|
Opinion
China Learns That 2009 is Not 1962
by
Amulya Ganguli
The inscrutable Chinese are supposed
to take every step after careful deliberation. Whether it is
Mao Zedong's smile for an Indian envoy to open a new chapter
after the 1962 conflict or the summoning of the Indian
ambassador in Beijing to the foreign office at 2 a.m. to
express displeasure, the Mandarins are believed to be
sticklers for sign language.
The perceptible downturn in Sino-Indian relations,
therefore, could not have been an unrehearsed event. It
began a few years ago with the Chinese ambassador's
assertions on the disputed status of Arunachal Pradesh and
Beijing's decision to unilaterally disown the 2005 agreement
to leave inhabited areas out of the proposed solutions for
the boundary question.
These incidents were followed by reports of an increase in
border incursions by Chinese patrols, attempts to block the
Asian Development Bank's loans for Arunachal Pradesh, the
filibustering by Chinese delegates at the Nuclear Suppliers
Group's meetings on the India-US nuclear deal, the stapling
of visas on the passports of Kashmiris, the depiction of
Kashmir as a separate country in Chinese-made globes,
involvement in development projects in Pakistan-occupied
Kashmir, and so on.
Arguably, the Chinese had convinced themselves that India
needed to be taught another "lesson", as they purportedly
did in 1962, to show who was the boss in Asia, especially to
the neighboring countries, none of which matched (or hoped
to match) Beijing's might. It is also possible that China
believed that its expected emergence as No.2 to the US
necessitated a perceptible snubbing of India, its only
potential rival in Asia.
These long dormant Middle Kingdom
sentiments are not entertained by the communist regime
alone. For instance, Chiang Kai-shek's book, "China's
Destiny", listed Tibet,
Mongolia, Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim, Burma and Vietnam as his
country's lost territories. Well-known historian R.C.
Mazumdar also noted that "if a
region once acknowledged her (China's) nominal suzerainty
even for a short period, she would regard it as a part of
her empire forever and would automatically revive her claim
over it even after a thousand years".
This attitude of aggrandizement contrasts sharply with
India's benignity and lack of imperialistic ambitions.
Although Southeast Asia, from Cambodia to Bali, demonstrates
the overwhelming presence of Indian influence, there has
never been any question of India claiming these lands as its
own.
The same spirit of generosity and friendship was shown by
India to Beijing when it rejected the Two China theory
preferred by the US in the 1950s and 60s and strongly
advocated Beijing's membership of the United Nations even
after the deterioration in Sino-Indian relations.
As a report on a conference of governors in 1959 said, late
prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru gave the "reasons for the
stand taken by India in the UN on the question of the entry
of China into the organization though there was resentment
in the country about China's hostile attitude towards
India". Nehru had also accompanied Zhou Enlai as a big
brother at the Bandung conference in 1955.
But China never reciprocated these friendly gestures.
Instead, as Nehru said after the 1962 war, "it
was wrong to assume that the Chinese undertook this
aggression only because they wanted some patches of
territory...China did not want any country near her which
was not prepared to accept her leadership; so India had to
be humiliated".
Continuing, he said, "though
India would not interfere with what was happening within
China, yet she came in China's way by the mere fact of her
separate political structure and pursuing a separate policy
which was succeeding".
These factors are apparently still riling China. Not only is
India emerging as a major regional power with a robust
economy which has weathered the storm of recession with
reasonable success, its "separate political structure" of a
widely admired multicultural democracy contrasts sharply
with China's obviously repressive one-party rule.
What is more, while Pakistan's degeneration into a
dysfunctional state robs China of an "all-weather friend"
which it could use to needle India, Beijing's own
peripheries have become seedbeds of trouble. Let alone
subdue its neighbors, the aspiring Middle Kingdom is not
even in full control over Tibet and Xinjiang, not to mention
Taiwan. Nor is it able to hide the growing rural unrest over
the disparity between the rich and the poor.
It is apparently because of such restiveness that even the
supposedly monolithic communist party is divided. On one
side are the so-called populists, who include President Hu
Jintao and Prime Minister Web Jiabao, with their preference
for a level-playing field between the poor Western regions
and the more affluent urban areas on the eastern coast and
on the other side are the elitists, who want faster growth
based on the free market.
It was perhaps to divert attention from all these
difficulties by ratcheting up nationalistic fervor that
China thought of provoking India. But its miscalculation was
that it did not take into account the fact that India in
2009 was different from its naive and militarily unprepared
self in 1962.
The blow to its pride in that year has led to an
augmentation of its military prowess, which it is no longer
hesitant to display. India also seems to have realized that
the Chinese misinterpret politeness as weakness. Hence it
chose to ignore Beijing's objections to the Dalai Lama's
visit to Arunachal Pradesh.
It is possible that the Chinese will now pay greater heed to
the second part of the advice of Sun Tzu, the military
genius of 6th century B.C., who said the winner is the
person who "knows when to fight and when not to fight".
IANS | October 31, 2009
Top | Opinion
|
