Kashmir Nuclear Scare: Myth or Muscle Fatigue

Tacstrat Analysis

Earlier this week, State Disaster Response Force officials in Indian occupied Kashmir distributed pamphlets warning citizens to make preparations for a possible nuclear attack. People were told to build bomb-proof basements and collect provisions to last them two weeks in confinement. This lengthy warning was published in the Greater Kashmir newspaper and described a possible war scene in detail. People were told to brace themselves for possible shock and to ‘expect initial disorientation as the blast wave may blow down and carry away many prominent and familiar features’. While Indian officials have called this ‘regular year-round civil defence preparedness’, and urged people not to connect it with anything else, one cannot help but speculate about the convenient timing of this ‘annual’ safety drill, which has in fact taken place for the first time.

The cross border skirmish earlier this year, has led to a staggering halt of negotiations and a perfunctory handshake on both sides that have been gritting their teeth since. The 70 year old lady’s flight into Pakistan had alarmed Indian officials who began setting up additional observation posts along the LoC. Pakistan fired across the border, and while cross border skirmishes barely make news any more, an Indian soldier with an ‘aggressive’ track record ordered a cross border attack. While the international media, as always, is wont to take an ‘unbiased’ approach to this series of attacks, several Indian newspapers have discussed the possibility and consequences of this bald provocation that led to the death of a Pakistani soldier. Two Indian soldiers were killed in a retaliatory skirmish that now appears to have escalated, as the streets of Srinagar are abuzz with rumours of a possible nuclear attack.

Indian soldiers, on many online forums, have said that even if their authorities have warned people to prepare themselves for a nuclear attack, this is purely for defensive purposes because of India’s ‘no first use’ nuclear doctrine, and Pakistan’s lack thereof.

This leads us to the question of nuclear doctrines espoused by both countries. Pakistan has stood behind its doctrine of ‘first use but last resort’, and has been severely criticised for it by western scholarship, which conveniently over looks Israel’s ‘Samson Option’. Last year President Zardari announced his inclination to sign a ‘no first use’ policy in line with India’s, while no action towards this end has been taken so far, a brief analysis of the India doctrine, which espouses the very reassuring ‘no first use’ policy, is in order.

The doctrine states that any threat of use of nuclear weapons against India shall invoke measures to counter the threat (clause 2.3a). The repeated assurance of ‘retaliation only’ does not care to expand on what constitutes these measures. Clause 2.5 states that “India will not resort to the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons against States which do not possess nuclear weapons, or are not aligned with nuclear weapon powers.” This clause further adds to the ambiguity ensconced in the doctrine that shrouds itself behind empty words and unspoken promises. The distinction between non-nuclear states and countries they are aligned with, in effect, places every single country on the Indian hit list. Since Germany and Japan, two non-nuclear states, are aligned with the US on many fronts (the doctrine doesn’t specify the type of alliance either), that makes them possible targets, especially if: “in the event of a major attack against India, or Indian forces anywhere, by biological or chemical weapons, India will retain the option of retaliating with nuclear weapons”. Thus, if Indian soldiers (they could be infiltrators or even part of a UN deputation) are attacked with nuclear weapons in any part of the world, the ‘no first use’ policy becomes null and void. Furthermore clause 2.3a, revised in 2003 states that, “however, in the event of a major attack against India, or Indian forces anywhere, by biological or chemical weapons, India will retain the option of retaliating with nuclear weapons.” Thus Blanco-ing out the ‘no first use’ for all intents and purposes.

Pakistan has justified its stance of adopting the ‘aggressive’ moral ground, by saying the ‘no first use’ policy on both sides would leave the concept of nuclear deterrence redundant and invite aggression from the Indian side. Pakistan has furthermore explained how the nuclear option will be employed once all others have been exhausted. This effectively places India and Pakistan on a level playing field.

The ‘threat’ of a Pakistani attack on Srinagar is by far the least plausible of all explanations our friends across the border have been proffering. Even less true is the statement that this is a routine safety drill. At best this can be described muscle flexing and a plea for attention in the post UN-observer mission stalemate. In terms of diplomatic progress, this might set the two countries back by two years of consistent peace talks and people-to-people contact. As the initial smokescreen of mistrust rises between the two countries, the audience can not help but wait for what will unfold next.

