The Great Nicobar Project


On our side of the house I am reading this news:

https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-15786461/america-crude-oil-port-texas-strait-hormuz-iran.html

And from the other side of the house - this analysis: I always learn something new from this particular analyst.  Enjoy!


The "Great Nicobar" project is ostensibly an Indian infrastructure and port project near the Strait of Malacca, but in reality it should be considered part of the great corridor war and the realignment of India's oceanic geopolitics. By building a transshipment port, airport, power plant, and strategic town on the Great Nicobar Island, India is trying to transform itself from a South Asian power into a maritime and corridor power at the Indo-Pacific level.

The importance of this project lies in the fact that the Strait of Malacca is one of the most vital bottlenecks in global trade, and a large part of the trade of East Asia, China, Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia passes through it. By actively present near this bottleneck, India wants to increase its role in global trade, put strategic pressure on China's sea routes, and show the United States and its allies that it can be one of the main pillars of the Indo-Pacific order.

But the risk of this project for Iran is also not small.

For Iran, the main risk lies in changing India's position. If India can become a major maritime transit hub in Nicobar, its geopolitical dependence on Iranian routes, especially Chabahar, will decrease.

Chabahar is not just a port for Iran; it is Iran’s connection point to India, Central Asia, Afghanistan, Russia, and the North-South Corridor. But if India simultaneously becomes active in Nicobar, IMEC, and strategic partnerships with the US, Israel, and the UAE, Chabahar will transform from a strategic necessity for the region into a negotiable option.

This is the dangerous point for Iran: the weakening of Iran’s geographical power, especially in the Persian Gulf.

Iran’s power is not limited to military or energy power; a significant part of Iran’s power comes from geographical necessity.

That is, others will have to include Iran in their calculations for connectivity, trade, energy, and transit. The Strait of Hormuz, Chabahar, Bandar Abbas, the Sea of ​​Oman, and the North-South Corridor are all parts of this geographical power. But the strategy of the US and its allies in recent years has been to build routes to eliminate Iran from the regional connectivity architecture, or at least to reduce its influence.

Within this framework, the Nicobar Project in the East, the India-Middle East-Europe Corridor in the West, and frameworks such as I2U2 with the presence of India, Israel, the US, and the UAE, together create a larger plan: to transform India into a power connecting Asia to Europe, without Iran being at the center of this connection.

The important point is that India should not be analyzed through the lens of historical memory and civilizational relations. India today is a completely self-interested actor.

India has military cooperation with Russia, strategic cooperation with the US, technology and security with Israel, economic projects with the UAE and Saudi Arabia, sits in BRICS and Shanghai, and talks about Chabahar with Iran at the same time.

Such a country is neither a permanent friend of Iran nor a permanent enemy; rather, it is a calculating power.

In the recent war between Iran and the US and Israel, India's behavior also showed that New Delhi is not willing to pay a heavy price for Iran. India initially leaned towards US and Israeli considerations and then retreated to controlled neutrality. This means that Iran must accept that in moments of crisis, India makes decisions with a geopolitical calculator rather than with civilizational memory.

Today, there are even discussions about expelling India from BRICS or Shanghai.

In fact, these discussions show that India is not trustworthy in any way in the multipolar order.

On the one hand, India sits alongside Russia, China and Iran in the East Axis; on the other hand, it cooperates with the US, Israel and the Indo-Pacific Axis. This duality makes India play a more of a brake role in BRICS and Shanghai.

Accordingly, the Nicobar project should not be considered simply as a new port; The project is part of India’s effort to redefine its position in the Indian Ocean and part of the process of diminishing Iran’s power in the corridor war.

Unless Iran integrates Chabahar, the North-South Corridor, Central Asia connectivity, Bandar Abbas, the Sea of ​​Oman, and the Strait of Hormuz into a unified strategy, projects like Nicobar, IMEC, and I2U2 will slowly erode Iran’s geopolitical power.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Charlie Kirk Marcus Aurelius "Meditations" would not exist if he had been assassinated for his thoughts at age thirty-one. I would have never read Alexander Solzhenitsyn's "Gulag Archipelago" if he had been assassinated for his political thoughts at thirty-one years of age. Winston Churchill would have never written "Hinge of Fate" (one of my favorite selections) had he been assassinated at thirty-one years of age. Ernest Hemingway was fifty-three years old when "The Old Man and the Sea" was published. Leon Uris was thirty-four years old when his novel "Exodus" was published. The average age of the delegates at the 1787 Constitutional Convention was forty-two.  Benjamin Franklin was 81 years of age at this time. The famous Persian poet Ferdowsi began writing "Shahnameh" when he was 37 years old and did not complete it until he was about seventy years of age.  This would be a tremendous loss not to have access to his though...
Read more
Image
Mohamed Elhassan He is powerful, made up of imperceptible layers.  He was only in his mid-teens when he first heeded the call to political action traveling to the Republic Palace of President Jafar Nimeiri seeking justice for his family. He is a well-respected Sufi.  In June,  he was awarded a Masters Degree in Islamic Studies from Hamad Bin Khalifa University (Qatar).  A recognized leader of the Kwahla tribe - with 16 million members.   Fast forward to 2010 and 2015 when he ran for President of the Sudan.  In 2015, it was my privilege to serve in a minor advisory role.  In recent years, he has given an enviable one hundred interviews with Al Jazeera Mobasha (life).   His name is Mohamed Elhassan.  I merely call him "friend". Mohamed Elhassan is president of the Sudanese Gathering Accord.  He is a man who knows his business, takes care of his business, and more importantly, takes care of his people. Less than a month ago he tra...
Read more
State of the Union:  Live Blogging Tammy and Blackfoot will begin live blogging shortly.  Grab your favorite drink and your BINGO cards and get ready to settle in for two hours of our POTUS speaking at SOTU.  We hope to keep this fun! https://opinionbytammy.blogspot.com/2026/02/state-of-union-bingo-cards.html __________________ Here we go, gang! "Gang" in the friendly family way, not in the Tren de Aragua way. President Trump and Mrs. Trump have left the White House and are on their way to the Capitol. I'm sure these past few days have been chock full of leafing through journals and diaries, and holding meetings with the inner circle for messaging strategies. Regardless of how much input his team gives him, we can always rely on our POTUS to not mince words, to lay the facts on the table and give us straight talk. Recently saw Newsom talking about Trump being an actor, and that he's a different person in different situations. Once again, Gavin is projecting his weakne...
Read more