|| Satyameva Jayate ||

Lets stop dreaming - Human chains will not stop China

…Even as New Delhi talks of taking up the issue of border incursions with China at the “appropriate highest level”, up in the Himalayas, the Indian soldiers are using a Gandhian method to stop the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops from intruding into the Indian territory.

With the PLA making fresh incursions into the Fingertip Area of Sikkim, Indian troops are now blocking the Chinese soldiers by forming human chains.

“We are literally forming human chains to stop the Chinese from crossing over,” says a senior Army officer. “If they come in groups of 20, we assemble 50 men and form a human chain. They can’t after all push us and cross the border.”

Under the terms of confidence-building measures started between the two countries during the days of Atal Behari Vajpayee government, troops on either side do not open fire to stop intrusions in disputed areas.

…There have been 65 transgressions into Sikkim in the last six months and on June 16, PLA men entered the region in light vehicles and later returned to their territory.

but more worrying is this…

At the Fingertips Area, in north Sikkim, Chinese patrols have been coming regularly for the past two years, the last being on Monday.� [ link ]

and taking up the issue at appropriate levels is certainly not going to “sort out China incursions issue”

…Dubbing Chinese incursions into Sikkim �unfortunate�, Minister of State for Defence M.M. Pallam Raju said on Thursday that India would take up the issue with China at the appropriate level. �The issue of incursions will be raised at the next flag meeting with the Chinese and also discussed at the appropriate level. As responsible neighbours, we will sort it out,� Raju told reporters.

But I applaud the Minister of state for defence for being candid:

��All this is happening because we are failing to assert ourselves as a nation on our stand on what we believe is ours,�� Raju told meadiapersons here on the sidelines of a seminar on Indian ways of war fighting, organised by Centre for Joint Warfare Studies (CENJOWS).

.

What realistic options does India have in the face of these constant low-intensity attempts by China to bully India?

Can India really win a war against China on the Eastern front?

I don’t know….

I will try and find answer to all these questions in the next few days. In the meantime, please contribute with your thoughts and comments.

Related Posts:

Slowly but steadily, China marches�ahead��

As the Government sleeps, dark clouds gather on the�horizon��

June 20th, 2008 Posted by B Shantanu | China related, Current Affairs, Geo-Strategic Issues (incl. Nuclear, Oil, Energy), India & Its Neighbours, Politics and Governance in India | 5 comments

« Previous | Next »

5 Comments »

1. From The Pioneer article by Ashok V Mehta, China eyeing Sikkim again

   …China’s military modernisation is moving at a frenetic pace. Defence spending has registered an annual increase of 17 per cent, officially amounting to $ 70 billion, though Western analysts say it is double that amount. The upgrade in military infrastructure in Tibet has trebled the operational and logistics capabilities of the PLA. Its strategic programmes are on the rise too.

   The boundary dispute, which hurts India, has for all intents and purposes remained on the back burner, periodically subjected to the charade of political and cartographic mechanisms for its resolution. It is a zero sum game. Cleverly, the Chinese have raised the political cost of any settlement to unacceptably high levels even raking up boundary dispute on the settled Sikkim border.

   Dealing with the two Chinas are officials in foreign office who believe relations with Beijing have never been better and military commanders who assert that there is a serious disconnect between our perception of Chinese intent and capabilities. But they are being advised to underplay, even underreport, border incidents.

   …Sikkim’s geo-strategic importance is recognised beyond doubt. Its eastern shoulder descends into the Chumbi valley to the point near the trijunction with Bhutan which is disputed. North Sikkim is the only area in the East from where any meaningful ground offensive into Tibet can be mounted. During Operation Falcon, following the Sumdorong Chu standoff in Wangdung, heavy tanks, artillery and mechanised vehicles were inducted into North Sikkim in 1987. As matching infrastructure lagged behind and slowed down to zero after the 1993 and 1996 peace accords, the military deterrent capability also withered away. So twice, once after 1962 and again in 1987, infrastructure development plans were aborted.

   …No Indian Prime Minister has ever visited Tawang which, the Chinese say, has an inalienable connection with Tibet.

   …The PLA’s posturing on the border is risk laden. Indian Army and Air Force do not have an adequate deterrent capability in the East. A counter offensive Corps has remained on paper since 1987. Belatedly two new Mountain Divisions have been sanctioned for the East. We are 20 years behind the Chinese in operational capability and infrastructure.

   Comment by B Shantanu | June 25, 2008

2. Excerpts from Why a full-blooded attack on China during Olympics is in India’s favour by R Vaidyanathan

   ***
   …

   The significant change that is taking place in China is pertaining to religion. The keynote speech by the communist party general secretary Hu Jintao to the 17th party congress in October last year devoted a paragraph to religion. He stressed that religious people including priests, monks and lay believers played a positive role in the social and economic development of China. Hence, religion is not any more the opium of the masses.

