There is an escalating stand-off between India and China in Ladakh.
Initially, it seemed more to do with tactical positioning and repositioning with some strategic implications. But the latest clashes and high casualties in Galwan valley of eastern Ladakh’s India-China Line of Actual Control (LAC) have brought about a grim prospect for peace. India has confirmed 20 deaths of its soldiers including the commanding officer of a battalion of Bihar regiment.
Casualties on the Chinese side have not yet been known, although Chinese Global Times newspaper has once mentioned that there are casualties on the Chinese side too. They haven’t revealed any figure of dead or wounded. The Indians are trying to put out a higher casualty figure on the Chinese side, which as of now is not plausible.
Strangely, all these fights, including the last and recent past one were hand to hand fights. There is an engagement protocol in the Ladakh-Tibet/Aksai Chin border between India and China that no gun should be carried. While the understanding held, fatalities did not. As per past agreements, the Indians understand Galwan river valley in the northeastern part of Ladakh-Aksai Chin border as its side of the LAC.
Tactically as of now, in addition to Galwan valley, the Chinese seemed to have gained the upper hand by repositioning their troops about 8km ahead of their usual patrolling point also in the north of eastern Ladakh’s Pangong lake area. It resulted in China’s occupation of about 40-60 sq-km area in strategically important eastern Ladakh. The development was confirmed by several neutral Indian security experts.
In recent years, in the northeastern tip of Indian Ladakh, the Indians upgraded one of their smaller battalion bases at Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO) area to a brigade base with an airstrip and essential road network. The road and its side road in various directions run through Galwan and Pangong Lake area. The DBO base dominated that bordering area in which the Chinese have the historic Karakoram Pass and further north the highway connecting Tibet to Xinging.
Last year, Indians completed the road between Leh, the capital of Ladakh, and DBO camp. In the immediate east of DBO lies world’s highest battlefront, the Siachen glacier. And from there towards the west is Gilgit. Baltistan.
In response to India’s border build-ups, the Chinese have moved their forces ahead of their Line of Actual Control in May 2020 to occupy part of the mountain range north of eastern Ladakh’s Pangong Lake in the area called Finger Heights, which also thus far has been understood to be in the Indian side of the LAC. They moved westwards, which allows them to dominate part of the eastern Ladakh road network.
These moves in Galwan and Finger Heights seem to have offset the advantage that the Indians gained by military build-up in DBO, and having a road connecting DBO from Leh. Though it is India’s right to expand or upgrade a base and construct a road in their side, the Chinese considered it to be a provocation, and took measures to counteract it.
Any amount of territorial loss has become quite sensitive in India these days -- be it a mountain peak or a barren land with no people. The stakes were made high by the BJP’s false propaganda against the past Congress governments of 1948 and 1962. Now, they themselves are bearing the brunt, despite the attempts of the numerous pro-BJP media to cover up the matter.
In a true benevolent sense, any escalation between the two continental powers China and India is something highly undesirable. This will not only destabilize peace in Asia, but also hinder the growing trade and investments between the two nations. Moreover, this will put many smaller Asian countries under big stress of an extreme balancing act at the cost of their economy.
One of the factors that heralds such a messy clash is the mindset of India’s Modi government. For cheap popularity, they put up a jingoistic face in front of their half-educated supporters. As a result, when pressure develops to deliver, they tend to make a mess. For example, Modi clearly doesn’t have the wisdom and dynamism of Indira Gandhi.
In 1971, intelligent Indira mastered global sympathy for the moral cause, prepared her military well, and gave a solid punch to the Pakistanis in the east with wholehearted support of the people of Bangladesh and the freedom fighters.
Modi’s militarism, on the other hand, is opportunistic and executed under dubious circumstances with dubious results ie, the 2018 Balakot strike and air battle just before the election. But how long can one fool people with theatrics?
The Hindutva nationalists also express their jingoism against China the way they do it against Pakistan. It’s true that the Indian military has become a lot stronger than before, but still, it has no upper hand over China. Moreover, the Chinese economy is four times bigger than India, with a similar population. The modernization of PLA has been way more robust than the Indian military. But as always, mindless self-overestimation and vanity lead to missteps.
This has played out yet again in eastern Ladakh. Any military and communication build-up in the border is sensitive. Modi wanted to show to his domestic audience that he is as bold with China as he claims to be with Pakistan. His misstep has boomeranged spectacularly. Can Modi undertake a Kargil-like clearing operation in eastern Ladakh against China as Vajpayee did against Pakistan?
In China too, despite all these talks of Marxism and mixed economy, there is a silent current of nationalism under the guise of their constitutional principle “communism with Chinese characteristics.” Why does a big prosperous nation like China, with a rich history, crave for small patches of barren land in the high Himalayas? Extraordinary amounts of military spending are being used to hold on to this terrain.
Modi media is extraordinarily quiet on eastern Ladakh happenings, especially about the losses around Pangong lake. This shows that objective journalism has vanished from the Indian landscape.
The latest clashes and casualties in Galwan valley have made things quite complex. The Chinese media is accusing India of crossing the lines and undermining China-India power imbalance.
Further deterioration of the situation might even lead to a stoppage of the huge trade that takes place between the two big countries, bringing economic hardship on both sides. The smaller nations of the trans-region, having useful relations with both India and China, will find it difficult to cope with the emerging complexities.
Overall, the entire trans-region of South, Southeast, and East Asia would suffer. The whole event has revived an old lesson, ie militant nationalism is a double-edged weapon. Sensible minds in South Asia and China would expect de-escalation for the greater good of Asia.
Sarwar Jahan Chowdhury is an opinion contributor to Dhaka Tribune.