Tevens
is dit het antwoord van India op een grote Chinese marinebasis die
dit land op Sri Lanka bouwt* op de door haar verworven haven
Hambantota (met een contract van 99 jaar, mede als een gedeeltelijke compensatie voor de enorme schulden die dit land heeft bij de Chinezen), bovendien heeft China een marinebasis in Djibouti......
Deze
bases, dus die van India en China controleren daarbij ook nog eens
uiterst belangrijke en druk bevaren scheepsroutes, waar o.a. gigantische hoeveelheden
olie worden vervoerd.......
Over
olie gesproken, rond de Seychellen schijnen zich enorme voorraden
olie te bevinden, waarmee dit land poogt 'op te stomen in de vaart der
volkeren', waarbij India 'uiteraard' deze voorraden deels zal overnemen tegen een zachte prijs. De melding van deze olie komt overigens niet van Tyler Durden, de
schrijver van het volgende artikel, maar van 'Cosmos' die reageerde
op dat artikel, zoals geplaatst op ZeroHedge (deze reactie is onder het zo volgende artikel weergegeven)
Het
is wat betreft wereldpolitiek wel duidelijk dat China en India het
voortouw willen overnemen van de VS en haar hielenlikkende
oorlogshonden (NAVO landen)...... Jammer genoeg is e.e.a. wel weer 'het fundament' van een
groot conflict tussen India en China, laten we maar hopen dat het zover niet komt, immers het gaat hier kernmachten.....
India To Build Major Overseas Military Base Off Africa To Combat China
Wed,
02/21/2018 - 00:30
India
is preparing to construct a significant overseas
military base on an island in Seychelles, an archipelago of 115
islands in the Indian Ocean, off East Africa to counter growing
Chinese influence in the Indian Ocean.
Last
month, Seychelles and
India signed a twenty-year agreement, permitting the Indian military
to build an airbase and naval installations on Assumption Island, a
small island in the Outer Islands of Seychelles north of Madagascar,
said Seychelles News Agency.
“This
[agreement] reinforces our commitment to not only further deepen
India-Seychelles relations, but to also take our partnership to
another level,” Indian
Foreign Secretary Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said in a statement.
“The
[mutual] co-operation is exemplified
by the operationalization of the Coastal Surveillance Radar System
[CSRS] in
March 2016, and our commitment to augment the defense assets and
capability of Seychelles,” he added.
The
agreement enhances India’s military capabilities and maritime
surveillance of Seychelles’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of 1.37
million square km. Assumption
Island will serve as a strategic staging area for the Indian
military, as the island chain resides between crucial global shipping
lanes.
This
is key as in 2016 alone, “approximately
40 million barrels of oil per day — equivalent to just under half
of the world’s total oil supply — traveled through Indian
Ocean entry
and exit points, including the Straits of Hormuz, Malacca, and Bab
el-Mandeb,” said CNN.
The
EIA classifies the region as a significant chokepoint for maritime
transit of oil. More specifically, the EIA calculates roughly 5.8
million barrels per day travels directly by Seychelles, which then
ultimately flows to the West. This would indicate India does not just
recognize Seychelles as a critical part of its global energy
security, but perhaps, India’s push to control the island is a
proxy of Washington.
India
has already provided Seychelles with military aircraft, helicopters,
and naval boats. It has installed a coastal surveillance radar system
on one of Seychelles’ islands to conduct intelligence gathering
activities. Throughout the years, the waters around Seychelles
have seen an abundance of Indian warships conducting anti-piracy
patrols
Senior
Indian naval officials have stated that the development of military
installations on Seychelles is to offset China’s maritime Silk Road
strategy in the Indian Ocean.
As CNN notes,
India is attempting to better posture itself in the Indian Ocean
despite its neighbor and long-standing rival China, who is already
situated with military installations in the region.
Under
Chinese President Xi Jinping, China’s naval reach has grown
considerably, expanding far beyond its immediate coastline into areas
not previously considered within its sphere of influence.
In
July last year China established its first overseas military base in
Djibouti, near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, among the world’s busiest
shipping lanes and one of three crucial Indian Ocean arteries.
The
strait, which is only 29 kilometers (18 miles) wide at its narrowest
point, connects the Mediterranean Sea via the Suez Canal, and the Red
Sea to the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean beyond.
The
opening of the Djibouti base was followed several months later by the
country’s controversial acquisition of the Hambantota port in
Sri Lanka, just 22.2 kilometers (13.8 miles) by some estimates from
the primary Indian Ocean sea lane that links the Malacca Straits to
the Suez Canal.
Malcolm
Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute
in Sydney, described the Hambantota deal — which saw Sri Lanka
grant China a 99-year lease on the port to service some of the
billions in debt it owes to Beijing — as part of a “determined
strategy by China to extend its influence across the Indian Ocean at
the expense of India.”
“That
port then gives them not only a strategic access point into
India’s sphere of influence through which China can deploy its
naval forces, but it also gives China an advantageous position to
export its goods into India’s economic sphere, so
it’s achieved a number of strategic aims in that regard,”
said Davis.
Indian
military officials said Seychelles and Assumption Island are a
powerful combination in extending the reach of India’s naval
operations, which it intends to rotate aircraft and ships throughout
the region.
“The
development is a clear indicator that India’s geostrategic frontier
is expanding in tandem with China’s growing strategic footprint in
the Indo-Pacific,” Captain
Gurpreet Khurana, of the Indian Navy’s National Maritime
Foundation, said.
As
India fears encirclement by militarist China in the Indian ocean, it
only leaves us to believe that these
nuclear-armed neighbors could be headed for another military
conflict. The
last time this occurred it was the war of 1962, which India is making
the needed preparations on Seychelles’ chain of islands that
will ensure another defeat is not an option.
Hier
de reactie van Cosmos:
Seems
like a play towards Africa. There certainly are a lot of
Indians in Africa. This would put the Indian military closer to
protect its diaspora. I guess its to blunt the Chinese inroads
into Africa.
Maybe
the Seychelles foresee conflict over deposits with their African
neighbors
........The
Seychelles archipelago in the western Indian Ocean with a vast
exclusive economic zone is believed to have large quantities of
untapped oil.
The
115-island nation depends heavily on tourism and fisheries for its
economy and government is hoping to add hydrocarbon to its economic
base.
An
assessment in 2012 by the U.S. Geological Survey in the western
Indian Ocean region which included Tanzania, Madagascar and
Mozambique estimated a total of 793 million barrels of oil present
in the Seychelles rift area.
Also
the Chinese are notorious for illegal fishing and factory trawlers.
The Indians can shoo them away. The Seychelles dont stand a
chance alone.
=================================* Overigens is India met deze laatste Chinese basis op Sri Lanka omsingeld door Chinese bases, zoals Durden in zijn artikel opmerkt......
Zie ook een eerder bericht van deze dag over de VAE die de zeestraat Bab el Mandeb vanuit Jemen onder controle wil krijgen, deze zeestraat is de verbinding van de Rode Zee met de Golf van Tadjoura en de Golf van Aden: 'De Verenigde Arabische Emiraten hebben de regering van Jemen opzij gezet en niemand bericht erover........'
