How not to deal with a rising China:
a perspective from south Asia
HOW NOT TO DEAL WITH A RISING CHINA: A PERSPECTIVE FROM SOUTH ASIA
The principal purpose of this article is to intervene in the robust debate on a rising
China within western academia and the policy community by offering a perspective that is often missing and rarely given sufficient attention—a perspective from
‘the region’. A view from south Asia may offer pointers on ‘how not to deal with
China’ and consequently enrich this debate. While there is a range of opinions in
the West stridently arguing over how to cope with the rise of China, the perspective from the region is less visible.1 This article offers a subaltern perspective by
drawing insights from three case-studies in south Asia.
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1
This article is part of the International Affairs September 2022 special issue: ‘International relations: the “how
not to” guide’, guest-edited by Daniel W. Drezner and Amrita Narlikar. The article benefited immensely
from the author’s initial discussions with Amrita Narlikar, the extremely valuable research assistance provided
by Chetan Rana and the comments offered by the anonymous reviewers. Cartoon by Sequential Potential
Comics, www.sequential potential.com.
It is surprising how little attention is paid to south Asia in the academic discussion on China’s rise. See e.g.
M. Taylor Fravel, ‘International Relations theory and China’s rise: assessing China’s potential for territorial expansion’, International Studies Review 12: 4, 2010, pp. 505–32; or even the two otherwise outstanding
articles in this special issue: Joseph S. Nye, Jr, ‘How not to deal with a rising China: a US perspective’,
International Affairs 98: 5, 2022, pp. 1635–52, and Janice Gross Stein, ‘How not to think like a hegemon’, International Affairs 98: 5, 2022, pp. 1615–33. A rare exception is Rush Doshi, The long game: China’s grand strategy to displace American order (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021), which accords significant importance
International Affairs 98: 5 (2022) 1653–1675; doi: 10.1093/ia/iiac165
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AMITABH MATTOO *
Amitabh Mattoo
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to the region in China’s grand strategic calculations. See also John M. Owen, ‘Two emerging international
orders? China and the United States’, International Affairs 97: 5, 2021, pp. 1415–31; Kai He and Mingjiang
Li, ‘Understanding the dynamics of the Indo-Pacific: US–China strategic competition, regional actors and
beyond’, International Affairs 96: 1, 2020, pp. 1–7.
Similarly, while sensitive to non-western thinking and scholarship, the primary objective of the essay is
not directed towards epistomologically ‘provincializing’ International Relations thinking on China. In the
last decade, inspired by Dipesh Chakrabarty’s Provincializing Europe: postcolonial thought and historical difference
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007), a number of thoughtful articles have appeared on this theme,
including in this journal.
See the section on author’s positionality at the end of the article.
To understand Kautilya’s thought, see George Modelski, ‘Kautilya: foreign policy and international system
in the ancient Hindu world’, American Political Science Review 58: 3, 1964, pp. 549–60; Rashed Uz Zaman,
‘Kautilya: the Indian strategic thinker and Indian strategic culture’, Comparative Strategy 25: 3, 2006, pp.
231–47; Roger Boesche, The first great political realist: Kautilya and his Arthashastra (Lanham, MD: Lexington,
2002). See also the magisterial study by Deepshika Shahi, Kautilya and non-western IR theory (London: Palgrave,
2019); and the forthcoming Kajari Kamal, Kautilya’s Arthashastra: strategic cultural roots of India’s contemporary
statecraft (New Delhi: Routledge, 2023).
John Mearsheimer, ‘The inevitable rivalry: America, China, and the tragedy of Great Power politics’, Foreign
Affairs 100: 6, pp. 48–59. See also John Mearsheimer, ‘China’s unpeaceful rise’, Current History 105: 690, 2006,
pp 160–62.
Hal Brands and Michael Beckley, Danger zone: the coming conflict with China (New York: Norton, 2022), read in
advance of publication.
Stephen G. Brooks and William C. Wohlforth, ‘The rise and fall of the great powers in the 21st century:
China’s rise and the fate of America’s global position’, International Security 40: 3, 2015–16, pp. 7–53; Michael
Beckley, ‘China’s century? Why America’s edge will endure’, International Security 36: 3, 2011–12, pp. 41–78;
Yan Xuetong, ‘The age of uneasy peace: Chinese power in a divided world’, Foreign Affairs 98: 1, 2019, pp.
40–6. For a recent corrective see Doshi, The long game.
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While anchored in theory, the ambition of this article is limited to drawing
empirically and ethnographically from the case-studies to offer a decentred view
of China’s rise as a way of furthering our understanding of the possible implications of Beijing’s recent assertiveness for the international system.2 From this
perspective, drawn from the author’s own positionality,3 China is deploying
all the instruments propounded by the ancient Indian philosopher and political
strategist Kautilya in his treatise Arthashastra: saam, daam, dand, bhed (‘persuade or
purchase or punish or exploit a weakness’) to dominate its neighbourhood, and
this approach could well be applied beyond the region as well.4 This comes close to
a western offensive–realist understanding that China, like any rising power, seeks
primacy in its region.5 As China faces challenges and pushbacks, it is expected
to become even more assertive in the region.6 However, while the literature on
Great Power politics focuses primarily on the consequences for the United States
and China,7 the aim of this study is to position the region at the centre of the
debate and explore the historical context of and changing dynamics in relations
with China. The three case-studies—drawn from Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka—
underscore the dilemmas posed by the binaries of bandwagoning and balancing.
These cases examine the trajectories of these relations and the scope for managing
China while prioritizing values over short-term, narrow interests.
Let me explain further. Graham Allison’s study on the ‘Thucydides Trap’
captured the essence of the challenge posed to the United States by a rising China.
The study revealed that over the past 500 years, in 12 out of 16 cases ‘in which a
rising power has confronted a ruling power’, the result was war. ‘When the parties
avoided war, it required huge, painful adjustments in attitudes and actions on the
part of not just the challenger but also the challenged.’ For Allison,
How not to deal with a rising China
the defining question about global order for this generation is whether China and the
United States can escape Thucydides’ Trap. The Greek historian’s metaphor reminds us of the
attendant dangers when a rising power rivals a ruling power—as Athens challenged Sparta
in ancient Greece, or as Germany did Britain a century ago.8
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Graham T. Allison, ‘The Thucydides Trap: are the US and China headed for war?’, The Atlantic, 24 Sept. 2015,
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/09/united-states-china-war-thucydides-trap/406756/.
For the use of these terms drawn from ornithology, see Graham T. Allison, Albert Carnesale and Joseph S.
Nye, Jr, ‘Hawks, doves and owls: a new perspective on avoiding nuclear war’, International Affairs 61: 4, 1985,
pp. 581–89; Ashton B. Carter and William J. Perry, Preventive defense: a new security strategy for America (Washington DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2000); Michal Onderco and Wolfgang Wagner, ‘Of hawks and doves:
mapping policies toward Iran and North Korea’, Nonproliferation Review 19: 2, 2012, pp. 177–95.
For Johnston, ‘Engagers argue that China is becoming socialized, though mainly in the sphere of economic
norms (e.g., free trade and domestic marketization). Skeptics either conclude that this is not the case, due to
the nature of the regime (for some, China is still Red China; for more sophisticated skeptics, China is flirting
with fascism), or that it could not possibly happen because China as a rising power, by definition, is dissatisfied with the US-dominated global order (a power-transition realpolitik argument).’ Alastair Iain Johnston, ‘Is
China a status quo power?’, International Security 27: 4, 2003, pp. 5–56 at p. 5.
For a deeper understanding of Weber, see Rolf E. Rogers, Max Weber’s ideal type theory (New York: Philosophical Library, 1969).
Johnston, ‘Is China a status quo power?’; Alastair Iain Johnston, ‘How new and assertive is China’s new assertiveness?’, International Security 37: 4, 2013, pp. 7–48; Stefan Halper and Joseph S. Nye, Jr, ‘The China threat
[with reply]’, Foreign Policy, no. 185, 2011, pp. 18–19.
Nye, ‘How not to deal with a rising China’, p. 1647.
See Francis P. Sempa, ‘Is H. R. McMaster the new Mr X?’, The Diplomat, 23 April 2020.
H. R. McMaster, ‘How China sees the world—and how we should see China’, The Atlantic, May 2020, https://
www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/05/mcmaster-china-strategy/609088/.
