Modi’s histrionic Ladakh visit and after
By M.R. Josse
KATHMANDU: In the morning of 3 July, 2020, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in a theatrical display of political chutzpah, helicoptered into, and spent two hours at, a military base at Numi near Leh, in Ladakh. This came 18 days after the grim 15-16 July confrontation between Indian Army personnel and China’s PLA forces in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley resulting in 20 casualties on the Indian side, with an unspecified number of Chinese soldiers killed.
In dramatically journeying to a forward area 230 km from one of the most lethal battlegrounds in the history of Sino-India clashes since the climactic conflict between them in 1962 Modi clearly had at least two key goals in mind.
WARNING TO CHINA
Those were: to boost the morale and confidence of Indian Army officers and ‘jawans’; and to issue a defiant finger-wagging ‘warning’ to China for pursuing an alleged policy of ‘expansionism’ although, curiously enough, he did not specifically name China.
Modi’s brief foray to the awesome heights of Ladakh has already stirred a hornet’s nest, as far as the Opposition Congress is concerned. This was highlighted at a press conference the following day when Congress leader Kapil Sibal, (PTI, Deccan Herald) not only openly questioned the claims made by the government vis-à-vis the recent confrontation with China but, in fact, went on to advise the prime minister to follow “raj dharma” by telling “the people about the reality of the Chinese incursions.”
So, what was China’s reaction to the jibe from India about ‘expansionism’? On one level, the very same day as Modi issued his by-now (in)famous ‘warning’, multiple media reports disclosed that Beijing, apparently stung to the quick, not only issued a counter threat to India against any “strategic miscalculation” with China but also dismissed Modi’s charge that China is ‘expansionist’ as “groundless.”
Zhao Lijian, spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry, declared, in answer to a question at a regular press conference: “India should avoid a strategic miscalculation with regard to China…Neither side should make any move that may complicate the border situation.” Zhao furthermore noted that China and India are in regular communication through military and diplomatic channels.
At another level, Ji Rong, the spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in New Delhi, responded in a tweet, thus: “China has demarcated the boundary with 12 or its 14 neighbours through peaceful negotiations turning land borders into bonds of friendly cooperation. It’s groundless to view China as ‘expansionist’, exaggerate and fabricate its disputes with neighbours.”
[China’s 14 neighbours are: Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar, Bhutan, Nepal, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Mongolia and North Korea. The two countries that do not have boundary agreements with China are: India and Bhutan.]
A TWO-FRONT WAR?
Interestingly, the charge of ‘expansionism’ was heard elsewhere too – this time, against India! That originated not from China, but from Pakistan.
As reported in the Karachi daily Dawn (3 July), Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi, in a telephonic conversation with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, in the wake of Modi’s histrionics, underlined that while Pakistan was exercising restraint despite Indian provocation, “India’s belligerent posture and expansionist policies were jeopardizing the region’s peace.”
It had also reported that on 3 July Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan chaired a high-level meeting to review the internal and external situation. Though it was sparse with respect to concrete details, it was timed not just against the backdrop of Modi’s sortie to Ladakh but also against the increasing noises being heard about the prospect of a two-front war for India.
In this context, a write-up by Ashok Mehta, a retired Maj. Gen in the Indian Army, in the Daily Pioneer (2 July), is worth mulling. Particularly noteworthy is this excerpt: “It is insane to start a conflict – in the middle of a pandemic that has yet to peak in India – which you cannot terminate on your terms given the power differential and its potential to turn into a two-front situation.”
Incidentally, Harsha Kakar, another retired Maj. Gen. in the Indian Army, writing in The Statesman (30 June), advises against “war hysteria” arguing, inter alia, that: “Lack of projection of the standoff and non-disclosure of casualties in local Chinese media implies it (China) is not building internal war hysteria for enhancing its current levels to levels of war.”
What merits close examination, too, is an article in The Diplomat (3 July), by Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan, which reports, inter alia, that: “Adding to the already complex situation, Pakistan is sending about 20,000 troops to territory it controls in India’s western flank opposite Ladakh, confronting us with a possible two-front problem.”
