China

Vietnam: a power on the rise?

April 13, 2021 by Carlotta Rinaudo

By Carlotta Rinaudo

The lush vegetation of the Mekong Delta (Credit: Carlotta Rinaudo, 2017)

In April 1975 the Vietnam War was over. Roads and bridges were left in rubble, and orphans were walking barefoot in the streets of Saigon. Following the war, the US had imposed a trade embargo prohibiting any commercial dealings with Vietnam, isolating the country from international trade.

Unsurprisingly, in the early 1980s Vietnam was one of the poorest places on earth. The Vietnamese Communist Party adopted a centrally planned economy that led to stagnant agricultural production, explaining why a country covered with lush paddy fields had to import rice from abroad. One-fifth of the Vietnamese population was on the brink of starvation, and electricity was available only 4 hours per day.

This situation changed in 1986, when the country opened to the world. Vietnam launched a set of reforms known as “Doi Moi”, successfully replicating the Chinese model: the country would preserve its single-party system while shifting towards a market-based economy. These reforms quickly boosted the economy and attracted massive Foreign Direct Investments. If a few years before Vietnam had had to import rice from abroad, by 1989 it had become the second largest rice exporter in the world.

Over recent decades, Vietnam has presented itself as a good international citizen, earning recognition and respect within the ASEAN group. It has signed a wide array of bilateral trade agreements, while joining the WTO, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), and recently, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). In 2019 it took a mediating role in global diplomacy by hosting the second Trump-Kim summit in Hanoi, and in 2020 it assumed the ASEAN chairmanship while successfully handling the Covid19 pandemic. Hanoi was in fact praised for giving one of the world’s best responses to the pandemic, quickly introducing a massive program of contact tracing while mobilizing the Vietnamese society in a collective fight against the virus.
These factors suggest that Vietnam is walking the path of a rising middle power, demonstrating a growing ability to shape international events in three particular areas: the global supply chain, the South China Sea, and the realm of 5G technologies.

Vietnam’s place in the global supply chain

Amidst the China-US trade war, many multinational companies have been looking to relocate their supply chain outside of the Chinese mainland, adopting a “China Plus One” business strategy. In this context, Vietnam has emerged as the ideal “Plus One” candidate, thanks to its ability to offer solid infrastructure coupled with a large low-wage workforce. Nike and Samsung have been outsourcing their production to Vietnamese factories for years, and recently Apple has started to assemble its AirPod earphones on Vietnamese soil too. This is not to say that “Made in Vietnam” will ever be able to replace “Made in China”: Vietnam doesn’t have the capacity to become the new factory of the world. To Vietnam’s 55 million manufacturing workers, China has 800 million; and while Ho Chi Minh City’s container port can accommodate 6 million containers annually, Shanghai reaches 40 million. Yet, in a “China Plus One” world, Vietnam has been able to emerge as a valid alternative, thereby securing an important position in the global supply chain.

Vietnam in the South China Sea

According to scholar Do Thanh Hai, Vietnam’s psyche has been shaped by its cyclical and perennial struggle against Chinese invasions from the North. This traditional Vietnamese perception of China remains in the country’s consciousness. Vietnam often sees China not as a conventional neighbor, but, rather, as a force of nature – “like floods and storms that feed into the deltas (…) to which Vietnamese, like reeds, must at once bend while remaining firmly intact.”

Aware of its military inferiority, Vietnam does not seek direct confrontation with its northern giant, instead it resists, “firmly intact”, protecting Vietnamese interests.

When, in 2014, China deployed one of its oil rigs in Vietnamese waters, Vietnam responded with a policy of “cooperation cum struggle”, displaying extraordinary pragmatism. First, Vietnam resolutely responded by raising global media attention to China’s assertiveness in the South China Sea, therefore internationalizing and securitizing a bilateral issue. Then, when China pulled the oil rig back, Hanoi sent its officials to Beijing to heal their diplomatic ties.

Although this approach might appear unusual, Vietnam only revived an old tradition of the past, when, after a territorial dispute, it used to send symbolic homages and annual tributes to Chinese emperors in order to secure peace, harmony, and recognition. This policy of “cooperation cum struggle” is a mix of soft and hard methods that helps Vietnam escape a battle it cannot win, while vigorously standing up for its own territorial sovereignty.

While other Southeast Asian countries like Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines have now softened their attitude in the South China Sea, Vietnam is increasingly perceived as the ASEAN champion that can contain Chinese maritime ambitions. This security leadership role has been widely acknowledged by the international community, with countries like Japan offering their support and providing offshore patrol vessels to Hanoi. With regards to China, Vietnam is indeed “bending like reeds, while remaining firmly intact.”

