USA + India vs China

'India, US need to partner to balance China in Indian Ocean'
PTI, Sep 2, 2010, 09.19am IST

WASHINGTON: With China increasing its military power and influence in the strategically crucial Indian Ocean, a noted American expert has urged the Obama administration to partner India to balance and counter Beijing's increasing influence in the region.

As the Indian Ocean is becoming increasingly important to China's economic and security interests, Dean Cheng of the Heritage Foundation said that Beijing appears to be pursuing what has been widely known as a "string of pearls" strategy of cultivating India's neighbours as friendly states, both to protect its economic and security interests and to balance a "rising India".

With Chinese influence in the region growing, it is essential that the US not fall behind in the Indian Ocean, but maintain a steady presence in the region, both to signal its resolve to stay engaged and to avoid the difficulties of reentering a region, Cheng wrote.

He said for the foreseeable future, Chinese strategic planners will need to pay increasing attention to China's Indian Ocean flank.

In the short term, Beijing is concerned about its growing dependence on the sea lanes of communications for sustaining China's economic growth.

In 2010, for the first time, China imported more than 50 per cent of its oil consumption. Chinese President Hu Jintao has already raised the issue of the Malacca Strait.

"There is little question that it is a key choke-point on China's oil supply routes. Part of China's interest in developing alternative ports and pipelines, such as in Pakistan and Burma, would seem to be motivated by a desire to reduce the criticality of the Malacca Strait," he said.

"Even if China's oil lifeline did not have to transit the Strait of Malacca, it would nonetheless traverse significant portions of the Indian Ocean. The growth of the Indian navy means that Chinese economic development is potentially at the mercy of India, as well as the United States. The forging of Indian security links with Japan and the United States is therefore a source of concern," he noted.

The above musings are nothing new.
I had heard this prophecy in my school days around the 60s.
"One day China will become so powerful that it will take the combined might of USA, Russia and India to contain it." Rather it went further, the 3rd world war would be fought with these thtree countries on one side and China on the other.
Now the truth is dawning.
USA has already lost the economic war.
It is so indebted to China that any day China could sell its dollars and the US economy would collapse. Not that China would do it easily for it knows it stands to lose, probably more than the USA as its coffers of dollars would not be worth the paper they were printed on. However, China is going on a buying spree with these dollars to capture the mineral wealth of the world. It can make the commodity market rise and fall as per its will.
Still, the USA has not learnt.
Its profligacy is making it print dollars without the backing of purchasing power and their debts continues to mount.
Like the rest of the developed world, their birth rate has decreased and better medical facilities has increased their aging population. Mechanization has increased to take care of decreasing work force but how long can this go on. Thus power is gradually shifting to India and China.
India has a government which is similar to USA. It would be in its interest to join hands with India.
The sooner they do it, better it is for both countries.
If the USA had joined its hands with India in Iraq and Afghanistan, it would have been going back with its head held high like a lion instead of its tail between its legs.
Pakistan is completely untrustworthy and the sooner the USA realizes it, the better for the world.