Why India and China should go back to the package border deal
Why India and China should go back to the package border deal
WRITTEN BY KUNAL SINGH
22 February 2021
The recently announced India-China troop disengagement plan around Pangong Tso is a welcome relief after the 10-month standoff in Ladakh. In June last year, the Indian and Chinese armies clashed in Galwan Valley leading to the death of 20 Indian soldiers and an unknown number of Chinese troops. The disengagement plan only involves the north and south banks of Pangong Tso and does not include other friction points on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) at Hot Springs, Gogra, and Depsang plains. According to India’s Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, the discussion for resolving outstanding issues will commence once the disengagement around Pangong Tso has been completed.
It is still not known why China decided to initiate these incursions in April last year and, therefore, Beijing’s decision to agree to a withdrawal (even from one theatre) is equally perplexing. The dominant view is that India’s decision to vacate the Kailash range on the south bank convinced China to withdraw from the Finger 4 to Finger 8 region on the north bank. Others say that China might have realised that it overstretched itself in Ladakh last year especially in light of an emerging era of confrontation with the United States.
Even if the tactical situation on the ground led Beijing to agree to a withdrawal, India would do well to be awake to the opportunities that US-China competition offers. Lt Gen YK Joshi, a general officer commanding the Indian army's Northern Command said that, ultimately, the two countries will have to move towards LAC clarification and boundary settlement because border standoffs and a normal bilateral relationship cannot go together. Here, I argue that it makes sense for both countries to go back to the ‘package deal’ to settle the boundary dispute. Unlike the last two occasions in 1960 and 1980 when India refused such a deal, New Delhi should readily accept it if offered now. It also makes sense for China to revive the package deal given the myriad of challenges it faces.
The Sino-Indian package deal
The package deal was first offered by Zhou Enlai in 1960 and involved both countries accepting the status quo in both the eastern and western sectors. India would get to keep Arunachal Pradesh (then the North-East Frontier Agency or NEFA) and China would get to keep Aksai Chin. Jawaharlal Nehru rejected this offer for two reasons. While earlier Nehru was not sure of India’s claims in Aksai Chin, by February 1960, Sarvepalli Gopal (a historian with the Indian Ministry of External Affairs) had studied the British archives and convinced the prime minister to press for the territory that linked Xinjiang to Tibet. Second, the Indian side regarded such an offer as unfair. To the Indian leadership, NEFA was uncontested Indian territory, and the Chinese offer to include it in a swap was merely to justify their territorial grab in the western sector. There also exists another argument that Nehru rejected the offer out of reputational concerns; Indian acceptance of the offer would betray weakness and invite further aggression.
Demarcation of the Line of Actual Control and hence the border in the western sector will not be easy but both sides should be willing to make some adjustments because the larger strategic gains accrued exceed, by a big margin, minor territorial losses.
The offer was remade in 1980 by Deng Xiaoping in an interview with Indian defence journal Vikrant. India’s former Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran later wrote that a series of confidential meetings in 1984 between A.P. Venkateswaran, then Indian ambassador to China, and the head of the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations, who was close to then Chinese premier Zhao Ziyang, helped the two sides to move towards a ‘LAC-plus’ solution. This was the best proposal for India because beyond accepting Indian sovereignty over Arunachal Pradesh, China would also concede some 3000 square kilometres in the western sector. Indira Gandhi, then India's prime minister, wanted to wait for the elections before responding to this tentative new offer. In any event, she was assassinated before the elections and the proposal fell through.
Why India should accept the border deal
Why would it make sense for India to accept the package deal today if it received a better deal in 1984? First, the 1984 offer (the best so far) was fleeting and since then China has hardened its position and demanded India make concessions (notably Tawang) in Arunachal Pradesh. Since Tawang is part of an Indian state that elects its leaders, this means giving it up is a non-starter. China is unlikely to go back to the LAC-plus solution and India is unlikely to negotiate Tawang away, therefore, the 1960/1980 package deal remains the best acceptable solution. Second, the material capabilities of India and China are now markedly different from the 1980s, where, at that time, India was still a slightly larger economy. Today, China's economy is five times bigger than India’s and Beijing spends more than three and a half times that of India on its military.
China is currently a peer competitor to the US while India is very much a middle-rung power and therefore settling the dispute at this time, even if not on the most favourable terms, would remove a millstone from around India’s neck. While China could still choose to behave in an aggressive manner after settling the dispute, Beijing would then however find it difficult to justify those moves by citing unsettled borders or differing perceptions of the Line of Actual Control. The settlement would remove China’s rationale for rattling its sabre across the Himalayas. As John W. Garver points out, keeping the border dispute unresolved only helps Beijing as it “is an excellent way of keeping Indian attention focused on the reality of China’s military power”.
Why would the same old package deal make sense for China given it is a much bigger power now and can dictate terms to India? It is important to understand the context in which previous offers were made. Zhou’s 1960 proposal was made, in the words of a retired PLA general, “when China was poor, weak, and isolated”, while Deng’s 1980 offer came when China was looking to reduce its conflicts, modernise its economy, and become a trading power. The most relevant example, however, comes from Chinese foreign policy in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Facing isolation from the world, China decided not to help Nepal, then embargoed by the Rajiv Gandhi government, to cultivate support in New Delhi. It is important to note that the landmark agreement on peace and tranquillity in the border area was signed by India and China in 1993 — at a time when China’s relations with the US had not yet normalised following the Tiananmen Square massacre and the post-Cold War era had created a unipolar world in which Beijing could not exploit the divergences between the US and Soviet Union to its advantage.
