Managing Chinese Threat

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 18 Sep 2010 01:06

A map I found in a blog: The southasianidea at wordpress by Nanni Kapoor.

Its from the Economist.

Rupesh · Post by **Rupesh** » 18 Sep 2010 01:38

NEW DELHI: The Chinese 'string of pearls' could well choke India one day if it's not careful. After strategic projects in Myanmar, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, China is moving closer to establishing a direct rail-road link to Bangladesh's port city of Chittagong as well as in helping construct the Sonadia deep-sea port at Cox's Bazaar.

China-watchers in the Indian security establishment say there has been "a flurry of activity" between Beijing and Dhaka on the two projects over the last couple of months.

Late last month, for instance, China's Yunnan province governor Qin Guangrong met Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina to promise all support for the proposed 111-km-long road-rail link between the two countries, with Beijing keen to sew up the agreement with Dhaka as soon as possible.

The project envisages connecting Chittagong with Yunnan province, via Myanmar, with the link distance measuring a mere 111 km. China has already roped in Myanmar for the tri-lateral project, which will help reduce its huge dependence on the global trade route through the Malacca Strait.

"China already has transit facilities through the Chittagong port, apart from commercial interests. A strong Chinese presence in Chittagong is bound to have security implications for India. It is, after all, our strategic backyard," said a senior official.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 18 Sep 2010 01:54

More than string pearls it looks like make India an island! or in complex variables to draw a zero round India to cut off the access.

Bade · Post by **Bade** » 18 Sep 2010 01:59

See even the flooded, below sea level land of Bangladesh is important, and we had visionaries even on BR (forget the DDM) write off that part of Indic sphere as not worth our time. There is a lot of bad Karma on India's side, that is unfolding.

surinder · Post by **surinder** » 18 Sep 2010 03:28

Bade wrote:There is a lot of bad Karma on India's side, that is unfolding.

What bad karma, Bade Mian?

surinder · Post by **surinder** » 18 Sep 2010 03:40

ramana wrote:Surinder,
I think UPA-2 has had its 1962 moment without firing a shot. And we haven't realised it all. People are arguing whether PRC is threat or which Indian political partynot in power is to blame.

Ramana,
Sad, but true. What a way to begin the weekend.

No defeat (like no victory) is a single-shot sudden unexpected event. It is usually is always a series of many poor defeatist decisions and actions that lead to defeat. PRC has been making incursions for a long time (UPA denied it for public). Then there were the absurd claimes on Arunachal for years (UPA promptly aggreed to negotiate ... there only claim to defiance was that setled areas would not be negotiated. Well one fine day, the PRC minister lambasted the shocked Indian team of that idea too). Then there was nuclear deal of PRC-TSP (UPA kept quiet).

This is a govt. that has spent enormous efforts in wooing every votebank politics and withdrawing from the international arena. The basic dealings with TSP have become a joke: Sharm-al-sheikh; Baloochistan statement; Havana statement (Joint Anti-atankr mechanism with the world's biggest atankvaaadis); aman-ki-aasha.

Next year will be the 40 year anniversary of the 1971 war, and the following year will be the anniversary of the 1962 war. Two years after that will the anniversary of 1974 tests. We can only imagine what the celebrations wil be. Anyone want to take a bet that BD war celebration will be subdued and low-key?

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 18 Sep 2010 03:40

surinder wrote:
Bade wrote:There is a lot of bad Karma on India's side, that is unfolding.
What bad karma, Bade Mian?

Selecting, electing Tamas leadership , void of Rajogun and free roaming of PS 'southasian " pimps as well feeding milk to snakes.

Karna_A · Post by **Karna_A** » 18 Sep 2010 04:36

Rupesh wrote:China eyes rail link to Chittagong

The way to handle China is by raising the issue of Xinjiang every time China needles Kashmir or AP. Raise the issue in OIC of treatment of innocent muslims in Xinjiang and how China is not allowing Kashmiri muslims to travel their historical silk road to Xinjiang by stapling their visas. Try to get TSP and BD, apart from OIC and OPEC help in this issue.
Covert help to Tibetans and overt help to Xinjiang is the Chanikiyan way that can and will confuse Confucius.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 18 Sep 2010 13:51

As we do not have a separate thread for Taiwan, and one reason why Taiwan is relevant to India, is for the role it can play in managing the threat emanating from PRC, I guess, this thread is the default Taiwan Thread as well.

If we want to avail of Taiwanese support in our efforts to contain the threat from PRC, we could try to understand the Taiwanese better. Following is a good treatise by Jiang Yi-huah on the questions of identity in general and how it manifests itself within Taiwan. We also needs to understand at the solutions proposed by China to establish its national identity - the Zhonghua Minzu. Without understanding these, we can also not exploit these either.

A Paper by Jiang Yi-huah
Department of Political Science
National Taiwan University
Is Taiwan a Nation? On the Current Debate over Taiwanese Nationalism and National Identity (pdf)

@Arihant

This would be of special interest to you.

Pratyush · Post by **Pratyush** » 18 Sep 2010 16:42

RajeshA wrote:
A State which sees itself under threat starts to prepare for war. Where is our preparation?

The problem is not that there is threat, it is also not that it is not appreciated. It is that the leadership has accepted defeat without any shot being fired by the enemy.

Take a good hard long look at the near abroad. You will see that the Indian influence is nearly gone. Not only that where the influence remains the leadership is doing all it can to loose it. As if burying their heads in the sand will make our problems go away.

The modernisation of armed forces appears to be a joke at the moment. The economic development is stalled by the greens and the reds. With the Yuvraj playing to reds.

Ships taking almost 10 years to comission is common. Subs lets not go there. Jets MRCA when? 155 MM arty heaven only knows. All the vital military tools are in short supply. Pleople will try to reassure that we can kick the PRC when we want. Perhaps so, but guys quantity has a quality of its own. We are lacking in quantity in nearly all major military tools that will make a diffrence in a major shooting war.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 18 Sep 2010 21:31

The reason why there's no Taiwan thread is that there's not sufficient interest driving one. Every once in a while a group of people start saying 'lets cozy up to Taiwan and get back at PRC', but beyond that, there's little depth, substance or interest. That is not enough.

From a moderators perspective, such a spur of the moment thread is doomed to die a slow death. It takes a dedicated group of posters, with at least a few having some degree of familiarity with the Chinese language, to for a more in depth analysis of either PRC or Taiwan. Frankly, most of this forum is more interested in TSP, though they're comparatively a nuisance value and cats paw, as we keep getting more economically and militarily powerful.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 18 Sep 2010 21:55

X-Posted from Future Strategic Scenario for the Indian Subcontinent -II Thread

Chinks in the Middle Kingdom

The Middle Kingdom has 4 main pillars

National Consolidation under One Identity and One State Authority
Strong Centralization of Political Authority
Economic, Technological and Military Strength
Pro-Active and Aggressive Foreign Policy & Neutralization of Rivals

National Consolidation under One Identity and One State Authority

Over the next decades more and more the people of the Indian Subcontinent would have to face the geographical and political implications of the Chinese National Identity Building Project - the Zhonghua Minzu.

This project tries to explain how different ethnicities within PRC are all Chinese, i.e. a China which has been dominated by an ethnic core of Han Chinese are now spreading the umbrella of this identity over all the ethnicities within PRC. This they have managed to do by establishing one National Language, one Script, one History, controlled Employment Market, hierarchical Political Structure, etc. On the basis of this political ideology, the Chinese are building the PRC nation. This model also demands that the 'ethnic core' not be fragmented. Every concentric circle starting from the 'ethnic core' has to be complete and consolidated.

That is one reason why the Chinese have insisted that all their enclaves under foreign domination be brought under Chinese sovereignty - Hong Kong, Macau and especially Taiwan.

One should ask why the Chinese are so adamant that Taiwan not change its name nor declare independence. As long as Taiwan keeps the name and remains true to the 'One China Policy', Republic of China (Taiwan) would be considered an ideological difference within the 'single Chinese nationhood', that needs repairing. If Taiwan really declares independence, then the whole model of Zhonghua Minzu comes crashing down.

