Neutering & Defanging Chinese Threat (15-11-2017)

Arjun · Post by **Arjun** » 18 Dec 2017 20:41

NRao wrote:Google to open artificial intelligence centre in China

Inaugurated I presume by our very own Indian American Mr Pichai!

Google’s Chinese research centre forms a portfolio of AI centres across the world, with Google also having bases in London, New York, Toronto and Zurich.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 19 Dec 2017 05:01

Arjun wrote:
NRao wrote:Google to open artificial intelligence centre in China
Inaugurated I presume by our very own Indian American Mr Pichai!

Google’s Chinese research centre forms a portfolio of AI centres across the world, with Google also having bases in London, New York, Toronto and Zurich.

Do not know about the inauguration aspect. But, what is well known is that China - so far - has been the only competition for Google. With this, Google may have tossed in the towel. What China is doing within "AI" is extremely impressive. I guess the pros of a single party system, yet, it is something to talk about.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 19 Dec 2017 05:02

As China Air Force Drills Near Taiwan, S Korea Jets Scramble

BEIJING: China's air force carried out another round of long-range drills on Monday, flying into the Sea of Japan, prompting South Korean jets to scramble, and again around self-ruled Taiwan amid growing tension over China's assertiveness in the region.

China has in recent months ramped up its long-range air force drills, particularly around Taiwan, claimed by China as its own.

The air force said in a statement that fighter and bomber aircraft flew through the Tsushima Strait that separates South Korea from Japan and into international waters in the Sea of Japan.

The Sea of Japan is not Japan's, and the drills were lawful and reasonable, air force spokesman Shen Jinke said in the statement, describing the exercises as routine and pre-planned.

In Seoul, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said five Chinese military planes were spotted entering the Korean Air Defence Identification Zone, and fighter jets scrambled in response.

The Chinese aircraft also flew through Japan's air defence identification zone, it added.

"Our fighter planes took normal tactical measures, identifying the models of the Chinese planes and flying aerial surveillance until they left," the South Korean statement said.

Chinese air force spokesman Shen alluded to the scrambled aircraft, saying they "responded to interference from foreign military aircraft" but were able to achieve the aim of their drill.

There was no immediate reaction from the Japanese government.

Taiwan's military said that China had staged a separate drill at the same time, flying through the Bashi Channel between Taiwan and the Philippines and then returning to base through the Strait of Miyako, to Taiwan's north and near Japan's southern islands.

Taiwan monitored Japan sending F-15 fighters to intercept, Taiwan's defence ministry added in its statement.

China's air force last week conducted "island encirclement patrols" near Taiwan, after a senior Chinese diplomat threatened that China would invade the self-ruled island if any U.S. warships made port visits there.

China suspects Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen, who leads the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party, wants to declare the island's formal independence. Tsai says she wants to maintain peace with China but will defend Taiwan's security.

China's air force exercises also come amid regional tensions over North Korea's nuclear and missile programmes, with bellicose rhetoric from both North Korea and U.S. President Donald Trump.

TKiran · Post by **TKiran** » 19 Dec 2017 09:44

There's a very easy way to handle such arrogance of Hans,

Drag them into conflict and defeat them, once, twice and again and again. There's a poem in Telugu

మేడి పండు జూడ మేలిమై యుండును,
పొట్టవిచ్చి జూడ పురుగులుండు౹
పిరికివాని మదిని బింకమీలాగురా
విశ్వదాభిరామ వినుర వేమా||

Which means, even though Hans artificially show as if they are great, they have fear inside their stomachs. That should be brought out to defeat them. But again, US can't do it, as they have correctly estimated, all others are indeed pussies. India has to show them their place. But who is going to bell the cat...??

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 19 Dec 2017 11:33

FYI

But despite those advancements, the Pentagon and others are worried that the United States is not moving fast enough.

“The bad news is our competitors aren’t standing still,” Work said.

China in particular has been investing heavily in AI, defense analysts say.

“China intends to seize the initiative to become the ‘premier global AI innovation center’ by 2030, potentially surpassing the United States in the process,” according to a recent report by the Center for a New American Security.

That should serve as a call-to-arms “Sputnik moment,” Work said. “I personally believe that a national challenge like this has to be met with a national response,” he said.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 19 Dec 2017 17:11

China, Russia, Islamists top Donald Trump’s enemy list; India is a partner in fight against both (sic) - Varghese K George, The Hindu

United States President Donald Trump’s new national security strategy, announced on Monday, promises support for India’s emergence as a “leading global power,” while identifying China, Russia and Islamism as main threats.

“We welcome India’s emergence as a leading global power and stronger strategic and defence partner,” the strategy document said. Enhancing India’s global standing from being a ‘balancing power’ to be a ‘leading power’ has been a stated strategic objective of the Narendra Modi government.

Increased quadrilateral cooperation

“We will seek to increase quadrilateral cooperation with Japan, Australia, and India. …We will expand our defence and security cooperation with India, a Major Defence Partner of the United States, and support India’s growing relationships throughout the region,” says the strategy, finalised after months of internal deliberations in the government.

India finds mention as a partner in Mr. Trump’s plans for South and Central Asia and Indo-Pacific, while China is named as a threat in both sections. The document saiys America “will help South Asian nations maintain their sovereignty as China increases its influence in the region,” and notes that many countries in the Indo-Pacific are looking to the U.S. for leadership even as “Chinese dominance risks diminishing the sovereignty of many states in the region.”

The document seeks to balance Mr. Trump’s 'America First' politics with the country’s traditional strategic principles, and consequently makes contradictory commitments. It calls for “advancing American principles [that] spreads peace and prosperity around the globe,” at one place, while at another, it says America will seek partnerships with countries “each with its own cultures and dreams.”

Nation-building or promotion of democracy in Islamic countries is not part of the strategy. The document says the U.S.'’s involvement in multilateral forums will be without any compromise on the country’s sovereignty.

Trump slams predecessors

Mr. Trump, in a campaign style speech to unveil the new strategy, slammed his predecessors for protecting the interests of other countries at the cost of the U.S.' own.

The document reiterates a series of announcements and speeches by the President and other senior officials in the last one year in the context of India. “We will deepen our strategic partnership with India and support its leadership role in Indian Ocean security and throughout the broader region,” it says. “And we will encourage India to increase its economic assistance in the region,” it observes about South and Central Asia.

The document underscores a warning to Pakistan, which had appeared in Mr. Trump’s “regional strategy” for Afghanistan earlier his year. “We will press Pakistan to intensify its counterterrorism efforts, since no partnership can survive a country’s support for militants and terrorists who target a partner’s own service members and officials. The United States will also encourage Pakistan to continue demonstrating that it is a responsible steward of its nuclear assets,” it says, in a reference to the risk of terrorists laying their hands on them.

State of complacency after Cold War

The strategy notes that the U.S. slipped into a state of complacency once the Cold War came to an end, while new rivals, state and non-state actors, used the international system against America. “These competitions require the United States to rethink the policies of the past two decades — policies based on the assumption that engagement with rivals and their inclusion in international institutions and global commerce would turn them into benign actors and trustworthy partners. For the most part, this premise turned out to be false,” says the document.

The document states that “a geopolitical competition between free and repressive visions of world order is taking place in the Indo-Pacific region,” while South and Central Asia and Middle East remain havens for Islamists.

The U.S. will act against threats at their source, the document says, echoing the principle of pre-emptive strikes. “…we will pursue threats to their source, so that jihadist terrorists are stopped before they ever reach our borders.” Mr. Trump accused his predecessors of neglecting the military and the document promises of a new round of military build-up. “It is a strategy of principled realism that is guided by outcomes, not ideology,” it says.

TKiran · Post by **TKiran** » 19 Dec 2017 21:20

Gurus, I was checking Google maps ever since the Doklam incident was happening but for the last 1week or so it was very confusing.

The Google maps now is showing the Bhutan area where the incident took place as part of Han China, not even dotted area. Only doklam plateau is showing in dotted area. Could some learned guru please confirm? I hope my map reading is bad and I am wrong. Otherwise did we really lose Doklam (Bhutanese territory) to Han and it was waste of an effort we put up at that area? Hope I am totally wrong.

vasu raya · Post by **vasu raya** » 19 Dec 2017 21:23

TKiran wrote:https://thediplomat.com/2017/09/china-a ... hostility/

China and India: The Roots of Hostility
Beijing and New Delhi’s rivalry has deep roots.

