On China, trust less and verify more
Author: G Parthasarathy
It is shocking that senior members of our security and defence establishments continue to place their faith in Beijing rather naively. They have seemingly not learned lessons from past experiences
While India has periodically been described as a ‘dynastic democracy’, China can now be described as a ‘dynastic dictatorship’, after its 18th Party Congress. Outgoing leader Hu Jintao alluded to concerns and the growing dissatisfaction in China over political corruption. He warned, “Corruption could even cause the collapse of the (Communist) Party and fall of the State.” The Party Congress had been preceded by the downfall of its rising star Bo Xilai, whose lavish and flamboyant lifestyle had led to the conviction of his wife for murdering a British businessman, and revelations of the billions of dollars of assets that Bo and his family had acquired, This was followed by a well-documented leak, quite evidently by Bo’s supporters, about ill-gotten wealth accumulated by Prime Minister Wen Jiabao and his family.
China’s worst kept secrets about dynastic politics in the Communist Party became public when it emerged that four of the seven members of its highest decision making body, the Standing Committee of the Politburo, were ‘Princelings’, or descendants of first generation, Mao-era political leaders. It is no secret that most Princelings, including Party chief Xi Jinping, have lavish lifestyles, with their families having acquired huge assets and extensive business interests. With public awareness increasing, because of extensive internet connectivity, the contradictions between having an open economy linked to foreign markets on the one hand and a one-party, authoritarian political structure perceived to be unresponsive to public grievances on the other, are coming to the fore in China. Interestingly, the 86-year old former President Jiang Zemin, who has two sons with extensive business interests, played a key role in the rise of the Princelings to power, quite evidently to ensure his sons’ ‘interests’ remain protected in the future.
Given the composition of its new leadership, China will inevitably continue to seek new ways to further open up its economy and maintain a high growth rate. But the Princelings are unlikely to bring any changes in the basic authoritarian nature of the State apparatus. Tutored by the approach of Deng Xiao Ping, who was determined not to follow the disastrous path set by Mikhail Gorbachev in the Soviet Union, by experimenting with political reform, the new dispensation will be averse to increasing democratisation. China will inevitably continue on its path of rapid military modernisation, combined with an ‘assertive’ line on its maritime and land boundary claims. One has recently witnessed aggressive Chinese postures resulting in a virtual naval takeover around the disputed Scarborough Shoal, claimed by the Philippines. A similar aggressive approach has been seen in the course of recent tensions with Japan, with Chinese naval vessels entering territorial waters, adjacent to the disputed Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands. China has evidently been emboldened by the American assertion that, while the US does have a stand on freedom and maintenance of peace and stability in the South China Sea, it “does not take sides in (maritime) disputes”.
China’s recent decision to depict the entire South China Sea, together with Arunachal Pradesh and parts of Ladakh, as Chinese territory in maps on Chinese passports, has to be seen in the light of this growing Chinese readiness to use might and military coercion to enforce its territorial claims. With jingoistic propaganda, together with a military build- up and coercion being used by the Chinese Communist Party leadership to assert territorial claims, evidently to divert public opinion away from domestic issues like high-level corruption, China appears in no mood to show any flexibility on its territorial claims along the Sino-Indian border. As Chinese passports are generally valid for 10 years, there can logically be no change in China’s territorial claims in this period.
Given these developments, one cannot but be surprised by the statement of National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon, who has brushed aside the serious implications of these Chinese actions, while voicing optimism that “we are in the process of agreeing on a framework to settle the boundary”. Have we forgotten that, after agreeing to delineate the Line of Actual Control, the Chinese backed off on the entire process? Moreover, in 2005, Premier Wen Jiabao agreed that “in reaching a border settlement, the two sides shall safeguard due interests of their settled populations in border areas”. This clearly signalled that there was no question of transferring territories containing settled populations and that it addressed Indian concerns on Chinese claims to Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh. Within a year, however, China was laying claim not merely on Tawang, but the entire state of Arunachal Pradesh as well. One can only conclude that the new ‘framework’ the National Security Adviser has spoken of to settle the boundary issue would be about as successful as the much touted ‘Joint Anti-terror Mechanism’ with Pakistan hadbeen — now unceremoniously buried, following the 26/11 terrorist attack in Mumbai.
Just a day before the NSA spoke, the Chief of Army Staff, General Bikram Singh, grandiosely described bilateral relations with China as “absolutely perfect” and ebulliently added that mechanisms were now in place to solve any issues between the two countries. This was an astonishing comment from the Army chief, coming at a time when the Army wants additional strike formations, artillery and attack helicopters, apart from vastly improved communication techonology, on the border with China. Was it because General Bikram Singh feels that, given the resource crunch and the imperatives for pre-election populist measures, the Army is unlikely to get its wishes fulfilled soon and needs to sound conciliatory to the Chinese? Moreover, do the other two Service Chiefs and the Union Minister for Defence share theoptimism that one can now rest easy as we have “mechanisms” to deal with the “absolutely perfect” relations with China? All these issues need to be debated, now that Parliament is in session.
New Delhi is talking of getting super-fast trains and rail equipment from China, at a time when there is growing concern at our over- dependence on second-rate Chinese power equipment, which has been prone to breakdowns. There are also serious concerns about the dangers to our cyber security and communications infrastructure posed by massive imports from China. Should we not insist on co-production, together with transfer of technology in such strategic sectors, with preference for cooperation with friendly countries like Japan, France and Germany, rather than with China? Moreover, our experiences in 1962 teach us that in dealing with China, wishful thinking, or ill-advised adventurism as adopted in our post 1958 ‘forward policy’, are best avoided.
http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnists/item/52967-on-china-trust-less-and-verify-more.html