Even more thought-provocative is a write-up in Islamabad’s The Nation (4 July), by Samson Simon Sharaf, which is chock-a-block with weighty thinking points. These include this excerpt: “India has been toying with the idea of a ‘two-front’ war since its defeat by China in 1962. Ironically, it was the Chinese who kept cajoling (her) from 1947 to 1960 to resist the spectre of a two-front conflict by making China an enemy. Much to Pakistan’s relief, India opened the two fronts to appease the West. Thus began the process of morphing two fronts into one by a stroke of Modi’s historic Union Territory and Kashmir maps…”
Similarly absorbing is this observation: “Against China, India never built interior lines and laterals for shifting forces in quick time, while its naval armada never rose above brown waters…” No less engrossing are these comments: “How will India teach China a lesson when it is economically and technologically reliant on China and has to fight along thousands of kilometers? Modi’s bad economic policies, effects of Covid-19 and snapping economic ties with China will pull India back for decades.”
IS CHINA ISOLATED?
A staple of the Indian media’s propaganda diet is the affirmation that today China is ‘isolated’ while India is attracting worldwide sympathy – if not concrete support – in its on-going military tussle with China.
Given space constraints, I will very briefly draw the attention of readers to a couple of illustrative and relevant geopolitical developments which rubbish such sweeping claims.
One refers to Sri Lanka; the other to Iran. With respect to the former, I quote a story (4 July) in the Deccan Herald whose lead is: “As Sri Lanka is set to relook its pact with India and Japan to develop and run the East Container Terminal of the Colombo Port, New Delhi suspects that China nudged President Gotabaya Rajapaksha’s government to review the 2019 trilateral pact.”
The other is an AFP item published in Dawn (5 July) which goes: “Foreign Minister Javad Zarif told the Iranian parliament on Sunday (5 July) that Iran has been negotiating a 25-year accord with China whose terms will be announced once a deal is struck.”
Those developments apart, it is striking that China has, in the aftermath of Modi’s much-ballyhooed trip to Ladhak – as per an AFP news item in Deccan Herald (5 July) – expressed the hope that India “corrects its actions” against Chinese products “immediately” – reminding her that “China has not adopted any restrictive or discriminatory measures against Indian products and services.”
That China is still very much in play, despite allegations to the contrary by a plethora of Indian media pundits, is obvious from post-Galwan politico-diplomatic moves by Beijing as reported, for example, in the Deccan Herald (4 July) and Indian Express (5 July).
Deccan Herald informs readers: “China is making new territorial claims not only along its disputed territory with India, but also along its undisputed stretch of its border with Bhutan. Thimphu has lodged a strong protest. After China sought to block a grant to Bhutan from Global Environment Facility (GEF) for the Sakteng wildlife sanctuary, which the Beijing representative said, at a virtual meeting of the GEF Council, was part of the disputed territory and was on the agenda of China-Bhutan boundary talks.”
Indian Express has this additional piece of information: “To complicate matters further, the Chinese foreign ministry in a statement said ‘a third party should not point fingers in the China-Bhutan border issue’, an apparent reference to India.”
[A later and separate development: on 6 July, following telephonic conversation between India’s National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi – the two countries’ special representatives on the border issue – a disengagement process was said to be underway. It remains to be verified, at this time.]
NEPAL NEXUS
As far as Nepal is concerned, a few points need to be kept in mind. The very first is that the new map India published – following the scrapping of Article 370 of her constitution and the transformation of Ladakh into an Union Territory last August – stepped not only on Chinese and Pakistani strategic toes but on those of Nepal, as well.
Secondly: Nepal’s new official map – conflicting with claims inherent in the new Indian map with regard to Kalapani, Lympiyadhura, and Lipulekh – received the constitutional imprimatur through a transparent political process guided by PM K.P. Oli. This had nothing at all to do with ‘Chinese incitement’ as claimed by India’s Gen. Naravane.
Finally, there has been a shrill and consistent cacophony in India against Oli, presently in the throes of a fierce tug-of-war within the ruling party.
At the time of writing, the political landscape is turbid and uncertain. Whatever the outcome, Nepal’s national interest must be safeguarded, at all costs.
The writer can be reached at:
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