By Mohan Malik
September 12, 2017

Great article! thanks for posting

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 20 Dec 2017 09:33

https://thehimalayantimes.com/nepal/chi ... pal-march/
Chinese president may visit Nepal in March

Chinese President Xi Jinping is likely to visit Nepal in March 2018. High-level political sources said China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs had listed Nepal among the countries that the Chinese president would visit in 2018 and also started ground work for the Chinese president’s visit to Nepal.Sources said President Xi would assume his second presidency in February after Spring Festival and would start visiting foreign countries in March.The Chinese side had prepared for President Xi’s Nepal visit last year, but it cancelled it due to change of government in Nepal. Sources said the Chinese president’s visit would have a symbolic significance after the left alliance’s victory in provincial and parliamentary elections.“For China, the left alliance’s victory is victory of a China-friendly force,” the source added.Xi took over the presidency in 2012 and will begin his second term as president in February. In China, the ruling Communist Party general secretary rules the country for two consecutive te

rms.

pankajs · Post by **pankajs** » 20 Dec 2017 09:36

TKiran wrote:Gurus, I was checking Google maps ever since the Doklam incident was happening but for the last 1week or so it was very confusing.

The Google maps now is showing the Bhutan area where the incident took place as part of Han China, not even dotted area. Only doklam plateau is showing in dotted area. Could some learned guru please confirm? I hope my map reading is bad and I am wrong. Otherwise did we really lose Doklam (Bhutanese territory) to Han and it was waste of an effort we put up at that area? Hope I am totally wrong.

The incident took place of Doklam plateau so I don't quite understand you saying "where the incident took place as part of Han China, not even dotted area. Only doklam plateau is showing in dotted area"

If the area where the incident too place is shown as Han and not dotted then I would expect Doklam plateau also to show up as Han area because that is where the incident too place.

At least that was what was reported to us mortals in India i.e. this recent incident took place on the Doklam plateau. Not sure if the Chinese version of the story was different but that you should be able to verify from your Chinese sources. From time to time you must discard the Chinese filters to see how it look to others.

pankajs · Post by **pankajs** » 20 Dec 2017 10:07

pankajs wrote:
TKiran wrote:Han have turned around the "Doklam" defeat to "strategic gain" for themselves.
How?
TKiran wrote: <<snip>>
@rajfortyseven

"#China has amassed division of troops&equipment&deployed ahead of #Yadong town.
2 mech units,atleast 9 inf battalions,>300 large vehicles,earth moving eqpt,construction material.
Gun position hardened,new gun position,infantry mortars&signal center upgrade
(link: https://theprint.in/2017/12/12/china-tr ... increases/) theprint.in/2017/12/12/chi…

Impelled by your latest post and in awe of your capacity to spin I went back at your last *substantial* post i.e. I dug into the link you had provided. Lets begin ...

The report begins with the following para

A Chinese buildup of troops and military infrastructure near the contentious Doklam plateau has gained pace in November, with fresh satellite images showing new mortar positions, hardening of gun positions and evidence that more than 5,000 troops could be deployed within 5-10 km of the conflict point.

Notice the word *Near* and *contentious Doklam plateau* in the first sentence. Let me put here what my takeaway is.

Doklam Plateau was *contentious*. I would have expected you to at least read this before you posted the link. You last post wrt Doklam / Doklam plateau / maps / Dotted line / Shown as Han area, etc could have been cleared if you had even read the first para of your own link. The last flare-up between Indian and China was about *Doklam plateau* only and nothing else. If that is shown as disputed or in dotted that is correct display given the status of that piece of land.

Considering that you have been posting quite frequently on the issue, I did not expect you to try and confuse this with some other general *Doklam* area and spin as if some area has passed into Han control *since the last flare-up* between India and China. That to me looks like a deliberate attempt to mix facts and create an impression as you put it ...

TKiran wrote:Han have turned around the "Doklam" defeat to "strategic gain" for themselves.

Now lets turn to the word *Near* in "near the contentious Doklam plateau". That to my understanding looks to mean *away* from the "contentious Doklam plateau"

I will leave my analysis there for the moment but if you try more such stunts to spin facts I will dig deeper into that report. I think it has some more material that is relevant but that is all for now from me.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 20 Dec 2017 10:18

NDTV.COM
https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/brahmap ... eststories

GUWAHATI: Assam's lifeline, the mighty Brahmaputra, could be turning into a threat to life along the river that it supported all along. Its waters are muddy and black.

The culprit is Siang river that originates in the Tibetan Glaciers and meets the Brahmaputra in Assam and there are fears it is getting worse.

A little over ten days after a test of a water sample from the river indicated that its turbidity was way over the safe limits for human consumption and set alarm bells ringing, NDTV got the Siang water samples tested at the prestigious IIT-Guwahati.

The test results found the particle pollutants level, known as turbidity, was 1249 NTU, or Nephelometric Turbidity Unit that measures the concentration of suspended particulates in liquid. The safe limit for potable water is 5 NTU.

That is 250 times more than the safe limit and more than twice the figures recorded earlier. The IIT report said the water also has very high iron and lead content

The findings are scary, particularly since the sample was taken from a remote, sparsely populated, high altitude place.

The IIT report says it could be "inferred without reservation" that the water from the Siang river in Arunachal Pradesh "is not suitable for drinking purposes" unless it is treated and dangerous for human consumption.

This week, a worried Rajya Sabha member from Assam Ripun Bora also flagged the sharp decline in water quality in parliament.

"There is an abnormal change of water in Brahmaputra during the last one month and poisonous, muddy, turbid water is flowing in this river. As a result, a lot of wild animals, aquatic life and fish died.... This catastrophe has jeopardized Brahmaputra valley civilization," Mr Bora told the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday.

Mr Bora blamed the muddy, poisonous water on what he said was China's 1,000 km tunnel being built upstream.

But China last week denied reports of any tunnel being built to divert Brahmaputra water.

Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, however, appeared to play down the risks.

"All the test results have come to us and it is not saying that it is not fit for human consumption," the Chief Minister said, citing a test report from Hyderabad-based Indian Institute of Chemical Technology.

"So, challenges are there but now gradually, it is purifying and I believe measures are being taken up in the highest level. We need not worry," he said.

deejay · Post by **deejay** » 20 Dec 2017 10:24

Pankajs ji, the way I see it is that now the Doklam plateau has become a Strategic Pain rather than a Strategic Gain for Chinese. They are now forced to maintain a high level of troop deployment at these remote places through winter. Obviously, they thing we are going to do what Pakis did in Kargil.

On the other hand we cannot do a strategic permanent build up the conflict area itself since it is a Bhutanese territory and not ours. What this means is that once the summer sets in 2018 (May-June) on wards this place can be an interesting place to keep a watch just like other areas where Chinese keep trying to build roads etc.

Presently, for winters, the Chinese are putting more troops through the weather grind. Over the cold months they will take weather related casualties and costs like we do. Once again, their build up is defensive and not offensive in nature. Building bunkers is clear sign of hardening defences.

Karthik S · Post by **Karthik S** » 20 Dec 2017 10:29

Singha wrote:NDTV.COM
https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/brahmap ... eststories

GUWAHATI: Assam's lifeline, the mighty Brahmaputra, could be turning into a threat to life along the river that it supported all along. Its waters are muddy and black.

The culprit is Siang river that originates in the Tibetan Glaciers and meets the Brahmaputra in Assam and there are fears it is getting worse.

A little over ten days after a test of a water sample from the river indicated that its turbidity was way over the safe limits for human consumption and set alarm bells ringing, NDTV got the Siang water samples tested at the prestigious IIT-Guwahati.

The test results found the particle pollutants level, known as turbidity, was 1249 NTU, or Nephelometric Turbidity Unit that measures the concentration of suspended particulates in liquid. The safe limit for potable water is 5 NTU.

That is 250 times more than the safe limit and more than twice the figures recorded earlier. The IIT report said the water also has very high iron and lead content

The findings are scary, particularly since the sample was taken from a remote, sparsely populated, high altitude place.

