Is China encircling India? - Claude Arpi

[Guest guest]

By Claude Arpi

 

http://in.rediff.com/news/2004/oct/04claude.htm

 

The Rediff Special/Claude Arpi

 

 

October 04, 2004

 

Deng Xiaoping used to say that it 'does not matter if a cat is white

and black as long it catches mice.' So whether Jiang Xemin or Hu

Jintao is in full control of the Communist Party's machinery

(including the People's Liberation Army), Beijing's attitude towards

Delhi will remain the same (even if today the cat calls itself

a 'peaceful cat').

In early 1950, a few weeks after India decided to be the 'first

nation' outside the Communist World to recognise Red China, a young

Bombay journalist running a magazine called Mother India prophesised

the invasion of Tibet. It was several months before Mao's troops

walked on the Roof of the World.

He wrote: 'It is quite on the cards that soon she [Tibet] will be

added to Mao's territorial possessions. But the story is different

with Nepal. Mao will perhaps wish to reach out through Tibet and

interfere with Nepal's present status. Nepal has good defence

resources, though an out-of-date political structure, and India will

be particularly interested in the security of this neighbour of

hers, since there are sixteen railroads leading from the Nepalese

border into our country and the Gurkha soldiers are an important

part of our own army. An extension of Mao's rule to Nepal will lay

India open to easy attack by him and consequently cannot under any

circumstances be tolerated. It will mean definitely a prelude to a

war between China and India.'

There are several interesting features in this article, the first

one being that the journalist, K D Sethna, was a disciple of the

great Rishi Sri Aurobindo and that all his articles were vetted by

the master who several times pointed out at the danger of Communist

China reaching India's doorsteps and engulfing what Mao named the

palm (Tibet) and the five fingers (NEFA, Sikkim, Bhutan, Nepal and

Kashmir).

Another remarkable feature of Sethna's piece is that 54 years later,

the situation does not appears to have improved and the threat over

India remain the same.

In the same article, Sethna stated: 'What the alarmists declare is

that if we did not recognise Mao he would precipitate a military

clash with us.'

However, today the position is poles apart: nobody is alarmed either

in the corridors of South Block or the media. Particularly after

Atal Bihari Vajpayee's visit last year to Beijing, India is again

becoming a friend (if not yet a brother) with China and the new

government (like its predecessor) is actively 'engaging' China.

Nevertheless, it remains that the situation today in Nepal, as was

55 years ago, is very worrying and the ascendancy of the Maoists,

whether they are supported by Beijing or not, is not a good omen for

India. One can only hope that the new foreign secretary, who has

been posted in Kathmandu and should have some knowledge of the

situation, will do something to 'engage' the king and his government

and encourage the creation of conditions to have the populace with

them and not against it.

In the meantime Beijing is more and more 'engaged in Nepal. An

agency report mentioned: 'Nepal's Crown Prince Paras' first visit to

China resulted in the establishment of a series of aid projects for

Nepal. China has agreed to provide nearly Nepali Rs 450 million (US

$6,250,000) to Nepal this fiscal year to support ongoing projects as

well as to initiate new ones.' During his visit, Paras met Chinese

President Hu Jintao and invited him to visit Nepal.

Another difference from the early fifties is that today China is a

power to reckon with. Remember when Tibet was invaded in 1950 China

was nothing. She was recognized only by a few 'fraternal Communist

nations.' During his stay in Moscow in 1949-1950 for several months,

Mao had had to literarily crawl in front of Stalin to get material

support for his country. At that time, India pushed hard for the new

Beijing regime's recognition, but very few cared for what India

believed and Beijing remained isolated.

In 2004, though Red China is dead and gone, under the banner of 'the

peaceful rise of China,' the Forth Generation's leadership has

transformed the Middle Kingdom into an Eden of wild capitalism.

China today is on top of the world or to put it more correctly, on

the top of Olympus. In August, when Dora Bakoyannis, the mayor of

Athens, handed over the Olympic flame to Wang Qishan, her Beijing

counterpart, China was indeed triumphant. New China was perhaps not

able to get the better of the United States (they just had won 32

golds, three less than the US), but as an Indian newspaper puts

it: 'Western sports officials and journalists no longer talk of

China taking over the US supremacy of world sport -- unchallenged

for a century -- as a possibility. Rather, it is an inevitability.