Vietnam in the technological race

Not only did Vietnam not include Huawei in its 5G network: Hanoi built its own domestic infrastructure and appears ready to deploy it for commercial use by 2021. Viettel, a Vietnamese state-owned telecom company, has collaborated with Ericsson to create its own 5G technology, and plans to expand the product to Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia. Hanoi has also provided a cheap mass access to the Internet for its citizens, while aiming to become a key player in e-commerce and online payment methods. After Ericsson, Nokia, Huawei, Samsung and ZTE, Viettel is the sixth producer in the 5G race, an impressive result for a country that 40 years ago was not able to keep up with food shortages.

Conclusion

A latecomer to the international community, Vietnam is now increasingly emerging as a regional middle power: it is well-integrated in the world economy, it operates on the front lines in the disputed waters of the South China Sea, and it is one of the only domestic producers of 5G technology. ASEAN was deliberately created to survive without a formal leader to ensure equality between its 10 member states – yet this has translated into mutual weakness rather than collective strength. For this reason, many scholars see in Vietnam a country that will be able to fill this leadership vacuum. From its isolation in the 1980s, Vietnam has come far: today, the vibrant streets of Hanoi tell the story of a place of possibilities.

Carlotta is a MA candidate in International Affairs at the Defence Studies Department, King’s College London. After completing her BA in Interpreting and Translation, she moved to the Middle East and developed a strong interest in the MENA region, North Korea, Cybersecurity, and the implications of the rise of China. Carlotta has written on a number of Italian publications on the Hong Kong protests and other forms of political unrest.

US Foreign Policy: The impact of the War on Terror on the Uyghur people

April 8, 2021 by Carlotta Rinaudo

By Carlotta Rinaudo

In June 2019 former President Donald Trump publicly signed the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act, imposing sanctions on Chinese officials responsible for the oppression of the Muslim minority in the Xinjiang region. Behind the closed doors of the G-20 summit in Osaka however, Trump seemed to have a different agenda. According to former national security adviser John Bolton, Trump told Chinese leader Xi Jinping that re-educating the Muslim minority “was exactly the right thing to do”. He then allegedly asked Xi Jinping to help him win the elections in 2020. Unfortunately, this is not the first instance of inconsistent U.S. policy towards the Uyghur people and Central Asia.

For centuries, the Xinjiang region was an arid and sparsely populated land, traversed by a network of lonely trade routes that transported Chinese silk to the Roman world. Its inhabitants, the Uyghurs, were oasis farmers and herders who spoke a Turkic language and practiced Sunni and Sufi Islam, sharing cultural and ethnic ties with the other Turkic tribes of Central Asia.

In 1759 the Xinjiang region was annexed by the Qing Dynasty, while the territories of the other Turkic tribes of Central Asia were slowly absorbed by the Russian Empire, thus becoming known as “Russian Turkestan”.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian Turkestan became what today is called Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and the southern part of Kazakhstan. As the Uyghurs watched their Turkic neighbours achieve self-determination, they too demanded independence. China’s reaction to this has grown increasingly assertive over recent years, sparking a heated debate between Washington and Beijing.

On one side, the Chinese government insisted that Uyghur separatists are engaged in terrorist activities, responsible for various bombings and assassinations, and connected with Chechen rebels, Al Qaeda, and the Taliban. In particular, Beijing focuses on a Uyghur separatist group known as the Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM). In the 1990s, representatives of ETIM travelled to Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and eventually Afghanistan, where they met with Osama Bin Laden in order to gain support for their insurgency in Xinjiang. This framing allowed Beijing to legitimise a massive education program which it claims is necessary to fight terrorism and eradicate extremism in the region.

But where Beijing says there are “vocational education and training centres”, and “de-radicalisation measures”, Washington instead sees “detention camps”, and “cultural genocide”. In particular, the Trump administration accused China of human rights abuses, torture, systematic rape, and forced sterilization against the Uyghur minority.

In this dire situation, however, what’s often overlooked is the United States’ own complicity in the origins of the very repression that it publicly condemns.
Following the 9/11 attacks, Beijing labelled Uyghur separatists as terrorist threats. In response, President George W. Bush said that China should not use the War on Terror as an “excuse to persecute minorities”. However, by 2002, Washington had changed its tune. Seeking China’s support in its invasion of Iraq, the US listed ETIM as a terrorist group, and assisted in having ETIM recognised as a terrorist threat by the Security Council. In addition, since 2002, the US has detained 22 Uyghurs in Guantanamo Bay. Blinded by its own interests in Iraq, Washington favoured the initial international legitimisation of repression against the Uyghur minority – the same repression it today condemns. 