The IIT report says it could be "inferred without reservation" that the water from the Siang river in Arunachal Pradesh "is not suitable for drinking purposes" unless it is treated and dangerous for human consumption.

This week, a worried Rajya Sabha member from Assam Ripun Bora also flagged the sharp decline in water quality in parliament.

"There is an abnormal change of water in Brahmaputra during the last one month and poisonous, muddy, turbid water is flowing in this river. As a result, a lot of wild animals, aquatic life and fish died.... This catastrophe has jeopardized Brahmaputra valley civilization," Mr Bora told the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday.

Mr Bora blamed the muddy, poisonous water on what he said was China's 1,000 km tunnel being built upstream.

But China last week denied reports of any tunnel being built to divert Brahmaputra water.

Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, however, appeared to play down the risks.

"All the test results have come to us and it is not saying that it is not fit for human consumption," the Chief Minister said, citing a test report from Hyderabad-based Indian Institute of Chemical Technology.

"So, challenges are there but now gradually, it is purifying and I believe measures are being taken up in the highest level. We need not worry," he said.

Isn't CPEC dependent on Indus and other river waters that originate from India, If so, can we cause them 'minor' water related difficulties?

Aditya_V · Post by **Aditya_V** » 20 Dec 2017 11:37

China's action in Brahmaputra is worse than what Saddam Hussain has done in the Gulf waters.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 20 Dec 2017 12:56

these debris would be the waste from some huge tunneling or civil works project like that Lhasa to Sichuan HSR which will go across the mountains ....there can be no other reason.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 20 Dec 2017 13:05

https://thewire.in/204767/siang-river-a ... dy-waters/

more details here. that river valley is inhabited by the Adi people one of major tribes in A.P.

Peregrine · Post by **Peregrine** » 20 Dec 2017 18:41

X Posted on the Islamism & Islamophobia Abroad & Terroristan Threads

Big Brother watching: China's 'thought police' surveils, strikes fear in Muslim minority

NEW DELHI: Thousands belonging to a minority Muslim community in China's Xinjiang province have allegedly been whisked off to and detained in state-owned "political indoctrination centers" as the government cracks down on growing "Islamic terrorism" in the country, the Associated Press (AP) said in a report.

Over the past year, mass disappearance of Uighur Muslims has instilled fear in the hearts of the marginalised ethnic community, which has been influenced by radical Islamic extremism, claims the government. Inhabited by 10 million Turkic speaking Uighurs, Xinjiang's Uighur Autonomous Region now resembles a police state, with foot patrols, armored vehicles and round-the-clock surveillance tracking their every move.

Under the pretext of rooting out terrorism, the Chinese government has adopted a "strike hard" campaign following a series of attacks in 2013 and 2014 carried out by Uighur separatists. The Communist party has banned fasting during Ramzan, forbidden Azaan in state-sanctioned mosques, prohibited long beards and Islamic headwear and restricted use of the Turkic language. Harsh punishments are imposed for refusing to watch state TV or radio programmes.

The government has also adopted sophisticated surveillance systems, including a biometric data collection program which collates "three-dimensional portraits, voiceprints, DNA and fingerprints", the AP report said.

"If we don't do this, it will be like several years ago — hundreds will die," propaganda official Bao Changhui told AP.

Earlier in April, the Human Rights Watch condemned the move to ban dozens of Muslim names like 'Saddam' and 'Jihad' on the grounds that they could "exaggerate religious fervour". Children with banned names will not have access to public schools and other social benefits.

The Communist Party has denied allegations of religious discrimination, instead pointing to decades of economic investment in Xinjiang and concerted efforts, such as preferential college admissions, to bring the Uighur population into the mainstream.

It is a well-documented fact that Uighur Muslims have been fighting alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan and also joined ISIS and al-Qaeda in Syria and Iraq. However, Beijing has not offered any concrete evidence of a foreign-directed terrorist organization working against the Chinese state that would warrant the crackdown on ethnic Uighurs in Xinjiang.

Even as it takes a hard-line stance on perceived Islamic extremism at home, China remains mostly aloof to reports of terrorist safe havens being nurtured by all-weather-ally Pakistan. Despite mounting pressure from the US, Islamabad has refused to step up its fight against terrorism and "allows terror groups like the Haqqani Network, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Muhammed (JeM) to operate freely from its soil", the Trump administartion said in a censorious report in July.

After endorsing the Xiamen declaration at the BRICS Summit 2017, which expressed concern for the first time on several Pakistan-based terror groups, China quickly backpedaled and attested to Islamabad's "clear conscience" and "great sacrifices" in its counter-terror efforts.

China has repeatedly blocked India's move to designate JeM chief Masood Azhar as a global terrorist at the UN Security Council and also opposed calls for sanctions against 26/11 mastermind Hafiz Saeed. Hitting out at Beijing's double standards on combating terrorism, India had said such actions only undermined the international community's resolve to fight terror. Just as Terroristani trained Uighur Terrorists are Terrorizing Xinjiang, soon Hafiz "Suar" Saeed will have his Terroristani "Non State Actors" join the Uighur Terrorists Brigade.

This, in spite of concerns about terror groups in Pakistan that Chinese intelligence believes has links to East Turkestan Islamic Movement, an influential separatist group in Uighur culture that has been designated as a terror outfit by the US and Britain.

Meanwhile, Uighur Muslims continue to live in the shadow of fear in Xinjiang, under a government that all but views them as the enemy. Big Brother is watching.

Cheers

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 21 Dec 2017 01:39

X-Post from Korea thread...

UlanBatori wrote:What do the mullahs here make of the DT double-biss on Russia-cheen? Major steam-letting in Beijing

Zhang Baohui, a professor of political science at Lingnan University in Hong Kong, said the document showed the partnership between Trump and Xi, which Beijing had been trying to cultivate, "is dead."

"(The NSS) moves away from the false cooperative-competitive equivalency of past US administrations and embraces the latter as a reality that has been thrust upon America."
The failure to get Beijing to play ball on North Korea is similar to how the US has failed to get Chinese buy-in for international institutions and regulations, particularly on trade and intellectual policy -- where significant gaps remain, much to the chagrin of US companies.
This has been a major issue for repeated administrations in Washington, Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations {and total failure as diplomat}, said during a talk Monday. "(The NSS) seems to reject the idea that we could embed China or Russia in an international system based on rules more or less to our liking," he said. "So it seems to suggest that the future is one of balance of power, friction, and so forth." Haass added there appears to be a "reorienting of the relationship more towards the direction of China as something of a problem or a competitor, particularly in the economic realm."
Now cheen teeth show:
According to Zhang, this is more of a return to the norm for US-China policy, after Trump appeared to consider taking a more isolationist approach in line with his "America First" campaign rhetoric. "Now his foreign policy (is returning) to the standard posture of the US in world affairs since 1945, which is that it is bent on maintaining primacy and sees other great powers as challengers," he said. This will likely represent a maintaining of the status quo in terms of US-China relations, Zhang said, pointing to the hard line the Obama administration took on the South China Sea and the consistently tough stance Trump has taken on trade since he came to power.
IOW, phoeey!

Rudradev · Post by **Rudradev** » 21 Dec 2017 04:09

Susan Rice, Obama's NSA, bemoaning in NY Slimes that her regime's Cheen-pasandi has become a thing of the past with Trump's new National Security Strategy:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/20/opin ... %2Fopinion

But the world is actually gray, and Mr. Trump’s strategy struggles to draw nuanced distinctions. Throughout, China and Russia are conflated and equated as parallel adversaries. In fact, China is a competitor, not an avowed opponent, and has not illegally occupied its neighbors. Russia, as the strategy allows, aggressively opposes NATO, the European Union, Western values and American global leadership. It brazenly seized Georgian and Ukrainian territory and killed thousands of innocents to save a dictator in Syria. Russia is our adversary, yet Mr. Trump’s strategy stubbornly refuses to acknowledge its most hostile act: directly interfering in the 2016 presidential election to advantage Mr. Trump himself.

