India´s Extended “Act East” Outreach to Northeast Asia : Its Economic and Security Interactions with China, Japan, and South Korea

This piece provides a preliminary comparison of the three countries—Chi- na, Japan, and South Korea—in the India’s foreign policy to understand the Modi government’s overall strategic positions and policies toward Northeast Asia. Symbolized with ‘Look East’ and its successor ‘Act East’ policies, the Indian foreign policy turned to its East—Southeast Asia, Northeast Asia, and Oceania—beyond the Subcontinent in Asia. This transformation of India’s foreign policy from both economic and security perspectives stems from a series of changes in its domestic and international environments. This piece also aims to link these changes to the primary questions on the India’s strategic approaches toward China, Japan, and South Korea as well as these three countries’ interactions with India from economic and security perspectives in the Modi era. In a globalized world, there are many belts and many roads, and no one nation should put itself into a position of dictating ‘One Belt, One Road’… The One Belt, One Road also goes through disputed territory (i.e., Jammu-Kashmir between India and Pakistan), and I think, that in itself shows the vulnerability of trying to establish that sort of a dictate. The Act East Forum aims to provide a platform for India-Japan collaboration under the rubric of India’s “Act East Policy” and Japan’s “Free and Open Indo-Pacific Strategy”. The Forum will identify specific projects for economic modernization of India’s North-East region including those pertaining to connectivity, developmental infrastructure, industrial linkages as well as people-to-people contacts through tourism, culture and sports-related activities. (Ministry of External Affairs of India 2017)