Halloween 31 October, Kashmir Black Day on 27th

Kashmiris on both sides of the Cease Fire Line (CFL) and all across the world will observe A Black Day on October 27, to convey to India that despite state terrorism they reject its illegal occupation of Jammu and Kashmir.

It was on October 27 in 1947 when Indian troops invaded Kashmir in clear violation of the partition plan of the Sub-continent and against the Kashmiris’ aspirations.

Call for the observance of the Day has been given by the All Parties Hurriyat Conference Chairman, Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq.

The day will be marked with total shutdown in Occupied State of Jammu & Kashmir (OSJK) and a march towards the United Nations Observers’ Office in Srinagar to draw the world attention towards the fact that India continues to deny the Kashmiri people their inalienable right of Self-Determination. Rallies in support of Kashmiris’ liberation struggle will be held in Muzaffarabad and the world capitals.

USA: High Risk of Terror Strikes in India

WASHINGTON – The United States has warned Americans of the potential for terror strikes in India during the holiday season after a series of recent bomb attacks.

The US has warned Americans of the potential for terror strikes in India during the holiday season

The State Department pointed to recent government warnings and media reports of attacks being planned in the South Asian country.

US citizens should be aware of the “continued possibility of terrorist attacks throughout India,” it said in a statement.

It urged Americans to “pay particular attention to their personal security during the Indian holiday season, which includes Hindu, Islamic and other religious and secular holidays between October and January.”

“US citizens traveling or residing in India are always urged to maintain a heightened situational awareness and a low profile, monitor local news reports, consider the level of security present when visiting public places, and take appropriate steps to bolster their personal security,” the State Department added.

It noted that markets, hotels and public transport were potential targets.

India has been hit by a series of bomb attacks in recent years, many of which remain unsolved.

Rangers, BSF agree to check illegal border crossings

Border forces of Pakistan and India have agreed to stop incidents of illegal crossing, smuggling and unprovoked firing on the working boundary.

Officials of Rangers and Border Security Force exchanging gifts before a meeting at Wagah border on Tuesday.

This decision has been taken in a joint meeting of Pakistan, India border forces held at Wagah on Tuesday. The Indian Border Security Force (BSF) Deputy Inspector General Vasudevan led the 10-member Indian delegation, which was given a warm welcome by the Pakistan Rangers’ delegation headed by Brigadier Wali as they crossed the zero line at Wagah border. Both officers shook hands, exchanged presents and had a group photograph taken. The Rangers also offered guard of honour before start of the meeting.

The quarterly coordination meeting was held at Joint Check Post at the Pakistan side of the Wagah border on Tuesday. The meeting is part of a mutually agreed programme aimed at coordinating measures taken by both forces for border management duties. Brig Wali told media before the session that 24 points would be discussed with BSF including ceasefire violation especially in Sialkot and Shakargarh sectors, smuggling, drug trafficking, casualties of unarmed civilians, border crossing and illegal construction of spur by Indian authorities at river Ravi at Narowal Sector.

Speaking at the occasion, DIG Vasudevan said both the authorities wanted a result oriented discussion. Answering a question he said he had given orders to BSF not to open fire on unarmed civilians who cross the border mistakenly, but also made it clear that it is difficult to judge a civilian crossing the border at night and distinguish whether he’s carrying a gun or a stick.

After the meeting a press release issued by the Rangers stated that dialogue was held in highly congenial atmosphere and there has been sincere endeavour from both forces to encourage junior commanders to mutually resolve minor issues.

At the end of the session the Indian delegation witnessed the flag ceremony and appreciated the parade of the jawans from Pakistan Rangers. The next quarterly meeting will be held at the joint check post Attari, India.

India: Gujarat riots records ‘destroyed’

Official records relating to the 2002 riots in India’s Gujarat state were destroyed in line with regulations, the government tells a panel probing the riots.