On China and Russia, I suspect the White House realists, to escape the embarrassment of a strategy that ignored Russia’s hostile behavior, agreed to lump China with Russia and almost always mention China first, to placate their nationalist colleagues who hate China but admire Russia. The result is a flawed analysis that may actually drive Russia and China closer together.

Do these morons even read public-domain pronouncements of the PRC govt mouthpieces regarding the ambitions of China to displace the US from its preeminent position globally?

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 21 Dec 2017 04:38

Obama SD did something stupid with Russia and got checkmated in Ukraine. Since then they have been making Russia a US enemy and going bonkers.
Above is more evidence of that.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 21 Dec 2017 07:30

Rudradev wrote:Susan Rice, Obama's NSA, bemoaning in NY Slimes that her regime's Cheen-pasandi has become a thing of the past with Trump's new National Security Strategy:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/20/opin ... %2Fopinion

In fact, China is a competitor, not an avowed opponent, and has not illegally occupied its neighbors.
Do these morons even read public-domain pronouncements of the PRC govt mouthpieces regarding the ambitions of China to displace the US from its preeminent position globally?

Now, that was the reason several Asian countries had jitters that the US could not be relied upon with Obama's 'Pivot to Asia'. Japan, already developing a bipartisan closer relationship with India with Shinzo Abe adding fuel to this fire, came particularly closer because of the American ambivalence. Philippines, with its Trump-like maverick Duterte, decided to surrender to China even after the UNCLOS ruling overwhelmingly supporting the Philippine position. Singapore, which wanted India to be its security guarantor after Independence, has also been nervous with the US.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 21 Dec 2017 07:36

Anti-India editorial in Maldives paper sparks political row - Sachin Parashar, ToI

A pro-Abdulla Yameen paper has kicked up a fresh political storm in the Maldives by describing in an editorial Indian PM Narendra Modi as a Hindu extremist who is also anti-Muslim. The editorial in the local Dhivehi language went on to describe India as the biggest enemy nation and said that a "new best friend'' be found for Maldives in China.

A unified opposition strongly protested against the "outrageous" article in the newspaper which, it said, had appeared in a mouthpiece of President Yameen and whose editorials were routinely approved by the President's office before publication.

The opposition led by the Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) believes this latest display of hostility should alert India about the dangers of overindulging the Yameen administration.

An MDP leader and former foreign minister of Maldives, Ahmed Naseem, told TOI that more robust Indian corrective measures will be in the interest of both India and the Maldives. "Appeasement with wishful thinking is not going to solve this crisis," said Naseem.

Exactly what India can do remains in the realm of speculation though with the Maldives' government bent on playing China against India in the strategically located archipelago in the Indian Ocean. The editorial in fact also accused India of plotting a coup against the Yameen government. It also accused India of acting against international law in Kashmir and of arming "Tamil terrorists" in Sri Lanka.

Opposition leaders like former presidents Mohamed Nasheed and Maumoon Abdul Gayoom came out strongly in support of India after the article was published. "I condemn the article...that brands India as an enemy of Maldives. Outrageous! No Maldivian in his right mind would subscribe to such views. India has been and remains a very close and trusted friend of Maldives,'' said Gayoom.

Nasheed also strongly condemned the "anti-India diatribe in regime mouthpiece''. "Prez YAG's reckless foreign policy is destroying our relationship with India. Maldives must be sensitive to India's security and safety," he said.

The Maldives remains the only country in the neighbourhood which Modi is yet to visit. Indian officials here seemed taken aback by the attack on the PM even though they avoided making any comment.

India had only last week reminded Male of its stated India First policy with the MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar saying that India expected Maldives to be sensitive to its concerns. This was after Male signed an FTA with China without taking the opposition into confidence and rushing it through the Parliamentary approval process. Days later, the government suspended 3 councillors for having an "unauthorised'' meeting with Indian ambassador Akhilesh Mishra.

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 21 Dec 2017 16:20

ramana wrote:Obama SD did something stupid with Russia and got checkmated in Ukraine. Since then they have been making Russia a US enemy and going bonkers.
Above is more evidence of that.

got themselves kicked in Ukraine AND Georgia AND Syria, hain? It is very interesting to watch US media/analyst statements on what happened in Syria after having followed Singhaji Newsfeed for the past several years.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 22 Dec 2017 05:23

chola · Post by **chola** » 22 Dec 2017 05:58

Prem wrote:

Nice poke in the eye of the Lizard. But we do need to remember that Taiwan is also a mercantilist Cheen state with surplus over everyone and has the same claims on Tibet and the South Indo-Cheen as the PRC.

Make use of but do not get too close.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 22 Dec 2017 09:54

India-China border talks today - Kallol Bhattacherjee, The Hindu

Another useless round.

India and China will hold the 20th round of negotiations on the border issues on Friday. The meeting, which comes four months after the forces of the two sides confronted each other at the Doklam plateau, will be headed by special representatives from both sides, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi.

The Ministry of External Affairs made a formal announcement for the talks on Thursday which were finalised during last week’s bilateral meeting between External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, held on the sidelines of the trilateral RIC (Russia-India-China) foreign ministers’ meeting. Ms Swaraj and Mr Wang had both indicated that the two sides realise the need to continue normal dialogue given the importance of overall relationship.

The MEA did not comment on what would be on the agenda of the Doval-Yang dialogue even though there have been some discussion in the Indian policy studies circles about the various issues like the One Belt One Road initiative, China’s opposition to Indian membership at the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) and the Indian opposition to China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that might feature in the talks.

The Hindu earlier reported that Chinese ambassador Luo Zhaohui had indicated China will be willing to change the name of CPEC to address India’s concerns regarding CPEC. “We can change name of CPEC (China Pakistan Economic Corridor). Create an alternate corridor through Jammu and Kashmir, Nathu La pass or Nepal to deal with India’s concerns,” the envoy had said in November in an academic meeting.

However, a new issue on the ground that may also feature is the issue of the pollution of the Siang river which has contaminated the flow of the mighty Brahmaputra in Assam. Though India has raised the issue most recently during last week’s discussion with visiting foreign minister Wang Yi, the Chinese foreign ministry’s spokesperson has dismissed the report.

“On the issue of Siang, now this is naturally a matter of concern to us. We are coordinating with the Ministry of Water Resources and we have ascertained certain facts. I can also share with you that the matter did come up during External Affairs Minister’s meeting with the Chinese Foreign Minister and again as you are aware there are existing mechanisms between the two countries to deal with such matters on the river arrangement,” said the spokesperson last week.

Prasad · Post by **Prasad** » 22 Dec 2017 12:33

A few articles that I happened to read recently. Do we have an oppression of minorities in PRC thread?

Declassified: Chinese official said at least 10,000 civilians died in 1989 Tiananmen massacre, documents show

“27 Army APCs [armoured personnel carriers] opened fire on the crowd (both civilians and soldiers) before running over them in their APCs.”

The document said that the SMR troops separated the students from local residents upon arrival at Tiananmen Square.

“Students understood they were given one hour to leave square but after five minutes APCs attacked. Students linked arms but were mown down including soldiers. APCs then ran over bodies time and time again to make ‘pie’ and remains collected by bulldozer. Remains incinerated and then hosed down drains.”

Twelve Days in Xinjiang:
How China’s Surveillance State Overwhelms Daily Life

Citizens and visitors alike must run a daily gantlet of police checkpoints, surveillance cameras and machines scanning their ID cards, faces, eyeballs and sometimes entire bodies.
When fruit vendor Parhat Imin swiped his card at a telecommunications office this summer to pay an overdue phone bill, his photo popped up with an “X.” Since then, he says, every scan of his ID card sets off an alarm. He isn’t sure what it signifies, but figures he is on some kind of government watch list because he is a Uighur and has had intermittent run-ins with the police.

He says he is reluctant to travel for fear of being detained. “They blacklisted me,” he says. “I can’t go anywhere.”
At a security exposition in October, an executive of Guangzhou-based CloudWalk Technology Co., which has sold facial-recognition algorithms to police and identity-verification systems to gas stations in Xinjiang, called the region the world’s most heavily guarded place. According to the executive, Jiang Jun, for every 100,000 people the police in Xinjiang want to monitor, they use the same amount of surveillance equipment that police in other parts of China would use to monitor millions.
At Xingxing Gorge, a windswept pass used centuries ago by merchants plying the Silk Road, police inspected incoming traffic and verified travelers’ identities. The Journal reporters were stopped, ordered out of their car and asked to explain the purpose of their visit. Drivers, mostly those who weren’t Han Chinese, were guided through electronic gateways that scanned their ID cards and faces.