When Chinese officials boast of 'winning 50 gold medals in Beijing,'

nobody sniggers.'

This has not come by wishful thinking or prayers, China has work

hard and invested much for this: their sports budget is

astronomical. The PLA Daily reported that Beijing spent $720 million

a year of their Olympic sports programme alone.

At Athens, China took part in 26 of 28 disciplines. Many, at least

in China, feel the investment was worthwhile: $20 million for one

gold medal. It is a good return not only because China can now await

2008 with regained confidence. In the Chinese psyche, 'face' is most

important and the leadership knows that in four years time, the

Middle Kingdom will be able to find its true place at the centre of

the world.

In an essay published recently in Foreign Affairs magazine, Peter G

Peterson, secretary of commerce in the Nixon administration

prophesised that the US are 'riding for a fall.' More and more

analysts feel that one of the consequences of the US decline will

see China taking the lead in the world during the 21st century. Hu

Jintao and his colleagues in Beijing firmly believe this.

The 'peaceful rise of China' means that Beijing will do everything

to keep the image of a peaceful nation till China rises to the top

in 2008. The date of the Olympics is not just symbolic. It is a long

planned programme and the investment in gold medals is only a tiny

aspect.

Till then, it does not mean that Beijing will do nothing and merely

watch the world. In recent months her foreign policy has never been

so assertive, especially against an India (with its one and only

silver) considered very weak. It is not only in Nepal that China is

keeping the pressure on India, it is in all her neighbourhood.

I had written earlier about the mysterious lake in Tibet. Beijing

has managed to keep the state of Himachal Pradesh on tenterhooks for

several weeks, causing tens of crores of rupees expenses to the

exchequer, just because, the leadership in Beijing refused to allow

an Indian team to access the danger. Road construction to the Indian

border was probably the reason for the landslides and China was

obviously not keen to inform Delhi about it.

In Manipur, where the agitation is linked to the murder and rape of

Thangjam Manorama, a militant, by the Assam Rifles, a deeper angle

has recently come to light. The web site Indiareacts.com

reported: 'Raids on Manipur university professors and at least seven

students unearthed details of telephone calls made to Hong Kong and

visits to meet Chinese MID or military-intelligence department

agents.'

'During questioning, one of the professors broke down and confessed

to visiting Hong Kong nine times in the past six months. A proposal

was recovered in the raid for Chinese mediation of the Manipur

issue. A further trail led to five Manipuri insurgent leaders who

had regular meetings with MID agents based in Myanmar, who were

presumably road mapping the agitation.'

We know about Myanmar and Beijing's support to the military junta

(and its aversion to Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Laureate who, let

us not forget, studied at the Institute of Advance Studies in Simla

for years and is considered close to India).

Beijing provides important economic assistance to Rangoon and since

the coup in 1988, China has built important infrastructures (roads,

bridges, power plants, harbour facilities), which in turn serve

Beijing own strategic interests.

Official Chinese figures tell us that 1 million Chinese people live

in Burma, but the real figure is probably around 3 million. Isn't

this one more subtle pressure on India's borders?

Another worrying incident is the rising harassment and persecution

of Buddhist tribals by militants of the National Socialist Council

of Nagaland (IM) and NSCN (K) in remote parts of Arunachal Pradesh.

The militant outfits have demanded annexation of land from the

Buddhist and issued a decree for their conversion to Christianity.

The villagers were given two options only -- embrace Christianity or

face capital punishment.

The objectives of the NSCN (IM) is to establish a 'Greater Nagaland'

based on Mao Tse Tung's ideology. Its manifesto is based on the

principle of socialism for economic development with a religion

addition 'Nagaland for Christ.' A powerful cocktail!

We could continue the list with the supply of arms to Bangladesh; or

the Beijing orchestrated saga of Dr A Q Khan in Pakistan, the

enhanced Han presence in Central Asia, particularly in Kyrgyzstan

where President Akaev has leased 125,000 hectares of the most

valuable Kyrgyz land to China 'with glaciers full of fresh water and

with a uniquely designed border outpost.' Though Kyrgyzstan has not

direct borders with India, the encirclement is getting tighter by

the day.

The rise of China, whether peaceful or not, should be of great

concern to India. A leadership change in Beijing will not change

this basic fact because, today as yesterday, Delhi is Beijing's only

economic and geostrategic rival in Asia.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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