The riots left more than 1,000 dead

Documents with records of telephone calls and the movements of officials during the riots were destroyed in 2007, five years after their origin

Officials say this is standard practice and in line with civil service rules.

More than 1,000 people, mostly Muslims, died in the riots.

The violence erupted after 60 Hindus died in a train fire. The cause of the blaze was never clearly established.

Hindu groups allege the fire was started by Muslim protesters, but an earlier inquiry said the blaze was an accident.

The Supreme Court set up a panel to investigate the riots in 2008, after allegations that the Gujarat government was doing little to bring those responsible to justice.

Government lawyer SB Vakil told the Nanavati panel probing the riots that some records relating to the riots had been destroyed according to the rules.

“As per general government rules, the telephone call records, vehicle logbook and the officers’ movement diary are destroyed after a certain period,” Mr Vakil was quoted as saying by the Press Trust of India news agency.

In April a senior police officer alleged in a sworn statement to India’s Supreme Court that Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi deliberately allowed anti-Muslim riots in the state.

Mr Modi has always denied any wrongdoing.

The Gujarat government has responded to the allegations by saying they have already testified before a special panel investigating the riots and will wait for the court’s verdict.

India: Maoist Attack in Chhattisgarh Leaves Indian Security Forces Dead

Six security personnel have been killed and eight injured in two separate attacks by Maoist rebels in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh.

India’s Maoist insurgency began in the late 1960s, in the remote forests of West Bengal state.

Four policemen died when a vehicle carrying them hit a landmine in Dantewada district.

And earlier on Sunday, two paramilitary soldiers were ambushed and killed by rebels in Kanker district, police said.

Maoist rebels say they are fighting for the rights of indigenous tribal people and the rural poor.

They are active in several eastern and central states. In one of the most deadly attacks last year, rebels killed 74 policemen in Dantewada.

India’s prime minister has described the Maoist insurgency as the country’s biggest internal security challenge.

Sunday’s attacks happened in the restive Bastar region.

In the first attack, rebels ambushed a contingent of paramilitary soldiers belonging to the Border Security Force (BSF) in Kanker, killing two soldiers and injuring four others.

Police officials claimed that a number of rebels were also killed in the firefight, but only one body of a rebel was recovered from the spot.

Later in the day, a vehicle carrying policemen on a search operation hit a landmine in Dantewada.

Four policemen died in the explosion, and four others were injured in the blast which tore apart the vehicle.

The BBC’s Salman Ravi in Raipur says Bastar is the most sensitive region of Chhattisgarh where Maoist insurgents control a large area.

During the last one month, Maoists have carried out many landmine explosions in the area, killing more than 30 security personnel.

A government offensive against the rebels – widely referred to as Operation Green Hunt – began in late 2009.

It involves 50,000 troops and is taking place across five states – West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Orissa and Chhattisgarh.

Delhi’s Rs 450-cr gift to Kabul

India proposes to announce a $100-million (about Rs 450 crore) financial aid for Afghanistan aimed mostly at building of public institutions and capacity augmenting during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Kabul this week. “There could be fresh assistance of about Rs 450 crore”, a senior government.

While Osama Bin Laden’s killing in Pakistan and its outcome on the war against terror will dominate the two-day trip, Prime Minister Singh is set to send out the message that “peace, prosperity, stability” of Afghanistan and “its people” are “top- of-the-mind issues” for India.

India is also concerned about the end-game in Afghanistan. With Osama’s killing taking US-Pakistan ties to an all-time low, experts think Delhi will be better heard in Kabul now.

Protests mount against Indian nuclear plant

SAKHRI NATE, INDIA: In the busy Indian fishing village of Sakhri Nate, it’s obvious what the locals think of the plan to build the world’s biggest nuclear power plant just across the creek.

A worker wearing a protective suit points at a cracked concrete pit near its No. 2 reactor of the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO)’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, April 2, 2011.

“Say No To Nuclear Power. We Don’t Want To Get Sick,” reads one slogan in Hindi on the side of a tarpaulin-covered shack selling sweet tea and sugary snacks.