The whole model of Zhonghua Minzu is built on two premises

that all people on the land of the Middle Kingdom are Chinese
that all such Chinese must live under the same state authority

If Taiwan declares independence it would be mean that either not all the people in the land of the Middle Kingdom are Chinese - they can for example be Taiwanese (a separate national identity) or even if they are ethnically Chinese from the land of the Middle Kingdom, they can have their own state. That means Xinjiang, Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria can all go their own separate ways, if they don't consider themselves as Chinese, or any group of people, either Manchu, Mongolian, Tibetan, Uyghur, Sui, or Han Chinese from some Province can decide to establish their own state with a different political system and authority. THAT would be the end of China. That is why China has been so adamant about Taiwan and has proceeded to thwart its independence.

So the fundamental ideology of the Chinese Political Elite is 'Zhonghua Minzu' - 'The Great People of China'. Communism was simply a slogan, an instrument to achieve the unity of China and establish a new central authority.

With the core consolidated, the Chinese would embark on a renewed passion to spread the color of the 'ethnic core' to the outlying concentric circles of various ethnicities - the Manchus, the Sui, the Tibetans, the Mongols, the Uyghurs, etc. That is also a reason why China is insisting on retaking Arunachal Pradesh especially Tawang. The whole concentric circle of Tibetans must lie within Zhonghua Minzu for it to be colored by the 'ethnic core' most easily. The Dalai Lama is a very big thorn in the side of the Chinese simply because he threatens the basis of Zhonghua Minzu. Zhonghua Minzu does it envisage this amount of autonomy for any ethnicity, that its resists the 'ethnic core's' continuous assimilating pull. That is why the CPC, 'the inner core', is trying to get the other fragments of the 'ethnic core', the Han Chinese in Singapore, to accept China's nominee for Panchen Lama.

This project has been going on for some time. Once the concentric circle of Tibetans is assimilated into the inner circle, the Chinese would, I am sure, proceed to other people in the region as well. If Tibetans can belong to the Chinese, then why not Burmese, or Laotian, or Vietnamese? If the Uyghurs can be Chinese, then why not the Kazakhs, the Kirghiz, the Uzbeks? If some Mongolians can be Chinese, then why not all Mongolians? It is this expansionist drive of PRC, which one day would cause China to claim the whole of our North-East. Then Assamese, Nagas, Mizos, Manipuris would all be claimed as Chinese people and be brought under Chinese rule.

The Chinese have employed strong tactics to impose the ideology of 'Zhonghua Minzu' over the Manchus, Sui, Mongols, Koreans, Tibetans, Uyghurs, and Taiwanese. There are still lot of chinks in the Middle Kingdom.

China has gone ahead and tried very hard to neutralize India. If India wants survive as a nation and a power, it would need to exploit all the chinks it can see in China's armor. Of course, the dragon spouts fire here and there to warn all others not to take too many liberties, but these should be ignored and one should proceed to question the fundamentals of Chinese nationhood.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 18 Sep 2010 21:59

PRC is like a tsunami from Delhi perspective. So no point in standing in its way. It too shall pass if we keep our India together. The key is to stop the insurgencies and hang on.

Jarita · Post by **Jarita** » 18 Sep 2010 22:20

As per Swamy and a couple of other folks in positions of power India truly has a Manchurian cnadidate in Sonia since 1995. It appears that she shifted allegiances to China after Russia not longer needed her/sustained her.
She has been at the forefront of all the ore deals signed with China where our ironore exports are sold at dirt cheap rates to enable china to make infrastucture against us.
Rumour has it that she has been aware of Chinese moves for long if not facilitated them.

<<The above are not my opinions but based on input from folks from some political parties and Subramaium Swamy>>

Klaus · Post by **Klaus** » 18 Sep 2010 22:33

^^^ So according to this source, raw has been giving info to GOI about pla presence in G-B (after all it is not a recent development) and this info has gone up to the highest echelons but nothing has been done about it, also the info has been largely suppressed from aam abdul. It is only Sellig Harrison article which has blown the lid off this hush-hush affair. Probably, upa-1 and upa-2 decided that we are anyway selling ore to dragon and we are lazy to go explore and mine in G-B, so let the Chinese themselves come in and mine it off.

Maybe some money coming in from black/hawala sources as payment from Chinese for this "memorandum of understanding".

Nihat · Post by **Nihat** » 19 Sep 2010 00:44

Maybe its just me but I think the even though the threat from China is very real, the paranoia of certain members to the current and evolving situation wrt PRC has been touching new heights.

For one, how does Chinese Army moving into GB in POK imply that India will soon Loose its own Kashmir region. If anything, a permanent Chinese presence in POK is a big risk for them, given the proximity to Xinjiang. It is entirely possible that the International Jihadis of Paki type will not take kindly to this development and may percieve them as oppresive occupiers and suppresers of Muslim brothers.

Someone also mentioned the slack pace of India's military mordenization wrt to China. I wonder what else india can do apart from what it is already doing, without harming ourselves. A lot has been done and continues to be done to counter Chinese military capabilities, for more on it, anyone can view the excellent analysis posted on the Intelligence gathering thread in military forum.

Then there is the reactive Indian Foreign policy and so called string of pearls which china is building. Our recent engagements with Bangladesh,Myanmar, South Korea and Japan are there for everyone to see and as for countering Gwadar, we always have the option of ramping up assistance to Iran on Chabahar port. The chinese are building ports and pipelines to remove the chokepoint of Malacca in IOR which they recognize is under increasing threat from a Indian Navy which is mordernizing very quickly. So it is but natural that they will build alternate supply routes so that India has lesser leaverage over them.

Straights of Malacca will continue to be a big choke point in the future and India recognizes this very well, it's importance to PRC economy is immense as it connects China to Middle East, Iran and Africa which are all vital energy sources needed to power the ever so hungry Chinese economy.

GoI is treating Chinese the right way IMHO, there is a lot of uppari pappi-jhappi in the form of cultural exchanges, similar economic agenda, co-op on world stage etc but the fact that India remains deeply suspect of the Chinese Intentions on the inside and cotinues to build active deterrance overtly is a good sign for the future.

Few posts back I think it was Shiv Saar who said that roughly 10 years back there was similar paranoia wrt to developments in TSP and how India should react but over the period of time, they have been reduced to a laughing stock for us. Now, I don't suppose the Chinese will become a laughing stock anytime soon but one thing that will happen over the next decade is that our percieved Inferiority complex and sense of insecurity wrt to China will gradually vanish.

sanjaykumar · Post by **sanjaykumar** » 19 Sep 2010 02:22

Yes India is an impotent, bumbling state and the Chinese are going to annex Balwaristan with India not even wailing about it.

(Or perhaps it is East Pakistan 1969).

Karan Dixit · Post by **Karan Dixit** » 19 Sep 2010 02:23

I have been opposing the sale of Indian steel to China for a very long time but alas no one listens to me.

Dhiman · Post by **Dhiman** » 19 Sep 2010 06:25

Nihat wrote: Few posts back I think it was Shiv Saar who said that roughly 10 years back there was similar paranoia wrt to developments in TSP and how India should react but over the period of time, they have been reduced to a laughing stock for us. Now, I don't suppose the Chinese will become a laughing stock anytime soon but one thing that will happen over the next decade is that our percieved Inferiority complex and sense of insecurity wrt to China will gradually vanish.

The problem with Pakistan is that its leaders don't have the courage to make course correction even when laws of nature require doing so. The problem with India is that our leaders will make painful course correction ONLY when laws of nature require us to do so instead of making a less painful course correction when the writing is on the wall. To deal with China we will have to take a bit more proactive course by ejecting our pacifist foreign policy while making sure that the economy is on right track.

RamaY · Post by **RamaY** » 19 Sep 2010 06:38

This lose of heart from Indics???

Brothers! Life of India is too vast to be undermined by UPA-I or UPA-II. The bad karma is that people put more emphasis on so-called e-con-omic progress than on national values and security.

