Using sports idioms to hash out issues of war and peace may seem inappropriate, but it is possible to say that the month-long India-China military standoff on the border near Sikkim is about to enter the home stretch this weekend.
The last curve on the racetrack is approaching in a couple of days, and what is clear is that there can only be one winner.
If the expectation was that the visit by Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval to Beijing to attend the seventh meeting of BRICS High Representatives on Thursday and Friday could provide a window of opportunity for a meaningful conversation to find a face-saving formula to resolve the standoff, that now seems unlikely.
On Monday, Beijing drew the red line for the benefit of Indian policymakers huddling to finalize Doval’s “talking points” in Beijing. The red line is that India must leave “Chinese territory” unconditionally, unilaterally, without further delay.
For the first time, the Chinese Defense Ministry waded into the discourse, with its spokesman Senior Colonel Wu Qian asserting that the People’s Liberation Army will defend Chinese territory “at all costs” and disclosing that Chinese border troops have “taken initial countermeasures at the site and will step up targeted deployment and training”.
Wu urged India to “abandon any impractical illusions” over the PLA’s “unshakable determination to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
Meanwhile, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang hinted at a regular media briefing on Monday that a meeting between Doval and his Chinese host State Councilor Yang Jiechi “to exchange views” could not be ruled out.
Curiously, the Communist Party tabloid Global Times in an editorial on Monday highlighted that Doval was the problem rather than the solution, saying he was “believed to be one of the main schemers behind the current border standoff”.
An accusing finger has been pointed at the Prime Minister’s Office in New Delhi. Doval reports to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The Global Times has a pronounced nationalist outlook, but making allowance for that, something seems to have changed fundamentally in the Chinese rhetoric.
It may be risky to be dismissive about the Chinese articulations as mere rhetorical flourish. The PLA has appeared on the front line as the lead actor. And China’s Military Commission is headed by none other than President Xi Jinping.
The Global Times editorial underlined that New Delhi should give up any “illusions”, since PLA forces “are being deployed to the border area, and will take effective countermeasures”.
Importantly, it ended with a political message that the Modi government may face self-invited humiliation. An analogy has been drawn that India may face “its most serious strategic setback since 1962”.
On the other hand, right-wing opinion in India continues to be that this is all Beijing’s “psywar”, and that China is only bluffing.
In this optimistic view, India is well prepared militarily and in reality China is “rattled” by the resoluteness of the Indian action to cross the border – something no previous Indian government before Modi’s leadership dared to do.
The argument that this is platinum-grade “muscular diplomacy” is predicated on the belief that what ensues may be “a short intense war” in which the PLA simply cannot muster the forces necessary to overcome the three Indian Army divisions deployed in the vicinity of the theater of contestation in Doklam.
The core assumption here is that China has no option but to accept as fait accompli the new fact on the ground, which the Indian Army has created. One analyst wrote: “Nothing is likely to happen other than more ejections of more hot air and gas from the Chinese side…. The PLA has just about another month to start an affray before the weather begins closing in. Beijing apparently doesn’t rate the PLA’s chances highly. Otherwise, it would, by now, have done something instead of just raving and ranting.”
Analysts close to Indian military circles assess that if China does not contest the new fact on the ground in Doklam, it will constitute “victory” for New Delhi and a strategic defeat for China.
Of course, a case can be made that “you live only once, so make the best of it”. But in the life of nations, there are assumptions and assumptions – and certain assumptions a nation makes at defining moments must be absolutely ironclad, with zero margin of error.
In 1962 India failed the litmus test with disastrous consequences. The assumption that the PLA is a paper tiger may be stretching things too far.
Besides, wars are never fought at the military level alone. Comprehensive national power invariably comes into play.
How long and weary the home stretch is going to be may become clear by this weekend.
Saeed Khan read the resolutions, first Pakistan has to vacate ite occupied territory which is called by you Azad Kashmir, they are available on internet.
Chinese diplomacy has been a disaster for over 70 years, all this will do is push India more firmly into the orbit of the West.
Indian governments bent over backwards to please China in earlier years from accepting the Chinese invasion of Tibet and its occupation by China through to giving up its UN seat in favour of China.
All China has to do is tickle India’s tummy and it will gladly appreciate and cooperate with China.
Instead it looks like this is a another Chinese foreign policy disaster
The Indian protectorate will act for the Bhutanese before annexation just as they had done in the Sikkimese.
Saeed Khan … Kashmir belong to Hindus, Muslims, Chritians and Sikhs ! to all not only to muslims… Where there is always muslim majority, they want to kill non-muslims or convert them by force ! Kashmiris are bloody selfish and ungrateful. What Hindus are doing to muslims nowadays is the reaction of Muslim oppression but even that is not right ! Hindus should not hate or fight against Muslims ! On the contrary, Hindus and Muslims cannot separate so they must learn to live together… This cow protectors hate and violence in India is not right as well ! I believe all of us are wrong….
