Clueless  on  China

Brahma Chellaney

The Sunday Guardian, July 4, 2010

Yet another round of India-China border talks is under way in Beijing. The unending and fruitless talks on territorial disputes underscore the eroding utility of this process. It is approaching three decades since China and India began these negotiations. In this period, the world has changed fundamentally. Indeed, with its rapidly accumulating military and economic power, China itself has emerged as a great power in the making, with Washington’s Asia policy now manifestly Sino-centric. Not only has India allowed its military and nuclear asymmetry with China to grow, but also New Delhi’s room for diplomatic maneuver is shrinking.

Power asymmetry in interstate relations does not mean the weaker side must bend to the dictates of the stronger or seek to propitiate it. Wise strategy, coupled with good diplomacy, is the art of offsetting or neutralizing military or economic power imbalance with another state.

But by staying engaged in the useless border talks, knowing fully well that Beijing has no intent to settle the territorial issues, India plays into China’s hands. The longer the process of border talks continues, the greater the space Beijing will have to mount strategic pressure on India and the greater its leverage in the negotiations. After all, China already holds the military advantage on the ground. Its forces control the heights along the long 4,057-kilometer Himalayan frontier, with the Indian troops perched largely on the lower levels. Furthermore, by building new railroads, airports and highways in Tibet, China is now in a position to rapidly move additional forces to the border to potentially strike at India at a time of its choosing.

Diplomatically, China is a contented party, having occupied what it wanted — the Aksai Chin plateau, which is almost the size of Switzerland and provides the only accessible Tibet-Xinjiang route through the Karakoram passes of the Kunlun Mountains. Yet it chooses to press claims on additional Indian territories as part of a grand strategy to gain leverage in bilateral relations and, more importantly, to keep India under military and diplomatic pressure.

At the core of its strategy is an apparent resolve to indefinitely hold off on a border settlement with India through an overt refusal to accept the territorial status quo. In not hiding its intent to further redraw the Himalayan frontiers, Beijing only helps highlight the futility of the ongoing process of political negotiations. After all, the territorial status quo can be changed not through political talks but by further military conquest. Yet, paradoxically, the political process remains important for Beijing to provide the façade of engagement behind which to seek India’s containment.

Keeping India engaged in endless talks is a key Chinese objective so that Beijing can continue its work on changing the Himalayan balance decisively in its favor through a greater build-up of military power and logistical capabilities. That is why China has sought to shield the negotiating process from the perceptible hardening of its stance toward New Delhi and the vituperative attacks against India in its state-run media. Add to the picture the aggressive patrolling of the Himalayan frontier by the People’s Liberation Army and the growing Chinese incursions across the line of control.

Over the decades, the Chinese negotiating tactics have shifted markedly. Beijing originally floated the swap idea — giving up its claims in India’s northeast in return for Indian acceptance of the Chinese control over a part of Ladakh — to legalize its occupation of Aksai Chin. It then sang the mantra of putting the territorial disputes on the backburner so that the two countries could concentrate on building close, mutually beneficial relations. But in more recent years, in keeping with its rising strength, China has escalated border tensions and military incursions while assertively laying claim to Arunachal Pradesh.

The present border negotiations have been going on continuously since 1981, making them already the longest and the most-barren process between any two countries in modern history. The record includes eight rounds of senior-level talks between 1981 and 1987, and14 Joint Working Group meetings between 1988 and 2002. The latest discussions constitute the 14^th round of talks between the designated Special Representatives since 2003. 

The authoritative People’s Daily — the Communist Party mouthpiece that reflects official thinking — made it clear in a June 11, 2009 editorial: “China won’t make any compromises in its border disputes with India.” That reflects the Chinese position in the negotiations. But even when Beijing advertises its uncompromising stance, New Delhi refuses to heed the message.

What does India gain by staying put in an interminably barren negotiating process with China? By persisting with this process, isn’t India aiding the Chinese engagement-with-containment strategy by providing Beijing the cover it needs? While Beijing’s strategy and tactics are apparent, India has had difficulty to define a game-plan and resolutely pursue clearly laid-out objectives. Still, staying put in a barren process cannot be an end in itself for India.

India indeed has retreated to an increasingly defensive position territorially, with the spotlight now on China’s Tibet-linked claim to Arunachal Pradesh than on Tibet’s status itself. Now you know why Beijing invested so much political capital over the years in getting India to gradually accept Tibet as part of the territory of the People’s Republic. Its success on that score has helped narrow the dispute to what it claims. That neatly meshes with China’s long-standing negotiating stance: What it occupies is Chinese territory, and what it claims must be on the table to be settled on the basis of give-and-take — or as it puts it in reasonably sounding terms, on the basis of “mutual accommodation and mutual understanding.”