Now that personal loyaltees are well defined on the forum, we can clearly see individual posts/psy-ops. Let us focus on the key national interest areas and let truth trimph...

Dhiman · Post by **Dhiman** » 19 Sep 2010 08:40

Sino-Indian Rivalry Heating Up
By Balaji Chandramohan
From http://atlanticsentinel.com/2010/09/sin ... eating-up/

The two Asian giants are gearing up for a showdown almost similar to that of the Cold War. China and India are growing at an incredible pace and with Western influence fading, both are increasingly gaining footholds in distant corners of the world through bilateral trade, investment and security relations.

In this classic greater power rivalry, China intends to keep India’s ambitions at bay by denying permission, for instance, to a lieutenant general posted in Jammu and Kashmir to visit China. The officer was planning to travel abroad in August of this year to attend a high level defense exchange between the countries.

Policy makers in New Delhi meanwhile are fretting about reports that 7,000 to 11,000 Chinese troops may be present in or near the city of Gilgit in Pakistani occupied Kashmir. The Government of India is attempting to verify these rumors which Pakistan’s envoy to Beijing has persistently denied.

Supposedly, the Chinese soldiers in Gilgit-Baltistan are to work on the construction of railroads as well as the extension of the Karakoram Highway. Such infrastructure projects could connect China more directly with Afghanistan and beyond; parts of the world which the resource hungry Chinese economy is anxious to reach.

Other reports indicate that the commander of the militant United Liberation Front of Assam in northeast India, Paresh Baruah, has received a six month visa to visit China. In response to what appears to a posturing more aggressive than usual, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh summoned a meeting of the Cabinet Committee of Security in Delhi. India’s ambassador to Beijing, S. Jaishankar briefed the committee on the current state of India-China relations during which the prime minister is supposed to have bursted that China intends to keep India at a “low level equilibrium.”

With the United States’ newfound policy of strategic reassurance evidently failing and the current administration unwilling to contain China, Beijing appears to have decided that it can have a free go throughout the world. To make that happen, it first has to establish a firm foothold in its own region from where to spread its “sphere of interest” to Africa and Latin America.

India challenges China’s predominance in South and East Asia. With a population of more than one billion, an economy that is rapidly expanding, a workforce that is likely to remain vast for generations to come and a subtle latent power, India is as much as Asian superpower as China is. What’s more, India is a natural leader in the geopolitics of South Asia and it has amplified its influence in the east in recent years. Countries as Japan and South Korea, searching for active strategic partnerships, are ready to cooperate with India.

Beyond the region, India has promoted diplomatic and economic ties within both the Indo-African Business Forum and the Pacific Islands Forum. It is engaging expatriates in service of India’s interests; the Indo-US civilian nuclear agreement of 2005 probably wouldn’t have happened without the active lobbying of Indian Americans. This has pushed India to initiate a “forward policy” in its foreign relations.

Beijing has been irritated with this relatively new activity from India’s side. It understands that in order to clip the wings of spreading India, it has to box it in in South Asia first. That is why China continues to support Pakistan. With India distracted in the west, China can quickly gain influence in the east.

On the whole, India hasn’t been similarly proactive in attempting to counterbalance China’s rise. Part of the reason is that the political class in India is not too concerned with international relations. Foreign policy finds very little emphasis in the contours of day to day politics in New Delhi. Manmohan Singh has been something of an exception but even his statesmanship cannot prevent the system from largely looking inward.

Iran is a case in point. While the United States were trying to engage with Iran, in part through China, India, a traditional Iranian ally, was left in the dark.

With India’s politicos largely indifferent or incompetent in the realm of foreign relations, the military has assumed responsibility for a significant chunk of the country’s external policy. It is understood that China and India are both continental as well as naval powers. In order to challenge China’s “string of pearls” strategy, India is developing a naval diplomacy of its own.

Evidence of China’s intentions can be seen in Sri Lanka where it is constructing a deep water port in the once sleepy fishing town of Hambantota, as well as in Pakistan, where it developed the Gwadar harbor. China is also courting the littoral states in the Indian Ocean including the Maldives, Mauritius and the Seychelles and has helped them with funds to boost their economy. In return, China expect to build more bases.

India, on the other hand, is regularly dispatching naval officers to these countries to participate in exchanges. It is also helping the Maldives in establishing a network of radars that will benefit the island nation which does not have a navy of its own.

The Sino-Indian rivalry is the story of the first part of the twenty-first century much like the rivalry between Germany and the United Kingdom defined the first half of the twentieth. As John Mearsheimer explained in The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (2001), “Great powers behave aggressively not because they want to or because they possess some inner drive to dominate, but because they have to seek more power if they want to maximize their odds of survival.” Such realism has dictated China’s conduct on the world stage for decades.

India’s foreign policy by contrast has always flirted with moralistic notions. Only with the start of this century did it appreciate the importance of realpolitik. India’s politicians are well trained in this regard when it comes to domestic affairs. Now they need to show similar genius in the field of international relations. If they can, India may stand up to China’s rapid ascend.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 19 Sep 2010 09:54

I am simultaneously amused and irritated by the wails of distress about China on here and the calls for arming to defeat China in the naive calculation that a war with China will show them their place and solidify India's place in the order of things as they should be.

Once again let me point out that when King Arthur was out fighting baddies his trusted knight Sir Lancelot was doing hukku-pukku on Arthur's wife Queen Genevieve.

India is King Arthur. China is the baddies. USA is Sir Lancelot who gets to have the most fun. I don't think people have any idea of the USA's strategy when we fall on the floor and roll with inconsolable grief about our status vis vis China. We should be crying doubly hard when we see the role of the US. Like the man who slept while the town was burning and woke up when his house caught fire - we are suddenly waking up to China without any insight into what has been happening in our neighborhood before China.

It was the USA that wanted to suck up to China in order to defeat the Soviet Union. A USA that was stuck in a pointless war in Vietnam with Nixon as President and Kissinger as Secretary of State struck upon th eidea of befriending China. The key, the condom for lifting the "bamboo curtain" and entering China was Pakistan's Gen Yahya Khan who later helped start the 1971 war.

And so, during the 1971 war it was

The USA that encouraged China to put pressure on India by mobilizing troops at the border (which China did not do in 1971)
The USA (Nixon) who said that he did not want any pressure to be put on Yahya Khan because he was a key figure in detente with China

Later it was the USA under the Carter and Reagan administrations who

Looked the other way when China transferred enriched Uranium and bombs to Pakistan
A US President refused to speak up in Congress that Pakistan was making a bomb
Ronald Reagan who spoke of "Freedom Fighters" in Kashmir in the same breath as the Taliban in Afghanistan

The China Pakistan relationship is old. It started after the 1965 war at which time the US had put sanctions on Pakistan and went from strength to strength. But the US has gained from that relationship.

If we make war against China deliberately - it is our economy that will suffer. If we don't make war - China will go about its business making friends and allies. If we cannot do the former, we cannot stop the latter. All that we can do is what is feasible and does the least damage to us in the short term and long term. We are starting with a handicap. We are starting from a position where the two most powerful powers in the world are supporting a country that is using Islam to hate India. In the long term we have to neutralise both the US and China.

Pakistan's failing status may give us the best opportunity to get Pakistanis to integrate their economy with the Indian economy. But that requires the defeat of the Pakistani army first. And not necessarily militarily. It is the akistani army that is supporting Chinese and US interests in the region and against India.

vera_k · Post by **vera_k** » 19 Sep 2010 11:42

Nihat wrote:For one, how does Chinese Army moving into GB in POK imply that India will soon Loose its own Kashmir region. If anything, a permanent Chinese presence in POK is a big risk for them, given the proximity to Xinjiang.

It means prolonging the India-Pak civil war long into the future. IMO, the Indian state cannot afford to fight this war as well as catch up to Chinese because of extant inefficiences in its state structures.

Nihat wrote:It is entirely possible that the International Jihadis of Paki type will not take kindly to this development and may percieve them as oppresive occupiers and suppresers of Muslim brothers.

