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ANALYSIS
India and China:
Neighborhood problems
By Rahul Bedi
NEW DELHI - China's deliberate delay in
announcing Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's
visit to Beijing, until barely a week before his
departure next Sunday, appears to be a shrewd tactical
move by a "dormant enemy" to weaken Delhi's negotiating
position on a range of outstanding territorial, security
and diplomatic issues.
Vajpayee's will be the
first visit to China by an Indian prime minister in a
decade.
Repeated pronouncements by senior Indian
leaders on Vajpayee's impending trip to China, without
any formal announcement on the exact schedule by his
hosts, signaled to Beijing that Delhi was desperate for
a summit at a time when the SARS (severe acute
respiratory syndrome) virus had besieged the region and
visits to the area were seriously curtailed.
Even after meeting Vajpayee at St Petersburg
this month, Chinese President Hu Jintao declared that
the Indian premier's visit would take place "within the
year".
Diplomats admitted that this had
considerably dampened the Hindu nationalist government's
enthusiasm over Vajpayee's China visit, besides
conceding tactical advantage to a "patient" and
"confident" adversary.
"China's diplomatic price
for a visit could go up, since India was publicly
committed to it and would lose face if it did not
happen," China analyst Harvey Stockwin declared. China
also strengthened its negotiating position by never
publicly committing itself to the June visit, he added.
Security officers in Delhi said that in dealing
with the Middle Kingdom's leadership - which prefers
subtle nuances, gestures and a combination of "smoke and
mirrors" as negotiating tools - India has made a
tactical blunder by indicating through numerous reports
what concessions it is seeking from Beijing.
"Delhi's announcements have been greeted with
characteristic silence by Beijing, showing up India's
political and diplomatic naivete in dealing with a
seasoned leadership," a senior diplomat said, declining
to be identified.
Besides territorial issues
that remain unresolved after the 1962 Sino-Indian war
and demarcating the disputed 4,056-kilometer frontier
between them, such issues as Bejing's military and
nuclear relationship with Pakistan are to feature
prominently in discussions between Vajpayee and senior
Chinese leaders, officials said.
Increased US
presence across Asia and the military alliances between
close Indian ally Russia and oil-rich Central Asian
Republics bordering China will also be debated.
"For the old apparatchiks who constitute the new
leadership in Beijing, Vajpayee's visit to China is an
opportunity to further Chinese interests," declared
security analyst and former Indian National Security
Advisory Board member Brahma Chellaey.
If
anything, the Chinese are providing valuable training to
Indians on how to talk peace but aggressively pursue
national interests.
India's recently released
annual Defense Ministry report cautions against ignoring
the fact "that every major Indian city is within reach
of Chinese missiles and this capability is being further
augmented to include submarine-launched ballistic
missiles".
This "asymmetry" (in nuclear weapons)
is likely to be further accentuated as China responds to
Washington's national missile defense program, it
states. China's defense relationship with Pakistan takes
a particular edge in view of the latter's known
belligerence and hostility to India and its acquisition
to nuclear assets, the report adds.
After 22
years of border negotiations, India is the only country
with which China has not settled its land frontiers or
even defined a line of control.
So far, it has
only exchanged maps on the largely undisputed "middle
sector" covering the border with the contiguous hill
states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttaranchal with
Chinese-administered Tibet, but not the more
controversial eastern and western sectors, the
resolution of which would impinge negatively on Chinese
strategic interests.
Alongside Chinese military
activity in Tibet, Nepal and Myanmar, directed at India,
Beijing's "expansionist naval ambitions" in the Indian
Ocean are greatly worrying Delhi.
India's chief
of naval staff, Madhavendra Singh, recently expressed
"concern" about the Chinese navy's "close interaction"
with Indian Ocean states such as Myanmar. In an
interview with the British-based Jane's Defence Weekly,
he said China - which allocates 33 percent of its
defense outlay on the navy - is helping Myanmar
modernize its naval bases that can support Chinese
submarine operations in the region.
Singh said
the Indian navy was also "closely monitoring" Chinese
activity in developing Gwadar port on close military
ally Pakistan's Makran coast, a move that could
seriously endanger vital shipping routes in the Persian
Gulf, crucial to India's trade and petroleum needs.
Security officers said China is helping Myanmar
modernize naval bases at Hainggyi, the Coco Islands,
Akyab, Za Det Kyi, Mergui and Khaukphyu by building
radar, refit and refuel facilities.
The Chinese
are also believed to be establishing a signals
intelligence (SIGINT) facility on the Coco Islands, 30
nautical miles from India's Andaman Islands territory,
to monitor its missile tests.
Indian Defense
Minister George Fernandes, who openly supports Myanmese
dissidents and hosts many in his official residence in
Delhi, has declared that Hianggyi base to be a joint
Sino-Myanmese naval establishment and that the Coco
Islands had been lent to Beijing.
In a direct
reference to China, but without naming it, the Defense
Ministry report declares that "Myanmar remains an area
of security interest for India ... because of the
activities of countries working against India's
legitimate security concerns".
Indian concerns
also center on increased Chinese involvement in the
annual export to India of Myanmese pulses and beans,
worth about US$300 million. Until recently this trade,
vital to India, was controlled by ethnic Indian traders
operating out of Singapore.
Beijing is also
lobbying hard for a corridor to the Indian Ocean from
southern China via Myanmar in addition to the
established route via the Malacca Straits. China has
already constructed a highway from Kunming, capital of
its Yunnan province, to Shewli on the Myanmese border.
According to a proposal being reviewed by
Myanmar's military junta, Beijing wants to extend that
road link to Sinkham for access to the Irrawaddy River,
flowing through to Yangon and into the Andaman Sea. Once
completed, Chinese barges would transport Chinese goods
down the Irrawaddy to Yangon and transfer them on to
waiting Chinese ships.
Yangon is resisting this
move, but foreign diplomats said it is a matter of time
before Beijing prevails.
Consequently, after
more than a decade of rhetoric, India has dumped the
cause of Myanmese democracy at the altar of strategic
and economic considerations and launched an aggressive
diplomatic and commercial thrust into Yangon to try to
blunt China's influence.
Pakistan and China were
among the few countries to defy international opinion
and forge close military ties with Yangon's junta in
1988, cleverly complementing their strategy of
encircling India.
"India has long ignored China
and to some extent Pakistan's growing influence with
Burma's military government at its peril. It is now
looking to correct this imbalance," a senior military
official said.
To neutralize China's influence
in Yangon, India was also instrumental in persuading
Bangladesh, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand about five
years ago to form an economic-cooperation group. But
little of significance has emerged from this coalition.
(Inter Press Service)
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