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While the debate on the dilemmas posed by a rising China predated Allison’s
study, the responses can be slotted along familiar Manichean lines of ‘accommodation’ by doves or ‘containment’ by hawks9—or, for Alastair Iain Johnston,
‘skeptics’ versus ‘engagers’.10 We use this binary typology as old-fashioned
Weberian ‘ideal-types’: subjective mental constructs that may be exaggerated but
are nonetheless useful analytical tools that help us to understand and make sense
of a complex reality.11 We see ‘doves’, arguing mainly in favour of strategies of
accommodation (Nye, Stein, Johnston and others), as excessively optimistic if not
misguided, given not only China’s history of aggression in the second half of the
last century but also its expansionism in recent years.12 Even in this special issue,
Nye argues against a ‘demonization’ of China, describes the Sino-US relationship as ‘cooperative rivalry’ and advocates ‘equal attention’ being paid to both
halves of the description. Nye also approvingly quotes Australia’s former prime
minister Kevin Rudd, who argues that the challenge is to manage the competition
with China rather than experience ‘defeat’ or ‘total victory.’13 Indeed, the former
US National Security Advisor H. R. McMaster, in an unusually incisive essay
(even regarded by some as a contemporary avatar of George Kennan’s 1947 article
in Foreign Affairs, ‘The sources of Soviet conduct’, which was written under the
pseudonym Mr. X),14 viewed an accommodative approach as driven by American
‘strategic narcissism’ and its ‘long-held assumptions’ that greater integration of
China into the world would have a ‘liberalizing effect on the country’, of which
McMaster saw no evidence.15 My case-studies, too, reveal the costs that straightforward engagement or constructive cooperation has produced.
Amitabh Mattoo
the old containment was simple, if not easy. The new containment will have to blend a
variety of policies, carefully coordinated with one another in design and execution. This
will tax the ingenuity and flexibility of the United States and its allies.18
The cases I have selected are not sui generis but representative of a pattern of
Chinese behaviour in the region; indeed, no state in the region has been excluded
from Beijing’s strategy, which is applied to Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and even
the small island state of the Maldives. In suggesting a strategy that combines interests with values I draw from my understanding of dharma, a concept most clearly
articulated by Krishna in the epic depicting the great war, the Mahabharata, in his
dialogue with Arjuna; here dharma combines statecraft rooted in realpolitik with
righteousness.19
Nuclear proliferation: China and Pakistan
The clearest example of China’s regional hegemonic aspirations, as well as its
revisionism, has been its clandestine but well-documented support for Pakistan’s
nuclear programme. This has been in violation of the letter and spirit of the
nuclear non-proliferation regime—despite China being a signatory to the Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1992 and a member of the Nuclear Suppliers
Group since 2004, and having earlier become part of the International Atomic
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Elbridge Colby, ‘Asia goes nuclear’, The National Interest, no. 135, 2015, pp. 28–37; Elbridge Colby and Ely
Ratner, ‘Opening gambit: roiling the waters’, Foreign Policy, no. 204, 2014, pp. 10–13.
McMaster, ‘How China sees the world’. See also his memoir: H. R. McMaster, Battlegrounds: the fight to defend
the free world (New York: Harper, 2020).
Michael Mandelbaum, ‘The new containment: handling Russia, China, and Iran’, Foreign Affairs 2: 12, 2019, p.
6. Mandelbaum’s ‘new’ containment strategy includes three challengers: Russia, Iran and, of course, China.
The concluding section of this article, on positionality, will expand on my views on dharma.
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But those arguing for an entirely interest-based strategy of containment (for
instance, Elbridge Colby’s strategy of denial) may also be wide of the mark, especially when seen from the perspective of China’s neighbours.16 Colby argues from
an American perspective that the United States should primarily sustain an antihegemonic coalition to deny China’s ambitions to dominate Asia, without much
sensitivity to the costs that will be borne by the states in the region—even the countries that China is targeting. My case-studies show that containment—on its own
and based entirely on interests (as divorced from values)—may not have reduced
the risks associated with China, increasing both the incentives for bandwagoning
among smaller states and Beijing’s willingness to punish those who are unwilling to
capitulate to its hegemonic aspirations. Instead, a strategy that involves close cooperation with like-minded allies in the region, and one that will require attention to
shared interests as well as shared values, is possibly a way forward to manage China,
especially if critical norms regarding non-proliferation and human rights are also
to be strengthened. As McMaster points out accurately: ‘China’s overall strategy
relies on co-option and coercion at home and abroad, as well as on concealing the
nature of China’s true intentions.’17 And, as Michael Mandelbaum argues,
How not to deal with a rising China
China’s role in Pakistan’s proliferation
China was among the countries where Pakistani scientists and engineers were
trained under the aegis of Atoms for Peace. While the seeds for nuclear intimacy
between the two nations were sown in the mid-1960s (driven by the Sino-Indian
war of 1962 and Chinese support for Pakistan in the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965),
there is incontrovertible evidence for the direct transfer of nuclear technology
and assistance to enrich uranium from the early 1980s onwards.22 China is also
believed to have provided Pakistan with designs of nuclear weapons and delivery
systems; there is evidence of no other bilateral collaboration on such a scale for
the development of nuclear weapons.23 For instance, China was responsible for
developing Pakistan’s Chashma reactors and M-11 short-range ballistic missiles;
and Chinese assistance was provided for, among other projects, the development
20
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23
Scott Sagan, ‘Why do states build nuclear weapons? Three models in search of a bomb’, International Security
21: 3, 1996–7, pp. 54–86.
Bhumitra Chakma, ‘Road to Chagai: Pakistan’s nuclear programme, its sources and motivations’, Modern
Asian Studies 36: 4, 2002, pp. 873–4. See also: Andrew Small, The China–Pakistan axis: Asia’s new geopolitics
(London: Hurst, 2015). For an early commentary read: P. K. S. Namboodiri, ‘China–Pak nuclear axis?, Strategic Analysis 6: 7, 1982, pp. 407–17. For an empathetic history of Pakistan’s quest for nuclear weapons, see:
Feroz Khan, Eating grass: the making of the Pakistani bomb (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2012).
Chidanand Rajghatta, ‘China gifted 50 kg uranium for two bombs to Pakistan’, Economic Times, 13 Nov. 2009,
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/china-gifted-50-kg-uranium-for-twobombs-to-pakistan/articleshow/5226309.cms?from=mdr; Douglas Waller, ‘The secret missile deal’, Time, 30
June 1997. (Unless otherwise noted at point of citation, all URLs cited in this article were accessible on 25
June 2022.)
G. Parthasarathy, ‘Beware the China–Pakistan nuclear axis’, Hindu Businessline, 9 March 2018, https://www.
thehindubusinessline.com/opinion/beware-the-china-pakistan-nuclear-axis/article22220540.ece1.
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Energy Agency (1984). It is also increasingly clear that this support was built on a
common strategy of ‘containing’ India’s aspirations as well as establishing regional
primacy by securing Pakistan’s subservience. Pakistan’s nuclear capability, rooted
in a civil nuclear energy programme, eventually became the centre of many
‘proliferation’ networks, including those promoted by the nuclear scientist Dr A.
Q. Khan, one of the founders of its nuclear programme. China has been critically
significant in driving Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme and missile delivery
systems, unarguably in violation of its international treaty commitments. The
collaboration continues to the present day, and as China rises and conflicts in the
region intensify, the issue of nuclear proliferation requires renewed attention.
As in the case of all other nuclear weapon states, a combination of factors
explains the rationale behind Pakistan’s quest for nuclear weapons: security calculations, domestic factors and normative reasons such as prestige.20 However, the
strongest motivation has been Pakistan’s need to deter India.21 In pursuing this
goal, it has received unprecedented assistance from China. The Pakistani nuclear
programme essentially began as a civilian nuclear programme following the US
‘Atoms for Peace’ initiative but, in the 1970s (accelerated by defeat in the war of
1971 against India), its quest for nuclear weapons became the programme’s central
feature.
Amitabh Mattoo
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28
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Siddhartha Ramana, China–Pakistan nuclear alliance: an analysis, IPCS Special Report 109, Institute of Peace and
Conflict Studies, Aug. 2011, http://www.ipcs.org/issue_briefs/issue_brief_pdf/SR109.pdf.
Timeline of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), Arms Control Association, n.d., https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Timeline-of-the-Treaty-on-the-Non-Proliferation-of-Nuclear-Weapons-NPT.
Binoda Kumar Mishra, ‘The China factor in south Asian nuclear politics’, in Bhumitra Chakma, ed., The
politics of nuclear weapons in south Asia (Farnham: Ashgate, 2011), p. 103; Jing-dong Yuan, Assessing Chinese nonproliferation policy: progress, problems and issues for the United States, James Martin Centre for Nonproliferation
Studies, 4 Jan. 2002, https://nonproliferation.org/assessing-chinese-nonproliferation-policy-progress-problems-and-issues-for-the-united-states/.
T. V. Paul, ‘Chinese–Pakistani nuclear/missile ties and the balance of power’, Nonproliferation Review 10: 2,
2003, pp. 3–6.
Jeffrey Smith and Joby Warrick, ‘Scientist: China gave Pakistan nuke blueprint’, NBC News, 13 Nov. 2009,
https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna33904300.
S. P. Shahi, Pakistan’s foreign policy (Delhi: Surendra, 2016), pp. 224–5.
Marvin Kalb, The agonizing problem of Pakistan’s nukes, Brookings Institution, 28 Sept. 2021, https://www.
brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2021/09/28/the-agonizing-problem-of-pakistans-nukes/.
Joseph Hincks, ‘Saudi Arabia is investing $20 billion in Pakistan. Here’s what it’s getting in return’, Time, 19
Feb. 2019, https://time.com/5531724/saudi-arabia-pakistan-mbs-imran-khan/.
