa represents another
maritime mission, although the severity of this threat remains in question. Piracy,
furthermore, is largely a law-enforcement issue, best combated within a country’s
territorial waters. Policing Indian territorial waters (a mission for the Indian
Coast Guard as much as for the IN) and cooperating with neighboring states to
train their forces, transfer equipment, and share information are central tasks.130 Asia Looks Seaward