As a result, India has been left in the unenviable position of having to fend off Chinese territorial demands. In fact, history is in danger of repeating itself as India gets sucked into a 1950s-style trap. The issue then was Aksai Chin; the issue now is Arunachal. But rather than put the focus on the source of China’s claim — Tibet — and Beijing’s attempt to territorially enlarge its Tibet annexation to what it calls “southern Tibet,” India is willing to be taken ad infinitum around the mulberry bush. Just because New Delhi has accepted Tibet to be part of China should not prevent it from gently shining a spotlight on Tibet as the lingering core issue.

Yet India’s long record of political diffidence only emboldens Beijing. India accepted the Chinese annexation of Tibet and surrendered its own British-inherited extraterritorial rights over Tibet on a silver platter without asking for anything in return. Now, China wants India to display the same “amicable spirit” and hand over to it at least the Tawang valley.

KOREAN DEMILITARIZED ZONE — One of the last Cold War relics, the Demilitarized Zone that cuts the Korean Peninsula in half, is the world’s most fortified frontier. Although this division has prevailed for almost six decades, it is unthinkable that it can continue indefinitely, despite renewed inter-Korean tensions over the deaths of 46 South Korean sailors in the sinking of a warship.

Just as the last two decades since the end of the Cold War have geopolitically transformed the world, the next two decades are likely to bring no less dramatic international change. One place where major geopolitical change seems inescapable is the Korean Peninsula.

Today, however, the spotlight is on the return of the Cold War between North and South Korea. Relations between the two Koreas have sunk to their worst point in many years, as South Korea’s neoconservative president — holding Pyongyang responsible for the sinking of the ship on the basis of a multinational inquiry that he ordered — has redesignated the North as his country’s archenemy. The North, in reprisal, has frozen ties with the South and banned its ships and airplanes from using the North’s territorial waters and airspace.

The deterioration in North-South relations, however, predates the March 26 sinking of the South Korean warship, Cheonan. It began soon after South Korean President Lee Myung Bak took office in 2007 and reversed the decade-long "sunshine policy" with the North that had been pursued by his two immediate predecessors, Kim Dae Jung and Roh Moo Hyun. As part of his policy of squeezing the regime in Pyongyang, Lee also effectively cut off bilateral aid.

Lee’s strategy has little to show in terms of results. If anything, the Stalinist regime in Pyongyang has demonstrated a proclivity to throw caution to the wind, best illustrated by the manner it conducted a second nuclear test, launched a long-range rocket and fired several missiles — all in the span of a few weeks in April-May 2009.

Although none of the four powers with a history of intervention on the Korean Peninsula — China, Japan, Russia and the United States — has any interest at present in disturbing the political status quo there, events could occur that are beyond the control of any internal or external force. The trigger for unleashing a cascading effect can come only from an increasingly isolated, impoverished and unstable North Korea.

North Korea’s economic crisis is deepening, with food shortages and widespread malnutrition rife in a nation of more than 24 million people. Desperate government attempts at currency reform have only spurred hyperinflation and simmering social unrest. The South’s reversal of the sunshine policy has added to North Korea’s economic woes.

Another indicator of the looming uncertainty is the poor health of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. Despite surviving an apparent stroke in August 2008 and returning to his feet, a shriveled Kim today looks palpably sick. On a recent visit to China, he was seen dragging his feet.

Kim Jong Il seems to be grooming his third son, the 26-year-old Kim Jong Un, to succeed him. In the coming months, Kim Jong Un is likely to assume a party position. But Kim Jong Un is too young and inexperienced to command popular respect and authority by succeeding an ailing father who may not last too long.

Given the worsening economy and the uncertainty over how long Kim Jong Il will survive, the decks seem stacked against the prolongation of North Korea’s totalitarian system for many more years.

Yet, China seems more intent than ever to maintain the North Korean regime, with or without Kim Jong Il. China continues to prop up the regime with economic aid, military hardware and political support. In fact, without the political protection it has continued to provide North Korea in the U.N. Security Council, the regime would have by now collapsed under the weight of international sanctions.

It is with such political protection that North Korea became the first nonnuclear member of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to breach its legal obligations and go overtly nuclear. It is also because of Chinese policy and protection that the now-dormant six-nation talks on the North Korean issue made no progress.

Yet, China has cleverly played its diplomatic cards to emerge as the central player on the North Korean issue, with U.S. policy more dependent than ever on Beijing for any forward movement. But Beijing, intent on shaping a regional order under its influence, has little interest in helping out U.S. policy.