Washington’s inconsistent foreign policy extended well beyond the Xinjiang region. Following the 9/11 attacks, President Bush built a strong relation with Islam Karimov, the first President of Uzbekistan, whose secret police regularly persecuted political opponents, torturing them in sound-proof cells with electric shocks, asphyxiation, and food deprivation. Nonetheless, Washington turned a blind eye to such oppressive violence.

Sitting on the Northern border of Afghanistan, Uzbekistan provided in fact an ideal location to establish a military base and a supply route that could support the American invasion of Afghanistan. Washington’s silence was a trade-off for Uzbekistan’s logistical support against Afghanistan. Once again blinded by its own interests, the US called its foreign policy a “policy of strategic patience”, perhaps an euphemism for what in reality was a policy of “strategic complicity”.

Today, Washington accuses Beijing of practices that are very similar to those committed by Karimov in Uzbekistan. The only difference being that China is a rival superpower, while Uzbekistan was an ally that served American interests in the War on Terror.

As a part of its policies in Xinjiang, Beijing has announced a poverty relief plan that aims to lift Uyghurs out of poverty by sending them to work in various factories all over China. But again, what Beijing calls “promotion of poverty alleviation”, Washington today calls “forced labour.” Ironically, some factories where such “forced labour” occurs are part of the supply chains of American companies like Apple, Nike, and Coca-Cola. American firms are therefore, consciously or unconsciously, benefitting from the same labour that their government claims to be a form of slavery.

In September 2020, the Uyghur Forced Labour Prevention Act was approved by the House of Representatives, in an attempt to impose stricter controls on goods that could be produced by forced labour. In turn, Beijing claims that Washington is instrumentalising the narrative of “forced labour” to ban Chinese imports amidst a ferocious US-China trade competition. Meanwhile, companies like Nike, Apple, and Coca-Cola have already started to lobby the US Congress in order to weaken the bill. It could undermine their supply chain, they say.

This chaotic situation not only demonstrates that the US and China remain heavily interconnected in their supply network, but it also shed lights on the wide-reaching repercussions of the War on Terror. In 2002, when the US’ enemy number one was Al Qaeda, Washington was ready to label Uyghur separatist groups as terrorist groups, and to justify China’s actions against them. But in 2020, when the US’ primary perceived threat is China itself, Washington has removed that same separatist group from the list, accusing Beijing of human rights abuses.

As the Biden Administration aims to reengage in the defence of human rights, a more consistent policy in Central Asia should be established – one that learns from past mistakes. After all, a global policeman should not be driven by their own agenda, but by the values they claim to protect.

Chinese Threats to Australia’s Power in the South Pacific

March 29, 2021 by Jorge Medina

By Jorge Medina

Frankhauser, J. (2020, June 20). China and Australian Flags [Digital image]. Retrieved December 04, 2020, from https://www.abc.net.au/cm/rimage/11847262-16×9-xlarge.jpg?v=2

Since the Covid-19 pandemic has taken a stranglehold on the world, many Western powers are eager to blame China for the global downturn, Australia, however, has been exceptionally outspoken in its recent statements about China’s actions regarding the pandemic. As the Covid-19 continues to surge, Australia uses this reason to make their voice louder about their concerns regarding China’s behaviour in the region. Australia has started behaving in a defensive way that has caused it to call-out the threats they have received from Chinese expansionism in the South Pacific. With this article, I would like to detail what are the Chinese threats that threaten Australian hegemony in the South Pacific and the significant change it is having in the region.

In the past few decades, a substantial number of Chinese students have flocked to Australian universities for education. This has brought a significant amount of cash flow and funding into the higher education sector, university funding dependent on the enrolment of these students. But this money does not come without strings. The Chinese government has set up many methods of surveillance on university campuses across Australia. It has led to self and forced censorship by academics who conduct research that involves anything to do with China. Students are not allowed to express themselves freely without the fear of facing retribution. When the Hong Kong protests erupted in 2019, Hong Kong students across Australia protested against the actions of the Chinese Communist Party back in Hong Kong, and Chinese diplomatic missions organized counter protests where Hong Kong and local students faced physical and vicious online retaliation.

