by Rex Wingerter

In April 1975 the State Department ended for the time
being any chances for a naval arms limitation agreement in the
Indian Ocean between the United States and the Soviet Union.
The State Department justified its refusal on the grounds that,
with the Soviet presence in Angola and Somalia, such an
initiative "might convey the mistaken impression to the
Soviets and our friends and allies that we were willing to
acquiesce in this type of Soviet behavior." ¹ Thus, Washington
has once again legitimized the construction of a new American
overseas military base as a reaction to Soviet armed adventures
abroad. In this case, the United States' new military outpost
will be a major air and naval base at Diego Garcia, an island
situated in the Indian Ocean about 2,000 miles from East
Africa, 1,000 miles from southern India, and 2,400 miles from
Bangkok.

What makes the State Department's reasoning unique
this time, compared to past policy rationales, is that since
1968 the Soviet Union has indeed ventured into areas outside
its traditional foreign policy scope. The extent of Russian
support in Angola, backed with Cuban troops, is in fact
something new in modern Soviet foreign policy. ² In light of
the high priority placed upon the Third World in Brezlinev's
February 1976 report to the Twenty-fifth Congress of the
CPSU, some U.S. officials suspect the Kremlin's operations in
Angola indicate a "new trend in Soviet-Third World policy." ³ As Brezhnev proclaimed: "From the rostrum of our congress
we emphasize once again that the Soviet Union fully supports
the lawful aspirations of the emerging states, their
determination to rid themselves of imperial exploitation and
to manage their natural resources themselves."⁴ The Kremlin
has also disregarded the fact that detente with the United
States may be threatened by Soviet support for revolution and
intervention in the Third World. "Detente," stated Brezhnev,
"does not in the slightest way abolish, and cannot abolish or
change the laws of the class struggle."⁵ In fact, Moscow views
detente as a way of advancing Soviet foreign policy objectives.
As Brezhnev concluded: "We do not conceal the fact that we
see detente as a way to create more favorable conditions for
peaceful Socialist and Communist construction."⁶

Stepped-up Soviet activities in Africa and Asia since the
early 1970s indicate Moscow's forward-looking policies.
Increased U.S. naval activity in the Indian Ocean has been one
way Washington has responded to Soviet thrusts in the region.
But this superpower competition threatens to reduce the
aspirations of the littoral country to meaningless verbiage.
US-USSR competition for the littoral states will increase their
dependency upon one of the two major powers. Superpower
rivalry also threatens to exacerbate local, indigenous conflicts
into major ones. One recent study has concluded that there
has been "a significant increase in the quality and quantity of
military equipment in the ocean region." ⁷ Through these arms
shipments, Washington and Moscow are strengthening their
domination over the recipient states. ⁸ But as countries in the
littoral continue to arm, and local conflicts escalate, the
chances for Washington and Moscow to be pulled into a
face-to-face confrontation in the Indian Ocean rapidly
increase. ⁹

It will be shown below that U.S. policy in the Indian
Ocean has long held one primary objective: to have the
military capability to influence events in Africa, Asia, and the
Middle East. To that end, since the early 1960s the U.S. Navy
and Joint Chiefs of Staff have sought to construct a major
military base on Diego Garcia. The historical record reveals
that these capabilities were to defend and expand uncontested
Western authority in the Indian Ocean. The aim of U.S.
military power in the region was to deter indigenous
revolutionary activities that threatened to break the West's
economic and political hold over the littoral states.

Since 1968 the projection of Soviet influence in the
Indian Ocean has been seen as substantially altering these
dependency relationships. In the West, Soviet activities have
largely been publicized as a military threat: interdict Western
shipping lanes, deny access to strategic ports and passageways,
etc. The Pentagon has seized upon this subject to the point of
deliberately overemphasizing Soviet naval power. This has
been done, in part, so as to persuade Congress and the
American public to support new military construction on
Diego Garcia and to enlarge U.S. naval forces world-wide.

But to conclude that the principle Soviet threat to the
U.S. is a military one is incorrect. The United States still has
the ability to win a conventional war at sea against the Soviet
Union. Where the real challenge lies is in the economic and
political realm. It is Russian aid and trade that can end
Western hegemony over Third World states, including those in
the Indian Ocean area. In Angola and Mozambique, for
example, the Soviets have already replaced the West as the
dominant foreign influence. Soviet economic policy toward
the Indian Ocean region, as pointed out by Gary Gappert, a
professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin, has
resulted in "important breaks with the colonial and
post-colonial trade system" between the West and the littoral
countries. As Gappert told a Congressional subcommittee in

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