Chalked on a wall around the corner is a message for the French company that has signed a $9.3-billion deal to supply the plant’s first state-of-the-art pressurised water reactors.

“Areva Go Back,” it says simply in English.

Opposition to the Jaitapur Nuclear Power Project runs deep in this part of the Konkan region of western India, whose people have earned a living from fishing and farming for generations.

As with many in the hard-to-reach coastal area 400 kilometres from Mumbai, 45-year-old fisherman Abdul Majid Goalkar’s argument is well-rehearsed.

At least 5,000 people work on about 600 boats, bringing in 50 tons of fresh fish, prawns and squid every day, he says. If the plant is built, he warns, all those jobs are under threat.

Others want to protect the village’s most famous export – the creamy, Alphonso variety of mango – grown on rocky, clifftop land earmarked for the 2,318-acre plant.

Over the last four years, the grassroots campaign against Jaitapur has built up a steady momentum and become increasingly vocal.

But resistance has hardened since the Japanese earthquake and tsunami that crippled the Fukushima plant, forcing a rethink on nuclear safety around the world and calls in India for a halt to atomic expansion.

Pravin Gaonkar, a fisherman and mango farmer spearheading the anti-nuclear campaign, said the Japanese nuclear crisis was all the more relevant, as the Konkan coast is prone to regular seismic activity.

Another development is that the so-far largely peaceful anti-nuclear campaign has turned violent.

On Monday, the police opened fire on a crowd of protesters, killing one and injuring several others.

The victim, Tavrez Sejkar, was buried in the red earth of the steep hillside cemetery in mainly Muslim Sakhri Nate on Wednesday.

Comparisons have been drawn with Singur in West Bengal state, where Tata Motors abandoned its plans for a new factory to build its Nano car after violent protests from farmers backed by local political parties.

Fast-growing, energy-hungry India, which wants to increase the share of nuclear in its energy mix from three percent to 13 per cent by 2030, could pay a high price if Areva followed Tata’s example.

At full capacity, the six-reactor Jaitapur plant would provide 9,900 megawatts of electricity – more than double the current energy deficit in all of Maharashtra, home to commercial capital Mumbai.

Supporters say it could provide power to a chunk of the 500 million homes across the country that are currently off the grid and is vital to India’s economic progress.

India’s environment minister Jairam Ramesh has angered opponents by insisting that the project will go ahead, even as he conceded that additional safety measures may be required because of Fukushima.

“India cannot afford to abandon the route of nuclear power,” he said on April 18. “From a greenhouse gas point of view, nuclear power is the best option.”

Professor Surendra Jondhale, head of political science at the University of Mumbai, doesn’t think the project will be be abandoned, although a delay is likely while the government reviews safety.

“We are now seeing the real issue being very much politicised. It’s overshadowed the real, genuine protests.”

Back in Jaitapur, where a giant poster of Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray and local leaders has been put up on the main street, locals Mahesh Karankar and Chetan Narkar say the impact of the violence has already been felt.

Police have locked down the area, fearful of further unrest. As a result, three days’ worth of fish is rotting in warehouses.

“Whether the Shiv Sena is with us or against us we don’t care,” said 23-year-old Narkar. “We don’t need anyone to help us carry on our protest.”

Another demonstration is planned for Sunday. Pravin Gaonkar says there will be no let up after that.

“If the government does nothing, at least 5,000 fishermen and farmers will go to Delhi and protest,” he added.

Narendra Modi – hated by minorities, loved by businesses

By HEATHER TIMMONS

GANDHINAGAR, India – In a soaring, unfinished conference hall in western India, thousands of businessmen and diplomats from around the world gathered recently for an investment meeting. They were there to pay homage to a politician for accomplishing something once thought almost impossible in India: making it easy to do business.

The politician, Narendra Modi, the chief minister of the state of Gujarat, sat onstage, stroking his close-cropped white beard, as executives from the United States, Canada, Japan and elsewhere showered him with praise.

Narendra Modi, chief minister of the state of Gujarat, spoke at a conference last month that was meant to promote business.

Ron Somers, head of an American trade group, called him a progressive leader. Michael Kadoorie, a Hong Kong billionaire, enveloped him in a hug.