Another way in which China threatens Australia’s regional power status is its increasing its investments into countries such as Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands. China has reached out to these small island nations, and has not only offered to help fund investment projects, but has also promised to aid the economies of these isolated nations. As these nations have traditionally relied on Australia for investment and protection, China’s increased influence, threatens Australia’s legitimacy in the South Pacific. In contrast to Australian aid and investment which is highly conditional on improving human rights and have significant corruption-fighting mechanism in place, China’s funding has no such preconditions. Accordingly, island nations have been accepting Chinese loans and funding to build grand infrastructural projects. These projects not only have limited benefits towards the growth of local economies and can be seen as ‘roads leading to no-where and can be seen as useless vanity projects used to perpetuate China’s debt-trap diplomacy initiatives. With a considerable amount of money floating into these nations, China is subverting Australia’s presence in the region and is shifting the patronage role. These physical projects are creating a significant amount of influence, even if they are roads that lead to nowhere. It is building roads figuratively connecting these nations with China and blocking Australia’s influence and subverting Australia’s power status in the region.

During the spring of 2020, in the first wave of the pandemic, many Australian leaders called for an inquiry into China’s role in the way that the pandemic has spread. Since then… (contemporaneous examples please). Australia sees China’s actions on Covid-19 as dangerous to the stability of the world, and counts China as the responsible actor at fault for its initial handling of the pandemic. China has seen this as an attack to their nation and started pulling Australian products across the country. Many Chinese citizens also started to advocate for a boycott against Australian products. China refuses to allow Australia to declare whatever it wishes on the world stage. It is making sure that Australia’s securitization of the pandemic occurs significant economic costs in order to deter other states from criticising its handling of the pandemic, and broader activities in its sphere of influence.

All of these actions threaten Australia’s role in their own region. China continues to influence in the local higher educational and political sphere. China has been investing with Australia’s traditional allies in the South Pacific. China seems to be changing the way that Australia functions as an actor in its own region and is significantly changing the security landscape of world politics. And as China continues to rise, it will continue changing the rules to the existing international world order.

Jorge is a MA student in the Conflict Resolution in Divided Societies program at King’s College London. Jorge is originally from the US and did his undergrad at UC Irvine and spent time at Yonsei University in South Korea. Jorge has previously spent time studying conflict in the Middle East through the Olive Tree Initiative and working for the Mexican Embassy in the US for the Office of Border Affairs. You can follow him on Twitter @medina_jorgeUK

The Old World of Arms Control is Dying

March 24, 2021 by Bryce Farabaugh

By Bryce Farabaugh

The future of nuclear arms control is uncertain. On February 3, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced the 5-year extension of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), the agreement between the United States and Russia that limits the number of strategic nuclear warheads and launchers each state may possess. The extension was a welcome relief for those concerned about the fate of the last remaining pillar of the global arms control regime, a system intended to reduce nuclear risks by improving insight, verification, and trust between the two states with the largest nuclear arsenals in the world. As the treaty’s survival was anything but certain under the previous administration, proponents of its extension are celebrating this victory, but such celebrations are bound to be short-lived as looming arms control challenges come into focus. U.S. policymakers are increasingly wary of China’s military capabilities, including its modernizing nuclear arsenal, and both supporters and skeptics of the New START extension concede future arms control agreements will likely need to include China in some capacity. Indeed, if meaningful arms control agreements are going to continue to serve the national security interests of the United States by reducing global nuclear risks in an evolving security environment, it’s helpful to interrogate arguments that were made against the New START extension to explore whether such arguments are likely to be obstacles in future arms control dialogues.

New START is largely a product of the post-Cold War thaw in relations between the United States and Russia. In the 1990’s, as the dust settled from the collapse of the Soviet Union and the United States came to terms with “the unipolar moment,” global nuclear stockpiles were reduced while cooperation on nuclear issues generally increased between the two states. Cooperative arms control measures between the United States, the former Soviet Union, and others were achieved during this period: the Open Skies Treaty improved confidence and security in Europe, Soviet nuclear weapons were successfully removed from Ukraine, and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) created an international network capable of monitoring nuclear detonations (among other successes) While there have undoubtedly been setbacks including the US withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in 2001 and the failure of the US Senate to ratify the CTBT, for a while it appeared increasingly likely that intense nuclear competition between the US and its rivals was a thing of the past.

