Opinion | The long game of China-India relations
By Tom Fowdy
Last week the 15th BRICS summit was held in Johannesburg, South Africa. Here, representatives from Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa met and discussed collective challenges facing the global south and the "economies of the future." Most notably, the group announced an expansion in its membership for the first time, with Argentina, Ethiopia, Egypt, Iran Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates all having joined. This was a big moment for the group, especially in pitching itself as (albeit more loosely defined) alternative to the US dominated G7.
But what was also distinctive about the meeting was that China's leader Xi Jinping held a private summit with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Here, the two sides reportedly agreed to "de-escalate tensions" over the disputed border in the Himalayas, where the two sides violently crashed in 2020 as part of New Delhi's pivot to more closely aligning with the United States. Relations between India and China have been tense ever since, with Modi's government having taken actions to oppress numerous Chinese companies in the light of purely protectionist goals, while also participating in the US led QUAD bloc with Japan and Australia.
India is well aware of the strategic significance which the US and the west at large have now given it, hence their entire initiative is known as "The Indo-Pacific." To some extent, it is obvious that New Delhi has sought to opportunistically capitalise on this, and in turn promote Anti-China sentiment, in the bid to further its own development, recognising that US led "decoupling" ultimately works in its favour by taking industries out of China and placing them in India. Apple and Foxconn have already done this to a small extent with goods assembly, and other companies are seeking to as well, although it is worth nothing that India's industrial capacity and infrastructure is not up to matching China yet.
Yet, it remains undeniable that India will be a future economic power either way. However, this does not mean that New Delhi and Beijing have to be "rivals" or even enemies, this is a western induced idea that aims to exploit the two in a divide and rule strategy, which in the long run will seek to dominate and subjugate both countries. It is ultimately critical that India and China find a way back to stabilising their own relations, and in turn work together in order to secure a multipolar world and secure a set of common underlying interests. For that reason never have organisations such as BRICS stood to be more important.
The common Indian nationalist view, encouraged by the BJP government, is that China is suppressing the development of India through its dominance of trade and investment, as well as encroaching on its territory. The latter issue has been a long running Faultline, which also led to a war in 1960. The next problem is China's close relationship with Pakistan, which it has made the closest partner of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in creating the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which India claims also runs through disputed territory in Kashmir. All of this has worked together to produce the strategic suspicion which ultimately paved the way for India's closer relationship with the US from 2017 onwards.
However, India has long heralded that its foreign policy is that of "strategic autonomy", that is it maintains non-alignment and seeks to foster relationships with all major powers. Notably, India has stood out for its unwillingness to isolate Russia amidst the invasion of Ukraine. However, because of the above issues, this "strategic autonomy" has not extended to China, which the Modi leadership has chosen to frame in adversarial terms. To some extent, New Delhi has not gone the full lengths of the US or western countries in demonising Beijing, and arguably does so strictly out of a "self-interest" perspective than subserviating itself to a hegemonic cause.
Despite this, the zero-sum rendering of India's relations with China is unhelpful, that is because it works towards the enforcement of a US unipolar world irrespectively. If the US succeeds in containing China, then it is obvious the next step will be to contain India, and it will weaponise India's neighbours and its neighbour first policy to do so and frame it as an aggressor. India therefore must come to the understanding that the rise of China is a boon for the global south, which includes itself, and despite differences the two countries must find partnership on various issues. India behaves currently like it wants to "replace" China as the world's factory and an economic power. While there is nothing wrong with aspiring to its own development and bettering itself, as a country with a similar sized population, the game isn't as simple as that. The US will not permit India to rise as an economic and technological powerhouse any less than it has China, and for that reason its leadership need to think ahead.
The author is a well-seasoned writer and analyst with a large portfolio related to China topics, especially in the field of politics, international relations and more. He graduated with an Msc. in Chinese Studies from Oxford University in 2018.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of DotDotNews.
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