Debates on the concept of 'Indo-Pacific' in the 21st century Indian foreign policy

There are three major changes in the equation of China, the US and India in Asian geopolitics: The 'Peaceful Rise' of China, one of the two giants of Asia, with the discourse of 'March West', the 'String of Pearls' theory, which emerged due to its strategic presence in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) and the hegemonic 'Belt and Road Initiative' (BRI) that presents with the 'Chinese Dream' rhetoric are the first changes. The second change is that the US' 'return to Asia' and has begun to show the 'special interest' to India, the other giant of Asia, which it assigns a 'balancing role', with the effect of the 'China factor' and the decline in its power projection. The third change is India's slower but more consistent rise than China and its 'Look East/Act East' policy. These three major geopolitical changes have led to the emergence of the 'Indo-Pacific' concept and its development as a 'balance strategy' in the axis of its fundamental dynamics. The US-China-India 'strategic triangle' on the Indo-Pacific, which emerged as a 'geopolitical region' where the Indian and Pacific Oceans are considered as a single strategic unit, is one of the two main debates, while the 'Quad' formation as the second debate witnesses of different Indo-Pacific interpretations of the four main Indo-Pacific actors towards balancing China. The study concentrates on the policies of the US and its traditional allies Japan and Australia and its 'strategic partner' India as fundamental Indo-Pacific dynamics regarding the Indo-Pacific narrative, and also India's relations with these three countries and China. This study, which is presented conceptually, process driven and through discourse and document analysis methods, as well as personal interviews with important names on the subject, develops practical approaches from the Realist and its bedfellow Geopolitics as well as Constructivist prism as the International Relations (IR) Theory. This study proposes the conceptualisations of 'Conjunctural Non-Alignment' (CNA) and 'Non-Aligned Balancing' (NAB) on the 21st century Indian Foreign Policy, which this study focuses, by presenting a new perspective considering domestic political and academic debates, as the importance India attaches to its traditional 'anti-alliance' and its proactive foreign policy structure with its own 'hierarchical strategic partnerships'. Keywords: Indo-Pacific, India, Conjunctural Non-Alignment (CNA), the US, China