Maritime Silk Road and China’s Indian Ocean Strategy: An Analysis from the Perspective of Cooperative Security

Abstract

The strategic importance of the Indian Ocean has been rapidly increasing and the construction of the “21st-Century Maritime Silk Road” has been upgraded to the level of national foreign policy. In this background, China will need a more clarified Indian Ocean strategy. This article takes the perspective of cooperative security analysis and argues that China should promote the security cooperation of the whole region and safeguard the Maritime Silk Road of the Indian Ocean by participating in the existing multi-lateral cooperation mechanisms of the Indian Ocean, making efforts to create new multi-lateral security cooperation mechanisms, joining hands with the great powers within and outside of the Indian Ocean region, and engaging in noncompetitive cooperation in security. The key for the promotion of the “Belt and Road” strategy is to achieve “policy coordination, facilities connectivity, unimpeded trade, financial integration and people-to-people relations”. This is also closely relating to the security of the Maritime Life line in the Indian Ocean which is an important component of China’s national interests in the Indian Ocean. China needs to implement its cooperative security strategy from the following four aspects: first, we need to actively participate in the existing multi-lateral mechanisms and arrangements of the Indian Ocean region; second, we must try to establish new multi-lateral cooperation mechanisms; third, we must promote the security cooperation of the Indian Ocean through great power cooperation and coordination; and fourth, we should take advantage of the noncompetitive security regions as the first step of cooperation.