The aftermath of the 1857 War of Independence saw the British establish a penal colony in the Andaman and Nicobar (A&N) islands, where many Indian revolutionaries and freedom fighters were incarcerated for life. The dark symbolism of kalapani, as the A&N came to be known, coupled with the remoteness of the islands, led to years of benign neglect by a distant New Delhi. It was only in 1962, when the Indian Navy (IN) raised an alarm about the reported sighting of a Chinese submarine, that the government sanctioned a detachment of 150 sailors to form a “naval garrison” to guard this huge archipelago of 836 islands spread across 450 miles of sea.
Against this backdrop, recent reports regarding the government’s heightened security focus on these strategic islands are to be welcomed, especially because in the past, these islands nearly slipped from India’s grasp.
In February 1942, just a month after the fall of Singapore, the islands were occupied by the Japanese as a prospective springboard for the invasion of India. Towards the end of 1943, they became the first part of India to be “liberated” from British rule, when Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose visited Port Blair and hoisted the INA tricolour. However, this was mere symbolism because the British reoccupied the A&N after the Japanese surrender in 1945. On the eve of Independence, the fate of these islands hung in balance. It is not commonly known that the British Chiefs of Staff had recommended that, given their strategic oceanic location, the A&N should be retained as a Crown possession. According to contemporary accounts, so relieved was British PM Clement Atlee when Indian leaders reluctantly swallowed the bitter pill of the Partition plan that he overruled the Chiefs of Staff and let India have these islands.
In September 1965 after the commencement of India-Pakistan hostilities, President Ayub Khan sent retired Air Marshal Asghar Khan as an emissary to seek support from fraternal Indonesia. In his memoirs, Asghar Khan records his surprise when the Indonesian navy chief, Admiral Martadinata, asked him: “Don’t you want us to take over the Andaman Islands? They are an extension of Sumatra and are, in any case, between East Pakistan and Indonesia. What right have the Indians to be there?” As it happened, the Indo-Pak conflict concluded before the Indonesians initiated any action.
In 1976, the A&N naval garrison, having been supplemented by army troops, was upgraded to Fortress Andaman & Nicobar. In 2001, the post-Kargil War security review saw the establishment of India’s first joint/unified operational command — the Andaman Nicobar Command (ANC) in Port Blair. By placing forces of all three services and the Coast Guard, under the command of the newly-created commander-in-chief, A&N, the military had taken a great leap of faith. In the 23 years that have elapsed, the ANC has proved an unqualified success, as a “theatre” in microcosm and provided tangible proof that the concept of “jointness” can work successfully in the Indian environment. Regrettably, the tried-and-tested ANC template has not found favour in the military’s vain, four-year-old quest for “theaterisation”.
Turning to other security-related aspects of the A&N islands, note must be taken of their unique geography. In the north, the islands are separated from Myanmarese territory by a mere 22 miles. At the southern end, Indira Point is just 90 miles from Indonesia’s Aceh province and the coast of Thailand lies 270 miles to the east. In stark contrast, Port Blair is about 850 miles from Chennai, as well as Kolkata. Although the surface area of these islands is only 8,300 sq km, they add 300,000 sq km to India’s exclusive economic zone with the promise of undersea hydrocarbon and mineral deposits. Only 31 of the archipelago’s 836 islands and islets are inhabited. This means there is a possibility of surreptitious occupation — a la “Kargil heights” — by a covetous neighbour.
To obviate the possibility of intrusions by state and non-state entities, ANC will need to maintain three-dimensional maritime domain awareness through networked assets, including radars, aircraft, satellites and unmanned vehicles. The command must be invested with adequate defensive and offensive firepower, as well as rapid-reaction forces with amphibious and airlift capabilities. The frequent transits of PLA Navy (PLAN) warships, submarines and research/intelligence-gathering vessels in these waters portend a sustained Chinese naval presence, including nuclear attack submarines. This would require the IN to maintain a substantial anti-submarine warfare capability in the A&N.
The severe disruption and re-routing of shipping, occasioned by the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, have served as yet another harsh and expensive reminder that “maritime choke points” constitute critical vulnerabilities for world trade and commerce. In this context, the Malacca Strait — more than 90,000 merchant ships carrying about 30 per cent of the world’s traded goods pass through it every year — presents a challenge as well as a latent opportunity for India. Of significance for Indian strategists is the location of the Great Nicobar Island, which sits astride the western entrance/exit of the Malacca Strait and can comprehensively dominate all shipping — merchant as well as naval — in transit. This was the reason that as far back as 2003, Chinese Premier Hu Jintao warned the PLAN about a future “Malacca Dilemma”.
The Andaman and Nicobar Islands are of great strategic importance since they straddle one of the busiest sea lanes in the world and give India the reach to monitor the flow of traffic from the South China Sea (Pacific Ocean) to the Andaman Sea (Indian Ocean) via the Strait of Malacca that’s key to trade and oil shipments in the Indo-Pacific.
One hopes that the reported security infrastructure upgradation is part of a cohesive strategy, which aims to convert the A&N islands into a formidable maritime bastion that will not only extend India’s defensive perimeter but also bestow the ability to project power or extend a hand of friendship to maritime neighbours. Such a strategy must acknowledge that for the foreseeable future, India would need to enlist the cooperation of like-minded partners to maintain peace and tranquillity in the Indo-Pacific. In this context, Port Blair could become a regional hub for navies to acquire interoperability in areas like disaster-relief, medical aid, countering piracy and human smuggling, aircraft/submarine search and rescue and other such cooperative maritime endeavours.
The writer is a retired chief of naval staff
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