Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts with the label Bay of Bengal

The Bay of Bengal: The Maritime Silk Route and China’s Naval Ambitions ( Source- The Diplomat, Author- David Brewester)

Colombo Harbor ( Image credits- Wikimedia Commons- Flickr/ Author- J G Morard) Source- The diplomat Author- David Brewester Since late 2013, Beijing has been promoting its “Maritime Silk Route” (MSR) initiative as a proposed oceanic complement to its various overland “Silk Route” projects. Details remain sketchy, but the proposal appears to envisage a system of linked ports, infrastructure projects and special economic zones in Southeast Asia and the northern Indian Ocean. While much of the public discussion to date has focused on ports and infrastructure, probably of greater significance is the development of new production and distribution chains across the region, with China at its center. The concept might be seen as akin to Japan’s “flying geese” strategy of the 1970s when Japanese companies outsourced component production to successive tiers of lower-cost states in Southeast Asia. If implemented, the initiative would bind countries in the Bay of Bengal and the nor