China, while stronger than ever, is also increasingly isolated. It is no secret that Joe Biden was Beijing's preferred candidate in last years US presidential election. However, Biden’s election victory might not have conferred China the relief it was looking for after a tempestuous four years with Donald Trump. The increasing prominence of great power competition in US foreign policy implies that China is becoming a litmus test for the Biden administration and its national security nominees. It should be noted that Biden’s nominees (expected) to work on the China portfolio are not romantics of any kind. In their first calls with their Chinese counterparts, both President Biden and Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken chose to read the riot act. The Japan Times reported that Quad countries of the US, India, Australia, and Japan — a group which Beijing fears is working towards containing China — might arrange a first leader-level summit.
A view of Pangong Tso in the Hmalayas. Image credit: Wikipedia
Since the April 2020 Ladakh incursions, India itself has taken several steps to hit back at China including banning Chinese technology apps and inviting Australia to the annual Malabar exercises in which Japan and the US are already regular participants. In addition, its officials have been more forthcoming than ever in calling out China’s hostile actions vis-à-vis India. The non-transparent manner in which Beijing has dealt with the origins of the Covid-19 virus has also brought it into confrontation with several other countries. Beijing has decided to punish Australia with trade sanctions because the latter dared to ask for an investigation into the origin of the pandemic.
The previous US administration had been considering steps to remove the global industrial supply chains from China to punish it for non-transparency in its handling of the coronavirus outbreak. Notably, it is not just Indo-Pacific countries but Europe too which has seen a sharp rise in negative views toward China in light of the pandemic. Generally, ASEAN countries have preferred not to be put in a position to choose between the US and China, and that has remained the case. However, when forced to choose, the US' favorability has risen from 53.6 per cent in 2020 to 61.5 per cent in 2021, and China’s has dropped from 46.4 per cent to 38.4 per cent during the same period. China’s inability to make reliable Covid-19 vaccines further raises questions on whether it can offer itself as a substitute for advanced Western countries to the third world.
While the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre was a human tragedy unleashed by the one-party state a graver tragedy is now unfolding in Xinjiang, where the minority Muslim community is systematically repressed and tortured by the Chinese state. Given China’s much bigger profile, the events in Xinjiang have not remotely impacted China on the global stage as much as the 1989 massacre. However, when combined with China’s aggression and bullying of neighbours and smaller powers, its increasingly criticised 'debt-trap diplomacy', and its flagrant disregard for international laws and rules, China’s image has truly taken a hit.
One must not forget that this sharp decline in China’s global reputation comes at a time when Xi Jinping has effectively declared himself to be the country’s president for life. Experts believe that achieving some progress in Taiwan, if not complete reunification, is going to be an important part of Xi’s legacy. For decades, China has worked to build the capabilities required to match the US in a conflict over Taiwan. However, any shooting contest with the US is likely to be dangerous both in terms of the cost to China and the potential for escalation. China’s small-sized nuclear arsenal suggests that it will have few options to escalate if it is losing a conventional war. Moreover, the notion that the defence of Taiwan should be an unambiguous US responsibility continues to enjoy popular support among the American national security community — a view shared by Kathleen Hicks, Biden's deputy defence secretary.
If Xi wants to shore up Beijing's declining political capital (globally), make China fit for long-term strategic competition with the US, and focus his efforts on preparing for a showdown on Taiwan, it makes sense that he should seek to reduce the chance of a flare-up on the India border. While India is currently the weaker power, it is no pushover on the long Himalayan border, and importantly, New Delhi recently moved to switch one of its mechanised corps from a Pakistan oriented role to one contesting China. Therefore the settlement of the India border issue, even without Tawang, should make good sense from China’s perspective.
Progress through pragmatism
India’s desire for a grand boundary settlement deal should not be seen as a betrayal of the Quad in any way as a land boundary settlement would allow New Delhi to focus on the Indian Ocean. It is important to note that experts have questioned India’s ability to contribute to the Quad’s security agenda in the maritime domain; especially in light of the two land threats it faces from China and Pakistan. India is the only member of the Quad which is not an ally of the other three powers and for all the help it gets from the US, neither Washington nor Tokyo or Canberra could come to India’s direct military aid in a Himalayan war against China. Resolving the boundary dispute would therefore free up a large chunk of India’s resources to focus on the maritime domain. As large neighbours with even larger ambitions and overlapping spheres of influence, India and China will continue to be competitors long after the border dispute is settled, therefore, India will remain a useful partner for the Quad.
A package deal that involves India giving up its claims on Aksai Chin — which it does not possess anyway — and China’s acceptance of Indian sovereignty over Arunachal Pradesh — which in reality it exercises — is not just a viable solution but is needed by all parties. Demarcation of the Line of Actual Control and hence the border in the western sector will not be easy but both sides should be willing to make some adjustments because the larger strategic gains accrued exceed, by a big margin, minor territorial losses. While a package deal may not be on the table or even on the mental radars of the leadership in each country, it should be, as it is the only thing that makes sense for everyone.
DISCLAIMER: All views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent that of the 9DASHLINE.com platform.
Author biography
Kunal Singh is currently pursuing a PhD at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Image credit: by Wikipedia