The ground situation of Underwater Domain Awareness (UDA) in the Indo-Pacific strategic space
Commodore RS Vasan IN (Retd), DG C3S and RD NMF Tamil Nadu
Director of the Chennai Centre for China Studies (C3S)
Key Highlights
- China has worked assiduously to change maritime geography through force and cartographic manipulation. This started with its excessive claims in the South China Sea.
- Monitoring the South China Sea has become necessary for China, the USA, and the regional players, many of whom conflict with China on the issue of the extent of the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
- The most recent sighting of a Jin-class nuclear submarine in the Taiwan Straits indicates the complexities of the underwater environment worldwide, notably in narrow waterways and contested areas.
- India has enormous interests in the events in the South China Sea and the Pacific, as those events impact India’s readiness and posturing in that region.
- China has accused the USA of nuclearising the Pacific, ignoring the fact that it has a nuclear arsenal that is threatening regional peace and balance.
The concept of Indo-Pacific has slowly and steadily occupied centre stage in international geopolitics and strategy. There are no illusions about the nature of power play in this region due to competition for space and influence. China has tried to work assiduously to change maritime geography through force and cartographic manipulation. This started with the excessive claims made by China in the South China Sea (SCS) [i] using the nine-dash line that apparently contained all the sea space that China needed to protect its strategic and commercial interests. Progressively, it built artificial Islands to augment its all-around capability beyond the first and second lines of defence.
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Commodore RS Vasan IN (Retd), DG C3S and RD NMF Tamil Nadu
Director of the Chennai Centre for China Studies (C3S)
Commodore RS Vasan IN (Retd) is a former Indian Navy officer and current Director of the Chennai Centre for China Studies (C3S). He also serves as the Regional Director of the National Maritime Foundation (NMF) in Tamil Nadu. He is also the Head of Strategy and Security Studies at the Centre for Asia Studies in Chennai. Commodore Vasan’s areas of study include maritime security, counter-terrorism, Indo-Pacific, neighborhood policies, and maritime dynamics in the IOR, China, blue economy, and ocean governance.