If this has potential, why wait for the Pakistanis to do something? Congress should hark back to '57, appoint a Muslim prime minister and kill two birds with one stone.

Pratyush · Post by **Pratyush** » 19 Sep 2010 11:57

Dhiman wrote:Sino-Indian Rivalry Heating Up
By Balaji Chandramohan
From http://atlanticsentinel.com/2010/09/sin ... eating-up/

SNIP......
India’s foreign policy by contrast has always flirted with moralistic notions. Only with the start of this century did it appreciate the importance of realpolitik. India’s politicians are well trained in this regard when it comes to domestic affairs. Now they need to show similar genius in the field of international relations. If they can, India may stand up to China’s rapid ascend.

SNIP.......

The portion in red shows a way how India can take on China but that will require Indians to seek International power for powers sake and not for the sake of being Mr Nice guy of the global order.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 19 Sep 2010 13:58

Disclaimer: No offense is intended by the response!

shiv wrote:I am simultaneously amused and irritated by the wails of distress about China on here and the calls for arming to defeat China in the naive calculation that a war with China will show them their place and solidify India's place in the order of things as they should be.

Wails of Distress have two functions, with one of them productive

To express distress
To wake up GoI to loss of strategic space, and get it out of its straitjacket

"Calls for arming to defeat China" is something I am yet to see on this thread. If somebody wants to oblige a blind man like me, please feel free. This sounds like a similar trick the secularists use. When one simply uses the word 'Hindu', the sekoolars start shouting, "you are a right-wing bigot, and you hate Muslims". It is like, when one accuses the other side of extremism, the other would not even take a single step in that direction.

"naive calculation that a war with China will show them their place" presupposes that everything is simply for show and ego massage, just because we are Indian onlee, and in a continuous menstruation with heightened hormone levels and emotionalism - and the rational faculty is as dead as a dodo.

"solidify India's place in the order of things as they should be" sounds better without the sarcasm. However I too could not use the sentence without some sarcasm, simply because when the country suffers the loss of strategic space, and goes on the back foot, the ability to solidify even the current disadvantageous place becomes outright optimism.

shiv wrote:Once again let me point out that when King Arthur was out fighting baddies his trusted knight Sir Lancelot was doing hukku-pukku on Arthur's wife Queen Genevieve.

India is King Arthur. China is the baddies. USA is Sir Lancelot who gets to have the most fun.

So what is worse - having the baddies destroy your kingdom or letting Sir Lancelot have some fun?

shiv wrote:I don't think people have any idea of the USA's strategy when we fall on the floor and roll with inconsolable grief about our status vis vis China. We should be crying doubly hard when we see the role of the US. Like the man who slept while the town was burning and woke up when his house caught fire - we are suddenly waking up to China without any insight into what has been happening in our neighborhood before China.

It was the USA that wanted to suck up to China in order to defeat the Soviet Union. A USA that was stuck in a pointless war in Vietnam with Nixon as President and Kissinger as Secretary of State struck upon th eidea of befriending China. The key, the condom for lifting the "bamboo curtain" and entering China was Pakistan's Gen Yahya Khan who later helped start the 1971 war.

And so, during the 1971 war it was

The USA that encouraged China to put pressure on India by mobilizing troops at the border (which China did not do in 1971)

The USA (Nixon) who said that he did not want any pressure to be put on Yahya Khan because he was a key figure in detente with China
Later it was the USA under the Carter and Reagan administrations who

Looked the other way when China transferred enriched Uranium and bombs to Pakistan

A US President refused to speak up in Congress that Pakistan was making a bomb

Ronald Reagan who spoke of "Freedom Fighters" in Kashmir in the same breath as the Taliban in Afghanistan

The China Pakistan relationship is old. It started after the 1965 war at which time the US had put sanctions on Pakistan and went from strength to strength. But the US has gained from that relationship.

Before 1971, USA also opposed Communist China. So if China had thought similarly (as noted above) there would have been no detente between the two, and China would not have been the economic and military power it is today.

Secondly PRC too did not hesitate to take on Soviet Union, when their own interests were threatened on the question of border demarcation. With the Sino-Soviet Border Conflict of 1969, China sent out clear signals that it will not compromise on its strategic interests, was not willing to live under the shadow of Soviet Union, and was willing to take on bigger responsibilities.

shiv wrote:If we make war against China deliberately - it is our economy that will suffer. If we don't make war - China will go about its business making friends and allies. If we cannot do the former, we cannot stop the latter.

I think we can both agree, that India need not think of starting a war with China. But I don't agree with the corollary though.

The question is not of entering into a hot war with China.

China has been in a proxy² war with India for a long time now.

Taking away the buffer between India and China. Disregard for India's interests in keeping the buffer.
Support to several insurgencies in the North East.
Nuclearization of Pakistan.
Propping up an aggressive Pakistani mentality against India after the 1965 war, immune to reconciliation and peace.
Visible support to Pakistan in Pakistan's Terrorist Attacks in India (visible in the UNSC)
Proxy support to the Maoists active in India
Prolonging border disputes with India, which can only mean, that China expects India to weaken and to later bite off far bigger territories off off India. Making claims on Arunachal Pradesh.
Not accepting India's claims on J&K, by occupying Aksai Chin, occupying Shaksgam Valley, withholding visa for Army man who served in J&K, calling PoK Northern Pakistan, Heavy infiltration into Gilgit-Baltistan.

So our efforts should be to

Stop the aggressive challenges to India's national consolidation and territorial integrity, using aggressive responses if necessary but more importantly a single minded determination and some enlightened realpolitik.
Stop the erosion of our influence in our strategic neighborhood - Indian Subcontinent, IOR
Intrude and expand in the strategic neighborhood of PRC
Install a system of policies which challenges the very basis of national consolidation and territorial integrity with a defensive military posture.
Military Buildup with accelerated procurements and weapon systems development cycles, and more joint ventures
Economic Development with special emphasis on infrastructure, manufacturing, control over mineral deposits and energy. Efforts should be made to attract FDI already in PRC and future FDI intended to go there, through both business incentives and politically measures.
Realign the West and Asian powers preference in favor of India.

Till now GoI has only made some qualified progress in the following fields

Military Progress - insufficient
Economic Progress - still exporting steel to China, serious setbacks in securing Oil & Gas resources.
Geopolitical - loss on Iran front, USA front after Win of the Democrats

In the first four fields GoI has shown dismal results.

shiv wrote:All that we can do is what is feasible and does the least damage to us in the short term and long term. We are starting with a handicap. We are starting from a position where the two most powerful powers in the world are supporting a country that is using Islam to hate India. In the long term we have to neutralise both the US and China.

Pakistan's failing status may give us the best opportunity to get Pakistanis to integrate their economy with the Indian economy. But that requires the defeat of the Pakistani army first. And not necessarily militarily. It is the akistani army that is supporting Chinese and US interests in the region and against India.

Pakistan is just one of the cat's paw. India faces a whole slew of challenges from China. It is also important that we don't lose sight of forging the right policy w.r.t. to China because of our preoccupation with Pakistan, because in the end, that is the whole strategy of China, that India burns itself out with Pakistan, and they get a free ride. This in fact amounts to the same thing you noted about our positioning with America - burning ourselves out fighting America's war with China.

It is not that I profess any love for USA or think they need to be given any quarter. I have even advocated an implicit understanding with AQAM if need be.

The thing is if we want to neutralize USA's support to Pakistan, one angle of it is also by convincing USA, that India would be the better bet for it - which can happen if we find a better strategy to deal with Pakistan but also stand up to China, US's strategic rival in Asia.

I'll be coming back to some of these points in subsequent posts.

shiv saar,
I was in two minds about responding to your post, knowing that you take no prisoners.

. No offense is intended.

csharma · Post by **csharma** » 19 Sep 2010 14:40

FWIW, an op-ed piece from People' Daily.