   The state-controlled Xinhua stresses that there must be freedom of belief. It says religion can play an important role in realising a “harmonious society,” which is the new political role of the party [Asia times Online July 3, 2008].

   That is the main issue we in India should be interested in. A study based on
   more than 4,500 people conducted by two professors of China Normal University in 2007 concluded that more than 300 million people, namely 31% of the population, were religious and more than 60% of them are in the 16-40 age group
   …

   In this context, there is a need for us to be more proactive. To recall the words of Hu Shih, former Ambassador of China to the USA (1938-1942), “India conquered and dominated China culturally for 20 centuries without having to send a single soldier across her borders.”

   We should now be sending Sri Sri Ravishankar, Mata Amirtanandamayi, Swami Ramdev and Pramukh Swami Shankaracharyas Vaishnavite seers and other spiritual leaders, besides Bharatnatyam experts, musicians and other artistes in dozens to China to ” conquer and dominate” by our soft power.

   We need to print millions of copies of Ramayana and Mahabharata and our Puranas and Gita in modern Chinese languages and make them widely available. The CDs of Mahabharata and Ramayana, etc can also be given free.

   We should create a fund of at least Rs 1,000 crore for this effort. This is the only way to destabilise our younger brother by de-legitimising Communism. Olympics is the best time to start it and, there is a need to continue the efforts relentlessly.

   …

   There is a statue of Kalidasa in the Shanghai theatreway, unveiled by the theatre academy. I can’t think of any metro in India, including the so-called “culture capital” Kolkata, having a statue of Kalidasa. At Kolkata, the theatre road became Shakespeare Sarani and not Kalidasa Marg. China has a thriving underground church, which is also of concern to the government. We should strategically recognise the weak point of China and also the need of its masses in the absence of Communism.

   …There are other issues. Officially, China recognises or permits only five religions —- Buddhism, Islam, Taoism, Protestantism and Catholicism (1997 government white paper quoted by The Economist, February 1, 2007]. Hence, we should take steps to include Hinduism as one of the permitted religions.

   The Indian government should take steps since four other religions of India are permitted.

   The point is that our soft power in culture is interwoven in a tapestry form with the religion. Howsoever hard one might try, there is no separating the two. Carnatic music without bhakti is neither music nor art.

   …Even when invitations come to Indian spiritual leaders, the Government of India is unenthusiastic
   and indicates its disinterest in the false assumptions regarding China’s political orientation. The policy formulators are still living in the sixties and seventies at a time when China is undergoing a gigantic social crisis due to material prosperity and spiritual vacuum.

   …The strategy should be to encircle China with music, dance, art, yoga, ayurveda, spiritual texts, etc and capture the hearts of the middle classes as we have done for centuries. In the process, we should de-stabilise the current dispensation and de-legitimise the remnants of Communism.

   Are we ready to undertake such an invasion?

   ***

   NOTE: Sadly, Prof. Vaidyanathan appears to have missed the point that India is a *secular* country.

   As for sending CDs of Ramayana, let us first get the Rama Setu recognised!

   Comment by B Shantanu | August 3, 2008

3. From Chinese threat looms large by G Parthasarathy

   …
   Just as China was becoming a net importer of oil in 1993, Gen Zhao Nanqui, a senior official of China’s People’s Liberation Army proclaimed: “We can no longer accept the Indian Ocean as an ocean of the Indians”. Another naval analyst Mr Zhang Ming recently proclaimed that the islands of India’s Andaman and Nicobar archipelago could be used as a metal chain to block Chinese access to the Straits of Malacca. China has used such arguments to boost its naval presence in the Indian Ocean. Adopting a ‘string of pearls’ strategy to encircle and contain India in the Indian Ocean, it has acquired base facilities at Gwadar and Pasni in the Makran coast of Pakistan, virtually at the mouth of the Persian Gulf. It is building a fuelling station in the port of Hambantota in southern Sri Lanka, a container facility with naval and commercial access in Chittagong, and linking its Yunnan province to the Indian Ocean through Myanmar. It has gone as far as Mauritius and Maldives for securing a strategic presence, with promises of massive economic assistance to these countries. China has also planned its most ambitious project in the Indian Ocean, proposing a canal access across the Isthmus of Krai in Thailand, linking the Indian Ocean to its Pacific coast.

   China has reinforced these measures by sending its first naval expeditionary force spearheaded by two destroyers into the Indian Ocean, purportedly to deal with piracy off the coast of Somalia. A Chinese fleet last entered the India Ocean in the 15th century, when an expeditionary force under Admiral Zheng He sailed across the Indian Ocean to Calicut, Muscat, Maldives and Mogadishu. President Hu Jintao’s China appears desirous of reviving the imperial ambitions of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty! As China strengthens its Navy acquiring aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines, India will soon find that unless it combines the boosting of its maritime muscle with imaginative diplomacy in its Indian Ocean neighbourhood and on China’s Pacific shores, it will be strategically marginalised and outflanked by an assertive and expansionist Beijing, which appears bent on exploiting the high costs of imperial overreach by the Americans in recent years. Given the manner in which China has joined hands with Pakistan to sabotage India’s quest for permanent membership of the UN Security Council and the devious role it played in the Nuclear Suppliers Group to undermine moves to end global nuclear sanctions against India, we should have no doubt that ‘strategic containment’ of India will remain the cornerstone of Chinese foreign policy in the foreseeable future.

