In the US global hegemony strategy, the Strait of Malacca has always been one of the 16 "maritime chokes" in the world that it must control.
The data shows that 1/4 of the world's maritime trade and 1/4 of the oil transportation must pass through the Strait of Malacca. Of the roughly 100,000 freighters that pass through the area every day, 60 percent travel to and from China. China imports 80% of its oil and 50% of its import and export trade through the Strait of Malacca.
Therefore, the Strait of Malacca is also seen as the "throat" of China's economy and energy. As long as the United States controls this choke point, it is equivalent to holding on to China's economic and energy lifeblood.
But what americans did not expect was that with the formal operation of China's leasing of Pakistan's Gwadar Port and the steady advancement of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, China's dependence on the Strait of Malacca for China's economy and energy has been greatly reduced, and the US conspiracy to "lock China with a gorge" will be completely defeated.
The United States can control the Strait of Malacca within 24 hours
Located between the Malay Peninsula and the island of Sumatra, the Strait of Malacca has a total length of 1,080 kilometers, an average depth of more than 25 meters, and only 2.8 kilometers at its narrowest point.
As a "maritime bridge" connecting the Asia-Pacific region with the Indian Ocean and the Middle East, the Strait of Malacca has become one of the busiest straits for merchant ships in the world. There are about 100,000 ships passing through the Strait of Malacca every year, accounting for 1/5-1/4 of the world's maritime trade.
In fact, south of the Strait of Malacca, there is another sea choke point, the Sunda Strait, which provides access to and from the Indian Ocean, and the Sunda Strait is a deep-water channel with very good navigation conditions. But at present, except for super-large cargo ships traveling through the Sunda Strait, most freighters will still prefer the Strait of Malacca.
The reason is that it takes more than a thousand kilometers to walk through the Sunda Strait, which is not cost-effective in terms of cost and time. Moreover, the infrastructure in the area around the Strait of Malacca is also more perfect, so the throat status of the Strait of Malacca is irreplaceable.
As a result, the Strait of Malacca has also become a place of contention since ancient times, and whoever controls the Strait of Malacca can control the economic and energy lifeblood of China, Japan, South Korea, and some Southeast Asian countries.
For hundreds of years, Portugal, the Netherlands, Britain, and Japan have all occupied the Strait of Malacca. It was not until the end of World War II that the Strait of Malacca was returned to the coastal states of Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore.
For such a strategically important place, great powers including the United States, Japan, And India have tried to control it.
In particular, the United States, in order to ensure hegemony in the Asia-Pacific region, and out of the need to curb the "sea lifeline" of China, Japan, and other countries, and at the same time suppress India's "eastward expansion," has been seeking to send troops to countries along the Strait of Malacca.
However, Indonesia, Malaysia and other countries have explicitly rejected the request of the United States, but Singapore has opened a backdoor for the United States.
Singapore is located at the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, adjacent to the southern mouth of the Strait of Malacca, guarding the narrowest section of the Strait of Malacca. As a result, Singapore's strategic position is much higher than that of Indonesia and Malaysia, which are also located along the Strait of Malacca.
In 1990, the United States and Singapore reached an agreement to allow the U.S. military to use Singapore's Changi Naval Base. Under the agreement between the two countries, the U.S. Navy's Seventh Fleet, including large carrier formations, as well as other passing ships, can dock at Changi base for logistical support and replenishment services.
But the purpose of the United States is clearly not as simple as finding an overseas supply base. As of June 2021, the United States has more than 300 U.S. military personnel stationed at Changi Naval Base, and five littoral combat ships have been deployed here in the form of rotations.
It can be seen that the United States has actually regarded Changi Naval Base as a military "bridgehead" for guarding the Strait of Malacca.
With this military "bridgehead", the time for the US military to sail north from Singapore to the Kuril Islands, or west to the Arabian Sea, can be shortened to less than 7 days, to Okinawa and the waters around Taiwan only take 4 days, to the central South China Sea as long as 2 days to reach.
In the event of an emergency, the U.S. Navy, deployed in Singapore, could control the entire Strait of Malacca within 24 hours.
A three-step strategy to crack the "Malacca dilemma"
Other Southeast Asian countries are keeping their distance from the United States, so why should Singapore, the only one, throw itself into the arms of the United States and open a back door for it? There are three main reasons for this:
First, singapore has had a lot of friction with its neighbors Indonesia and Malaysia over ethnic and religious reasons and territorial disputes. Singapore has few people and is unable to play games with the neighboring powers, so lending military bases is also aimed at borrowing the strength of the United States to seek self-protection.
Second, Singapore has been playing the trick of "small country diplomacy" by "attracting wolves into the house." For Singapore, the higher the strategic value of the Strait of Malacca under U.S. control, the more its own international influence will increase.
In this way, Singapore can maneuver between major powers such as China and the United States in order to maximize its own interests.
Third, under the protection of the United States, Singapore's economy has also developed rapidly. In particular, with the US military in charge, Singapore has become an important transit point for passing merchant ships passing through the Strait of Malacca, and the Port of Singapore has become one of the busiest ports in the world.
