The Indian Ocean - Michael Pearson [219]
Alas, Britain's decline as a Great Power meant a role in the distant and by now rather irrelevant Indian Ocean was beyond its capacity. In 1968 Harold Wilson announced that Britain was to withdraw from the Far East, the Arabian Sea and the Gulf by the end of 1971. They left the great naval base at Singapore in 1975, truly marking the end of an era. It is no coincidence that it was in 1971 that the Soviet Union first sent a substantial fleet into the ocean, though they had had a smaller presence for a few years previously. The ocean in fact now became a player, albeit a minor one, in the Cold War.
Writing at the beginning of the twenty-first century, it is already difficult to appreciate the intensity of feeling generated by the rivalry between the Soviet Union and the United States as it affected the Indian Ocean. Certainly at the time some academics and serving officers saw a very clear danger. Hanne, writing in the Military Review, subtitled the 'Professional Journal of the United States Army', was concerned that the United States had not moved in to fill the vacuum left by the British departure: 'many analysts have stated that the United States, with or without its allies, would have to move a visible naval force into that region to preclude its immediate de facto annexation by the Soviet Union into its "sphere of influence.''' Large areas of the Soviet Union would be within range of American submarines if they were based in the Indian Ocean, but instead, 'Attempting to convince the newly independent powers that security, self-determination and equitable prosperity come from the acceptance of a pro-Soviet foreign policy, the USSR is moving steadily along many fronts, publicly confident in the historic veracity of its ideology.'91 So also from the defence analyst Patrick Wall in his edited book The Indian Ocean and the Threat to the West. He complained that the West 'is watching supinely while the world's greatest land power [that is, the Soviet Union] starts to dominate the sea as well.' Instead of doing something about this, 'Leftward-leaning Western Governments enthusiastically abuse, and try to boycott, South Africa and Rhodesia. At the same time, without seeing any inconsistency, they advocate an expansion of trade and close cultural links with the Soviet Union and her satellites.' It was a matter for regret that 'Few, if any, African states can really be called pro-Western. The majority are unaligned but responsive to Soviet, and Chinese, penetration.... Lenin believed that the Western democracies would destroy themselves from within through becoming soft, greedy, and lacking in will power. He may yet prove to have been right.'92 Scary stuff, but perhaps appropriately I bought my copy of this book at a stall. The stamp inside said 'Discarded'.
What happened was that the Soviet Union was concerned about what it perceived as an American build-up in the area, as seen in the total support given to the Shah of Iran from the early 1960s, and the formation of various military alliances, of which the most important for our area was CENTO. In August 1971 the Indian and Soviet governments signed a Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, which increased Soviet access in the region. The west was concerned not only about Soviet activities, but also about the fact that as domestic oil supplies declined in the United States the Indian Ocean, and especially the Straits of Hurmuz and Melaka, were the choke points through which travelled much of the vital oil. Japan, vital to American interests, received 85 per cent of all its oil from the Gulf via the Indian Ocean, and Europe about 50 per cent.
Yet neither side invested very substantially in a naval presence in the ocean. Both were held back by communications difficulties, as the ocean was far