SIPRI Yearbook 2021: armaments, disarmament and international security: summary (Stockholm: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, 2021), pp. 16–17.
‘China–Pakistan new nuclear deal may push world towards renewed arms race, conflict’, ANI, 18 Sept. 2021,
https://www.aninews.in/news/world/asia/china-pakistan-new-nuclear-deal-may-push-world-towards-renewed-arms-race-conflict20210918062533/.
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of gas centrifuges at Kahuta and the provision of heavy water for the Karachi
Nuclear Power Plant (KANUPP) reactor.24
Even though China acceded to the NPT on 2 March 1992,25 it sustained clandestine support to Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme.26 In later years, while
China committed itself even more fully to the nuclear non-proliferation regime,
it did not stop supporting that programme.27 Moreover, China’s claimed adherence to the guidelines of the missile technology control regime runs counter to its
deep involvement in the development of Pakistan’s missile-based delivery systems.
Chinese assistance provided a channel for further proliferation through Pakistan. There is also evidence to link Dr A. Q. Khan and China;28 through this close
collaboration, a ‘wider proliferation circle’ emerged, including North Korea’s and
Libya’s nuclear programmes.29 There are also reports of Pakistan assisting Saudi
Arabia in its quest for nuclear weapons,30 while Pakistan’s ties with several terrorist groups, including the Taliban, leaves open the possibility of these non-state
actors accessing nuclear technology through their mentors in Pakistan’s military
headquarters at Rawalpindi.31 Recent SIPRI reports provide further evidence of
the increasing dangers of proliferation in the region because of this collaboration.32
The signing by China and Pakistan of the Framework Agreement on Deepening
Nuclear Energy Cooperation on 8 September 2021 reflects continuing convergence
in the nuclear realm, even while China is in the middle of a major modernization of
its arsenal.33 Under the agreement, China will help build four more nuclear plants
in Pakistan and will expand substantially nuclear cooperation with Islamabad.
Pakistan’s nuclear weapons programme is principally motivated by its concerns
over India, making the relationship a a triadic one, involving China, Pakistan and
India. A nuclear Pakistan allows China to complicate India’s nuclear calculations
and doctrinal considerations, as well as to establish its dominance firmly in the
region.
How not to deal with a rising China
Infrastructure investment: China and Sri Lanka
Through its investment in and considerable assistance to the island state of Sri
Lanka, China has dramatically increased its influence and arguably eroded Colombo’s capacity to make independent decisions on key issues of foreign policy. Not
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Khalid Iqbal, ‘Pakistan’s nuclear program: the context’, Policy Perspectives 13: 1, 2016, p. 44; Chakma, ‘Road to
Chagai’, p. 902.
Chakma, ‘Road to Chagai’, p. 882.
Hassan Abbas, Pakistan’s nuclear bomb: a story of defiance, deterrence and deviance (Delhi: Penguin Allen Lane, 2018),
p. 71; Zalmay Khalilzad, ‘Pakistan’, in Jozef Goldblat, ed., Non-proliferation: the why and the wherefore (London:
Routledge, 1985), p. 135.
Chakma, ‘Road to Chagai’, pp. 894–7.
Masood Khalid, Pakistan–China relations in a changing geopolitical environment, ISAS working paper, Institute of
South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore, 30 Nov. 2021, https://www.isas.nus.edu.sg/papers/
pakistan-china-relations-in-a-changing-geopolitical-environment/.
Khalid, Pakistan–China relations in a changing geopolitical environment.
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While closer relations between India and the United States have further
catalysed the Sino-Pakistani relationship, especially after the nuclear deal between
Washington and New Delhi in 2006, the irony is that Pakistan was a close US ally
during much of the Cold War.34 From the 1950s into the early 1970s, Pakistan
was a member of the UK-inspired Central Treaty Organization and the US-led
Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, while at the same time maintaining a close
relationship with Beijing.35
After the Soviet Union’s intervention in Afghanistan in 1979, Pakistan became
a critical US ally. The Reagan administration provided Pakistan with US$3.2
billion in aid as part of its strategy to contain the Soviet Union.36 The Reagan and
Bush administrations also ignored the Solarz and Pressler amendments (Pakistanspecific anti-proliferation legislation), which sought to promote non-proliferation
to ensure Pakistan’s continued support in Afghanistan. The Soviet presence in
Afghanistan bolstered existing Chinese–Pakistani nuclear cooperation and paved
the way for clandestine collaboration in missile systems.37
The roots of Sino-Pakistani relations lie in their mutual security concerns vis-àvis India.38 The two began to build ties in the 1960s, agreeing to a border settlement
treaty in 1963 soon after the Sino-Indian conflict of 1962. Pakistan was crucial in
facilitating US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s visit to China in 1971. Successive governments in both countries have committed to the ‘all-weather’ friendship, which is crucial for them to achieve their national and common regional
goals.39
In recent decades, the balance has tilted in favour of India in US foreign policy
calculations. Simultaneously, bilateral relations between India and Pakistan are
going through a period of great mistrust and volatility. Inclusion and development of the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), show China’s commitment to Pakistan while overlooking India’s
concerns for its security and sovereignty. In addition to this, the Taliban’s coming
to power in Afghanistan provides an incentive for Pakistan to commit itself to
intensifying its proximity to Beijing.
Amitabh Mattoo
only is China the biggest trading partner of Sri Lanka, but the latter has also
emerged as one of China’s most important partners in the BRI.40 Increasing Chinese
investment in key areas in Sri Lanka has led to the widespread claim that Colombo
may have compromised on its sovereignty by undertaking these projects.41
Chinese investment in Sri Lanka’s infrastructure
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42
43
44
45
46
47
European Commission, Countries and regions: Sri Lanka, n.d., https://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/countriesand-regions/countries/sri-lanka/.
US Department of State, ‘A conversation with Ambassador Alice Wells on the China–Pakistan Economic
Corridor’, Wilson Center, Washington DC, 21 Nov. 2019, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/event/conversation-ambassador-alice-wells-the-china-pakistan-economic-corridor; Meera Srinivasan, ‘Sri Lanka opposition, civil society mount legal challenge to Chinese-backed Port City Bill’, The Hindu, 15 April 2021, https://
www.thehindu.com/news/international/challenges-to-china-backed-colombo-port-project-land-in-sc/article34329231.ece. On the larger aspects of China’s international economic diplomacy see: Lina Benabdallah,
‘Contesting the international order by integrating it: the case of China’s Belt and Road Initiative’, Third World
Quarterly 40: 1, 2019, pp. 92–108; Deborah Brautigam, ‘A critical look at Chinese “debt-trap diplomacy”: the
rise of a meme’, Area Development and Policy 5: 1, 2020, pp. 1–14; Deborah Brautigam and Tang Xiaoyang,
‘Economic statecraft in China’s new overseas special economic zones: soft power, business or resource security?’, International Affairs 88: 4, 2012, pp. 799–816; Shaun Breslin, ‘China and the South: objectives, actors and
interactions’, Development and Change 44: 6, 2013, pp. 1273–94.
Nilanthi Samaranayake, ‘Are Sri Lanka’s relations with China deepening? An analysis of economic, military
and diplomatic data’, Asian Security 7: 2, 2011, pp. 119–46.
Umesh Moramudali, ‘The economics of the China–India–Sri Lanka triangle’, The Diplomat, 1 May 2021,
https://thediplomat.com/2021/05/the-economics-of-the-china-india-sri-lanka-triangle.
Bhagya Senaratne, ‘Chinese financing in south Asia: the story of Sri Lanka’, South Asian Voices (Stimson
Center), 21 Jan. 2021.
Ganeshan Wignaraja, Dinusha Panditaratne, Pabasara Kannangara and Divya Hundlani, Chinese investment and
the BRI in Sri Lanka (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, March 2020), p. 5.
Ankit Panda, ‘Sri Lanka formally hands over Hambantota port to Chinese firms on 99-year lease’, The Diplomat, 11 Dec. 2017, https://thediplomat.com/2017/12/sri-lanka-formally-hands-over-hambantota-port-tochinese-firms-on-99-year-lease/; Selina Ho, ‘Infrastructure and Chinese power’, International Affairs 96: 6,
2020, pp. 1461–85.
Gulbin Sultana, ‘“Colombo Port City Economic Commission Act” breeds economic and geostrategic
concerns’, Financial Express, 2 June 2021, https://www.financialexpress.com/world-news/colombo-port-cityeconomic-commission-act-breeds-economic-and-geostrategic-concerns/2263439/.