Hawks pecking at the brittle nerves of India

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90002 ... 45252.html

On top of that, to secure their access to Asia, and maintain their coveted preeminence over the region, the West has to pull one to its side to check and beat the other, and it bets on India. But the wise Indian government, walking on the tight rope between doves and hawks at home, is not so willing to place the China-India ties at stake, the time-honored bilateral relations entering its 60th anniversary, and keeping a far-reaching significance.

RamaT · Post by **RamaT** » 19 Sep 2010 14:58

(I am just re-stating the basics as few here TonyMontana, etc. seem want to paint India as the aggressor while obfuscating the Chinese role.)

The argument against the Chinese boils down to a few simple points:

1. They thought that India would stay 'backwards', it has not and so they are taking steps to contain it.
- Argue against US/India NSG agreement.
- Continuously deny support for India on UNSC
- Develop various containment strategies/pain points against India.
2. To contain India they are screwing with Pakistan/Nepal/BD/Sri Lanka to a degree that negatively affects Indian interests and policies.
3. In addition they are actively militarizing PoK, Tibet and sea lanes which again negatively affect Indian interests and policies.

These are all facts and cannot be argued... and to those who would say Chinese motivation is to enhance China and not to the general detriment of India, I would say that the two are very linked. China sees a G2, with the US holding sway in one hemisphere and it in the other, and for it to have competition in Asia is not something it can countenance.

The Indian response has so far been lackluster.. the look east policy has provided some basic relations with other Asian countries but nothing resembling a strategic alliance against China. This is early days yet and one can envision some offshoot of ASEAN growing into something like that.

The problem however is that India needs time to grow it's economy while simultaneously containing the negative Chinese influence, and China isn't just going to fall apart as a number of people here hope.. but if you don't believe me, here's someone more qualified: http://fora.tv/2010/07/28/Niall_Ferguso ... chapter_12

So, if China isn't going to fall apart and we need time to grow(hopefully overtaking Chinese rate of growth as their mis-steps cause some pain) and figure out what can we do to:

A. Counter Chinese actions in our sphere of influence.
B. Distract Chinese government from our region.

Being that we are a smaller economic entity and they can outspend us, we need to employ asymmetric warfare. The release of the recording of the Nepal vote purchase being the perfect example of well employed tactics. The CPC are getting a well deserved reputation as bogeymen and this must be exploited by India to retain our own strategic space.

RajeshA · Post by **RajeshA** » 19 Sep 2010 17:01

X-Posted from India and Japan: News and Discussion Thread

Masaru wrote:New Warning From Tokyo on China’s Military
“China has been rather intensifying its maritime activities including those in waters near Japan. The lack of transparency of its national defense policies and the military activities are a matter of concern for the region and the international community, including Japan…”

Relations cooled earlier this year, in part because of various incidents in waters disputed by Tokyo and Beijing. In May, Japanese and Chinese diplomats also publicly sparred at a meeting in South Korea, after Japanese Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada pressed Beijing to shrink, or at least not increase, its nuclear-weapons arsenal.

Japan was also rattled by China’s refusal to condemn North Korea after a South Korean naval vessel was sunk in March, killing 46 South Korean servicemen, in an incident that Seoul blamed on Pyongyang. Japan considers North Korean one of its biggest security threats.

Atri · Post by **Atri** » 19 Sep 2010 18:02

An article written long ago on previous version of Future strategic dhaga..

Atri wrote:People's Republic of China (PRC) and its rise have been an interesting story which is unfolding. The sheer pace with which China is expanding, makes one think whether this growth is healthy or is it cancerous. Is China expanding out of opportunity or is it expanding out of desperation.

The model of PRC economic growth is such that it has no option but to grow and expand. If PRC economy stops expanding, it will start collapsing even faster. There sustainability factor is slightly less in PRC economy which India has. The price of existence and expansion has to be paid by salvaging USA out. At all costs. PRC was very well placed until last october. It still is in great position, but the Simhasana has begun trembling.

Expansion of economy keeps the people quite because being quietly oppressed and earning a decent livelihood is profitable for common man. It is like a pressure-cooker situation. The virulently expanding economy is the safety valve which PRC cannot afford to loose. If this safety valve fails to work, the pressure will build up and the cooker will explode. PRC has to generate wealth and invest in US at all costs. Because, if dollar falls, the trillions of dollars in Chinese coffers will grow worthless. The people in US are democratic and decadent. They have had their share of prosperity and a robust social-security system of US will ensure that people in US won't die of hunger, this is for sure. China does not have such outlets like Social security system and democracy. There is Hunger-problem in PRC which is enormous. So, as days of recession linger, PRC's need to generate money will increase exponentially.

Even more alarming is the scenarion which can be seen when we compare the rise of India along with that of China. As these countries rise, their spheres of influence have begun to overlap and conflict of interests have ensued. Here is an account of understanding of China's interests in Asia, Indian subcontinent and rest of the world.

Interests of PRC in India's vicinity

1. To strengthen its grip in Tibet and Xinjiang

2. To suppress the separatist movements in these provinces at all costs.

3. Govt in Nepal favouring PRC, more importantly, not favouring India.

4. Contain the rise of Japan and stop from Japan and Taiwan cooperating with each other - antagonistic to PRC interests.

5. Support Pakistan enough to contain India but not to influence Xinjiang (one important possibility for India)

6. Energy routes from middle east to be secured, both land-based and sea based. Pipeline from Iran-Pakistan-China would be very helpful for China..

7. Huge consumer market in middle east hence, one potential importer of Chinese goods.

8. Vietnam - to ensure that Communist dictatorship remains incumbent in Vietnam. People are pissed but cannot revolt.

9. Same is the case with Myanmar.

10. The neighbourhood of China - Myanmar, Vietnam, Taiwan and Japan are opportunities for India, if utilized correctly. If democracy is facilitated in these two countries people will favour India. Vietnam can be a long shot, but Myanmar is an urgent necessity.

11. The major concern of PRC is Taiwan and Japan. India comes third. PRC's attention is more fixed towards first two..

12. Before going for Tibet, Myanmar should be India's numero-uno priority. Secondly Nepal. Thirdly, Baloochistan (this is tricky). Fourthly, friendship with Iran, Vietnam. Tibet will liberate itself on its own, if Myanmar, Nepal and Baloochistan become pro-Indian.

13. A big chunk of economy of PRC is based upon value addition and cheap labour. The market of ASEAN (Association of South-East Asian Nations) depends upon PRC, irrespective its repressive policies for cheap labour. Many products of ASEAN are imported in PRC, added the value and exported to the West since labour is comparatively quite expensive in ASEAN. If India is able to convince ASEAN to prefer India over China, they will be more than happy. The Indian system is transparent than that of China and intentions nobler than China. If we could persuade ASEAN to deal with India and that too in Indian rupee, nothing like it...

Rest of the world

Given the meltdown in west, this safety valve of PRC is most prone for mal-function. If India can snatch one or two big markets from PRC, it will be helpful to us. USA has the backing of Europe for cultural reasons. India and China do not. They have to be self-motivated, when it comes to ideology and civilization. So, when looking at the global prospects for PRC to continue expanding, we have to look at potential markets.

IMO, there few such areas which can be the hotspots for investment and hence chance for aggressive growth.

1. First is Sub-Saharan Africa. Not all Africa is poor. Some nations like South-Africa, Kenya, Sudan can be promising. I guess, PRC has marked the presence in Sudan.

2. Second Region is South America. I do not know how much is Brazil's clout in South American continent, but lots of commies there, which can be beneficial for PRC to facilitate as growth sectors. Traditionally, it is US back-door. But, US is cash-strapped for investment. So USA might allow PRC's investment in Central and South Asian countries. Chinese anyways like dealing with commies, dictators and Military Junta, which are dozen a dime in South America.

3. Third Region is Eastern Europe. But, we have Russia sitting over there. Even if Russia is cash-strapped. But, I don't know how Russia will deal with the massive PRC investments in eastern europe.Once again, it has to be done with Unkil's blessings.