The reality is that China is being guided by its ancient zhonghwa ideology, which calls for an East Asian order led by China. According to zhonghwa, the entire region stretching from the Korean Peninsula to the Japanese archipelago is supposed to be within China’s sphere of influence, thus requiring it to exercise leadership through aid, leverage and diplomatic maneuver.

That may explain why Beijing, ignoring sensitivities in South Korea, warmly received Kim Jong Il on a recent state visit — a visit about which Seoul learned only after the North Korean strongman had arrived in China.

The fact is that China sees its interest best served by preservation of the status quo on the Peninsula. Korean reunification would not only change the geopolitical dynamics in Northeast Asia by creating a resurgent united Korea, but also bring U.S. influence and military to China’s doorstep.

Today, by continuing to play the North Korea card, Beijing is able to wield political leverage against the U.S. At the same time, it is able to keep the economically powerful South Korea — a U.S. ally that is double the size of North Korea demographically — at bay. The logic on which Chinese policy operates is simple: Outside forces like the U.S. cannot be allowed to exercise power in China’s backyard.

Yet, such is China’s growing clout that none will dare to criticize the political protection it provides North Korea — not even Lee’s government, despite the dual diplomatic snub Beijing has recently delivered, first by hosting Kim Jong Il and then shielding Pyongyang over the Cheonan crisis.

Through his hardline policy on Pyongyang, Lee has played into China’s hands. Beijing can only thank him for pushing North Korea onto its strategic lap.

Given the fact that it will be South Korea, like West Germany, that will have to bear the costs of reunification, the South should actively be seeking to open up the North, rather than working to further isolate it. The way to reduce the costs of reunification would be for the North to be integrated with the South economically before moves are made toward political integration. But Lee’s policy, in reversing the inter-Korean detente, has blocked such a path.

China has not tried to export its economic model to its client states. It is actually afraid that if North Korea begins to reform, its own ailing system could collapse under the weight of its contradictions. After all, despite its economic success, China itself must walk a tightrope on opening up to the outside world. Because of its opaque, repressive system, the more it globalizes, the more vulnerable it becomes internally. China has sought to open up only to the extent necessary to underpin economic growth.

It is doubtful it can prop up the North Korean system for very long. When Kim Jong Il passes away, events over three to four years could create an unstoppable momentum toward radical change in the North — and on the Peninsula as a whole.

China pushes
Japan and India closer to the U.S.

Brahma
Chellaney

The Sunday Guardian, May 30, 2010

China’s rise in one
generation as a global player under authoritarian rule has come to epitomize the
qualitative reordering of power in Asia and the
wider world. Not since
Japan rose to world-power
status during the reign of the Meiji
emperor in the second half of the 19th century has another non-Western power
emerged with such potential to alter the world order as China today. As the
2009 assessment by the U.S.
intelligence community predicted, China stands to more profoundly
affect global geopolitics than any other country. China’s ascent, however, is dividing Asia, not bringing Asian states closer.

            A fresh
reminder of that came recently when provocative Chinese actions prompted the new
Japanese government to reverse course on seeking a “more equal” relationship
with the United States and agree to keep
the American military base in Okinawa island.
That outcome is similar to the way Beijing has
been pushing India closer to
the U.S. through continuing military and
other provocations.

Given that the balance of power
in Asia will be determined by events as much in the Indian Ocean rim as in East Asia, Tokyo
and New Delhi
are keen to work together to promote Asian peace and stability and help
safeguard vital sea lanes of communication.
Japan and
India indeed are natural
allies because they have no conflict of strategic interest and share common goals to build
institutionalized cooperation and stability in Asia. There is
neither a negative historical legacy nor any outstanding political issue between them. If anything, each
country enjoys a high positive rating with the public in the other
state.

Prime Minister Yukio
Hatoyama’s visit to India
last December, soon after coming to office, showed he is keen to maintain the
priority on closer engagement with India that started under his four
immediate predecessors, especially Junichiro Koizumi, Shinzo Abe, Yasuo
Fukuda and Taro Aso of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), now in the
opposition. Mr. Hatoyama and his Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) came to power
vowing to reorient Japanese foreign policy and seek an “equal” relationship with
the United
States. But events have forced a rethink.

How unstable the security environment
is in Japan’s own
neighborhood has been brought home by two recent incidents with
China and the renewed
tensions on the Korean Peninsula following the sinking of the South Korean naval ship.