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For Sri Lanka, until the early 2000s, India was a far more important economic
partner than China.42 It was in the 2010s that China emerged as its most important
investment and trade partner. Between 2010 and 2020, ‘China has been the largest
foreign investor in Sri Lanka’.43
China’s investment in Sri Lanka predates the BRI. However, since the launch
of the BRI in 2013,44 Chinese infrastructure investment in the country has risen
from US$5.4 billion between 2006 to 2012 to US$6.8 billion (2013–19).45
Hambantota port and Colombo Port City are good examples of growing
Chinese encroachment in Sri Lanka. They are viewed as part of a ‘string of pearls’
strategy of encirclement that found takers within the strategic community after
the leasing out of Hambantota port to China.46 In May 2021, Sri Lanka passed a
bill to approve the Colombo Port City project despite protests in the country and
concerns about the bill’s constitutionality.47 Approval of the bill in the face of
such opposition marks another success for China’s creeping development diplomacy in the region. China’s infrastructure investment in Sri Lanka pays immediate
economic dividends while also serving Beijing’s medium- and long-term strategic
How not to deal with a rising China
48
49
50
51
52
53
Shu Zhang and Matthew Miller, ‘Behind China’s Silk Road vision: cheap funds, heavy debt, growing risk’,
Reuters, 15 May 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-silkroad-finance-idUSKCN18B0YS; How
will the Belt and Road Initiative advance China’s interests?, Center for Strategic and International Studies, n.d.,
https://chinapower.csis.org/china-belt-and-road-initiative/.
Wignaraja et al., Chinese investment and the BRI in Sri Lanka, p. 8.
Deep Pal, China’s influence in south Asia: vulnerabilities and resilience in four countries (Washington DC: Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace, Oct. 2021), p. 11.
Shantanu Roy Chaudhury, ‘How China is expanding global influence via debt trap diplomacy’, The Wire, 7
March 2021, https://thewire.in/world/china-debt-trap-diplomacy-south-asia-europe.
Pal, China’s influence in south Asia, p. 6.
Press Trust of India, ‘Sirisena backs Xi’s Maritime Silk Road project’, Business Standard, 7 Feb. 2017, https://www.
business-standard.com/article/pti-stories/sirisena-backs-xi-s-maritime-silk-road-project-117020700853_1.
html.
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goals. China has been proactive in pushing for such development projects in other
regions as well, even before demand emerges from the recipient states. This is
also being witnessed, for instance, in China’s efforts to dominate the forthcoming
5G mobile communications infrastructure. China has provided large amounts of
capital through its financial institutions, such as the China Development Bank and
the Export–Import Bank of China, to enable its state-owned enterprises (SOEs)
to make highly competitive bids against competitors such as Japan.48 This allows
China to expand its export markets and popularize the use of its currency.
However, domestic needs and factors are also crucial drivers of this relationship. For example, the Hambantota project is located in former prime minister
Mahinda Rajapaksa’s constituency, and in an area in an area hit by the 2004
tsunami. Further, Sri Lanka suffers from a marked infrastructure gap,49 and China
has been one of the major sources of finance to fill this gap when other countries
were reluctant owing to Sri Lanka’s human rights record.
Apart from the headline projects, Chinese investment has meant a vast expansion of Sri Lanka’s roads and the expressways, development of its non-renewable
energy sector, and enhanced delivery of public services such as water and sanitation. Relations between the two countries are also built at people-to-people level,
facilitated by growing tourism and the popularity of Buddhist historical sites in
Sri Lanka. A key feature of China’s development assistance in the region has been
the appointment of ambassadors such as Cheng Xueyuan, who came from the
United Front Work Department of the Chinese Communist Party and not the
traditional diplomatic corps.50 This, in effect, creates a direct link between the
higher rungs of leadership of the two countries and takes project operation into
fast-track mode.
‘Debt trap’ may be a reductionist way to encapsulate the relationship between
China and Sri Lanka, as Sri Lanka may have initially used China’s economic diplomacy to fuel its development. However, over the years, its reliance on Chinese
loans has increased.51 There has also been a rapid growth in government-togovernment interactions.52 The Chinese political leadership, as well as the heads
of the SOEs, have built personal relationships with the formerly ruling Rajapaksa
family. Even in the brief interregnum between the Rajapaksa regimes, the Sirisena
government endorsed the BRI and continued the projects, despite having criticized them during the tenure of the preceding government.53
Amitabh Mattoo
Although it is clear that Sri Lanka’s relationship with China has been tightening on the
basis of increased economic, military, and diplomatic interactions, no evidence exists that
Sri Lanka will be obligated to China strategically due to these stronger ties. Sri Lanka has
economic debts to pay China due to infrastructure development loans and weapons used in
its civil war, but there is no proof at this point that these will translate to Chinese strategic
sway over major Sri Lankan foreign policy decisions such as band wagoning with China
against India and the United States.58
Nevertheless, while the economic relations between China and Sri Lanka are
the primary concern for this article, these relations are built on a strong political
partnership. China was the main weapons supplier to the Sri Lankan government, and this helped the Rajapaksas end the civil war. Further, China has been
a constant supporter of Sri Lanka at the UN, and has blocked several attempts to
investigate the Sri Lankan government’s alleged human rights violations during
the civil war.
In 2017, Sri Lanka’s inability to service its debt forced it to lease out Hambantota
to a Chinese company. Since 2019, China has risen to become Sri Lanka’s biggest
bilateral lender, to the point where it owns roughly 10 per cent of all external
loans taken out by Colombo. Initially, most loans were targeted for infrastruc54
55
56
57
58
N. P. R. Deyshappriya, A. A. K. A. Damanupola and M. M. T. D. M. Kumari, ‘Sri Lanka–China tourism
relations: an analysis of recent trends in Chinese tourist arrivals to Sri Lanka’, Sri Lanka Journal of Advanced
Social Studies 9: 1, 2019, p. 56.
Ananth Krishnan, ‘China backs Sri Lanka on UNHRC resolution’, The Hindu, 22 March 2012, https://www.
thehindu.com/news/international/china-backs-sri-lanka-on-unhrc-resolution/article3088478.ece.
Pal, China’s influence in south Asia, p. 21.
Srinivasan, ‘Sri Lanka opposition, civil society mount legal challenge to Chinese-backed Port City Bill’.
Samaranayake, ‘Are Sri Lanka’s relations with China deepening?’, p. 139.
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China has used a variety of instruments to increase its influence in Sri Lanka,
even during the civil war within the country. In 2002, when the tourism industry
was struggling, China endorsed Sri Lanka as an official tourist destination. Today,
China is one of the largest sources of tourists to Sri Lanka.54 China has defended
Sri Lanka against charges of human rights abuses that have attracted widespread
international attention as well as indictment by independent agencies.55 The two
states often stand with each other, in multilateral forums, on sensitive domestic
issues including those related to Taiwan, Tamil separatism and the Uyghurs.56 The
lack of a strong civil society and robust state institutions in Sri Lanka has meant
that even popular discontent has failed to restrain the progress of the projects
endorsed and funded by Beijing.57 Moreover, China’s influence has increased
dramatically while India’s involvement has waned; historically, New Delhi had
been the most important external player in the country.
In Sri Lanka, as in a few other states of south Asia, China has shown an ability
to make great inroads by exploiting weak state institutions, building relationships beyond governments, and demonstrating remarkable consistency when
other powers may have been fickle in their policies. However, there are voices
that warn against an over-reading of Chinese influence. According to Nilanthi
Samaranayake:
How not to deal with a rising China
Diplomatic sources in Colombo say Beijing is advising Sri Lanka against turning to the
IMF and offering bilateral financial support of its own. China’s penetration of the Sri
Lankan elite has been deep, and Beijing’s influence on the Rajapaksa government persists.
But as the economic crisis deepens and political shifts continue in Sri Lanka, New Delhi
and Washington will hope Colombo’s shift away from Beijing will accelerate.61
Robayt Khondoker and Rashed Uz Zaman believe that Sri Lanka has made use
of ‘positive hedging’ while dealing with China by employing ‘active engagement
and accommodation’.62 Hedging is a go-to option for Asian states where there is
uncertainty about power transition, the influence of actors beyond China and the
United States, and the existence of complex networks.63 A consequence of the
‘debt trap’ diplomacy has been the renewed interest in Sri Lanka on the part of
countries such as Japan and the United States. The Sri Lankan government may
be able to use the fear of Washington and other like-minded capitals to attract
investment.
Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s 2019 election manifesto projected a ‘friendly’ and
‘non-aligned’ foreign policy.64 Moreover, it specifically mentioned ‘working
closely with India’ and ensuring ‘that ownership of strategic assets’ is not transferred to a foreign country. China, on the other hand, is mentioned in a list of
59
60
61
62
63
64
Moramudali, ‘The economics of the China–India–Sri Lanka triangle’.
Dushni Weerakoon, Utsav Kumar and Roselle Dime, Sri Lanka’s macroeconomic challenges: a tale of two deficits,
Asian Development Bank South Asia working paper no. 63, March 2019, https://www.adb.org/sites/default/
files/publication/493451/swp-063-sri-lanka-macroeconomic-challenges-two-deficits.pdf.
C. Raja Mohan, ‘Across south Asia, US and India push back against China’, Foreign Policy, 6 April 2022, https://
foreignpolicy.com/2022/04/06/us-india-china-sri-lanka-south-asia-geopolitics/#.