4. Fourth is Iran. USA cannot do anything here. But PRC is friend of Islamic countries, especially Sunni ones. Iran being a Shia muslim country, it will be tricky job. Practically, entire Islamic world can potentially be China's growth sector. China gels nicely with nations where democracy is weak which is the scenarion is most of the Islamic nations.

5. Fifth region is Oceania. However, Pacific is the region where two biggest pains in PRC's ass dwell - Taiwan and Japan.

6. Sixth is India. The areas of strategic and economic interest of both China and USA is India...

USA and PRC desperately want India to develop and empower her domestic market and abide to rules of WTO faithfully and buy their goods. They will control the demons created by them (Pakistani Army, Taliban and ISI) so that India spends more on development and defence. And India is doing that. But, it is frustratingly slow and also, India's efforts for total indegenisaton and hunger for Transfer of Technology is what is pinching them.

Within 15 years, If current growth rate continues, India will be powerful enough to assert her dominance over Indian Ocean and Indian subcontinent. That will be the time when the need of oil will start becoming dire and India is geopolitically well placed to extract the benefit. It is not long before India will remove this thorn in her leg, called Pakistan and start running.

Hence, they don't want India to become too powerful and start projecting her power beyond her boundaries. In other words, PRC and Unkil are looking for a decent girl who will become an ideal house-wife. Kaaryeshu Daasi, Karaneshu Mantri, Bhojyeshu Maata, Roopeshu Lakshmi, Shayaneshu Rambha, Kshamayeshu Dharitri, Satkarma Naari, Kuladharma Patni as described in Neetishaastram !!

Middle East is firmly under USA's grip and they won't tolerate anybody else's presence, especially of the one who is perceived as friend of Islamic nations due to Israel.

The love which blossomed between Manmohan Singh (MMS) and Bush was strictly business. The asset which dubya liked in Indya was her ecOnOmy and market. If India can work out her internal problems and develop the rural component, she will be able to project her Mohini Roop (economy and market) and Durga Roop (military) at will.

Mohini Roop of Bharati can deal with jolted asuras who were running for Amrita-Kumbha and are now distressed. It is this Mohini Roop that can potentially contribute significant;y in pulling the world out of recession. Beauty is, in strange manner, extremely powerful. Even Durga is described as so incredulously beautiful that Shumbha-Nishumbha fell in love with her. A beautiful intelligent woman with stable mind can achieve lot more than man. Her soft power is extremely potent. Just that, under UPA govt led by MMS, this Mohini became a dumb-blonde.

For people who listen to reason (PRC, USA et al), Mohini can persuade them to fall in line. For dick-heads like Shumbha-Nishumbha, Chanda-Munda and Mahishasura (Pakistani Army, ISI, Taliban et al), Durga-Roop is more than enough.

India can snatch at least one really huge market away from Chinese, that is Indian domestic market. Of course, its not that easy and there are WTO considerations and India cannot do like this because India will suffer too.. But, it can at least be used as leverage, which India is not doing.

What will happen if India declares that it will not import anything from a nation which helps Pakistan? Guess, who will suffer the most !!!

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 19 Sep 2010 20:50

China’s “Malacca Dilemma”
Publication: China Brief Volume: 6 Issue: 8
April 12, 2006 12:00 AM Age: 4 yrs
http://www.jamestown.org/programs/china ... no_cache=1

China’s heavy use of the Malacca and Lombok/Makassar straits in Southeast Asia is emblematic of this concern. The Malacca Strait is a narrow and congested waterway separating Indonesia and Malaysia, with Singapore located at its southern tip. As the shortest route between the Indian and Pacific oceans, the strait is one of the world’s most important waterways. More than 60,000 vessels transit the strait each year, carrying 25 percent of global trade. The Lombok/Makassar Strait passes through the Indonesian archipelago and is used mainly by Very Large Crude Carriers. In terms of volume of oil shipped, this route is of near equivalent importance to the better known Malacca Strait.

For China, the strategic significance of these straits increases every year. At present, approximately 60 percent of China’s crude oil imports originate in the Middle East, and this figure is expected to rise to 75 percent by 2015. Oil from the Persian Gulf and Africa is shipped to the PRC via the Malacca or Lombok/Makkasar straits. Over the past few years Chinese leaders have come to view the straits, especially the Malacca Strait, as a strategic vulnerability. In November 2003 President Hu Jintao declared that “certain major powers” were bent on controlling the strait, and called for the adoption of new strategies to mitigate the perceived vulnerability. Thereafter, the Chinese press devoted considerable attention to the country’s “Malacca dilemma,” leading one newspaper to declare: “It is no exaggeration to say that whoever controls the Strait of Malacca will also have a stranglehold on the energy route of China” (China Youth Daily, June 15, 2004).

Alternatives:

1. New Panama type Canal in Thailand (Kra Isthmus)

As a means to reduce strategic vulnerabilities, the PRC is diversifying its sources of energy imports away from the Middle East and is considering financing transit routes that would bypass the Malacca Strait altogether. Yet all of the proposals involve significant financial outlays, technical problems, and security concerns. The most fanciful proposal thus far has been to construct a canal across the Kra Isthmus in southern Thailand. The idea of an “Asian Panama Canal” linking the Andaman Sea with the Gulf of Thailand, and hence the Indian and Pacific oceans, has been around for centuries. First suggested in 1677, the idea has been revisited at least a dozen times since then. Yet on each occasion the project has been shelved due to lack of financial resources, technical difficulties and security problems. The idea was most recently revisited in 2001. Proponents envisaged a two-lane canal, an east-west highway running parallel, and harbors, oil refineries and storage facilities at each end (Bangkok Post, July 6, 2003). The canal, it was argued, would create jobs, generate revenue in the form of transit fees and oil refining, and benefit the global economy because ships could save 3-4 days sailing time by avoiding the Malacca Strait.

Initially the idea seemed to arouse great interest in the PRC. Beijing, however, baulked at the estimated $20-25 billion price tag. In 2003 the government of Thaksin Shinawatra effectively killed the project when it declared it would not provide any financial support for the proposed canal. Instead, the Thaksin government championed the Strategic Energy Land Bridge (SELB), a 150-mile underground oil pipeline across southern Thailand. At an estimated cost of $600-800 million the SELB would cost a fraction of the Kra Canal. The PRC has expressed an interest in the project, although its enthusiasm seems to have waned somewhat because of cost concerns and escalating political violence in Thailand’s southern provinces (The Nation, February 14, 2005). Moreover, the SELB would not really lessen the vulnerability of seaborne energy imports into the PRC, as tankers would still have to sail to and from Thailand, therefore merely shifting the focus of the problem slightly

2. Sittwe Myanmar

As far as China is concerned, it would be far better if oil deliveries could be made closer to home. With this in mind, Beijing is giving serious consideration to two large infrastructure projects. The first is a 750-mile pipeline from Sittwe in Burma to Kunming in Yunnan province, with an estimated cost around $2 billion (Asia Times, September 23, 2004). A Burma-China pipeline is appealing to Beijing for two reasons. First, oil tankers from the Middle East and Africa would be able to bypass the Malacca Strait by sailing directly to Sittwe. Second, the project is politically appealing given the close links between Rangoon and Beijing. Talks between the Chinese and Burmese governments on the feasibility of the project began in mid-2004. Then in December 2005 the Burmese junta signed a deal with PetroChina to supply 6.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas to the PRC over a 30 year period. It was reported that the gas would be transferred to China via a pipeline to Kunming (Straits Times, February 2). If a gas pipeline is constructed, it is likely that China would also build an oil pipeline running parallel.

3.Pakhanastan

Another proposal is to transfer oil and gas from Pakistan into China’s Xinjiang province. This route would involve oil tankers off-loading their cargoes at the Pakistani port of Gwadar, a facility heavily financed by the PRC government (China Brief, February 15, 2005). Energy resources would then be transported by road, or more likely rail or a pipeline, to Islamabad 900 miles to the north. From there, the energy supplies would be sent a further 750 miles to Kashi (Kashgar) in Xinjiang province along the Karakoram Highway that links Pakistan with China. Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf has pushed the idea of a China-Pakistan “energy corridor” for several years now, arguing that the Pakistani economy would benefit from the construction of oil refineries and oil and gas storage and transshipment facilities, while China would gain an alternative to the Malacca Strait.

