Opinion | After border clash with India, has China made a strategic miscalculation?

Name: India and China attempt to de-escalate border tension after deaths
Uploaded: 2020-07-10T01:00:14.000Z
Duration: 2 min 13 s
Description: India and China attempt to de-escalate border tension after deaths

China seems to have decided it can bear the cost of its territorial assertion at the disputed border and has warned India against strategic miscalculation

However, the current gain might cloud the big picture for Beijing in the long term

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C. Uday Bhaskar

Published: 9:00am, 10 Jul 2020Updated: 11:17am, 10 Jul 2020

India and China have begun a cautious process of disengagement at certain locations in eastern Ladakh, against the backdrop of 20 Indian soldiers, including a colonel, having been killed by the People’s Liberation Army in violent scuffles on June 15. Beijing, while acknowledging PLA casualties in the incident, has not released official figures.

India accused China of “premeditated” transgressions at multiple locations along the contested Line of Actual Control and strongly condemned the manner in which the Indian soldiers were ambushed.

In the following fortnight, both nations enhanced their troop levels and a tense stand-off ensued along the disputed border, with each side blaming the other for the loss of life. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid a surprise visit to Ladakh on July 3 and asserted that “the era of expansionism is over” without referring to China explicitly. In an unusually sharp formulation, China’s foreign ministry warned India not to make a “strategic miscalculation”.

While negotiations between local military commanders did not lead to a satisfactory outcome, high-level political intervention, in the form of talks on July 5 between Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, enabled a lowering of military tensions.

Although both sides reiterated their commitment “to not allow differences to become disputes”, the road ahead is fraught with uncertainty over the sincerity with which the Doval-Wang agreement will be implemented.

02:13

India and China attempt to de-escalate border tension after deaths

Between them, India and China have amassed tens of thousands of troops with inventory that includes tanks and artillery along the 1,600km frontier in the contested western sector while air assets have also been placed on a round-the-clock operational pattern. Winding down will be an extended process.

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