One incident involving China occurred less than two months ago, on April
8, when a helicopter from a Chinese naval vessel in international waters south
of Okinawa flew to within 92 meters of a
Japanese defense force escort ship — so close that Japanese sailors could
clearly see a gun-wielding Chinese soldier. To compound matters, not only was
Tokyo’s diplomatic protest summarily dismissed by Beijing, but Chinese naval ships less
than two weeks later, on April 21, sailed between Okinawa and another Japanese
island chain to conduct a large-scale exercise. Once again, a Chinese naval
helicopter buzzed a Japanese escort ship. A Chinese military analyst called on
Japan to get used to
China‘s navy appearing in
Japan‘s exclusive economic
zone.

The second
incident happened last month. Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi flew into a
rage after his Japanese counterpart, Katsuya Okada, politely suggested that
China cut its nuclear arsenal. At the
May 15 meeting in the South Korean city of Gyeongju, Mr. Yang yelled that his relatives had been
killed by Japanese forces in northeastern China during Japan’s occupation of China.
He almost walked out of the meeting.

The upshot of
such incidents and the greater volatility in the regional security environment is that
Prime Minister Hatoyama and his Cabinet are now convinced that this is not the
time to move the Futenma air base off Okinawa, even if it means breaking one of his DPJ’s
election campaign promises.

Significantly, there also have a number of
incidents that suggest that China is starting to muscle up to India.
The renewed Sino-Indian border tensions have resulted from growing Chinese
assertiveness on several fronts — border (Chinese
cross-frontier incursions have increased in a major way); diplomatic
(resurrecting its long-dormant claim to India’s Arunachal Pradesh state, which
is three times bigger than Taiwan); and multilateral (launching an international offensive to undercut Indian
sovereignty over Arunachal; for example, by successfully blocking the
Asian Development Bank from identifying that region as part of India in its $1.3
billion credit package last year). As the resistance to its rule in
Tibet has grown since last
year, Beijing has sought to present
Tibet as a core issue to its
sovereignty, just like Taiwan. Tibet now holds as much importance in Chinese
policy as Taiwan. In ratcheting up the
Arunachal issue with India,
Beijing seems to be drawing another analogy:
Arunachal is the new Taiwan that must be “reunified” with
the Chinese state.

In fact, the incidents with
Japan and India serve as another reminder that Chinese
policies and actions are counterproductively pushing these countries closer to
the U.S.

There is
realization in Japan and
India that each is located in
a very dangerous neighborhood and that their security ties with the U.S.
are critical.

India and Japan,
although dissimilar economically, have a lot in common politically. They are
Asia’s largest democracies, but with fractured,
messy politics. Just as India has progressed from doctrinaire
nonalignment to geopolitical pragmatism, Japan —
the “Land of the Rising Sun” — is moving toward greater realism in its foreign
policy.

Their growing congruence of
strategic interests led to a Japan-India security agreement in 2008, a
significant milestone in building Asian power stability. A constellation of
Asian states linked by strategic cooperation and sharing common interests is
becoming critical to ensuring equilibrium at a time when major shifts in
economic and political power are accentuating Asia’s security challenges. The Japan-India security
agreement was modelled on the 2007 Australia-Japan defense accord. Now the
Japan-India security agreement has spawned a similar Australia-India
accord.

The path has been opened to
adding strategic content to the Indo-Japanese relationship, underscored by the
growing number of bilateral visits by top defence and military officials. As
part of their “strategic and global partnership,” which was unveiled in 2006,
India and Japan
are working on joint initiatives on maritime security, counterterrorism,
counterproliferation, disaster management and energy security. But they need to
go much further.

India and Japan, for
example, must co-develop defence systems. India and Japan have missile-defense cooperation with
Israel and the U.S.,
respectively. There is no reason why they should not work together on missile
defense and on other technologies for mutual defense. There is no ban on weapon
exports in Japan’s U.S.-imposed Constitution,
only a long-standing Cabinet decision. That ban has been loosened, with
Tokyo in recent
years inserting elasticity to export weapons for peacekeeping operations,
counterterrorism and anti-piracy. The original Cabinet decision, in any event,
relates to weapons, not technologies.

As two legitimate
aspirants to new permanent seats in the UN Security Council, India and Japan should
work together to push for the Council’s long-pending reform. Asian peace and
stability would be better served if all the three major powers in Asia —
China, Japan and India — are in
the Council as permanent members. Beijing’s
provocative actions indeed underscore the risks of China remaining Asia’s sole representative among the Council’s permanent
members.

While Asia’s growing importance in international relations signals a systemic shift in the global distribution of power, it is the rising heft of a single country — China — that by itself is transforming the international geopolitical landscape like no other development. As world history attests, the dramatic rise of a new power usually creates volatility in the international system, especially when the concerned power is not transparent about its strategic policies and military expenditure. Therefore, China’s rise constitutes a strategic challenge by itself in Asia — a challenge that needs to be managed wisely, so that Beijing stays on the positive side of the ledger, not the negative side.

