Bangladesh has emerged as a middle power in the Indo-pacific — cementing its strategic, economic, and geopolitical sway — attracting the attention of the great powers on its own merits. The salient geostrategic position at the heart of the Indo-Pacific, where the contending great powers locked in a power struggle, has further boosted Bangladesh’s strategic leverage in the region. Attendant with the strategic leverage is the perils since Bangladesh needs to navigate the delicate great power tussle in the evolving Indo-Pacific, requiring Bangladesh to trod a tightrope across the fault lines of the region’s geopolitics.
Whereas there has been much hullabaloo about the meteoric rise of Bangladesh in the global landscape, however, the deliberate and coordinated deft economic and geopolitical balancing had not been lauded, rather the puzzle tinged with surprise that Western commentators expressed suggest such a rise as a fluke.
Geopolitical Tri-Balancing
Dubbed three-way balancing, Bangladesh’s subtle navigation across the Indo-Pacific’s tumultuous strategic frontiers deserves praise. While other countries are strained by competing demands and pressures of the great powers, Bangladesh has maintained a measured and prudent policy, that allowed the country to evade entanglements within the ambit of any power, despite harnessing the advantages of the strategic partnership.
As the stakes of the mutual rivalry between the United States and China ramped up, Bangladesh maintained a policy that balanced both states, while reaping the dividends of the partnership. China’s sustained economic partnership has morphed into a strategic partnership, since owing to congenial relations between Bangladesh and China, Bangladesh enjoys considerable economic benefits extended from China.
While the Chinese investments in Bangladesh generated alarms among a certain section about the “debt trap”, however the fate of Sri Lanka did not transpire in Bangladesh. Rather than betting on unsustainable projects, Bangladesh’s infrastructural projects have been prudent, which enabled the country to harness Chinese financing without being ensnared in traps. The stealth influence of China on Bangladesh has rattled the United States, which deems Bangladesh a lynchpin in regional geopolitics. This is underpinned by vigorous diplomatic overtures between the two countries, turning the complexion of the bilateral ties into a strategic partnership. Although both US and China harbored displeasure about Bangladesh’s engagement with the rival, however, Bangladesh placated the concerns by not tilting to any power, rather maintaining equidistance from both powers.
The third country in Bangladesh’s strategic balancing mix is India — deemed as an adversary of China and a partner of the US in the Indo-Pacific — Bangladesh’s engagement with India played out based on the latter’s concern about China’s influence on Bangladesh. However, this concerns and suspicions didn’t fester, rupturing the bilateral ties, rather relations with India flourished in the spirit of historical and traditional ties. It has been categorically and repeatedly stated by the policy high-ups in Dhaka that historical bonds link Bangladesh to India, which serves to dispel the latter’s suspicion about Bangladesh’s abandonment of India in favor of China. Furthermore, Bangladesh has repeatedly asserted that its ties with China are in the economic realm, underscoring China’s lack of motives for political interference.
Moreover, the tri-balancing mechanism allows Bangladesh to delicately balance the competing demands of the three power brokers in the region — the United States, India, and China.
Economic Omni-Balancing
Through harboring an attitude towards economic balancing across a host of powers, Bangladesh’s diplomatic and geopolitical existence thrives on economic prosperity. The country made astounding economic prosperity in the previous decades, defying the pessimism of Western observers about the sustainability of Bangladesh’s economy and its economic survival. The omni-balancing in the economic frontier is evident as the country taps into a panoply of countries and geographical complexes — including the European Union, Middle East, Australia, and East Asian Countries.
The RMG sector — the cornerstone of the economic resurgence of Bangladesh — hinged on the sustained linkages with the European market, facilitated through preferential trade provisions. The remittance inflow to Bangladesh — windfalls that kept the economy afloat amidst the tempest of COVID-19, was reliant on the middle eastern markets.
Such economic linkages and robust economic diplomacy to project economic interests allowed Bangladesh to stage an economic resurgence.
Reimagining Viability in the Post-LDC Future
In the post-LDC period, a series of benefits that Bangladesh hitherto enjoyed will cease to exist, scaling up challenges for the country to maintain its robust economic development. In this context, the viability of the present linkages needs to be reimagined, and the new destinations beyond its traditional market need to be explored. Given Bangladesh’s deft maneuvering in the face of the previous challenges, the country is equipped to sail through the strategic and economic ferment raging across the region — withstanding the cocktails of crisis with aplomb.
[Photo by Foreign and Commonwealth Office, UK, via Wikimedia Commons]
*Kazi Asszad Hossan is a Researcher at Central Foundation of International and Strategic Studies (CFISS). The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author.