Robayt Khondoker and Rashed Uz Zaman, ‘Coping with rising China: responses of the small states of south
Asia’, in Rajiv Ranjan and Guo Changgang, eds, China and south Asia: changing regional dynamics, development
and power play (New Delhi: Routledge, 2022), p. 64.
Van Jackson, ‘Power, trust, and network complexity: three logics of hedging in Asian security’, International
Relations of the Asia–Pacific 14: 3, 2014, pp. 331–56.
Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Vistas of prosperity and splendour, 2019, p. 15.
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ture projects, but of late Sri Lanka has depended on Chinese loans for budgetary
support and to manage its balance of payments.59 Between 2018 and 2022, Sri
Lanka has signed multiple currency swaps and foreign currency term financing
facilities with China. These instruments have provided China with great leverage
over Sri Lanka.
The 2022 economic crisis in Sri Lanka warrants attention. As a result of political
and economic mismanagement, Sri Lanka suffers from a ‘twin deficit’ problem.60
Its domestic expenditure far exceeds its national income, and the state suffers
from a stark current account deficit as well. The shortage of foreign currency
and maturing international debt have rendered the economy dysfunctional. This
crisis has also revealed that though Sri Lanka owes a significant amount to China
in the form of high-interest loans, its current state is primarily the result of a lack
of prudence in macroeconomics. Since 2020, as the pandemic has wiped out entire
economic sectors in Sri Lanka, the country has looked for assistance from states
such as India before China. It is, in effect, trying to reduce its economic reliance
on China. As Raja Mohan points out:
Amitabh Mattoo
developed countries whose standing in commerce and trade must be acknowledged. There is a clear attempt to diversify relations. Rajapaksa’s first diplomatic
meeting after his election victory was with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Sri Lankan foreign policy seems to be on the track of attracting interest but
avoiding entanglements. It has used China’s rise and eagerness to invest in its
development; however, it will avoid limiting its options and increasing interaction with India and the US attests to its attempts at striking a balance.
The way China has escalated its border conflict with India over the past few years
illustrates the extent to which Beijing is willing to punish regional players that
are unwilling to accept its dominance and hegemony, or that seek to counter
its growing power and influence within and outside the region. Beijing’s new
aggressiveness has coincided with the strengthening of India’s ties with the United
States, particularly after the nuclear deal of 2006.65 India shares its second longest
border with China, and this is still contested. The border has been a source of
tension between the two countries since the 1962 Sino-Indian war, despite the
confidence-building measures initiated over the past three decades and China’s
becoming one of India’s largest trading partners.
Over the past decade, it has become obvious to key Indian decision-makers
and negotiators that the hope that a web of rules-based arrangements would
compel China into accepting the status quo and gradually produce an institutionalized commitment to a liberal order, domestically as well as internationally,
has proven to be a chimera. It has also become clear that a privileging of Chinese
strategic culture by some west and south Asian Sinologists, based on a Confucian–Mencian paradigm rather than a much more aggressive parabellum Chinese
strategic culture, represented at the very least an underestimation of the challenge
posed by Chinese revisionism.66
On the contrary, Indian negotiators believe that Chinese decision-makers
have internalized what Johnston describes as a ‘parabellum strategic culture so
that Chinese strategic behaviour exhibits a preference for offensive uses of force,
mediated by a keen sensitivity to relative capabilities’. Here the external environment is viewed ‘as dangerous, adversaries as dispositionally threatening, and
conflict as zero sum, in which the application of violence is ultimately required
to deal with threats’.67
65
66
67
Frank O’Donnell and Mihaela Papa, ‘India’s multi-alignment management and the Russia–India–China (RIC)
triangle’, International Affairs 97: 3, 2021, pp. 801–22; Sidra Hamidi, ‘Constructing nuclear responsibility in
US–India relations’, International Affairs 98: 2, 2022, pp. 707–25.
See section on positionality at the end of this article.
Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural realism: strategic culture and grand strategy in Chinese history (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1995) p. 155; also Alastair Iain Johnston, ‘Cultural realism and strategy in Maoist China’, in
Peter J. Katzenstein, ed., The culture of national security: norms and identity in world politics (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1996), pp. 216–68; Alastair Iain Johnston, ‘China’s militarized interstate dispute behaviour
1949–92: a first cut at the data’, China Quarterly, vol. 153, 1998, pp. 1–30.
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Border conflict: China and India
How not to deal with a rising China
History of the border conflict
The Sino-Indian border conflict is rooted in the colonial past. In 1913, the British
convened a meeting in Shimla at which representatives from China, British India
and Tibet came together to settle the borders. The agreement following the convention was signed in 1914.69 The 3,488-kilometre Sino-Indian border was divided into
three sections. The Johnson line defines the western sector and marks the boundary
between Ladakh and China. The middle sector is the relatively stable part of the
border, the only part for which India and China have exchanged maps and have a
broad agreement.70 The McMohan line delineates the eastern sector between India’s
Arunachal Pradesh and China. The western and eastern sectors have been constant
points of conflict between the two states. China claims parts of Indian territory in
both sectors as its own, and has rejected both the Shimla Accord and the McMohan
line.71 In the late 1950s, China also began construction of roads through Aksai Chin
(Indian territory according to the Johnson line) to link Tibet with Xinjiang. Diplo68
69
70
71
Nirupama Rao, The fractured Himalaya: India Tibet China 1949–62 (Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2021); Shivshankar
Menon, India and Asian geopolitics: the past, present (Delhi: Penguin Allen Lane, 2021); Vijay Gokhale, The long
game: how the Chinese negotiate with India (Delhi: Penguin, 2021); Vijay Gokhale, Tiananmen Square: the making
of a protest—a diplomat looks back (Delhi: HarperCollins India, 2021); Ananth Krishnan, India’s China challenge:
a journey through China’s rise and what it means for India (Delhi: HarperCollins India, 2020); Shyam Saran, How
India sees the world: Kautilya to the 21st century (Delhi: Juggernaut, 2017).
R. S. Kalha, The McMohan Line: a hundred years on, Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, 3 July 2014, https://www.idsa.in/idsacomments/TheMcMahonLine_rskalha_030714. For the history of
the Johnson line, see Mohan Guruswamy, ‘India–China border: learning from history’, Economic and Political
Weekly 38: 39, 2003, pp. 4101–3. See also A. S. Bhasin, Nehru, Tibet and China (New Delhi: Penguin, 2021); A.
G. Noorani, India–China boundary problem, 1846–1947 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2012); and Manoj
Joshi, Understanding the India–China border: the enduring threat of war in High Himalaya (London: Hurst, 2022).
Sushant Singh, ‘Line of Actual Control (LAC): where it is located, and where India and China differ’, Indian
Express, 1 June 2020, https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/line-of-actual-control-where-it-is-locatedand-where-india-and-china-differ-6436436/.
Rao, The fractured Himalaya, pp. 474–83.
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This hard-line approach was particularly clear in the negotiations over the
disputed border between India and China, where Beijing’s apparent unwillingness to arrive at a pragmatic settlement also revealed a grander design to box India
into south Asia, and to limit its influence within and outside its neighbourhood.
Similarly, the deep connection between China and Pakistan over the latter’s nuclear
programme was driven by a common hostility towards India and its extraregional
aspirations, as well as by Islamabad’s historical disappointment in the inconsistency of US policies towards the region. Recent writings by key Indians involved
in negotiations with China provide further evidence for the complex and often
inscrutable Chinese policies towards India.68 Most importantly, it is evident that
China is seeking primacy in the region and is willing to deploy a range of instruments to establish its regional dominance, including the promotion of a range of
incentives to smaller states to promote bandwagoning. In sum, China has been
limiting India’s abilities to balance while encouraging Sri Lanka and Pakistan to
bandwagon. In doing so, China has demonstrated remarkable strategic patience
while incrementally, slowly but surely, making inroads into the region.
Amitabh Mattoo
Recent escalations
Narendra Modi’s government came into power with the promise of improving
relations with China. The informal Wuhan summit of 2018 was widely viewed
as a potential turning-point in the relationship between the two countries. At
their second informal summit, near Chennai in 2019, the leaders agreed to not let
‘differences on any issue to become disputes’.75 However, the goodwill generated
by the ‘Wuhan Spirit’ and ‘Chennai Connect’ has now receded into history.
The first major confrontation had emerged before these informal summits, in
Doklam in 2017. Doklam lies at a trijunction between India, China and Bhutan;
Bhutan’s relationship with India has traditionally been deep and close.76 In June
2017, China started construction on a road near Doka La pass in the Doklam
region, which falls inside Bhutanese territory. India supports Bhutan’s claims on
the territory, while China claims that Doklam is part of Tibet. Moreover, Chinese
presence in the region threatens India’s Siliguri corridor, often described as the
‘chicken neck’.77 For decades, the tensions in this area had been managed through
diplomatic channels. Therefore, India (under Operation Juniper) responded on
18 June 2017 to prevent any new construction.78 Both India and China published
historical reports to buttress their claims over the disputed territory.79 On 28
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
Ivan Lidarev, ‘History’s hostage: China, India and the war of 1962’, The Diplomat, 21 Aug. 2012, https://
thediplomat.com/2012/08/historys-hostage-china-india-and-the-war-of-1962/; see also Srinath Raghavan,
‘Sino-Indian boundary dispute, 1948–60: a reappraisal’, Economic and Political Weekly 41: 36, 2006, pp. 3882–92.