After all, in 25 years from now, China will clearly be more powerful and influential than it is today, with a greater propensity to assert itself on issues while projecting power far beyond its shores. China’s rapidly accumulating power already is emboldening Beijing to pursue a more muscular foreign policy. After having touted its “peaceful rise,” it has shown a creeping propensity to flex its muscle.

China’s economy has expanded 13-fold over the last 30 years, thanks to surging exports and copious investments. As a result, China already has arrived as a global economic player. Today, with its burgeoning foreign-exchange reserves, it is courted around the world to help resolve a host of financial problems. At the same time, it is true that China’s global ambitions get weighed down by its vulnerabilities, including authoritarian rule, an opaque culture, failure to accommodate ethnic nationalities like the Tibetans and Uighurs, and growing disparities in Chinese society.

Militarily, China is likely to continue to put the emphasis on indigenous research and development to further augment its capabilities. China already spends far more on its military than any other country in Asia.

It is also set to develop clear and deep linkages between trade and foreign policy, and between trade and power projection. That will mean a proactive, assertive Chinese foreign-policy posture in relation to countries and issues of vital interest. The creeping extension of China’s security perimeter is bound to increase international concerns about the opacity of its strategic doctrine and military spending.

China’s priority, of course, will remain what it has been for long: Boosting indigenous capabilities, especially its conventional and nuclear deterrence, and working to shift the balance of power in the Asia-Pacific in its favor. China’s increasingly sophisticated missile force remains at the heart of its military modernization. As part of a calculated strategy to project power far beyond its frontiers and strengthen its deterrent capabilities, China has placed missile prowess at the center of its force modernization. It is developing a range of land-attack and anti-ship cruise missiles, long-range surface-to-air missiles and anti-radiation missiles. As its nuclear-force modernization gains further momentum, shifts in China’s nuclear doctrine — from a defensive orientation to a more offensively-configured posture — would inevitably occur.

Broadly, Chinese naval power is set to grow exponentially, as Beijing expands its indigenous ship production and deploys naval assets far from its exclusive economic zone. Little surprise the Chinese Navy is beginning to show open interest in extending its reach and operations to the Indian Ocean — a crucial international passageway for oil deliveries and other trade.

That interest is manifest from the Chinese projects in the Indian Ocean rim region, including the building of a port at Hambantota in Sri Lanka, the modernization of the Bangladeshi port of Chittagong, and the construction of a deep-water naval base and commercial port for Pakistan at Gwadar, situated at the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz — the only exit route for Persian Gulf oil. In addition, the Irrawaddy Corridor between China’s Yunnan province and the Burmese ports on the Bay of Bengal is set to become a key economic and strategic passageway involving road, river, rail and harbor links.

In the Pacific Ocean, as underlined by the rising frequency of Chinese naval patrols, Beijing also is seeking to extend its strategic perimeter there. What is being subtly suggested by Chinese analysts today — that the Western Pacific is China’s maritime zone of influence — could set the stage for an intensifying strategic competition with Japan.

Beijing, not content that Han territorial power is at its pinnacle, still seeks a Greater China. With 60 percent of its present landmass comprising homelands of ethnic minorities, modern China has come a long way in history since the time the Great Wall represented the Han empire’s outer security perimeter. Yet, driven by self-cultivated myths, the state fuels territorial nationalism, centered on issues like Tibet and Taiwan, and its claims in the East and South China Seas and on India’s northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh. China’s insistence on further expanding its national frontiers stymies a forward-thinking approach essential to building peace and stability in Asia.

It is thus not an accident that as its power grows, China seems more determined than ever to choke off Asian competitors, a tendency reflected in its hardening stance toward India. Hopes of a politically negotiated settlement of the lingering territorial disputes have dissipated amid Chinese muscle-flexing along the long, 4,057-kilometer Himalayan frontier. Indeed, it is approaching three decades since China and India began border negotiations, making them already the longest and the most-barren process between any two countries in modern history. In this period, the world has changed fundamentally.

Against India, the PLA is now better geared to wage a short, swift war by surprise, thanks to the significant upgrading of the military infrastructure and logistics on the Tibetan plateau. The state-directed demographic changes under way in Chinese-ruled Tibet also carry long-term military significance vis-à-vis India.

The India-China tensions explain why soaring bilateral trade is not a barometer of how well a relationship is doing. Trade in today’s market-driven world is not constrained by political differences — unless political barriers have been erected, as the U.S. has done against Cuba and Burma, for example.