Indeed, the crown jewel of the post-Cold War arms control agreements, New START, entered into force in 2011 and was viewed by many as a major achievement in US-Russian relations. Set to expire in February 2021, the United States and Russia appeared unable to come to an agreement on its extension. This fact was somewhat surprising, as New START was widely popular among US nuclear experts. Arms controllers praise its limits on deployed strategic warheads, while counterforce advocates value the verification and monitoring protocols that provide visibility into Russian military capabilities. Likewise, leaders at the highest levels of the Russian Government publicly stated their desire to extend the agreement without preconditions. The reticence by the US to extend New START had been attributed to a host of explanations, but one complaint from US negotiators surfaced repeatedly: the absence of China from the treaty.

The US’s insistence on including China in New START and related strategic dialogues is puzzling for several reasons. First, China is believed to have a much smaller arsenal than either the US or Russia, meaning its number of strategic warheads is already far below the limits of the agreement. Second, China was not party to the original negotiation and had few (if any) incentives to join. And third, Chinese security concerns are very different than the decades-long nuclear rivalry between the US and Russia, etc. This begs the question then that if the US possesses nuclear superiority over China, both quantitative and qualitative, why does it continue to behave as if China is a significant and growing nuclear threat that must be controlled at all costs?

One answer may lie in how humans process information. US policymakers are often students of history and thus rely on historical analogies for interpreting new events. Additionally, behavioral scientists have shown that humans, in general, often rely on information that they believe is relevant for a situation even when the circumstances, parties involved, stakes, and other conditions are quite different, resulting in cognitive biases that can impact decision-making. In the context of US-China cooperation/competition over nuclear weapons issues, these two facts suggest policymakers may be heavily inclined to view the current situation as a replay of the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union. This could lead policymakers to mistakenly pursue policies that previously worked for the US despite the drastically different circumstances of the current situation.

This overreliance on the flawed Cold War analogy between the US and China can be seen in statements by senior US officials responsible for overseeing nuclear weapons policy. For example, in May 2020, US Special Presidential Envoy for Arms Control, Marshall Billingslea, stated that the US is prepared to spend Russia and China “into oblivion” in order to win a new nuclear arms race. Billingslea had also reportedly called Chinese efforts to modernize its nuclear forces “a ‘highly alarming effort’ to gain parity with the far larger arsenals that Russia and the United States have kept for decades.” These concerns evoke memories of the infamous “missile gap” argument that plagued American political discourse beginning in the 1950’s , a myth that still echoes in comments like those of Billingslea and other former officials

In addition to these tired Cold War analogies, theoretical arguments about the structure of the international system may alternatively explain increasing nuclear competition between the United States and China. Under this framework, states are constantly competing with one another in order to achieve national goals, whether supremacy in the international system or narrower goals like regional security or relative gains vis-à-vis competitor states. Nuclear competition in this scenario is largely inevitable as states constantly strive to improve military capabilities. Recent scholars have argued why maintaining a robust nuclear arsenal is important to deter nuclear conflict with a rising power like China or, in the event of a crisis, possess the ability to terminate the conflict on terms favorable to the US. Matthew Kroenig argues maintaining “nuclear superiority” can provide significant utility for the US should such a crisis or conflict occur. Keir Lieber and Daryl Press similarly argue that states may be able to escape nuclear “stalemate,” which suggests that while the US currently maintains a significant nuclear advantage over China, technological advances may erode this advantage and thus some form of nuclear competition is inevitable. Additionally, some US Government intelligence agencies have contributed to this perceived “inevitability” by promulgating largely-unrealistic projections of the growth of the Chinese nuclear arsenal, which further reinforces the US-China nuclear competition framing.

Policymakers’ overreliance on Cold War logic and deterministic structural forces may make the future of arms control look bleak, but students of history would be wise to remember that even during the darkest days of the Cold War, the United States and Soviet Union were able to find common ground to reduce risks and avoid catastrophe. The unfolding competitive relationship between Washington and Beijing shouldn’t be viewed through a strictly zero-sum lens, and cooperation between the United States and China on security issues with global implications must be pursued when possible. With New START officially expiring on February 5, 2026, the clock is ticking; now is the time to get creative and imagine how a new world of arms control can deal with emerging nuclear risks that threaten to erase the progress previous generations worked so hard to achieve.

Bryce Farabaugh is a master’s student at the University of Chicago’s Committee on International Relations and an external representative for Strife. You can follow him on Twitter @brycefarabaugh

Galwan Gaffes: Turbulent Times for the Sino-Indian Relationship?