GPD, ‘India–China border: a new possibility’, Economic and Political Weekly 23: 18, 1988, p. 877. The wellknown China expert Govind Purshottam Deshpande wrote a regular column in the Economic and Political
Weekly using the acronym GPD.
Mihir Bhonsale, Understanding Sino-Indian border issues: an analysis of events reported in Indian media, occasional
papers no. 143 (ORF, 2018), pp. 5–12.
Government of India, Ministry of External Affairs, ‘2nd India–China informal summit’, 12 Oct. 2019, https://
www.mea.gov.in/press-releases.htm?dtl/31938/2nd_IndiaChina_Informal_Summit.
Sarina Theysand Katharina Rietig, ‘The influence of small states: how Bhutan succeeds in influencing global
sustainability governance’, International Affairs 96: 6, 2020, pp. 1603–22.
Josy Joseph, ‘What is the Doklam issue all about?’, The Hindu, 27 Jan. 2018, https://www.thehindu.com/news/
national/what-is-the-doklam-issue-all-about/article22536937.ece.
Snehesh Alex Philip, ‘Operation Juniper—inside story of how Indian Army pushed China back from Doklam’,
The Print, 17 Oct. 2019, https://theprint.in/defence/operation-juniper-indian-armys-human-wall-chinadoklam/307332/.
Sutirtho Patranobis, ‘Letters show Nehru didn’t endorse British-era treaty with China on Sikkim border’,
Hindustan Times, 4 July 2017, https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/nehru-s-1959-letters-provechina-s-bluff-on-india-s-acceptance-of-sikkim-border/story-3pcPZxmYlHdilnxXSWr0yH.html.
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matic channels and high-level visits, including those of Premier Zhou Enlai to
India, failed to settle the border conflict. This eventually led to a brief war in 1962,
in the course of which China annexed Aksai Chin.72
The war of 1962 led to a breakdown of relations between the two countries that
lasted for over two decades. In the 1980s, India and China—even though failing
to demarcate the border—began negotiations on mutually agreeable principles.73
However, even during the years of relative calm, there were at least 30 reported
incidents of Chinese incursions into Indian territory between 2003 and 2014.74
Since 2014, the border conflict has taken centre stage with the conflict at its most
intense since the 1962 war.
How not to deal with a rising China
80
81
82
83
84
85
Ashok Sajjanhar, The Doklam crisis ends: a diplomatic victory for India, Observer Research Foundation, 30 Aug.
2017,
https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/the-doklam-crisis-ends-a-diplomatic-victory-for-india/;
Pragya Pandey, ‘2017 BRICS summit: post-Doklam, India, China meet in Xiamen’, The Diplomat, 7 Sept.
2017, https://thediplomat.com/2017/09/2017-brics-summit-post-doklam-india-china-meet-in-xiamen/.
The Line of Actual Control is a notional line that separates Chinese-controlled territory from Indiancontrolled territory on the disputed Sino-Indian border.
M. Taylor Fravel, ‘Why are China and India skirmishing at their border? Here’s 4 things to know’, Washington
Post, 2 June 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/06/02/why-are-china-india-skirmishingtheir-border-heres-4-things-know/.
‘Full text: PM Modi’s address to Indian armed forces in Leh’, Indian Express, 5 July 2020, https://indianexpress.com/article/india/narendra-modi-speech-india-china-border-dispute-galwan-pangong-tso-ladakh-lehnimu/.
‘Galwan Valley: a year after the violent clash’, Indian Express, 14 June 2021, https://indianexpress.com/article/
india/galwan-valley-clash-timeline-india-china-disengagement-7358554/.
‘Explained: why China rakes up Arunachal Pradesh time and again’, Times of India, 14 Oct. 2021, https://
timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/explained-why-china-rakes-up-arunachal-pradesh-time-and-again/articleshow/87023193.cms.
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August 2017, after weeks of diplomatic negotiations, India and China mutually
agreed to disengage; troops were demobilized and returned to their original posts.
A week later, Prime Minister Modi and President Xi Jinping held lengthy bilateral
discussions on the sidelines of the BRICS summit held in Xiamen, China. At that
point, while there were doubts over the sincerity and longevity of de-escalation,
both states were able to save face.80
On 15 June 2020, at the height of the COVID–19 pandemic, India and China
clashed—in an almost medieval fashion, with clubs and rocks—in the Galwan
valley in the western sector, with the loss of several military personnel on both
sides. The stand-off had begun in May, with China mobilizing troops near the
Galwan valley and Pangong Tso lake. This was apparently a reaction to India’s
road construction near the Line of Actual Control81 but clearly a new Chinese
assertiveness was on display.82 In fact, a scuffle had broken out at Naku La in
Sikkim in early May, leading to the first violent confrontation between the two
nations since 1975. Since then, a series of diplomatic and military talks have taken
place with a view to mutual disengagement in this sector, but Chinese intransigence has prevented any chances of a breakthrough. However, on the domestic
front, national passions have been stoked, and relations at a popular level have
plummeted to a new nadir.83 The Indian government also imposed a ban on a
number of Chinese web-based applications, including the video-sharing platform
TikTok.
Military and diplomatic efforts have brought about a gradual easing of tensions.
Indian and Chinese troops began synchronized disengagement from the northern
and southern shores of Pangong Tso in February 2021.84 The situation has not
reverted to the pre-clash status quo, however, and is unlikely to do so.
The Chinese and Indian governments have been very sensitive over the issue of
Arunachal Pradesh in the eastern sector. China lays claim to the entire Indian state
of Arunachal Pradesh, with a primary interest in Tawang district that is directly
rooted in China’s revisionism over the Shimla Accord and the McMohan line.85
Control over this district would provide China with access to India’s north-eastern
states, which are currently buffered by Arunachal Pradesh. Further, Tawang hosts
the world’s second largest Tibetan Buddhist monastery, the Tawang Ganden
Amitabh Mattoo
Namgyal Lhatse. The Dalai Lama, after escaping from Tibet through Tawang,
spent time in this monastery in 1959. China has constantly opposed visits of highranking dignitaries, most prominently the Dalai Lama, to Arunachal Pradesh.86 In
contrast to Ladakh, where its strategy may be aimed at acquiring small, uninhabited territories, in Arunachal China has been building villages.87
India’s response and future trajectories
The future of the region vis-à-vis China
The selection of these three case-studies reflects the multilayered nature and effects
of China’s rise in the region; but they are not atypical of Beijing’s behaviour.
The three actors chosen—Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India—have different kinds of
relations with China. Pakistan has historically been an ally even while maintaining
close ties with the United States, especially during the Cold War. India has sought
to maintain its strategic autonomy and prefers to avoid any alliance commitments.
Sri Lanka, on the other hand, owing to its history of civil war and human rights
abuse, has found itself isolated from a large part of the world. The contexts, the
86
87
88
89
90
91
‘Dalai Lama’s Arunachal Pradesh visit negatively impacts border dispute, says China’, Economic Times, 12 July
2018, https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/defence/dalai-lamas-arunachal-pradesh-visit-negativelyimpacts-border-dispute-says-china/articleshow/58144382.cms.
Vishnu Som, ‘China has built village in Arunachal, show satellite images’, NDTV, 18 Jan. 2021, https://
www.ndtv.com/india-news/china-has-built-village-in-arunachal-pradesh-show-satellite-images-exclusive-2354154.
Dan Altman, ‘What the history of modern conquest tells us about China and India’s border crisis’, War on
the Rocks, 9 July 2020, https://warontherocks.com/2020/07/what-the-history-of-modern-conquest-tells-usabout-china-and-indias-border-crisis/; for the strategy of fait accompli, see also Dan Altman, ‘By fait accompli,
not coercion: how states wrest territory from their adversaries’, International Studies Quarterly 61: 4, 2017, pp.
881–91.
Rory Medcalf and C. Raja Mohan, Responding to Indo-Pacific rivalry: Australia, India and middle power coalitions
(Sydney: Lowy Institute for International Policy, Aug. 2014), pp. 15–17.
See: https://www.state.gov/blue-dot-network-vision-statement/.
‘India approved as observer of Indian Ocean Commission’, The Wire, 6 March 2020, https://thewire.in/diplomacy/india-approved-as-observer-of-indian-ocean-commission.
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As has been suggested, the killing of soldiers and capturing of small chunks of
territory is viewed as a very contemporary Chinese form of conquest—a strategy
of fait accompli—implying that China will annex small territories at little cost and
without provoking India to the extent that it may want to escalate the situation
into a fully fledged war.88 How should India respond?