Surveillance cameras loomed every few hundred feet along the road into town, blanketed street corners and kept watch on patrons of a small noodle shop near the main mosque. The proprietress, a member of the Muslim Hui minority, said the government ordered all restaurants in the area to install the devices earlier this year “to prevent terrorist attacks.”

Eh, read the entire article. THAT is a troo surveillance state. Heres something hilarious (remember they used knives during the riots in urumqi?)

In Aksu, a dusty city a five-hour drive east of Kashgar, knife salesman Jiang Qiankun says his shop had to pay thousands of dollars for a machine that turns a customer’s ID card number, photo, ethnicity and address into a QR code that it lasers into the blade of any knife it sells. “If someone has a knife, it has to have their ID card information,” he says.

Why China’s winter fuel crisis is a cold, hard lesson in the law of unintended consequences

The central government is now grappling with a gas crisis after its battle against smog backfired in recent weeks, leaving people like Yang without stable energy supplies during the freezing winter.

It is an unintended consequence of the government’s drive to tackle air pollution that has seen smoke-stack factories closed, ineffective officials punished and coal use reduced across northern China.

The swift realisation of the gas policy reflects a broader change in Chinese officialdom.

State media has blamed the decision-makers for delivering poorly thought-out measures, but also criticised local officials for their focus on pleasing superiors while showing little concern for the public.

“[They] pledge their determination every time and mechanically implement their superiors’ orders. It seems policy implementation has improved, but their actions actually deviate from the party line of pragmatism,” read an article in China Comment, the Central Publicity Department’s official journal, last week.

But the article also quoted a grass-roots cadre as saying there was no room for local officials to take a pragmatic approach to policy.

“Even a district chief will be sacked if a household is found burning coal – so why would you expect us to adapt policies to the local situation?” the official asked. “When there are directives from above, we get extra tasks and responsibilities as the orders filter down to each level of government. Us grass-roots cadres are driven nearly crazy when the orders reach us.”

AP Exclusive: Digital police state shackles Chinese minority

The mass disappearances, beginning the past year, are part of a sweeping effort by Chinese authorities to use detentions and data-driven surveillance to impose a digital police state in the region of Xinjiang and over its Uighurs, a 10-million strong, Turkic-speaking Muslim minority that China says has been influenced by Islamic extremism.

Along with the detention camps, unprecedented levels of police blanket Xinjiang’s streets. Cutting-edge digital surveillance systems track where Uighurs go, what they read, who they talk to and what they say. And under an opaque system that treats practically all Uighurs as potential terror suspects, Uighurs who contact family abroad risk questioning or detention.

The campaign has been led by Chen Quanguo, a Chinese Communist Party official, who was promoted in 2016 to head Xinjiang after subduing another restive region — Tibet. Chen vowed to hunt down Uighur separatists blamed for attacks that have left hundreds dead, saying authorities would “bury terrorists in the ocean of the people’s war and make them tremble.”

Through rare interviews with Uighurs who recently left China, a review of government procurement contracts and unreported documents, and a trip through southern Xinjiang, the AP pieced together a picture of Chen’s war that’s ostensibly rooting out terror — but instead instilling fear.

AP Exclusive: Anger with China drives Uighurs to Syrian war

The story of how Ali ended up in a distant war zone echoed the experiences of other Uighurs the AP spoke to in Turkey, who said they joined religious militant groups at first because of grievances against Beijing or support for the idea of a Uighur nation. Most knew little about political Islam that fueled jihadis in other countries, and none said they met with recruiters inside China.

But that changed as soon as they left China’s borders. As Uighur refugees traveled along an underground railroad in Southeast Asia, they said, they were greeted by a network of Uighur militants who offered food and shelter — and their extremist ideology. And when the refugees touched down in Turkey, they were again wooed by recruiters who openly roamed the streets of Istanbul in gritty immigrant neighborhoods like Zeytinburnu and Sefakoy, looking for fresh fighters to shuttle to Syria.

Uighur activists and Syrian and Chinese officials estimate that at least 5,000 Uighurs have gone to Syria to fight — though many have since left. Among those, several hundred have joined the Islamic State, according to former fighters and Syrian officials.

As Uighurs streamed out of China, militant leaders have seized upon China’s treatment of Muslims as a recruiting tactic. The Islamic State, for instance, regularly publishes Uighur-language editions of its radio bulletins and magazines, while the Turkistan Islamic Party has been releasing videos on a near-weekly basis, said Rita Katz, director of the SITE Intelligence monitoring group.

“How can those who are imprisoned due to their faith be freed? How can they be saved from this humiliation?” a masked Uighur fighter says in a Turkestan Islamic Party video released last year. “Words from our mouths won’t help, but jihad for Allah will.”

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 22 Dec 2017 14:17

^^ that QR coding knife is the stuff of science fiction of dystopian future technocratic tyrannies. but its already here.

chola · Post by **chola** » 22 Dec 2017 16:58

Singha wrote:^^ that QR coding knife is the stuff of science fiction of dystopian future technocratic tyrannies. but its already here.

A respected technology analyst told me years ago that Cheen’s combination of cut-throat capitalism and authoritarianism will eventually have it winning out in the sciences. Once the government wants to do something, they would pour money and resources to achieve it. And a dog-eat-dog economy is providing the state with endless varieties of new technology. In neither the state nor the private sector are there any ethics to slow them down.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 22 Dec 2017 17:30

Yang-Doval talks covered extensive ground, says Chinese foreign ministry - Atul Aneja, The Hindu

The Chinese foreign ministry on Wednesday said that talks between China’s state councilor Yang Jeichi and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval covered extensive ground and were not confined to discussions on the borders alone.

Foreign ministry spokesperson, Hua Chunying said that the 20th round of talks between the two Special Representatives (SR) reflected the directions given by Chinese President Xi Jinping and Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the Xiamen summit of the BRICS countries in September.

She said that the SR talks were an important platform for “strategic communication” between the two neighbours.

“Member of the Central Committee and Yang Jiechi just held the special representative meeting with the Indian side. This mechanism is not only a high level channel of dialogue on the border affairs between the two sides but also an important platform for strategic communication between China and India,” the spokesperson observed.

She added: “We know that President Xi and (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi met this year in Xiamen and reached an important consensus. So the special representatives meeting this time would follow the consensus of the state leaders to exchange our views on the issue mutual concern focus on cooperation across the board so as to achieve our win-win cooperation and mutual benefits.

Ms. Hua signalled that additional mechanisms for maintaining calm at the borders were not required as the existing channels of communication were “operating very well”. “We hope the Indian side will work with China to make the most of the current mechanism to uphold security and peace as well as tranquility in the border area so that we can create enabling conditions for the bilateral relations.” {See the moral high stand that China rushes to take}

Mr. Yang’s visit acquires additional significance as his stature has risen in China’s official hierarchy following the recent 19th Party Congress. Unlike foreign minister Wang Yi, who continues his presence in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), Mr. Yang has been elevated to the 25-member Politburo.

Highly placed sources said that Mr. Yang’s visit had been “shaped” by the recent visit to India by foreign minister Wang, which did not go into specifics, but unveiled the “broad trajectory” that the relationship between the two countries could acquire in the future.

But Mr. Yang’s visit was meant to generate more specific ideas to “give new direction to the relationship,” in view of China acquiring a higher profile in South Asia and the Indian Ocean, and India’s inclination to more deeply engage with countries in the Indo-Pacific.

Earlier an official source had told The Hindu that the dialogue in Xiamen summit had proposed urgency for a new hands-on mechanism that would supplement the already existing, but periodically held, “strategic dialogue” between the two countries. The new channel of regular communication was expected to address concerns of an aspirational India and rising China in the region, including the Indian Ocean and the Asia-Pacific.

So, the Special Representatives dialogue is acquiring a broader one-point conflict-resolution mechanism or sounding-board.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 23 Dec 2017 07:33

India-China boundary talks ‘positive’, says Ministry - Nayanima Basu, Business Line

“The talks were positive and focussed on bringing out the full potential of the Closer Developmental Partnership between the two countries.