February 19, 2021 by Prachi Aryal

By Prachi Aryal

India and China have been involved in regular skirmishes alongside their disputed border (Al Jazeera)

On June 15, 2020, Indian and Chinese troops were involved in an unexpected hand to hand combat in Galwan valley, resulting in at least 20 casualties. This confrontation doubtless has its roots in the 3,500km unmarked and disputed border shared by the two nations, that since the birth of both countries has been the site of successive minor clashes The Galwan valley incident marks a break with these more reserved skirmishes as it’s the first since 1975 that has resulted in loss of life. It has subsequently led to the deployment of thousands of soldiers by both sides, raising concerns of an unintentional war.

Galwan valley, in India’s Ladakh region, lies along the western sector of the Line of Actual Control (a line separating Indian and Chinese territory) and close to Aksai Chin, a disputed area claimed by India but controlled by China. Shivshankar Menon, former Security Adviser of India has warned that the militarization by either side of the border is troubling for the Asian region as it opens the possibility of a fully-fledged war between the two nuclear armed nations.

Speculation surrounding the clash suggests several micro-causes but underlying each are the powers’ competing strategic goals. Strategists assert that India’s growing economic development and global diplomatic influence have become impediments for their Chinese counterpart, thus the move to intrude into Indian territory was China’s attempt to disrupt the status quo in the region.

Experts assert that China’s strategy of modern conquest is that of fait accompli, a calculated risk to establish dominance by seizing small territories. This strategy often leaves the victim with few viable options to restore the previous status quo. Fait accomplis, allow unilateral gains of power and changes to the existing state of affairs; reminiscent, therefore, of China’s actions in the Aksai Chin, Spartly Islands in South China Sea, Doklam and the skirmishes with India.

The 15 June clash accentuates not just the strategic tensions but the more fundamental problems in the Sino-India relationship. China’s continued military assistance to Pakistan and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) initiative, on disputed territory claimed by India, has created an environment of mistrust between the two nations. Similarly, India’s opposition to the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), coupled with historically sour relations stemming from India granting sanctuary to the Dalai Lama, has intensified bilateral tensions.

Many reports claim that the clash was triggered by India’s construction of the Darbuk-Shyok-Daulat Beg Oldi (DSDBO) road in the Ladakh region, which would give India the upper hand in accessing the Daulat Beg Oldi airstrip, thereby paving the way for easy transportation of troops and material during conflicts. Indeed, the occurrence of skirmishes and clashes have usually mirrored the construction of infrastructure around the disputed region. Both the countries view such projects as being imbued with strategic and tactical motives, leading to exacerbated skirmishes.

The growing public discontent surrounding India’s response to the situation in Ladakh poses a strategic difficulty for the government in New Delhi. Chinese retreat is unlikely as it has adopted a fait accompli strategy of land grabs with the purpose of intimidating and coercing nearby rivals in order to establish itself as a regional hegemon. India’s traditional approach of quiet diplomacy, whilst working to soothe domestic public sentiments, will provide China the space to continue with such land grabs. With limited military options, and an increased need to address public discontent surrounding the government’s inaction, India finds itself in a strategic quagmire. Its move to ban Chinese mobile phone applications, citing national security interests, is unlikely to have any effect on China’s position on the border.

Regular border skirmishes are fundamentally products of slapdash colonial cartography which imposed arbitrary and contested borders between the two nations. The Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar has made repeated public statements reiterating that the only viable way of restoring Sino-India ties is by disengaging and de-escalating the military situation in the LAC (Line of Actual Control)LAC (Line of Actual Control) The regular cross-border clashes are contrary to the Wuhan spirit championed by the two nations, who had agreed to significant economic cooperation for development in the South Asian region.

China’s resort to military trespassing in the Galwan, as on 15 June, has created an atmosphere of mistrust and antagonism with its Indian neighbour. The frozen diplomatic talks compounded with China’s unchanged position and its fait accompli strategies of land grabbing are likely to create a geopolitical and strategic crisis in the Asian region. Sino-India relations in the future are likely to see mixed elements of conflict and cooperation as each side is driven, by their strategic objectives, to ever more aggressive actions. It is possible that, without a clear demarcation of the border, skirmishes like these can create destabilizing consequences for the Asian region.

Editor’s Note: There have been a number of recent events since the time this article was finalized for publication that impact this topic and region. The information contained in this article was current as of January 2021.

Prachi Aryal is a MA student in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London. Her research interest is inclined towards Gender, Human Rights, and Cross border conflicts in transitioning nations and how visuals from conflict zones play a role in communicating the realities of conflict to the broader world. She completed her BA in Journalism from the University of Delhi, India.

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