   Comment by B Shantanu | March 21, 2009

4. Excerpts from: India’s unwise military moves:

   …India has long held contradictory views on China. Another big Asian country, India is frustrated that China’s rise has captured much of the world’s attention. Proud of its “advanced political system,” India feels superior to China. However, it faces a disappointing domestic situation which is unstable compared with China’s.
   India likes to brag about its sustainable development, but worries that it is being left behind by China. China is seen in India as both a potential threat and a competitor to surpass.
   But India can’t actually compete with China in a number of areas, like international influence, overall national power and economic scale. India apparently has not yet realized this.
   Indian politicians these days seem to think their country would be doing China a huge favor simply by not joining the “ring around China” established by the US and Japan.
   …
   But this is wishful thinking, as China won’t make any compromises in its border disputes with India. And while China wishes to coexist peacefully with India, this desire isn’t born out of fear.

   Hat Tip: Do read Nitin’s take on this

   Comment by B Shantanu | June 11, 2009

5. Courtesy Sanjay The China-India Border Brawl from which some brief excerpts:

   The peaceful, side-by-side rise of China and India has been taken for granted in many quarters. But tensions between the two giants are mounting, and Washington would do well to take note. On June 8, New Delhi announced it would deploy two additional army divisions and two air force squadrons near its border with China. Beijing responded furiously to the Indian announcement, hardening its claim to some 90,000 square kilometers of Indian territory that China disputes.

   To understand what the tussle is about, consider recent history: The defining moment in the Sino-Indian relationship is a short but traumatic war fought over the Sino-Indian border in 1962. The details of that conflict are in dispute, but the outcome is not: After a sweeping advance into Indian territory, China gained control over a chunk of contested Tibetan plateau in India’s northwest but recalled its advancing army in India’s northeast, leaving to New Delhi what is now the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh. Relations have been characterized by mistrust ever since, but neither nation has shown any inclination to return to armed conflict.

   In recent years however China has been raising the temperature at the border. Chinese claims to Arunachal Pradesh and frequent Chinese “incursions” into the nearby Indian state of Sikkim have begun to multiply in line with Beijing’s rising economic and political influence. Moreover, unlike India, China has methodically developed its infrastructure along the disputed border, littering the barren terrain with highways and railways capable of moving large numbers of goods and troops.

   For its part, New Delhi has become both increasingly aware of its disadvantage and exceedingly suspicious of China’s intentions. India’s June 8 announcement that it will deploy two additional army mountain divisions to the northeastern state of Assam will bring India’s troop levels in the region to more than 100,000. The Indian Air Force, meanwhile, announced it will station two squadrons of advanced Sukhoi-30 MKI aircraft in Tezpur, also in Assam. They will be complemented by three Airborne Warning and Control Systems and the addition or upgrade of airstrips and advanced landing stations. This is part of a broader effort to bolster India’s military and transportation infrastructure in its neglected northeast.

   Upon hearing India’s plans, Beijing became irate. The People’s Daily, a Communist Party mouthpiece that serves as a window into the thinking of Beijing’s insular leadership, published an exceptional broadside against New Delhi on June 11. It described India’s “tough posture” as “dangerous,” and asked India to “consider whether or not it can afford the consequences of a potential confrontation with China.” China is not afraid of India, the editorial taunted, while mocking India for failing to keep pace with China’s economic growth.

   The editorial reminded New Delhi that Beijing had friends in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal but most importantly, it left no doubt about Beijing’s future position on Arunachal Pradesh: “China won’t make any compromises in its border disputes with India.”

   This is not the first time China has lost its cool over the border issue. Back in 2006, China’s Ambassador to India ignited a political firestorm when he declared the “whole state of Arunachal Pradesh is Chinese territory… we are claiming all of that. That is our position.” Later, on two separate occasions, China denied visas to Indian officials from Arunachal Pradesh, explaining Chinese citizens didn’t require visas to travel to their own country.

   …
   China has been applying pressures as well. This March, China broke with Asian tradition and tried to block a $2.9 billion loan to India at the Asian Development Bank, furious that the loan would fund a $60 million flood-management program in Arunachal Pradesh. (Last week China was overruled with help from the U.S., and the loan went through.) Before that, Beijing clumsily attempted to torpedo the U.S.-India nuclear deal from its seat at the Nuclear Suppliers Group.

   Is anyone in New Delhi worried…or even listening? You can bet not.

   Comment by B Shantanu | June 24, 2009

Leave a comment

Site info