The West’s notions of history and geography between Europe and Asia, are drenched in myriad cultural implications and can be traced back to ‘The Romance of Alexander’.
This is a collection of essays mixing truth, epic drama and mythology, composed between the death of Alexander The Great in 323 B.C., and the fourth century A.D, and attributed either to Callisthenes, Aristotle’s nephew or to Alexander’s tutor.
During a 10-year period, Alexander forged an empire encompassing Asia Minor and what the West later defined as the Middle East, annexing the current lands of Turkey, Syria, Israel and Palestine, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, a slice of Pakistan and northwest India.
For more than two millennia, Alexander best embodied in the West the clash of these two lofty paradigms: East and West. Alexander’s conquests also helped India to enter the Western frame of mind in terms of geography and civilization.
We eventually learned that India was actually close to the Arab world – overland via Iran, and in naval terms via its direct connection to the Persian Gulf.
The exchange of goods, traditions and culture was always inbuilt in the Big Picture. Overland or seaborne, the ancient Silk Road – before arriving in China – went through India. Rome was already trading with India before learning about the Middle Kingdom, and vice-versa as the Chinese barely knew the Mediterranean existed.
Closer to the West
So, India was always closer to the Western mind than China.
In parallel, when Vasco da Gama reached southwest India in 1498, those ports for more than a millennium had been trading with China, Southeast Asia, the Arab world and the Mediterranean.
The historical case can be made that India’s royals, after trading for so long with Arab, Jewish and Chinese merchants, were fooled by the “peaceful” intention of the first European incursions, which eventually led to British domination of the subcontinent.
This background should be taken into account when we look at what happened during the latest international Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi. This was sponsored by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs and the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), an Indian think tank.
The theme of the Raisina Dialogue was “Managing Disruptive Transitions.” And the number one “disruptive transition” was identified as no less than China’s New Silk Road, otherwise known as the Belt and Road Initiative.
“The reality is that China is a disruptive transitional force in the Indo-Pacific, they are the owner of the trust deficit in the region.”
More than 200 million Indians are Muslims, which makes it the third largest Muslim nation in the world after Indonesia and Pakistan. So, it is no wonder that Premier Narendra Modi’s right-wing pro-Hindu BJP acts as the self-proclaimed defender of a multi-millennium civilization.
But when we dig deeper we find that modern Hindu nationalism – instead of worrying about the destiny of the Mahabharata – was actually born in the 1920s, infused with the theories of Mazzini, d’Annunzio and even one Benito Mussolini. Still, that was all about fear of the Hindu identity being swamped by Islam and Christendom.
Now, it is all about fear of China.
Belt and Road versus ‘Quad’
NATO was in full voice at the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi via Admiral Harry Harris, commander of US Pacific Command and named recently as US Ambassador to Australia. According to Harris, “the reality is that China is a disruptive transitional force in the Indo-Pacific, they are the owner of the trust deficit in the region.”
Significantly, the navy chiefs from the Quad nations – US, India, Japan, Australia – all agree on it. So does retired General David Petraeus, the former CIA director and mastermind of the surges in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Neocon ideologue Zalmay Khalilzad, a former US Ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan, also attended, and duly agreed that by trying to connect all of Eurasia via the Belt and Road, China would “change the international order.”
The Raisina Dialogue fully illustrated the scope of Washington’s terminological pivot from “Asia-Pacific” to “Indo-Pacific”, while detailing the prescription inbuilt in the new Pentagon Defense Strategy.
China – along with Russia – are “revisionist powers” bent on undermining the “international, rules-based order”, especially China with its “predatory economics” which will be fully developed through the Belt and Road program.
So, it was up to Quad to implement a new China containment strategy.
Geopolitically, in Beijing, China-India relations are regarded very seriously, second only in importance to China’s relations with the US. Lately, China-Russia relations have been in the ascendant – mutually exhorted as a “strategic partnership”.
China-Japan relations, meanwhile, may qualify as a distant fourth although vast swathes of the Chinese public appear to consider it the second biggest threat to President Xi Jinping’s “Chinese Dream”.
Yet once Beijing consolidates its influence over key maritime trade routes across East Asia, Japan will cease to be a problem. The real problem is if India ever decides to try to cut or at least interfere with China’s Belt and Road Initiative naval routes – and complex supply lines – across the Indian Ocean.