But no matter what calculations Singapore and the United States have, if China wants to keep the country's economic and energy lifeline uncontrolled, it must solve the "Malacca dilemma". How to crack it? At present, there are three main strategic layouts:
The first is to build and open onshore oil and gas pipelines such as the China-Russia oil and gas pipeline, the China-Kazakhstan oil and gas pipeline, and the China-Myanmar oil and gas pipeline to reduce China's dependence on offshore oil transportation. Thus, even if the offshore oil routes, including the Strait of Malacca, are cut off, China will not run out of oil and gas.
The second is to open a China-Europe express train, so that Chinese goods can directly reach Europe and other regions through Central Asia and the Middle East by land. Although the current China-Europe express train has a limited capacity and cannot replace the sea transport, it can play a role in replacing the sea transport of important materials at a critical moment.
The third is to build the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor and create a sea outlet where China can directly reach the Indian Ocean. Based on the special relationship between China and Pakistan, in the future, China's trade exchanges with the Middle East, Europe and Africa can completely leave Xinjiang, then pass through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor to Gwadar Port, and then travel by sea and land to reach relevant destinations.
Because the CPEC also includes an oil and gas pipeline from Gwadar Port to Xinjiang, the opening of the CPEC can reduce China's dependence on maritime trade and oil transportation, and its role in the security of China's economy and energy transportation is also more prominent.
The United States and Singapore dreamed of the port of Gwadar
Therefore, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor has become a key move for China to solve the "Malacca dilemma". The key to the role of CPEC depends on the Gwadar port.
Located on the southwest coast of Pakistan's Balochistan province, Gwadar Port is next to the Persian Gulf, only 72 kilometers from the Iranian border and about 400 kilometers from the Strait of Hormuz, the choke point for global oil.
For the United States, which has long wanted to control the Strait of Hormuz, it has long set its sights on Gwadar Port. But because the United States did not really help Pakistan build the port, including Singapore, which later attempted to develop it.
So Pakistan handed over the port to Chinese companies in 2001. After 14 years of construction, the port was opened to navigation in 2016.
Prior to this, Middle Eastern oil took 14,490 kilometers of sea routes to China and had to pass through the Indian Ocean and the Strait of Malacca. With the Gwadar Port, China's oil resources imported from Saudi Arabia, Iran and other countries can be disembarked from Gwadar and directly to China's Xinjiang through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
Economically, the potential of Gwadar Port is also enormous. At present, Pakistan has transferred the right to use 2281 mu of land around the Gwadar Port Free Trade Zone to the Chinese company and signed a 43-year lease with the Chinese company, including a 23-year tax holiday.
From this scale, Gwadar Port has the conditions to build a super-large port in the world. According to the plan, the annual cargo throughput of Gwadar Port will reach more than 300 million tons, which is 10 times that of Karachi Port, the largest port in Pakistan.
In the future, China's trade with the Middle East, Africa and Europe can, in principle, land at Gwadar Port and then enter China's Xinjiang through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
In this way, the port of Gwadar is equivalent to an important outlet extending from the northwest of China to the Indian Ocean. Not only that, but as a commercial port, Gwadar Port's role is far more than commercial interests.
In special periods, it can also provide certain material and logistical support for the Chinese Navy. At present, piracy on the Indian Ocean route is still very frequent, which seriously threatens the safety of passing merchant ships.
Therefore, the navies of many countries, including China, are carrying out escort operations in the Indian Ocean, especially in the waters of Somalia. If there is logistical supply support for the Gwadar port, then the Chinese Navy's escort peacekeeping operations in the region will also be more convenient.
Strictly guard against sabotage actions by hostile forces
Because Gwadar Port is so important to China, countries such as the United States have been secretly sabotaging the construction of the port and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.
In the eyes of the United States, in recent years, China has been trying to use trade port facilities around the world to control the "strategic throat" of the sea, which is what the United States calls China's "pearl chain strategy.".
In addition to the Gwadar port, the ports invested and built by Chinese companies, such as the ports of Sittwe in Myanmar, the port of Hambantota in Sri Lanka, and the port of Cathar in Bangladesh, are known as part of this strategy.
The United States concocted the "pearl chain strategy" because China's overseas port construction is disintegrating the CONSPIRACY of the United States to "lock China with a gorge." After all, with these ports in operation, China's energy and economic lifeline can be firmly in its own hands.
Therefore, the United States must undermine cooperation on relevant projects by rendering up the "China threat theory" in order to achieve the purpose of obstructing China from solving the "Malacca dilemma".
On the other hand, India, as a major country on the indian ocean coast, has always been angry about China's investment activities in the Indian Ocean region.
In particular, China's cooperation projects in Pakistan have been repeatedly undermined by India, including terrorist attacks against the China-Pakistan project and Chinese.
Therefore, in the future, with the highlighting of the strategic role of Gwadar Port and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, the security threat from the United States, India and other countries may become more and more large, and China also needs to strengthen its strict prevention and combat the sabotage actions of hostile forces.