A China-Pakistan energy corridor would be an expensive proposition for Beijing given the long distances and rugged terrain involved. Gwadar’s Baluchistan province is also prone to separatist violence. At the geopolitical level, however, the proposal is attractive for two reasons. First, Gwadar is very close to the Persian Gulf and all maritime choke points save for the Strait of Hormuz would be effectively bypassed.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 19 Sep 2010 21:02

Folks it strikes me that the same advertising agency that cooked up rhetorical catch phrases "Rolling Thunder" and "India's superpower aspirations" also cooked up the term "String of pearls"

The Map below shows an image of the article about Malacca straits linked above. China needs its oil and would proabably like to have its oil without having to fight every inch of the way.

Note that the distance to the Malacca strait from Car Nicobar is 1200 km - well within the MKI's unrefuelled range.

The distance to Sittwe in Myanmar is 260 Km. Prithvi and Brahmos range.

The "Kra peninsula" canal is closer than Malacca. If that has "security problems" imagine what Pakhanastan means.

While "string of pearls" is taken by us Indians to mean "shiver in your dhotis you sodding SDREs" - it can also mean "Shiver in your kimkoms" or whatever it is the Chinese like to shiver in. Those pearls are all within India's bench-oddgiri range.

Christopher Sidor · Post by **Christopher Sidor** » 19 Sep 2010 21:08

ramana wrote:Christopher Sidor, Can you name or link the report hee? Thanks, ramana

http://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewto ... 85#p942385

I am sorry ramana the post should have said reports and not report. But I have given the reports which led to the post below

Chinese Relations with South Asian States
This article is how China views its relations with south asia nations. But in the section on Sino-Indo relations there are some very decent insights.

The Past and Future of Export-led Growth
From the above mentioned blog

.........
.........
For geopolitical reasons and out of confidence in its own innovation capacity and competitiveness in high value adding activities, the United States was willing to open its markets to imports from economies in Asia and Europe which were important allies in the Cold War. The vast, efficiently retailed and organized American market proved to be an elastic source of demand and U.S. companies were ready to vacate niches for low end labor intensive imports.
..........
..........
The U.S., long the importer of last resort and the consumer driven economy par excellence, is now so indebted and its industry so hollowed that prolonged adjustment is inevitable. This will mean weaker demand for imports and greater competition from U.S. exporters. Other western countries with current account and public sector deficits and/or aging populations are unlikely to fill the gap and certainly China and the other BRICs cannot come close to rivaling the import demand of the U.S. – China’s share of global GDP is less than 9 percent.
Rising energy and resource costs could lead to a shrinkage of production networking, encourage more vertical integration in leading producers and dampen trade and growth. The costs associated with urbanization and climate change will also increase the capital coefficient of growth (ICORs).

Please note that is a blog and not an official view of worldbank. There are various things that can go haywire with the scenario outlined in the blog. Basically we have yet to see America shift to a more balance economic structure. We have yet to see America closing or restricting its market for chinese manufactured goods.
When the author refers to "Other western countries with current account and public sector deficits and/or aging populations are unlikely to fill the gap" he is basically referring to western Europe countries.

Japans lost decade.
This article gives a concise and a birds eye view regarding the japans lost decade of 1990's. Japans failure to close its insolvent banks in 1990, led to the gradual drawing down off the massive bubble that took a decade to unwind. Something similar happened w.r.t to Lehman Brothers, which was basically insolvent. America let it go under. But it failed to apply the same principle to AIG and GE. I dont know the real solvency status of Citibank, otherwise I would have added it also to the list of AIG and GE. This year China gave the biggest stimulus burst in the world after US. Most of this money has gone to real estate via its banks. There are, according to some estimates, some 64.5 Million homes which are unoccupied in China. Some 200 Million people can be accommodated in these homes. 200 million is approximately 1/5th population of China. The parallels between china and japan are striking over here. The only silver lining is that in China there is a vast mass of people yet to move from the rural to urban areas, while in 1990's Japan had none. They might absorb these vacant homes. But like India, where many homes are kept locked and empty, due to various factors, these houses might not get tenants at all and they might not retain their values, which will lead to massive write downs by banks.

Please note that I do not subscribe to most of these views as described in the article, as predicting what will happen in the forthcoming 10 years is fraught with danger. The point that I am was trying to make, is that our future w.r.t to china is bright. However in the near term(2-5 years) and medium term (5-10 years) we will face immense problems. And one of those problems will be the military threat of PRC.

rohitvats · Post by **rohitvats** » 19 Sep 2010 21:52

Gentlemen,

There is something about this energy security argument and String of Pearls strategy and NA gambit that does not make sense to me. May be I'm just too thick in the head to understand these things. But here goes.

First, the issue of existing Sea Lanes of Communications(SLoC) for China and their vulnerability. Ok, so the traffic moves into a very narrow corridor in the Malacca Straits. In case of conflict, what does the aggressor do? Park his vessels at the mouth of straits or before and prevent the China bound traffic from going through. So far so good. Now, how many countries can do this to China? Can Thailand, Vietnam or Indonesia do this? Temporarily yes but for longer duration to warrant an effect on China, no. Why? Because China can really hurt these nations hard - either by using Ground forces and AF or PLAN and AF. These nations don't have the power to sustain a conflict with the Chinese.

Which leaves only India and US Navy. Not only the present SLoC but the planned alternates can be blown to smithereens by USN at will, so we leave the Gorilla out of equation as of now. Coming to India, yes we can squeeze the Dragon's balls in this sector. But given the A&N aircraft career in the middle of Indian Ocean, Malacca Straits or no Malacca Straits, we could have done the bad things to Dragon as we wished. The ships simply have to go east to reach Chinese ports.

Which brings me to a question - what security will the Sittwe and any proposed pipeline through NA bring to the Chinese. In the case of Sea Denial or Sea Control, the might of Indian Navy would have been required. In case of GB, all it will require is couple of LGB and Chinese can wish the pipeline goodbye for a long time - after all, the LGB can target not only the pipeline but the mountains as well. Bring the damn mountains down and its bye-bye pipeline. To this add another angle - during the peace time, no one can needle the china bound sea cargo. For interception of Sea Cargo is final step short of war. In case of a pipeline running through the length of Pakistan and then NA, small incidents can be engineered at will. And one has the benefit of 'non-state' actors. By building such a line, Chinese will be placing their balls in the hands of Indians and Americans to be squeezed at will.

Similarly, in case of Sittwe, the ships simply have to go close to A&N. There is no escaping this aircraft career. Or other IN Ships. Similarly, Uncle has the DG in the Indian Ocean. And we can again have non-state actors blow some stuff in these areas. So, what security has the Chinese achieved by these acts?

Coming to String of Pearls theory - OK. What about it? Can China place whole of PLAN west of Malacca Straits to take on IN or USN and use these bases to sustain their effort? Unless, Hambantota starts flying Chinese flag, I don't think PLAN can look for logistical support in these areas on a large scale. And how will it prevent these ports from being taken out by India? Can GoSL take such an extreme step against India? Without repurcussions? And extreme ones at that?

So, what security has the Chinese achieved?

Thanx.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 19 Sep 2010 22:30

rohitvats wrote:Gentlemen,

There is something about this energy security argument and String of Pearls strategy and NA gambit that does not make sense to me. May be I'm just too thick in the head to understand these things. But here goes.

So, what security has the Chinese achieved?

Continue thinking. Find out if it is a hoax or a real thing

arnabh · Post by **arnabh** » 19 Sep 2010 22:32

http://the-diplomat.com/2010/09/10/chin ... ia-gamble/

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 19 Sep 2010 22:39

Rajamohan writes in Indian Express

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/drawn ... rs/683316/

Drawn in at the borders

C. Raja Mohan Posted online: Sat Sep 18 2010, 02:53 hrs

Having squandered some of the best years in the history of India’s external relations, the UPA government’s defence policy is now condemned to deal with some of the worst. Through much of its first term in government, the UPA had a relatively peaceful Jammu and Kashmir, a ceasefire on the borders with Pakistan, a measure of stability in Afghanistan, tranquil borders with China, and improving relations with all the major powers.