The key geopolitical question of the 21st century is how the ascension of China will “disrupt” American hegemony and arguably enable a Chinese – actually Eurasian – century.
China and India would have all it takes to be complementary. Both are members of BRICS, the group also comprising Brazil, Russia and South Africa. They are also part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), as well as top nations in the G-20. And yet New Delhi persists on treating Beijing not as a partner but as a threat.
Fear of the rising power
Xi Jinping, for his part, seems to take the Thucydides Trap seriously: when a rising power causes fear in an established power which escalates toward war. Xi has referred to it many times in his speeches.
So, closing the historical circle that started with Alexander, we now have an informed reader from the Middle Kingdom showing respect toward the most eminent historian of Ancient Greece
Xi is, in fact, warning the US, and by proxy, India, not to fall into the mistake that generated the Peloponnesian War, where every player lost.
The fear instilled in Sparta by the ascent of Athens rendered the war inevitable (replace Sparta by Washington/Delhi and Athens by Beijing). Athens was defeated as well as its model of democracy. In fact, the whole of Greece was defeated, its decline acting as a prelude for being conquered by Philip of Macedonia.
Inspired by the maritime expeditions of Admiral Zheng He, Xi’s point is that China is a benevolent power, with the New Silk Road – a massive trade route and a potential multiplier of wealth – developed as the archetypal globalization 2.0 “win-win”.
But, don’t count on India and the Quad to play along.
Well stated, Greg! Masters of Tibet, the PRC holds the high ground above India’s Ganges plain heartland. The same Tibet plateau places China’s populous heartnand far from India’s reach. Strategic advantage to China. In addition, Pakistan, eternally hostile to India, flanks that country to the west and is China’s ally of convenience. Additional advantage to China. As I see it China has India in such a geostrategic cleft stick that it need never worry about occasional Indian government bluster. That frees up China’s energies to pursue other, more important, foreign policy goals; as you astutely point out. China holds all of the ace cards.
India is just too preoccupied with its insecurities. It should concentrate on improving its economy and lifting millions of its people out of poverty. They already have enough deterrence against possible invasion. When you see your neighbor prosper you do not sulk in envy. You try harder to keep pace or do more. Their insecurity is making the region volatile. They are playing to the tune of the west with its own agenda of keeping the whole of Asia in check and maintain the present world order where they presently dominate.
Ironic and plain hypocritical for the United States of America, which has inserted intself into more kinetic wars (and cyper wars) since its founding less than 300 years ago than any other modern nations, should characterize China as a nation lacking in "trust deficits".
Many freedom figthers in places throughout the world would rightly consider the USA a nation that betryaed them when the going got tough.
In fairness, has China betrayed any allies, leaving them to be crushed by opposing enemies. Has China colozined India, as has the British Empire.
The great Admiral Harry Harris (whom I am fond of) certainly knows his history, but he rose to rank during the Cold War so he perhaps sees the world in only through dichotomous visions. China, foe, because it does not bend to USA’s will. Japan is Donald Trump’s sycophant so it’s a friend.
A new paradign has solidified since the dissolution of the Soviet Union and perhaps Adminral Harris should start viewing the world through that paradigm. Many nations, even those who once carried water for the USA, would (privately) say the USA lacks a huge trust deficit, especially with Donald J. Trump seeking military world hegemony and behaving like an Emperor.
Firstly, China vs India war does not serve either China’s or India’s best interest. A conflict between China and India only benefits third parties, so keep that in mind.
Secondly, your Indian chaps seem to live in your own dreamed up bubble to always talk about possible India/China war. I believe leaders of both countries are better than that, despite minor clashes on the border and heightened verbal exchanges at times.
Hellenistic analogy is tempting and interesting but inapposite. Nice article, nevetheless. To indulgen the author, who would be the 21st century Gauls?
Since India and China are both "nuclear" powers, neither country would launch land invasions against each other. Thus, a Commander Flamininus is not needed to drive out any Macedonian. (Indeed, Parkistan is also a nuclear power.) Nuclear weapons’ mutual destruction assurances are sufficient to deter land invasions, as the Cold War amply demonstrated. (Skirmishes in Kashmire (and other border regions) are likely to continue now and then, unfortunately.)