India is certainly seeking to diversify and deepen its engagement with likeminded countries both within and beyond the Indo-Pacific region.89 While India,
Australia, Japan and the United States have strengthened their involvement in the
Quad and the Blue Dot network (which aims to provide quality infrastructure
development projects that are, inter alia, open and inclusive, transparent, economically viable and aligned with the Paris agreement90), India and France are also
enhancing their maritime cooperation through platforms such as the Indian Ocean
Commission.91
How not to deal with a rising China
experiences of these states and their agency cannot be ignored in seeking to understand the response to China within the region.
A major constraint in framing a common regional response to the rise of China
is the institutionally fragmented nature of the south Asian region. The South
Asian Association for Regional Cooperation has been rendered dysfunctional by
the rivalry between India and Pakistan.92
Escalatory behaviour of China
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
Rajeesh Kumar, South Asian ‘zombie’: the futility of reviving SAARC, Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses
issue brief, 1 May 2018, https://idsa.in/system/files/issuebrief/ib-the-futility-of-reviving-saarc-rkumar-010518.
pdf.
Doshi, The long game, p. 4.
Doshi, The long game, pp. 159–60.
Doshi, The long game, p. 161.
Doshi, The long game, p. 236.
Mahendra P. Lama, ‘China’s Trishula approach in south Asia’, in Ranjan and Guo, eds, p. 53.
Liza Tobin, ‘Xi’s vision for transforming global governance: a strategic challenge for Washington and its allies’,
Texas National Security Review 2: 1, 2018, pp. 154–66.
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Rush Doshi defines the period 2008–16 as that of China’s ‘second strategy of
displacement’.93 During these years, China began blunting US influence in its
region and establishing its own hegemony. He emphasizes that Chinese grand
strategy has been based on the ‘international balance of power’, a balance that
was shifting as a result of the 2008 global financial crisis.94 This shift is reflected
in China’s changing pattern of military spending—from sea denial capabilities
to sea control and amphibious capabilities. In economic terms, China launched
‘offensive economic statecraft that would allow China to build its own coercive
and consensual economic capacities over others’, along with a political strategy to
develop its own alternative institutions.95 The BRI and the Asian Infrastructure
Investment Bank spearhead this policy shift. China’s infrastructure investments
and economic diplomacy are motivated not by purely economic interests but with
the aim of developing ‘economic leverage’, which could alter interdependence
patterns among states, influence their internal politics and shape the framework
of global economic activities.96 Similarly, Mahendra Lama describes China’s
approach in south Asia as a ‘forward policy’ led by a three-pronged approach based
on ‘making local entry through strategic entry points, engaging the neighbouring
country nationally in core economic and other sectors, and partnering regionally
with regional organizations’.97
President Xi Jinping’s focus on ‘national rejuvenation’ and a ‘community of
common destiny’ in his recent addresses hint at an assertive China,98 which seeks to
alter the current paradigm of international politics, beginning from its periphery.
There are also concerns that, as China grows in power, its principle of the One
China policy will expand to the point where ‘disputed’ territories are aggressively claimed. The recent and regular skirmishes between India and China,
beginning with the 2017 Doklam crisis, reflect this changing reality. While both
countries have put in place several mechanisms to negotiate and discuss border
Amitabh Mattoo
issues, including a range of confidence-building measures, the settlements near
Arunachal Pradesh, the stand-off at Doklam and the confrontation in Galwan
valley all bear testimony to a change in tactics by China.
Conclusion
Reflections and positionality
The nature of the Chinese threat
My views on China have been shaped, over time, by academia but more so by my
involvement in various decision-making and advisory bodies of the government
of India and of state governments. Until India’s 1998 nuclear tests and China’s
ferocious response, I shared the dominant view (within both the academic and
the policy community) that was in favour of an integrationist/accommodationist
approach to China. The Sino-Indian model of conflict resolution (keeping contentious bilateral issues, especially those related to the border, on the back burner,
while normalizing and improving relations in other areas) seemed to provide a
template even for relations between India and Pakistan. The 1998 nuclear tests (by
India, and then by Pakistan) represented a distinct rupture in the thinking of the
policy elite as well as in my own ideas; there was a growing realization that China
wanted to box India into south Asia, and its clandestine support for Pakistan’s
nuclear programme, for instance, was largely a function of this policy. Yet there
was still a lack of clarity on how India should respond to China, especially since
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As the consequences of China’s rise are debated within academia and the policy
community, south Asia provides a precursor for what may be witnessed within
the international system. Our three cases suggest the following. China is not just
firmly establishing its imprimatur in the region, but is also seeking dominance
through a variety of instruments and the demonstration of remarkable strategic
patience and clarity. Through extraordinary policies (including those on
non-proliferation, human rights and development assistance) it has encouraged
Pakistan and Sri Lanka to bandwagon while seeking to punish India’s attempts
to balance Beijing’s influence in the region. China is increasingly unwilling to
tolerate a regional challenger, especially one that has extraregional aspirations
or is establishing a close relationship with its global rival—the United States.
China will become increasingly more assertive and belligerent as India remains
reluctant to accept Chinese dominance or acquiesce in its systematic violation
of important international norms. A strategy that seeks to bolster a democratic
India, militarily and diplomatically, may offer the chance of preserving stability
and strengthening international norms in south Asia and beyond. There is also a
need to provide an alternative to Chinese assistance and—learning from them—to
engage with consistency. More importantly, developing a coherent response to
China demands strategic patience and commitment even while Beijing continues
to test the patience of the region and beyond.
How not to deal with a rising China
When in 1969 I joined the St Stephen’s College (Delhi), to my surprise, I found the very
people from whom we had escaped a decade ago right next door. In fact my college proved
to be the centre of the Naxalite activities. They used the same jargon, had the same convictions, and they held identical views to the Chinese communists. One of their popular
slogans was: ‘China’s way is our way; and China’s Chairman Mao our Chairman.’101
While revelations about the excesses of the Cultural Revolution and the events
at Tiananmen Square had done much to erode this image, it continued to find
takers within sections of opinion within the Indian left. Of note was China’s
ability to take hard internal decisions as well as to face up to pressure from the
West, which had been applauded by sections across virtually the whole spectrum
of public opinion in India from the extreme left to the extreme right. Why can we
not do a Tibet in Kashmir? Would China have capitulated before the hijackers in
99
Kanti Bajpai and Amitabh Mattoo, eds, The peacock and the dragon: India–China relations in the 21st century (Delhi:
Har Anand, 2000).
100
Literally translated from Hindi: Indians and Chinese are brothers.
101
See Dawa Norbu, Tibet: the road ahead (New Delhi: HarperCollins India, 1997), pp. xii–xiii.
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relations with the United States too had reached a nadir in the immediate period
after the nuclear tests.
The complex web of emotions, ideas and policies towards China was in
evidence again in the very first days of the twenty-first century. On 4 January
2000, the arrival of the 14-year-old Ugyen Thinley Dorje, the 17th Karmapa of the
Kagyupa sect of Tibetan Buddhism, from his monastery in Tsurphu near Lhasa in
Tibet to the capital-in-exile of the Dalai Lama at Mcleodganj, brought to the fore
many of the mixed feelings that have traditionally defined India’s attitude towards
China: suspicion, empathy, shock, solidarity, rivalry, friendship, curiosity, fear,
anger, awe, admiration, contempt and, above all, bewilderment.
In 2000, I co-edited a volume that brought together different Indian perspectives
on China.99 In the opening essay that I wrote on ‘Imagining China’, I described
four distinct views of India’s eastern neighbour. First was the view of China as an
ancient friend and modern ally: Hindi-Chinee Bhai-Bhai.100 The view of India and
China as two ancient civilizations, with strong past links, in partnership together
in the modern world, was essentially a normative, idealized view, rooted in the
desire to see India and China emerge as strong allies in the contemporary international system. Understandably, therefore, this image of China often exaggerated
both the historical links as well as the space for contemporary cooperation. In this
sense, some critics found this image distinctly outdated at the beginning of the
twenty-first century.
Second, closely related to the image of China as both an ancient friend and a
contemporary ally, was the view of China as a role model. There were aspects of
this image that merited attention. One was the image of China as the near-ideal
communist state and society. This image of China, although much eroded, had
inspired a whole generation of communists as well as activists of the Naxalite
movement and even middle-class radicals in Delhi colleges. As the Tibetan scholar
Dawa Norbu recollects:
Amitabh Mattoo
Indian thought and the importance of dharma
For me, long-term stability in the international system is dependent on ensuring
respect for and commitment to shared norms, including democracy, respect for
human rights, and strengthening of the nuclear non-proliferation regime. In this
sense, my views during the past two decades may be described as ‘modified’ realist.
The importance of both interests and values to ensure stability in the international
system was catalysed by my readings of Indian thinking on international relations,
particularly the Mahabharata.103
In 1991, close to his death, Bimal Krishna Matilal, the Spalding Professor of
Eastern Religions and Ethics at All Souls College, Oxford, wrote one of his final
pieces: a brilliant polemical essay entitled ‘Krsna: in defence of a devious divinity’.