That was the moment to undertake some comprehensive defence sector reforms, do the groundwork for rapid military modernisation, alter the internal dynamics of Kashmir, and catch up with China’s rising power potential.

Sadly, the UPA government did not. It now confronts the prospect of the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan, a breakdown in the peace process with Pakistan, a stalled boundary negotiation with China, internal turbulence in Kashmir, China’s questioning of India’s sovereignty over J&K, and deepening Sino-Pak cooperation across the board, including in Jammu and Kashmir.

Meanwhile, the government’s hand-wringing in face of a crisis in Kashmir and the serious internal discord in the Congress party raise questions about the political will of the Indian state under the UPA government. It will be no surprise if India’s adversaries want to take advantage of widely perceived fecklessness in Delhi.

As the idea of a two-front military tension gains ground — the thesis that has been argued not just by the former National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra but also by General Deepak Kapoor, when he was the chief of army staff — amidst a worsening regional security environment, India’s military faces great challenges.

There is nothing in the publicly available excerpts from the remarks of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Defence Minister A.K. Antony at the combined commanders meeting last Monday to suggest that Delhi is gearing up. The defence ministry continues to return money approved by Parliament for building arms year after year. The annual spending on defence as a percentage of GDP has fallen to one of its lowest levels since border clashes with China in 1962.

Although arms makers from around the recession-hit advanced world are queuing up in Delhi, our defence ministry seems unable to develop an acquisition process that can grasp the opportunity for a significant expansion of India’s defence industrial base. {batting for uS mfgs?}

While the Indian private sector is eager to build advanced arms manufacturing capabilities, the defence ministry seems to think that stuffing contracts down the throat of public sector units that are choking with orders they cannot execute is in the best national
interest.

Cynics would say we should forget the tall talk of a defence
industrial base when the UPA government cannot even build roads on our borders. The prime minister told the combined commanders that “border infrastructure” is an “integral part” of our defence preparedness and the task must be approached with some “urgency”. Well put. But is any one in the government responsible for getting this done?

On his part, Antony told the brass that India “cannot lose sight of
the fact that China has been improving its military and physical
infrastructure” on our borders. This probably is the understatement of the decade, for China’s transformation of the transport infrastructure in Yunnan, Tibet, and Xinjiang, the provinces that border South Asia, has been nothing short of revolutionary. China’s decision to build road and rail networks across the borders of these provinces is bound to transform forever the geopolitics of our neighbourhood.

One wonders if Antony’s statement that we should not lose sight of the PLA’s new mobility along and across its border is an abstract philosophical statement or a commitment to respond.

A recent report from the parliamentary standing committee on defence suggests the progress on road-building on our northern frontiers has been simply pathetic. According to the report, of the 277 roads that the UPA government decided to build a few years ago, only 29 have been completed to date. There is said to be progress of sorts (think Commonwealth Games) on another 168 roads, and work has not even started on 80 projects.

The state of border road-building is symptomatic of the nation’s
larger defence paralysis. A national disaster like the 1962 debacle with China awaits the UPA government if it does not get its defence act together quickly. In 1962, it was Delhi’s failure to understand the significance of Chinese road-building in Ladakh that set off the crisis.

The debacle of 1962 was not really a military disaster. The Indian army lost only a few battles. The air force was barely used. There was not much of a navy to talk about. As China administered a limited amount of force to teach India a lesson, the war was lost in the mind of a Delhi that was utterly unprepared.

The tragedy of 1962 was in essence a failure of the civilian
leadership of our military. It was about the naive assumptions about the world that India’s political leadership had cherished. Delhi had then misread China’s interests, intentions and capabilities.

For many, a national disgrace of the kind seen in 1962 is unimaginable in the current environment. Has not India become a much stronger economy since the early 1990s? Is not its military much more capable than in 1962? The fact, however, is that India’s relative defence gains have been outstripped by the more rapid advances in Chinese military power.

As Chinese power today radiates at us not just from across the Himalayas but also the Indian Ocean, Delhi’s problem is neither the lack of financial resources nor the absence of military/ technical solutions. It is about the UPA government’s political will to address the defence challenges purposefully.

There are two ways in which nations cope with defence challenges. One is to mobilise the nation’s own resources and restructure the defence apparatus. The other is to leverage external opportunities. Any serious Indian defence strategy must do both, much like it did after 1962. But is there any one out there in charge of India’s defence policy?

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Why is Rajamohan so worried if there isn a worry as old timers here say? And note who he stands as responsible.

Dhiman · Post by **Dhiman** » 19 Sep 2010 22:50

shiv wrote: Note that the distance to the Malacca strait from Car Nicobar is 1200 km - well within the MKI's unrefuelled range.

Sir, the total distance betwen Great Nicobar Islands (India) and Banda Aceh (Indonesia) is around 180km. This is the corridor from where most of Chinese oil supplies and their European/African trade passes through. If I was GoI, I would 1) go and plant the Indian flag on the sea floor between Banda Aceh and Great Nicobar (just like China has planted its flat at the bottom of South China sea). Doesn't mean anything, but sends a strong symbolic message. Once I have done that, I would be 2) imposing all sorts of environment restrictions on Chinese oil tankers crossing this region and develop 3) excellent relationship with Indonesia. There are probably better ways to harass the Chinese here every time they raise temperatures in the North. GoI needs to be sending the Chinese the right signals and this one of the places to do so where Chinese are completely powerless.

While "string of pearls" is taken by us Indians to mean "shiver in your dhotis you sodding SDREs" - it can also mean "Shiver in your kimkoms" or whatever it is the Chinese like to shiver in. Those pearls are all within India's bench-oddgiri range.

A&N Islands need to be turned into an offensive and defensive fortress before it is too late.

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Venkarl · Post by **Venkarl** » 19 Sep 2010 22:51

Karan Dixit wrote:I have been opposing the sale of Indian steel to China for a very long time but alas no one listens to me.

Karanji....even if all BRFites listens to you and agree with you..will it have any effect? Its Corporates and GoI babus who drive these things with myopic vision...

Dhiman · Post by **Dhiman** » 19 Sep 2010 23:00

rohitvats wrote: Coming to String of Pearls theory - OK. What about it? Can China place whole of PLAN west of Malacca Straits to take on IN or USN and use these bases to sustain their effort? Unless, Hambantota starts flying Chinese flag, I don't think PLAN can look for logistical support in these areas on a large scale. And how will it prevent these ports from being taken out by India? Can GoSL take such an extreme step against India? Without repurcussions? And extreme ones at that?

So, what security has the Chinese achieved?

Thanx.

Looking at the Navy deployment during the tsunami, China hasn't achieved any security with its "string of Perls" that India can't take down in a day, but what it has achieved is "influence" at the expense of Indian influence around our neighborhood. China's peacetime strategic space has expanded in India's neighborhood while our peacetime strategic space has contracted in our own neighborhood.

If this is allowed to continue for long or without any Indian intervention, the Chinese will end up incorporating the economics of our neighborhood into their own (plus become de facto rulers of Pakistan and Myanmar) and make India completely isolated in its own neighborhood. So the question in my humble opinion is whether we want to live under Chinese hegemony or not? If history is our guide, loss of strategic space, should not be taken lightly.

Bade · Post by **Bade** » 19 Sep 2010 23:21

All these new energy corridors that China is planning will take a decade or more. Now if Myanmar does become a full fledged Chinese colony then what advantage does India have ? Same with Pakistan too. It means China can keep India engaged in the subcontinent without allowing it to harm its interests in the mainland. It is just the beginning to a long siege of India.

The chances of Myanmar being totally lost to China is much higher than losing parts of Pakistan to China. With Myanmar under its defacto control the whole of South east Asia and Indian subcontinent comes under its sphere of influence.