“They re-emphasised their commitment to achieve a fair, reasonable and mutually acceptable solution to the India-China boundary question at an early date {In diplomatese, it means that there was no progress at all, only a continuing stalemate} ,” said a statement issued by the Ministry of External Affairs post the meeting.

The MEA also highlighted that until such time the boundary issue is settled, it is critical both sides adhere to “peace and tranquility in the border areas”.{This is another confirmation that the differences on the border issue are as wide as ever and the MEA expects it to be a further long haul. It accuses China of 'disturbing peace and tranquility'. This refers to Doka La issue, naturally. From this, one can only guess that both sides stood firm on their perception, if not an exchange of tough words}

It also said that both Special Representatives also swapped ideas on various confidence building measures. However, it was not clear what exactly those measures were as the statement did not mention those.

However, sources told BusinessLine, India pushed China to establish the long pending hot-line between both the military headquarters in order to implement an effective channel of communication on the border issue.

BRI initiative

It seems that the Chinese side urged India to review its decision of boycotting the multi-billion dollar infrastructure project of ‘One Belt One Road’ (OBOR).

Sources said China also raised the issue of the 73-day long Doklam standoff that brought both countries almost on the brink of a skirmish.

However, apart from the boundary issue, both officials also discussed other bilateral issues and vowed to maintain regular contact.

“They acknowledged that as two large developing countries engaged in their national modernisation, relations between India and China transcend their bilateral dimensions and have significance for peace, stability and development of Asia and the world. Both sides also exchanged views on regional and global issues of mutual interest,” MEA said.

Later in the day, State Councillor Yang met Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with Doval.

During his meeting with the Prime Minister, Yang is believed to have expressed China’s desire to be party to the recently revived ‘Quadrilateral’ or ‘Quad’, a security and strategic grouping amongst US, Japan, Australia and India, sources said.

yensoy · Post by **yensoy** » 23 Dec 2017 08:25

The way these border meetings work is as follows - we have to keep having the meetings, possibly for the next 100 years. If we were to ever stop, the Chinese will deem that as India giving up its claims. The mechanics and outcome of each meeting is uninteresting - each one will end in a stalemate and inane press releases; however the continuation of meetings is the decider here.

DavidD · Post by **DavidD** » 23 Dec 2017 11:15

Well, you know what's gonna happen at Xinjiang. That kind of surveillance has only been around a couple of years. In a couple of decades it'll become the way of life, and in a few more decades Uighurs will at best be like the Hui and assimilate. There's certainly nothing ethical about any of it, but I suppose this is the modern replacement for the old school methods of forced assimilation, which is typically genocide + relocations e.g. Chinese with various native Chinese tribes/kingdoms and Whites with various native American tribes.

sanjaykumar · Post by **sanjaykumar** » 23 Dec 2017 11:52

That is a common Chinese argument and valid enough. You too have a right to be barbarous because there are babarians in the world. Sophisticated.

shashankk · Post by **shashankk** » 23 Dec 2017 12:46

The world is seeing the rise of a new world order with economic interdependence and cooperation amongst different nations at a level unmatched at any other instance in history. The changing dynamics have not left the Asian Continent untouched, with new, increasingly complex and multilateral relations being formed between the nations every day. The last two decades have seen the spectacular rise of China as an economic powerhouse and, in a post-Cold War world, the emergence of a new geopolitical climate.

China’s engagement with all of the neighbouring countries with respect to power projections and foreign policy is well known. Be it in the form of hostilities for pending unresolved ‘issues’, state-sponsored and private economic investments, indirect proxy wars and trying to install governments which are under her direct/indirect control.

Over the last decade, there has been a marked increase in these activities and trying to wrest control over specific nations which China has identified as strategically important. These countries overtly represent the trade routes, oil supply and sea lines of communication but covertly also enable viable replenishment and supply base for her Military especially for the PLAN (People’s Liberation Army Navy [1]). Through the direct and indirect investment of money, power, politics and military aid, China has created an astonishingly beautiful encirclement of India at various levels.

This analysis is meant to understand this encirclement (chakravyuh) and how India can fight this out. The views and opinion in this analysis are based on open sources and connecting the dots to build and analyse. Qualitatively looking at the chief issues and possible solutions let us to firmly believe that all is not lost in this big geopolitical game. The whole encirclement can be broken and restricted to what can be either a mutual benefit to India or to a position which will not threaten India over coming decades.

Chapter 1
Introduction
China has been making direct and indirect investments in Asia and African region from the early 2000s. However, in last 5 years, there has been marked an increase in its initiatives to make all these outward reaches into strategic geopolitical tools. The chief tool is shown in the picture below

Figure 1 – OBOR or One Belt, One Road initiative connecting Land and Maritime Silk roads [2]

OBOR has been represented as an economic tool [3]. It has been defined in many circles as the blueprint connecting over 60 countries accounting for 60% of the world’s population. Its collective GDP equivalent is approximated to be over one-third of the world’s wealth. The economic corridors OBOR proposes are as under

1. New Eurasian Land Bridge

2. China – Mongolia – Russia Corridor

3. China – Central Asia – West Asia Corridor

4. China – Indochina Peninsula Corridor

5. China – Pakistan Corridor

6. Bangladesh – China – India – Myanmar Corridor

These economic corridors effectively constitute the framework of the OBOR initiative beyond China’s borders

The location and structure of the corridors are shown in the map below, which also outlines the route of 21st Century Maritime Silk Road.

Figure 2 – The six economic corridors proposed under OBOR

Owing to Indian reservations and non-commitment, the whole initiative has not been fully successful. But the foundation of this whole initiative as a concept and realisation has progressed with multiple overt and covert investments in various domains.

The extent of Chinese investments has been well documented and in various fields especially infrastructure. The Figure below depicts such forecasted investments in our area of interest over next 5 years. Strikingly Beijing has been pushing its soft power status as much as possible opening up new routes of communication, access to markets and also enabling power play into the domestic political setup in most of these places.

Figure 3 Chinese Investments in 2017-21 [4]

With the above figure, the adjoining commentary [4] stated

In 14th May 2017, this year, Mr Xi pledged an additional $124 billion towards his $900 billion “Belt and Road” initiative, a global trade and infrastructure drive that he is promoting as a long-term “win-win” campaign for the 65 nations that have signed up to it. Most western leaders stayed away from a two-day summit highlighting Chinese ambition to secure greater influence, but the 28 heads of state present at what Mr Xi called “a gathering of great minds” included President Putin of Russia and President Erdogan of Turkey.

If the OBOR was just the threat owing to economic aid and strengthening China’s position by accessing more markets at reduced cost and secured lines, few analysts went ahead and declared another stratagem called String of Pearls [5]

In an article in The Washington Times dated January 17, 2005 [6], it was disclosed that

“China is building strategic relationships along the sea lanes from the Middle East to the South China Sea in ways that suggest defensive and offensive positioning to protect China’s energy interests, but also to serve broad security objectives,” said the report sponsored by the director, Net Assessment, who heads Mr. Rumsfeld’s office on future-oriented strategies.

In spite of this disclosure, officially China never uses this terminology but its recent spate of actions indicate this stratagem being used from the South China Sea to Djibouti and in between CPEC project and Gwadar development, Hambantota development in Sri Lanka, Port construction in Myanmar, Container facility in Bangladesh and even overtures to open a path to Nepal. The map below gives an accurate idea of this aspect

Figure 4 – China’s String of Pearls in the Indian Ocean. (Map Courtesy CIMSEC)

The “string of pearls” concept is often viewed a military initiative, with the aim of providing China’s navy access to a series of ports stretching from the South China Sea to the Arabian Sea. This has caused some consternation, particularly in India, which sees itself as being encircled. [7]

On July 12, 2017, when Chinese troops started moving into Djibouti for deployment into the 1st overseas base, this encirclement more or less became prominent. China’s Military and assets being deployed to secure their strategic investments causes a big headache for India from Political, Economic, Military and strategic perspectives. The game is set for a great rivalry between India and China with China already making the first move and entwining India into this chakravyuh. How India responds and what will be the best course of action going forward, this paper will analyse it in subsequent chapters.

