#dnaEdit: Spectre of war

There are China doves and China hawks in New Delhi, and the hawks outnumber the doves. There is the curious twist that the hawks admire Chinese efficiency and ruthlessness, and this is the dominant sentiment in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as well as in the group of strategic advisers to the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. During the Jana Sangh days of the 1950s and the 1960s, the anti-China sentiment was ideological because of the communist government. And this was also associated with the 1962 India-China war where India met with military setback. The then Jana Sangh blamed it all on Nehru’s rose-tinted view of Red China. In the last 20 years, the BJP has been maintaining a tough, if not belligerent, attitude towards China but there is now a tinge of unmistakable admiration for the Chinese economic success. Chinese President Xi Jinping’s three-day State visit to India seemed to have lulled the experts and the BJP politicians into believing that China is keen to increase its trade relations and invest more in India, and the border incursions, however irritating, can be pushed to the margins of the bilateral agenda. 

Xi’s speech, as reported in the Chinese official news agency, the Xinhua, to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) commanders that the army should remain loyal to the Communist Party of China and be prepared to win a regional war has raised apprehensions. Does the reference to the regional war imply that China would not hesitate to raise the stakes over the border issue? Is it another instance of the inscrutable Chinese speaking of improving economic relations on the one hand, and preparing for a war on the other? The anxieties of the Indian security experts may not be misplaced, but it would show that the reference to a regional war would have other connotations to China’s political leaders and its army commanders. It would include Japan, Vietnam, and other countries in the South China Sea and it also refers to the issue of Spratly islands, which the Chinese refer to as Nansha islands. Beijing also faces the challenge of Islamic terrorism in the Xinjiang province in the far west of the country. India would want to cooperate with China on the issue of Islamic terrorism, but not on disputes involving countries like Japan, Vietnam and other south-east Asian countries. It would be a mistake to read the reference to a regional war as implying a war with India, though this need not be ruled out completely.

India will have to understand the complexity of Chinese security assessment and apprehension. India is not the only rival or foe of China in the Asia. There is a multipolar world out there and Indian policymakers have no option but to reckon with it. There is no room for old Cold War-type dominant players. There is a perception in the Indian strategy circles that India, China and Japan will be the dominant players and that these three could set the agenda for the rest. Xi’s cryptic reference to regional war reveals that he accepts the complex multipolar reality. In many ways, China is not even aspiring to be the dominant player. Its leaders are keen to defend Chinese interests, and the experience with the predatory Western powers, and Japan later, has made it bitter and suspicious. China does not believe in the rhetoric of universal peace and harmony. It knows that very tough measures are needed to keep peace on the ground.