The article challenged the western view of the apparently less-than-godly conduct
of Krishna before and during the war in Mahabharata on the battlefield of Kuruk102
The Task Force was chaired by K. Subhramanyam and included the following members: M. S. Ananth, Tarun
Das, Amitabh Mattoo, R. K. Pachauri, Vinod Patney, P. Rama Rao, Arvind Virmani and Uday Bhaskar
(Member Secretary). It presented its report to the prime minister in June 2006. The report is still classified and
not in the public domain.
103
For an easy English read, see John D. Smith, The Mahabharata (New Delhi: Penguin Classics, pb 2009).
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Kandahar? Would China have signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty under
pressure? These were only some of the questions that were being rhetorically
posed in public debates in India. Furthermore, China’s emergence as a significant
economic and military power, and the manner in which it has been able to reform
its economy without compromising on its security posture, was also viewed with
awe and admiration.
The third image was one of China as an unpredictable adversary and dangerous
rival. By 2000, China was consistently identified as the most likely source of insecurity to India, and the greatest potential threat to Indian interests in the mediumterm and long-term future, in any survey of opinion among the strategic elite in
the country. Fourth and finally was the view of China as inscrutable and mysterious. The image of the unfathomable Chinese was also one which struck a chord
within most sections of public opinion. The positive image in this context was
that of exotica, of fine silks and beautiful princesses in secret gardens. The negative
image, at its most extreme, was a monochromatic one of teeming millions in Mao
jackets deeply involved in hatching dangerous conspiracies.
This growing dominance of the view of China as a dangerous rival and
unpredictable adversary was reinforced by my tenure on the advisory board of
India’s National Security Council from 2001 to 2003. I was tasked, along with my
colleagues, with preparing an annual review of India’s national security challenges,
and provided with access to papers and confidential briefings, including those on
the neighbourhood. By 2006, when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh set up the
Task Force on Global Strategic Developments,102 it was clear that seeking a modus
vivendi with the United States was critical to help counter the threat from China,
which was India’s principal long-term strategic challenger.
How not to deal with a rising China
shetra.104 In 2012, inspired, in part, by Matilal, and by the compendium of essays
on the Mahabharata edited by Arvind Sharma of McGill University, I wrote—
rather pretentiously:
If all the books on war and peace were to suddenly disappear from the world, and only the
Mahabharata remained, it would be good enough to capture almost all the possible debates
on order, justice, force and the moral dilemmas associated with choices that are made on
these issues within the realm of international politics.105
104
Bimal K. Matilal, ‘Krsna: in defence of a devious divinity’, Ethics and epics: philosophy, culture and religion (Delhi:
Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 90–108. Originally published in Arvind Sharma, ed., Essays on the Mahabhartha (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1991), pp. 401–18.
105
Amitabh Mattoo, ‘An Indian grammar for international studies’ The Hindu, 11 Dec. 2012.
106
See George Tanham’s essay in Kanti P. Bajpai and Amitabh Mattoo, eds, Securing India: strategic thought and
practice (New Delhi: Manohar, 1996).
107
Fortunately, we also now have the benefit of S. Jaishankar’s book, The India way: strategies for an uncertain world
(Delhi: HarperCollins India, 2020), which recognizes the importance of the Mahabharata in a deeply perceptive chapter, ‘Krishna’s choice: the strategic culture of a rising power’. Earlier, we had the inspiring account of
Amrita Narlikar and Aruna Narlikar, Bargaining with a rising India: lessons from the Mahabharata (Delhi: Oxford
University Press, 2014).
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My article, along with other writings, was an attempt at confronting a major
western critique of India; a Eurocentric belief that India and Indians had only
episodically written about strategic issues, and that there was no real culture of
strategic thinking in India. The vice-president of the RAND Corporation (a US
think tank), George K. Tanham, had put this starkly in his 1992 article, ‘Indian
strategic thought: an interpretative essay’ (commissioned by the US UnderSecretary for Defense), in which he argued that the Indian elite had not thought
systematically or coherently about national security. Since then, many scholars
have reviewed different traditions of strategic thinking in India: from Asoka’s
post-Kalinga idealism to the more predictive hard-headed realism of Kautilya, to
the more critical traditions of thinking about war and peace.106
Today, as India confronts some of its biggest strategic challenges, there are
insights that the Mahabharata offers us, including from the immortal dialogue
between Krishna and Arjuna.107 For Matilal’s western critics, ‘[Krishna] is a riddle,
a paradox. If anything, he appears to be a devious diplomat’, an enigma. In reality,
Krishna (even in his mortal form) is the ultimate strategic visionary, a political
genius, who believes in upholding dharma, almost at any cost.
What, then, does dharma mean, particularly in terms of strategic vision? First,
dharma means upholding the larger righteous interest, the welfare of humanity, in
both its mundane and its transcendental sense. For the leadership of a nation-state,
it means protecting the national interest, defined as the interests of the people,
from internal and external adversarial circumstances.
Second, dharma means action not passivity; acting without material incentives, and without regard for narrowly defined gains from that action. And acting
decisively while recognizing, however, that the fight to uphold dharma will almost
necessarily always cause collateral damage (both in terms of a strict adherence to
principles as well as possibly unrestrained violence).
Amitabh Mattoo
108
Matilal, ‘Krisna: in defence of a devious divinity’, p. 106.
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Finally, the fight for dharma requires acting independently, without attachment, without fear and without external pressure. In sum, dharma in foreign
policy can only be sustained through the doctrine of strategic autonomy. It is
the only principle that can bring into harmony flexibility in diplomacy (even
duplicity when needed) and purposeful violence when required; so much so that
true statecraft and strategic autonomy become inseparable, bringing about a fusion
of thought and action for the higher purposes of statecraft. Dharma is beyond selfinterest, it is beyond partisan causes, it is concerned almost always with the larger
good; it reifies humanity, the people, and not necessarily the state. As Krishna
emphasises to Arjuna: ‘Karmany evādhikāras te mā phales u kadācana mā karma-phalahetur bhūr mā te sańgo mā te sańgo ‘stv akarmani’ (You have a right to act but never to
any fruits thereof. You should never be motivated by the results of your actions,
nor should there be any attachment).
In contemporary terms, what are the secular aspects of the wisdom that Krishna
imparts to Arjuna, particularly in the Bhagavad Gita? Ultimately, for Krishna, our
strategic policies must be rooted within the overarching framework of dharma
and devoted to promoting the larger righteous national interest (Yato dharmas Tato
Jaya: Victory and dharma go together), rather than any selfish or partisan cause.
In many ways, this wisdom reinforces India’s longstanding quest for strategic
autonomy, defined as the pursuit of stability, space and strength, as an instrument
for promoting national dharma. As an illustrative example, even at the end of his
teachings and his call for action, Krishna encourages Arjuna to reflect introspectively on what he has learned, and discard whatever he finds unsuitable: ‘Iti te
jñānam ākhyātam guhyād guhyataram mayā, vimrśyaitad aś es enayathecchas itathā kuru’
(Thus, I have explained to you the most confidential of all knowledge. Deliberate
on this fully, and then do what you wish to do.)
In terms of moral philosophy with deep implications for statecraft, the
concerns that define Matilal’s essay are similar to those raised by the sage Uttanka
in Aśvamedhikaparvan, when he encounters Krishna after the war. Why does
Krishna not successfully broker peace between the warring cousins rather than
preside over genocide? Why does Krishna undermine his stature by apparently
resorting to ‘duplicitous or even deceitful means in the course of war’? Matilal
and others offer compelling explanations to provide a coherent justification of
Krishna’s actions, including those rooted in moral consequentialism and the lack
of omnipotence of the lord when he acquires an earthly form. Krishna is the final
guardian of dharma, a leader; and on occasion, as Matilal points out, a leader needs
to create ‘new paradigms for showing limitations of such a generally accepted
moral code of truth-telling and promise-keeping’.108 One of the few in the West
who understood the importance of dharma (otherwise, for most, an elusive term)
was the scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer (leader of the Manhattan Project, which
led to the development of the first atomic weapons). As he witnessed the first
nuclear test in July 1945, ‘he thought of a verse from the Bhagavad Gita: divi sūryasahasrasya bhaved yugapad utthitā yadi bhāh sadrsī sā syād bhāsas tasya mahā hmanah (If
How not to deal with a rising China
109
For Oppenheimer’s exact words, view: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqZqfTOxFhY.
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the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be
like the splendour of the mighty one)’. And then the shloka or verse: (I am become
Death, the destroyer of worlds).’109 Not surprisingly, Oppenheimer supported the
development of nuclear weapons against fascism, but opposed the production of
a thermonuclear hydrogen bomb during the Cold War. This, he believed, was the
difference between dharma and adharma; and it is a distinction that thinkers on war
and peace would do well to reflect upon and comprehend in its fullest and most
inclusive sense. For as Napoleon Bonaparte was said to have predicted, ‘ ... when
China awakes, she will shake the world’, with the Chinese Communist Party
lending substance to what may be apocryphal wisdom through its revisionism.
In contrast, India is, in its essence, driven by Dharma, and sees itself as not the
Middle Kingdom but endorses normatively the idea of vasudhaiva kutumbakam (the
world is one family). In this Manichean contest, the world surely needs a stronger
democratic India.