Chapter 2
The String of Pearls
First, what is String of Pearls? The earliest definition that emerged is from July 2006 [7]

Each “pearl” in the “String of Pearls” is a nexus of Chinese geopolitical influence or military presence. An upgraded airstrip on Woody Island, located in the Paracel archipelago 300 nautical miles east of Vietnam, is a “pearl.” A container shipping facility in Chittagong, Bangladesh, is a “pearl.” Construction of a deepwater port in Sittwe, Myanmar, is a “pearl,” as is the construction of a navy base in Gwadar, Pakistan.Port and airfield construction projects, diplomatic ties, and force modernization form the essence of China’s “String of Pearls.” The “pearls” extend from the coast of mainland China through the littorals of the South China Sea, the Strait of Malacca, across the Indian Ocean, and on to the littorals of the Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf. China is building strategic relationships and developing a capability to establish a forward presence along the sea lines of communication (SLOCs) that connect China to the Middle East

Figure – 5 – Sea Lines of Communication (SLOC) for China

The whole ruse of economic development for friendly nation followed by protecting such investments via Military deployment is the outcome of this strategy. The overt need of finding market accessibility, the resolute case of demonstrating growing financial might and increasing the geopolitical influences seems to be the key motivating factors for the peaceful nature of these pearl formations. The pretext got further strengthened by the Somali pirates causing harm to the SLOCs.

Figure 6 – Somalian Piracy – Threat map – 2005-2010 [8]

Connecting the figure 6 with figure 4 now reveals how the anti-piracy and protecting the SLOCs became paramount to the military aspect of the strategy. Unfortunately, the dual use aspect of the infrastructure build-up may enable China to use her men, planes, ships and submarines with vital capabilities to choke the whole of Indian SLOCs as well.

The resulted base in Djibouti, Gwadar and many more places where a submarine can berth for supply replenishment is not just for anti-piracy measures but rather increasing the militarization aspect and controlling the rivals whom China considers as a threat for herself. These SLOCs common to both India and China also houses the largest route of Oil supply for the major part of the world. Busiest to the core, this corridor serves as nationally important aspect for multiple nations and this provide China with additional ammunition to either gain more geopolitical respect or to create choke points which can create issues and even cripple the adversaries. The usage of proxy elements as pirates to continuously harass a group of particular shipping lanes and countries dependent on it can become a big tool as well. Especially with the fact that China shares the highest number of border disputes and it has maintained an aggressive posture in claiming such disputed lands as their own and even going to the extent of putting military assets to protect the same.

Chapter 3
India’s geopolitical issues with String of Pearls
Rear Admiral K Raja Menon (Retd) has summed it up as the following areas of geopolitical concern for India wrt the string of pearls [9]

Figure 7 – Areas of geopolitical concern

If we see this figure, it is easier to understand that both India and China basically square off and have no advantage over the whole area of concern. For India one side its the high mountains in the East, Planes in the West and Sea in the South. Each of the places with distinct advantages and disadvantages. For China, the whole of IOR is a long distance away from mainland requiring a formidable Blue Water Fleet to actually protect it. The Tibetan region dispute is well known for both India and China and thus it remains a status quo. The movement if it happens deep inside Myanmar literally will also stretch their supply line. The Myanmar government in spite of Chinese overtures also wishes to be in good books with India for the road and connecting infrastructure enabling it to have land transit routes too. Thus all types of chess games as of now basically point to a draw status.

The change in the strategic strength happens via fundamental instability of Pakistan and China’s huge investment in CPEC or China Pakistan Economic Corridor. [10] Over the last few years slowly the Chinese investments and buying of Stakes in Pakistani State Enterprise mean there is a dramatic increase in controlling form over Pakistan. With the further extent of military cooperation, assets being supplied with long-term loans and establishment of proxies to control state machinery, China’s control and changeover of Pakistan into its own province or vassal state is almost complete. The issue of proxy elements is already well known with the usage of terror proxies and aiding them with arms and financial aid in North East India. With the radicalised religion based proxies in Chinese hands, there seems a greater stability-instability paradox. On the side it keeps India engaged with constant de-stabilisation aspects and on the other side, the same radicalised elements can also cause a religion based extremism elemental increase in Chinese provinces closer to Pakistan. The extent of the fallout from such a situation is a worrisome factor and coupled with mainstreaming the terror elements into the political front to gain legitimacy and recognition points to a grave concern. On one side the Chinese investments and underlying security make its investments very much secured yet they further went ahead and ensured the income generated via this whole project, trade increase and even transport plus transit benefit China far greater than Pakistan. This implies over time, there will be a deep grudge built up which can be exploited by radicals and can unite all under the name of one religion to fight against this oppressive stance of China. This will throw the whole Western Border of India and the adjoining geopolitical concern into chaos and possibly lead to Syria 2.0 scenario all over again.

The other area of concern is the Middle East. The house of almost all problems exists as of today in spite of Oil being the largest resource allowing them to manipulate the whole world economy as per their whims. Yet there is Saudi Arabia Qatar issue, Iran hotbed, Syria- ISIS, Turkey NATO to and fro stances, Israel-Palestine, Hizbollah-Hamas, Nuclear Weapon and continuous quest for an Islamic Bomb under their control – the list is pretty long. The illegal trading and proliferation of Oil and changing the small guidelines to hurt Import dependent economy like India is a big risk. The challenge for India is that each side will insist on a mutually beneficial relationship with India but also insist on differentiating between their own friendly and enemy nations wrt to India’s relationship. As India is dependent on ME for Oil, our stance and our strategies have to be very careful of this aspect.

Other potential areas of concern include the identifying more such Pearls in

Bangladesh: A container port facility at Chittagong is coupled with extensive Naval and Commercial Access. Bangladesh reliance on Chinese military assets like submarines via soft loans is a step in that direction. In total for over 34 projects, a sum of USD 25 Billion has been committed by China. [11] The challenge for a growing economy like Bangladesh is soft loans help in creating less stress over any commercial loans which may have stringent terms and a higher rate of interest. Smartly, China has been trying to convert such loans into commercial loans and trying to make Bangladesh default like in the case of Sri Lanka, it wishes to use the secured assets as a way of consolidating its hold once the default occurs. Dhaka has been resisting this attempt knowing well the fate of Hambantota port and China taking it fully for failing to repay the debt and thereby buying it to square that loan off from its books.

Nepal: The India-Nepal relationship has seen several ups and downs but last few years have seen possibly multiple bottoms. With the sharing of culture and majority religion same like India, the differences emanating between Kathmandu and New Delhi are very surprising. Chiefly these issues have been taken advantage by lack of communication and strategic compromises to find a middle path to solve the challenging issues. China had made several in-roads into Nepal by taking advantage of these discomforts and had fuelled up the anti-India stance even more. The last few issues of rights of Madhesi people, access to fuel & Oil and basic transport routes, the communication and internet access for local Nepalese people had only created a bigger divide which China took full advantage by providing quick telecommunication and broadband coverage, maintaining neutral stance for ethnic group’s rights and even trying to open a new path for transport via Friendship Highway. This coupled with quick rehabilitation and aid when the earthquake struck Nepal helped China consolidate its position in the minds and heart of Nepalese people.

Figure 8 – Map of the Friendship Highway – Kathmandu to Lhasa [12]

With China in Nov 2017 taking the cross-border railway plan very seriously [13], this implies Nepal will rely greater on China and any adverse relationship impact is easily offset by Nepal Chinese communication and accessibility. Nepal thus gains a route via OBOR easily and looks at OBOR for its own survival and directly plays into the hands of the waiting China who will use Nepal then easily to open another front wrt India. In Nepal investment summit 2017 held in Kathmandu, India committed USD 317 million while China proposed to invest USD 8.3 billion. Such is the stark difference in the financial aid that Indian strategy in Nepal needs urgent attention and smart play to maintain some control and protect India’s interest.