India’s Modi wants his impossibly complex country to become a manufacturing powerhouse like China, hence his campaign to seek to realize "Made-in-India" deam. But, India’s obsession with outdoing Pakistan can hinder its mission to realize that dream. The law of comparative advantage, which is truely borderless, permits India to obtain a piece of the "Made-in-India" dream, as China’s "Made-in-China" dream has been achieved with exceptional successes. (Parkistan too can achieve its own "Made-in-Parkistan" dream.)
Germany continues to enjoy its "Made-in-Germany" dream, and it is likely to continue doing so for decades to come, as has Japan has done with its "Made-in-Japan" dream in high-end manufactured goods (and services). Consumers the world over still want and buy Mercedes Benz made in Germany, and bullet trains and water-purification systems made in Japan sell famously well in many parts of the world and Japan’s Shinkansen is still the gold standard in the world.
In the age of Internet, Airbus A380, bullet trains, satellite TV receptions, super cargo ships, and other modern contraption, the world can and will accommodate as many trade lanes as possible. Thus, the New Silk Road can coexist along side with and complement other roads backed by India, Japan, US, Australia, the Russian Federation ("BRICS"), and other nations.
Consumerism, if properly nurtured, supported and protected by nations, will be the Commander Flamininus of the new digital world and he won’t need to commence any kinetic warfare or shed a drop of blood in the name of any legion.
Tan Chee Hong: Australia is no "running dog" of the USA – whatever that unflattering term means. Based upon certain shared values we find that by collaborating with then USA in certain matters of policy that we are treated with greater respect abroad than we would be if we tried to go it aloneas a neutral. Our relationship with the USA is a matter of pragmatic choice, not of compulsion.
After reading Mr. Escobar’s article, as usual I am compelled to think about diverse subjects: Why is NATO, not satisfied with containing Russia in Afghanistan, in the Indian Ocean? To add China to the project? Is the US carrying on the British Imperial Policy of divide and conquer (Can’t have those Asian powers ganging up on the Western ones) (Note: Nehru in "The Discovery of India" waxed about how China and India had long historical trade and cultural connections). And Pepe is right, water is an issue, but IMO, not the water in the ocean but the water which flows from the mountains and which amalgamation of people calling themselves a nation state gets it.
Thucydides traps aside…
One thing that’s bound to happen is that China will 『from now onwards 』be putting New Dehli’s on notice exactly the way she puts the US and the USSR (or Russia) on notice in a manner she’s never done before in the past – ever – in this region.
Hypothesis: 2000 nukes 『minimum, maybe more』, will from now, started to be added to our western flank to guarantee it that the subcontinent will get totally smelters if they are stupid enough to allow themselves to be fanned by Uncle Sam to test CHINA’S RESOLVE…
Already, DF-15’s, 16’s, and DF-17’s, probably numbering in the hundreds by now have been shipped by the boxcar along the Tibet rail lines and positioned all along Himalayas foothills from Xinjiang to the border with Myanmar and this does not put into account the 『CONTINENTAL』 BALLISTIC MISSILES that are in shelters dug deep into the Himalayas rock formations since the 90’s…
So do read our lips India…
Pepe. Your take on History is too Western European thus flawed.
Athens lost because of its wasteful Democracy of the Demos (the 5% moneyed males, who rule over the 95% rest – women, plebs, slaves).
Had Athens listened to its own prophet Socrates who offered a more efficient alternative of Republic (a govt of the people, by the people, for the people) they would have prevailed.
Today, China is Socratic/Confucian and India the Athenian Democracy. In this era of Globalization and Free Trade, Republic will triumph over Democracy.
India is world’s largest Democracy, and that will be its undoing. India kills its Socrates’. 70 years ago it spurned Jinnah who wanted a Republic vs Nehru’s Democracy who forced a split of the country in 2 then 3. If India continues with Democracy it will be split again soon.
Learn from history, but India does not, forgetting its own Scriptures.
"He who sees diversity, but not the unity behind the diversity, marches on from death to death" – Katha Upanishad.
You do not compare a Pope with a thief, or apples and oranges.
China is unified by language and race, and surrounded by friends. It was never occupied for long. It is also Buddhist/Confucian, thus rational.
