Expert Kanti Bajpai explains how recent agreements between India and China could transform global geopolitical dynamics
Relations between India and China underwent a significant turnaround in October 2024. Two sudden developments marked this change. First, on October 21, India announced an agreement with China to resume patrolling rights in Depsang and Demchok in Ladakh, which had been denied following the military clash in Galwan in June 2020. The resumption of patrols will be followed by the withdrawal of thousands of Chinese and Indian troops deployed on the front lines since the 2020 clash. The October agreement followed the creation of stabilizing buffer zones at other flashpoints in Eastern Ladakh in 2021-22. The second development was the almost simultaneous announcement that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping would meet in a bilateral meeting during the BRICS Summit held on October 23.
What caused this positive change in China-India relations? Although there is no official explanation, three factors may have led to the détente.
The first likely factor was economic. India’s economy grows at an average of 7% per year, but to achieve growth of 8-10% per year, it needs essential products from China (metals, active pharmaceutical ingredients or APIs, and machinery and equipment) as well as investment Chinese. The Chinese economy is growing at 3-4% per year.
Thus, the Indian economy, as it approaches Japan’s GDP, is becoming a more attractive destination for exports and investment, especially as China’s economic relations with the West decline due to risk reduction strategies.
The second factor is the realization that the two sides are at an impasse. Unless China and India want to resolve issues on the battlefield, the massive post-Galwan troop deployments have become a waste of men, money and material. As both parties understand that a decisive military victory in Eastern Ladakh is implausible, military deployments are militarily useless (and have lost their symbolic value).
Furthermore, both armies face greater challenges. For India, a two-front conflict, with China and Pakistan simultaneously, would be frightening.
New Delhi, therefore, needs to reduce the biggest but most tractable threat, which is China, while building its capabilities to deal with a two-front war and a powerful and modernizing Chinese military.
For China, the biggest military concern is in the Taiwan Strait, the East China Sea and the South China Sea. Beijing also does not want a two-front confrontation.
The third factor is a completely different strategic concern, namely the United States. India is a strategic partner of the US, mainly because both countries consider China a threat.
However, New Delhi is going through a rough patch with Washington – due to American criticism of India’s democratic regression, human rights and protection of minorities, and more recently, allegations that some Indian officials were involved in an assassination attempt of a Sikh separatist activist on American soil.
U.S. intelligence apparently also shared information with Canada about the murder of a Sikh separatist in Vancouver, which Ottawa alleges was organized by elements of the Indian government.
By reconciling with China, the Modi government may be signaling to the US that it has other strategic options.
For China, relations with the US have continued to worsen under President Joe Biden – due to trade and technology issues, domestic problems such as Tibet and Xinjiang, Taiwan and the South China Sea, and the formation of the US-US coalition. Japan-Australia-India in the Indo-Pacific. It is in China’s interest to destabilize this coalition, and one way to do so is to push India toward neutrality.
These three factors are significant, indicating that détente can be sustained and eventually lead both countries on the path to normalization. What additional steps can India and China take to maintain military detente and encourage the normalization process?
The first step has already been taken, that is, the resumption of patrols by both forces in Depsang and Demchok, with the necessary protocols (smaller patrols, prior notification of patrols, etc.). The next step will be to resume patrols in Galwan, Pangong Tso and other hotspots. So far, the stabilizing measure has been the creation of buffer zones to keep troops separated.
Buffer zones have been useful. However, both sides may fear covert incursions into these areas which then become permanent deployments. Monitoring the zones is therefore vital. Patrolling is a way of monitoring. Other means include terrestrial and satellite sensors, as well as drones.
However, drones can be destabilizing as they can “break out” of buffer zones. And, of course, they can carry weapons. Negotiations will therefore be needed to determine whether the buffer zones in Galwan, Pangong Tso and other places are sufficient. It is worth noting that China has also requested patrolling rights in areas of Arunachal Pradesh, where India has military control. This will also have to be addressed directly.
The second step would be to make a partial but real start to the withdrawal of troops. A long, harsh winter awaits the thousands of troops in Ladakh. Although a complete rollback – the so-called “deployment” – cannot occur immediately, a positive move would be the demobilization of a significant part of the massive deployments.
This would bring real and symbolic benefits. The phase and sequencing of demobilization may not be strictly equal and reciprocal.
Demobilization is easier for the Chinese army, given the superior infrastructure and flatter terrain in Tibet where they would return. It is more difficult for the Indian army, due to poorer infrastructure and the winding mountainous roads that the retreating forces must travel.
Finally, as there was likely an economic justification for détente, the normalization of economic relations needs to occur if both parties are to reap the full benefits of the agreement.
Here, India needs to speed up authorization for Chinese imports and investments that are not considered security risks. It also needs to ease visa restrictions for Chinese executives and technicians servicing Chinese equipment in India. And China needs to do something about the huge trade imbalance with India, which bothers and worries New Delhi.
It is not enough for Beijing to claim that the problem lies with Indian companies, which are uncompetitive. If Xi Jinping can make an economic deal with Donald Trump, he can certainly make one with Narendra Modi too.
In short, although China and India remain suspicious of each other, there is a real opportunity to redirect this bilateral relationship in a positive direction.
By Kanti Bajpai, is Deputy Dean (Research and Development) and Wilmar Professor of Asian Studies at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, and author of India versus China: Why they are not friends.
Source: https://www.ocafezinho.com/2024/11/27/por-tras-da-reaproximacao-entre-china-e-india/