Bhutan: India and Bhutan share a special relationship over decades. Here also China has attempted to try its level best to meddle in some manner. With the redrafted 2007 India-Bhutan friendship treaty, Bhutan has slowly got the right to follow an independent foreign policy. China has tried to showcase its economic muscle here also with an open carrot of a huge economic package in case Bhutan agrees to settle all disputes bilaterally with China and not involve India with whom Bhutan is committed via Friendship treaty. The recent Doklam crisis was a tussle due to these overtures only with China-Bhutan border disputes in 3 different pockets out of which Doklam is strategically most important from India’s perspective. China has offered to relinquish its claim over two pockets in northern Bhutan in exchange for the Doklam pocket in the western Bhutan, where Indian and Chinese armies were engaged in eyeball encounter. India is the security provider for Bhutan had to step in to safeguard both Bhutan’s sovereignty and India’s security. The flared up issue had been solved by the peaceful climb down from both China and India but this dispute, in reality, is far from being solved. This will be a potential point of crisis over time and will need adequate attention from India’s perspective.

Myanmar: India-Myanmar relationship has been healthy for a long time but the government has always been closer to China than India. In spite of turning democratic, the elections have not been fair and elected candidates always are by the support of China overtly or covertly. Primarily a commodity resource-rich country, China has invested huge sums in Myanmar in infrastructure and mining in last 3 decades. One of the controversial projects is the port development of Kyauk Pyu port in Bay of Bengal with an estimated Chinese investment of USD 7.3 billion. With China having, by all means, a controlling stake of over 75%, this is a very big threat to India. With Chinese arms and military assets, Myanmar is dependent completely on China for its survival. This port will see subsequently berthing of Chinese nuclear submarines and with electronic intelligence gathering facilities on islands in the Bay of Bengal and near the Strait of Malacca, this makes it a grave risk for India.

Sri Lanka: The island nation had been in a stable relationship with India until the IPKF movement and subsequent Tamil Eelam issues which ate up almost decades of time and gave an opportunity for outside nations to use Sri Lanka as a political tool to counter India. Sri Lanka owes almost USD 8 bn to China and that is estimated to be approximately 12%+ of its overall debt. These loans are commercial in nature and hence attract a significant rate of interest. These loan based projects and the port opened for commercial purpose 7 years ago had generated limited revenues and hence Sri Lanka has struggled to repay its due. In 2016, Sri made a deal to sell an 80 percent stake in the port to the state-controlled China Merchants Port Holdings. With vociferous protests from all sides, in July 2017, the deal was amended to give Chinese company 70 percent stake in a joint venture with Sri Lanka Ports Authority owned by Sri Lankan government.

Figure 9 – Hambantota location on a map

This December Sri Lanka has formally handed over its southern port of Hambantota to China on a 99-year lease, which government critics have denounced as an erosion of the country’s sovereignty. [14] The Sri Lankan government has given assurances that the port will not be used for military ends. Despite Sri Lankan assurances, Indian observers express concerns that Beijing could operationalize Hambantota as a resupply node for the People’s Liberation Army-Navy in the future. [15]

Maldives: India-Maldives shared a healthy relationship for a good amount of time till there was a change in regime which is very much pro-China. China via way of economic subsidies for tourism market has controlled the local government’s major source of revenue. With the cancellation of GMR building the infrastructure project and giving it out finally to a Chinese company, the shift was more or less made public. Last year, China acquired an uninhabited island near Maldives capital Male on a 50-year-lease at the cost of USD 4 million. Some reports claimed that Chinese will build a military infrastructure

More at : http://www.strategicfront.org/chinas-st ... hakravyuh/

DavidD · Post by **DavidD** » 23 Dec 2017 13:55

sanjaykumar wrote:That is a common Chinese argument and valid enough. You too have a right to be barbarous because there are babarians in the world. Sophisticated.

The world is a barbarous place, and people are barbaric. We like to think we've become more civilized through the millennia, but really we're just barbarous in a different way. No doubt the whites thought they were so civilized compared to their ancestors and the natives they slaughtered, and no doubt in a few hundred years people will look back at us and think how barbaric we were as well, but they'll just be barbaric in their own ways.

chetak · Post by **chetak** » 23 Dec 2017 17:30

@shashankk ji

There are some other initiatives in the region too. The hans were/are keen to grab the doklam area and maybe break through the chicken neck stretch to isolate/separate India's NE including arunachal so as to link up with a yet to be constructed deep sea port in beedi land by building a new deep-sea port at Sonadia thus cleaving a pathway to the IOR from the under developed China’s Yunnan province.

Japan and the US seem to have been serious contenders for this new deep sea port and japan won out by providing an alternate to the han project. The US has been looking for a naval base in this region for decades now when they first made a proposal for vishakapatnam to India.

"In 2014, Japan came up with a proposal for a project at Matarbari, 25 km from Sonadia, which would include not only a deep-seat port but four coal-fired power plants and an LNG terminal. It offered to provide 80 percent of the funding for the $4.6 billion port on easy terms." thus spiking the hans thrust into the IOR via sonadia. They already have chittagong for commerce but that is a over crowded, shallow port unable to accommodate large container vessels.

Also a new game seems to be afoot with the OIC and other jehadi groups looking at how to partition myanmar to give the rohingyas their own "homeland" and also simultaneously queer the pitch for India in cashmere.

Is there now to be an islamic "east timor" strategy in myanmar?? India will have to step in decisively to pre-empt this budding project.

The beedis are not all what they seem and there are enough of them untraceable in India to cause real damage, if push came to shove but a purely rohingya state with contiguous borders with the beedis will be an existential threat to them as well as us as long we have a stupid govt in WB.

The entire region, WB + NE has the potential of turning into another lebanon, becoming a plaything for the ISI as well as the hans

Prasad · Post by **Prasad** » 23 Dec 2017 17:44

Prasad wrote:Not specific but an overview -
PLA to make strides in new era

Looks like drone delivery with C2 from fighters & new bomber are among things to watch out for.

Some boasting in there sure, but they're going at military strengthening with a bloody-mindedness nobody else is doing. And they're pretty sure of their mil strength dovetailing into diplomatic strength. Tone regarding Doklam seems to indicate that they'll come back hard for sure next summer once they finish building up their current positions until then.

Peregrine · Post by **Peregrine** » 24 Dec 2017 00:31

British archive reveals 10,000 were killed in China's 1989 Tiananmen crackdown

BEIJING: At least 10,000 people were killed in the Chinese army’s crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square in June 1989, according to a newly released British secret diplomatic cable that gives gruesome details of the bloodshed in Beijing.

“Minimum estimate of civilian dead 10,000,” the then British ambassador Alan Donald said in a telegram to London.

The document, made public more than 28 years after the event, was seen by AFP at Britain’s National Archives.

The estimate, given on June 5, 1989, the day after the crackdown, is almost 10 times higher than estimates commonly accepted at the time, which generally reported a toll ranging from several hundred to more than a thousand dead.

But French sinologist Jean-Pierre Cabestan said the British figure was credible, pointing out that recently declassified US documents gave a similar assessment.

“That’s two pretty independent sources which say the same thing,” said Cabestan, a professor at Hong Kong Baptist University.

The British ambassador’s report was “not particularly astonishing considering how crowded it was in Beijing, the number of people mobilised” against the Chinese government, said Cabestan, who was in the Chinese capital in the days leading up to the crackdown.

Donald’s account gave horrific details of the violence unleashed on the night of June 3-4 when the army entered Beijing to end seven weeks of protests on Tiananmen Square, the symbolic heart of Communist power.

During their advance, armoured personnel carriers “opened fire on the crowd (both civilians and soldiers) before running over them in their APCs,” wrote the ambassador, who said his source was a person who “was passing on information given him by a close friend who is currently a member of the State Council”, the Chinese cabinet.

Once the soldiers arrived in Tiananmen Square, “students understood they were given one hour to leave square but after five minutes APCs attacked,” Donald wrote.

“Students linked arms but were mown down including soldiers. APCs then ran over bodies time and time again to make ‘pie’ and remains collected by bulldozer. Remains incinerated and then hosed down drains.”

At the end of June 1989, the Chinese government had said suppression of the “counterrevolutionary riots” had killed 200 civilians and several dozen police and military.

Nearly three decades after the crackdown, the communist regime continues to forbid any debate on the subject, mention of which is banned from textbooks and the media, and censored on the Internet.

Cheers