This article discusses the geopolitical dimension of maritime security, which has been neglected by scholars despite the growing number of studies devoted to a variety of aspects related to maritime security. T
By Basil Germond
Department of
Politics, Philosophy and Religion, University of Lancaster
Image Attribute: thebureauinvestigates.com / Creative Commons
Geographical
‘permanence’ such as the length of a country’s coastline or the absence of
direct access to the high seas constrains sea power in general and
maritime security policies in particular, “for geography does not argue. It
simply is” This in no way means that politics and policies are
determined by geography but that geographical factors need to be taken into
account in the list of explanatory factors along with other material,
structural and ideational factors.
Maritime security
has to do with (illegal and disruptive) human activities in the maritime
milieu, that is to say a certain geographically delimited space. Thus, states
are differently impacted by maritime security threats depending on their actual
geographical location. For example, in the case of illegal immigration by sea,
Italy is more directly impacted than (for instance) the United Kingdom, because
of its very geographical location. Sicily and especially the island of
Lampedusa are located directly on the main (and one of the shortest)
immigration route from North Africa to the EU and have thus sustained a
constant flow of illegal migrants for the past decades. In other words, even if
Britain, France or Germany may be the ultimate destination goal of illegal
migrants crossing the Mediterranean on small boats, Italy, Spain (through the
Gibraltar Strait) and Malta are more easily, quickly (and relatively safely)
accessible by boat than the UK or even France, due to evident geographical
factors. As a result Italy has to spend more resources on counter-immigration
than many other EU states, which explains its recent request for the EU’s
assistance in dealing with counter immigration at sea in central Mediterranean,
leading to the launch of FRONTEX operation Triton in November 2014. This
example illustrates that simple geographical realities have constraining
impacts on states’ maritime security policies, notably when it comes to
regulating human activities at sea.
The same reasoning
works for other types of illegal flow within the maritime domain. For example,
drug smuggling directly impacts countries located on the main routes, such as
Spain through the Gibraltar Strait, or those whose coasts are difficult to
monitor due to a negative ratio between the length of the coast to police and
the resources at the disposal of the navy/coast-guard. This can be the case for
small states such as for example Ireland with limited resources and a rather
extended coastline or powerful states such as the United States, which despite
the resources at the disposal of its coast-guard service has such a long coast
to monitor and is the intended destination goal of so much drug trafficking
that it still struggles to ‘seal’ its maritime borders. Here the geographical
factor (length of coasts) is clearly not sufficient to explain the burden of
counter-narcotics. Material power (such as the coast-guard budget) and drug
traffickers’ business strategies (privileged destination countries) need to be
factored in the explanation. As shown in Table 1, the geographical factor is
still very relevant. Despite the US deploying almost 20 times more coast-guard
vessels, each of those vessels have a theoretical length of coast to monitor
that is just 62 km shorter than the one devoted to each Irish offshore patrol
vessels (OPV).
States’
involvement in maritime security also depends on nongeographical factors such
as governments’ capabilities and/or will to tackle maritime security threats.
For example, Somalia has not been in a position to control illegal activities
in its own territorial waters (hence the need for foreign maritime
capacity-building operations, such as EUCAP Nestor). Empowering secessionist
Somaliland’s and autonomist Puntland’s own coast-guard forces shows the
importance of political will and material realities as explanatory factors. It
has also been argued that in certain South East Asian countries, police or
naval forces are reluctant to engage in counterpiracy activities and could even
be “complicit in these crimes, especially in areas where a culture of
corruption (possibly boosted by underpaid maritime security forces or smuggling
activities) has evolved under years of authoritarian governments”
Due to the global
nature of the maritime domain and to the transnational nature of many of the
current maritime security threats (immigration, drug smuggling, piracy, etc.),
countries not directly impacted by the threats coming from the sea can
nevertheless decide to contribute to the policing efforts, based on the
understanding that they will eventually be impacted later. For example the EU
has set up the FRONTEX agency to deal with illegal immigration and coordinate
member states’ activities in this field, based on the principle that member
states are all impacted by the consequences of illegal immigration to the EU
whatever their geographical location. Counter-immigration at sea represents a
major part of FRONTEX’s budget and activities; in 2012, the largest share
(42.3%) of the agency’s operational budget (excluding risk analyses and research
& technology) went to sea borders joint operations (Frontex,: 32). In
2013, within the FRONTEX framework, North European countries such as Denmark,
Iceland, Finland, Latvia and landlocked countries such as Austria, Luxembourg
and even non-EU member Switzerland have contributed to counter-immigration
operations taking place in the wider Mediterranean area (Frontex, : 59).
This shows that states include geographically distant maritime regions into
their security perimeter, for transnational threats need to be tackled beyond
one’s external boundary. Controlling the sea far away from home is of strategic
value. It represents a means to expand one’s zone of control and competencies
beyond one’s external boundary, which can be considered as a form of
post-modern territorial expansion. It must however be noted that
overseas possessions imply the right and the duty to maintain a (naval)
presence there, which is mainly about affirming one’s sovereignty, although
overseas naval bases and prepositioning can also contribute to power projection
and naval diplomacy.
Maritime security
threats are also used in geopolitical discourses as an argument (amongst
others) justifying the projection of security beyond one’s external boundary. In other words, geographical representations framed within the
‘safe/inside’ versus ‘unsafe/outside’ dichotomy encompass maritime elements.
For example, the seas surrounding Europe are represented as vectors of threats
in both EU’s and member states’ discourses, which may then justify various
(sometimes controversial) projection activities in the maritime periphery of
Europe. Securing the freedom of the seas and policing the ‘global commons’
justifies projecting regulations, norms but also police and naval forces beyond
one’s territorial or jurisdictional waters. In other words, maritime security
has a geopolitical dimension. The control of distant maritime areas is
presented as vital to assure security on land. This construction of threats
along geographical lines and the practical consequences in terms of power and
forces projection are strengthened by the fact that the boundary between naval
deployments and maritime security operations is growingly blurred, which is
illustrated by counter-terrorist and counterpiracy operations currently taking
place at the Horn of Africa, which result in
the deployment of frigates within war-like coalitions. It is interesting to
note that the deployment of frigates instead of patrol vessels is mainly due to
geographical considerations; the units sent by the US, the Europeans or the
Chinese need to sustain operating for a long period far away from their bases,
which is beyond the capacity of many coast-guard patrol vessels. As will be
discussed below, the geopolitical dimension of maritime security also reflects
in current maritime security strategies.
This article is an excerpt from a research paper, titled - "The geopolitical dimension of maritime security" published by Elsevier at Marine Policy 54 (2015) 137–142
under Creative Commons License 4.0 | Open Access funded by
Economic and Social Research Council
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