James Denk …. sometimes situations go out of control but Hindus and Sikhs are Friends ! Puslims from Pislam are the root of world problems…
I think that this is time to sit down on table and negotiate the issues…war not option…
Alok Narayan
B.S.
China has concluded border settlements with 12 of its 14 neighbors,
except India and Bhutan.
China/Bhutan would’ve long demarcated their border and established diplomatic relation if not for Indian arm twisting of the tiny kingdom.
The Bhutan claim on Doklam was raised only on the 19 rounds talk in 2000, at the behest of New Delhi.
India is ‘protecting Bhutan’, dont make my toes laugh !
Delhi is the source of unrest in South Asia, just ask the Nepalese,
Sri Lankans, Sikkimese, Bhutanese…….
http://www.nytimes.com/1990/10/07/world/india-based-groups-seek-to-disrupt-bhutan.html
James Denk The Chinese jurisdiction based on trivial area domination tricks is not material ownership but a contested possession since it has been opposed by Bhutan from 2007 onwards. Further, any effort to contruct a C-40 road here is in contravention of 1998 Sino-Bhutan Boundary accord mandating a status-quo and has deep ramifications for 2012 Sino-Indian SR boundary resolve of essentially determining the tri-junction only through a tripartite agreement. Then, again we were treaty bound to defend Bhutan against any territorial agression, so in effect we not only had a duty but a right to interference. And lastly, we indeed have a clearer record b’coz unlike the utter Chinese disregard to UN arbitral award in case of SCS we indeed ceded territory to our neighbour Bangladesh on one such In’tl award.
Alok Narayan
China building roads in territory under Chinese juridiction claimed by Bhutan, nothing to do with India.
Indian troops crossing the settled border from Sikkim consititute an invasion,
hope this help, professor of law.
‘we Indians unlike the Chinese have a clean past record in accepting even adverse Int’l judgements on such territorial dispute.’
Cough cough…
Everybody in South Asia knows Indians speak with forked tongue,
Ask the nagas….
Gandhi
‘Nagas have every right to be independent. We did not want to live under the domination of the British and they are now leaving us. I want you to feel that India is yours. I feel that the Naga Hills are mine just as much as they are yours, but if you say ‘it is mine’ then the matter must stop there. I believe in the brotherhood of man, but I do not believe in force or forced unions. If you do not wish to join the Union of India nobody will force you to do that
‘
But when Nagas formally sought independence,
Nehru banged his fist on the table and screamed,
“Whether heaven falls and India goes to pieces and the whole country runs red with blood, I will not allow the Nagas to be independent. I can station one soldier for every tree in Nagaland.”
India then invaded Nagaland and waged a genocidal war which killed hundreds of thousands civilians. Even today the Nagas are still groaning under the world’s most dracanian ‘anti insurgency ‘ law, the AFSPA.
India invaded and committed genocides in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Meghalaya, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura, Kashmir, Sikkim, BHutan.
They dont call India the USA of South Asia for nuthin you know prof ?
Vijay Raghavan
‘James Denk What is chinese priority flying planes to Japan,Building sea in south
china sea,building roads suddenly & then wanting to dock in srilanka,want ties with Bhutan…..however it does not think it should settle tibet.If you say it is chinese territory then why is china crying when Korea wants to have Thaad in its territory.’
so you invaded China cuz it ‘fly planes past Jp sea and building sea [sic] in SCS,
YOU are getting more and more incoherent dude.
‘wanting to dock in srilanka’
so RAW ousted prez Rajapaksa. !
‘want ties with Bhutan.’
is that a crime too ?
You saying Bhutan, a sovereign country ,needs Delhi permission to make friends ?
Thats why you brought down the first democratically elected Bhutan PM
jIGME Thinley in 2013 when he looked set to complete the border talk with China !
YOu are showing your true color’, its all about Bhutan. !
You forbade BHutan to have diplomatic relation with China, sabotage the border negotiation, cuz you treated BHutan as your private fief, just like Nepal, Sri LaNka, and every small countries in your peripheral.
No wonder they call India the USA of South Asia !
There are a lot of lies from CIA trolls posing as Indians making inflammatory comments. India and China should watch what each other does rather than listening to idiotic comments on the news. That is the way to counter CIA schemes to start a war in the region.
Saeed Khan I bet you have not read the U.N Resolution otherwise u won’t have asked this silly question..
Alok Narayan; If India is such a law abiding citizen why does it not implement UN resolutions on Kashmir?
In last 10 years the way the Chinese were behaving this was always coming. Lets look at the recent past 1 year. China blocked India’s entry into NSG, blocked Mazhar asod’s labelling as international terrorist, openly supporting Pakistan. This incident was inevitable. Unlike other countries in East Asia, there is one major difference for China in this conflict and that is the nukes India posses. India has invested heavily in the delivery systems and this is not a showpiece for its republic day parade. India will have to use it in the full scale war scenario and its is a open known fact that China has more wealth and better industry that what India posses at the moment. So in a nuclear Armageddon China has more to lose. It just takes one leader with the same thinking for the general public’s nightmare to be real. This is how serious and worried China should be too for a resolution, not just India.