The risks of a soft line towards China are so obvious that it is inconceivable that New Delhi can possibly ignore them in its current search for a more viable posture towards its big neighbour. Yet some of the adverse consequences of a “friendly” approach can bear mention here in the interest of placing the mini-debate on China in a proper perspective.
The vague talk of a dialogue with Peking can cause unnecessary misgivings in the Soviet Union which is, whether anyone likes it or not, India’s main support for defence against China. The Soviet leaders and diplomats make no secret of their dismay. They fear that India may unwittingly weaken the resolve of other countries to resist China’s threats and blandishments.
This does not mean that New Delhi should allow Moscow a veto over its China policy. If the concept of non-alignment means anything, it is that the country retains the right to shift its posture towards Peking or any other capital at its convenience and choice. But it is commonsense to recognise that since 1962 a special relation has developed between the Soviet Union and India. This has centred and continues to centre on the question of the containment of China. It will be sheer adventurism on the part of New Delhi to jeopardise it in the present context when in doing so it cannot count on any greater responsiveness towards its needs in Washington.
Grave Risk
Moscow took a grave risk last year when it brushed aside India’s susceptibilities and interests and decided to provide arms aid to Pakistan. The timing of the decision – soon after President Ayub Khan’s serious illness early last year – showed that in spite of all the sources of information and analysis at their disposal the men in the Kremlin failed to grasp the simple fact that they could no longer ensure the survival of the regime by extending military assistance to it because it had become extremely unpopular at home. They must own some of the responsibility for the shift in Indian public opinion on the question of China. The Soviet arms aid decision came as a big shock to most Indians and their instinctive reaction was that the country needed to rethink its China policy.
Moscow will be making a grave mistake if it takes the simplistic view that the desire to open a dialogue with Peking is a variant of anti-communism and that it is inspired either by the so-called reactionaries in India or the cold warriors in Washington who still think of the Soviet Union as their country’s principal rival and challenger. There can be no doubt that the desire for a rapprochement with China is widespread and that it is to no small extent the direct result of the Soviet wooing of Pakistan.
But in the circumstances the right course for New Delhi is not to act in a huff but to open a meaningful discussion with Moscow not only on the question of Soviet arms for Pakistan but also on the future security of the whole region. India has suffered grievously in the past because of the Government’s reluctance to do so either with the Soviet Government or the American Administration. It is unbelievable but it is true that New Delhi did not enter into serious discussions on its security problems with either Washington or Moscow between 1959 and 1962 when its relations with Peking were steadily deteriorating and the Chinese posture was becoming more and more menacing. Next time the consequences of a lack of understanding with Washington and Moscow can be far graver for India because China is now a nuclear power.
A Warning
Unnecessary misunderstanding in Moscow is not the only risk New Delhi is running. Unwittingly it is spreading the illusion that the soft option of an early rapprochement with China is open to the nation. The danger of such an illusion cannot be over-emphasised because it involves the political disarmament of a people who have little experience of international relations and who do not realise sufficiently dearly that often nations have to live with difficult problems for generations. The experience of the ‘fifties and early ‘sixties should serve as a warning against political disarmament.
On a superficial view it can be argued that the Union Government will find it easier to deal with the CPM-dominated West Bengal Government if it adopts a friendly approach towards China. In fact New Delhi might end up by lending a measure of respectability to the Naxalites and by making the moderate leaders’ task of dealing with the extremists in the CPM even more heartbreaking than it is already. The evolution of the CPM into a national party can be retarded by a soft official line towards China.
The mini-debate on the question of a new approach towards China in this country has so far centred on one issue: have there been or have there not been some indications that the Chinese are interested in a dialogue with India? This is a relevant question but is of secondary importance except in a very immediate sense. From the long-term point of view the key questions relate to China’s place in the world and in the region, its conception of its future role, the risks it is prepared to take in the pursuit of its objectives, the resistance it is likely to encounter from external and regional powers and so on.
These issues have to be discussed in the new framework created by China’s breathtaking success in developing nuclear weapons and missiles and America’s failure to stabilise its power on the South-East Asian mainland. A China armed with nuclear weapons is a qualitatively different entity from the non-nuclear China which invaded India in 1962 and withdrew before the United States could intervene. Even if America can perform the miracle of reaching an agreement with Hanoi which allows it to stay on in South Viet Nam some time in future, China will be operating in a far more favourable situation than it has done all these years for the simple reason that Washington will be extremely reluctant to get involved in another Asian war.
It has been possible to evade the stark implications of these two momentous developments – the acquisition of nuclear arms by China and the US failure in Viet Nam – because the so-called cultural revolution immobilised the country precisely during the period when these should have become abundantly clear. It looks as if the cultural revolution is now over. Even if it is not, Mao Tse-tung will not oblige the rest of the world for ever by keeping China in a state of turmoil and thus preventing it from fulfilling its external ambitions. China is a great power and will function as such in coming years. It is time that New Delhi braced itself for the strenuous exercise of defining the kind of world in which it would find itself and how it proposed to deal with it. It would be sheer escapism to suggest that it already knows the answers. So far it has not even framed the right questions.
The official as well as non-official thinking in India on the problem of China is influenced by a series of illusions and half-truths. These need to be shed before clear thinking becomes possible on this critical issue.
Not True
First, Peking’s propaganda notwithstanding it is not true that China is encircled by the United States, the Soviet Union, India and Japan acting in concert. All these powers are pursuing different objectives. More often than not they are thwarting each other. The Soviet Union, for instance, has been undermining America’s position in South-East Asia irrespective of its interest in the containment of China. Japan has been treating India as a potential rival and not as a potential ally.
Secondly, the talk of Dr. Ho Chi Minh playing the role of an Asian Tito is a dangerous simplification unless it is assumed that the United States will maintain a strong military presence on the South-East Asian mainland and that the North Vietnamese will be willing to rely on it to offset China’s formidable power.
Thirdly, it is utterly premature for anyone to suggest that Peking has come to regard Russia as the main enemy and that it will adopt a conciliatory attitude towards the United States and smaller countries in the region. China has no compulsion to do so and its ideological preoccupations will effectively prevent it from doing so. Taiwan cannot be wished away.
Fourthly, as far as India is concerned the dispute is neither confined to the border nor is it merely an offshoot of China’s struggle with the Soviet Union. It needs to be recalled that Peking does not accept New Delhi’s present status and influence in Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim and even those parts of the sub-Himalayan tribal belt which it does not claim. Knowledgeable persons believe that the Chinese have not abandoned the idea of promoting a federation of Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim and NEFA under their auspices. The concept of “just wars of national liberation” can have many variants.
The list is disturbingly long. New Delhi must look at the realities more closely before it can hope to fashion a policy which is better adapted to cope with the new forces in South and South-East Asia.
The Times of India 19 February 1969