India is divided by language, race, religion. Predominantly Caste Hindu but with large Muslim fifth column, and surrounded by enemies around. By land it is blocked to the West and East and North. And it was occupied by 7 foreigners in last 3,500 years.
The above are both strengths and weaknesses. Unity can be a blessing, but so can be diversity.
On the whole India has better assets, warmer climate, more universal culture, well connected to the world. If India can make peace with its citizens and its neighbors, it will outshine China many times over. However, if it fails, it will see China as its next occupier.
Those who believe India is weaker than China in economic, I do agree. In a democratic country its not that easy to implement a decision like a communist country. But if military war is concern we have geographical advantage. We can block entire Indian Ocean that may cost China alot. Although China is trying hard to get a chunk in Indian Ocean but it won’t be that easy.
Indians can make only nonsense comments. Be reasonable
India started 1962 war. That is by Indian own instestigation.
Comparing China to Athens ? What fart ? China a benevolent power changing the status quo in the so called South China Sea by adding military facilities and bullying small countries in the region with economic bribes or military threats ?
Next you will be stating that India started the 1962 war with China ? the author is really are just as brainwashed as the suicide bombers under Islamic terrorism.
In this article, Pepe sounds more like a outhpiece of the Indian elites, very uncharacteristically.
"Geopolitically, in Beijing, China-India relations are regarded very seriously, second only in importance to China’s relations with the US. "
Ths is straight from some of the self-serving Indian elites. Sino-India relations are way down in China’s priority, after the US, Russia, Japan and Europe. In fact, most of the times, India appears on the Chinese national radar when it jealously starts to provoke China or when there are some armed conflicts between India and Pakistan. Lately, India has got more attention from the Chinese because its chest-pounding and hostitlies towards China.
That being said, there are a lot more potential between China and India. India just needs to adopt a broad-minded policy. It also needs to have a more realistic grounding of its national status and power in the international arena, particularly vis a vis China; that way, it won’t feel that everything China does was meant to "contain" India – India is not that much a threat to China to warrant such strategy. Simply put, India is not in the same league as China, probably never will. Therefore the so-called ‘Thucydides Trap’ with India is way exaggerated.
If India wants to play the game, it may end up on the losing side. With 200 m Muslims in India spread all over the country and Pakistan jostling for dominance, India will have an internal religious problem that will sap up all its energy. China, on the other hand, has a Muslim problem which is easily controlled, being located in only 1 province. If India wants to play games, it will have its hands full.
Why antagonise China when both can work together for the common good. Its partners are tainted: USA is a failing superpower and Japan’s WWII history irks Asia. Australia is just a running dog of USA. Don’t forget that India has just rejected the hand of peace and friendship because of its jealousy. It is not thinking and behaving rationally. It cannot blame what is to come. Good luck if it thinks it can come up on top in this tussle.
I disagree with Pepe about India’s position in the mind frame of Americans. Just goin by the main stream media China is spoken about far more than India. That holds true on Website articles, TV news and newspapers. India is barely mentioned.
As for the commenters they discuss China far more than India. Mostly because they do not know or care to know about the subcontinent. Pepe is right about the mythology that surrounds Alexander the Great and that would be the extent a good deal of Americans would care to go when it comes to India.
Even Hollywood has done far better movies on China than on India "The Last Emperor" being one of many.
Every aspect of China is covered in the US. From Beijing’s politics to the Three Gorges Dam. From her economy to her military might. More commenters comment on Xi Ping than on Modi.
India is well known but mainly around her failures. Commenters often download pictures of the worst of India. scenes of public defection, open sewers, slums fill some forums. I do not see anything like that on China.
Whatever current alliances and rivals that are being formed it has little if anything to do with either China’s or India’s historical links to the West.
Sorry Kevin, " it is like Modi still has no toilet and China has colonized Mars…". And " it is like the US has a toilet, but no sewage working…".
And " it is like Australia…. what is Australia ???"
India is very very jealous of the Middle Kingdom——-it is like India is still on earth and China has colonized Mars————that is how WIDE the gap is. The Middle Kingdom continues to march forward!!
India is behaving like a nation on the defensive – probably with good reason and just like the USA. China is bound to win.