“I would encourage you all to invest here,” Mr. Kadoorie, chairman of the Asian power company CLP Group, told the audience, “because it has been an even playing field for me.”

The coastal state of Gujarat, famous as the birthplace of Mahatma Gandhi, has become an investment magnet. The state’s gross domestic product is growing at an 11 percent annual rate – even faster than the overall growth rate for India, which despite its problems is zipping along at 9 percent clip.

And Mr. Modi receives – some would say claims – much of the credit. The year before he took office in 2001, Gujarat’s economy shrank by 5 percent.

But critics of Mr. Modi, a Hindu nationalist, point to another legacy of his early days in office – something that has made him one of the most polarizing figures in Indian politics. Months after he became chief minister, Gujarat erupted in brutal Hindu-Muslim riots that killed more than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims.

Despite Mr. Modi’s subsequent denials, he has not fully escaped a cloud of accusations by rival political groups, victims and their families, and human rights groups that he and his aides condoned the attacks against Muslims and – as one case now before the Supreme Court charges – may even have encouraged them.

A special investigation team formed by the Supreme Court has filed a 600-page investigative report on the riots, which has not been officially released. Numerous other lawsuits related to the riots are also winding through India’s courts. In 2005 the United States refused to grant Mr. Modi a visa, on grounds of religious intolerance. Meanwhile, environmental activists and local tribesman who have been protesting the construction of seven dams in Gujarat that will displace 25,000 people say they the protesters have been regularly jailed by the state police, charged with being Naxalites, a militant rebel group.

Mr. Modi, who has declined interview requests from The New York Times for several years, did not comment for this article.

Of the lingering controversies, a spokesman for Mr. Modi, Steven King, with the Washington public relations firm APCO Worldwide, wrote in an e-mail responding to questions: “The government has very highly developed grievance proceedings.”

Corporate executives, though, tend to concentrate on Mr. Modi’s pro-business attributes, which they see as something of an anomaly in an India where government bureaucracy, bumbling or corruption too often impedes commerce.

“In India there is a sense that efficiency is at such a premium because there is so little to go around,” said Eswar Prasad, a professor of trade policy at Cornell who has served as an adviser to the Indian government. “When people find an effective politician who can make things happen on the ground, they are willing to ignore the character flaws.”

Under Mr. Modi’s watch, the energy companies Royal Dutch Shell and Total have opened a major liquid natural gas terminal in Gujarat, and Torrent Power, an Indian company, has built a huge power plant. Meanwhile, Tata Motors, DuPont, General Motors, Hitachi and dozens of other foreign and Indian companies have built factories, expanded operations or invested in projects in the state.

When the Canadian heavy machinery company Bombardier won a contract to supply subway cars to the Delhi Metro in 2007, it needed a factory site, quickly. It found one in Savli, an industrial estate in Gujarat. Just 18 months later- when in many parts of India, the permit process might still be grinding away – the factory was built and operating.

“It was incredible,” said Rajeev Jyoti, the managing director of Bombardier in India, “and it was a world record within Bombardier.”

Compared with most other states, Gujarat has smoother roads and less garbage next to the streets. More than 99 percent of Gujarat’s villages have electricity, compared with less than 85 percent nationally.

In 2009, Gujarat attracted more planned investment than any other state in the country, about $54 billion by value of announced plans, according to Assocham, a trade association of Indian chambers of commerce.

Mr. Modi, who has no business or economics background, deserves praise for this, corporate leaders say. Before entering politics in his late 30s, he was a religious volunteer for the Hindu nationalist group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, which sponsors schools and provides aid during natural disasters, but has also been widely criticized as being intolerant of other religions and of secular Hindus.

In India, where corrupt politicians often seem to be raiding the public coffers to benefit their offspring, Mr. Modi’s success is sometimes attributed to his apparent lack of a family life. Acquaintances and local news reports say he was married at a young age but separated soon after from his wife. Mr. Modi has never commented on reports about his personal life.

Mr. Modi’s administration has brought novel solutions to some of India’s most tenacious problems. Corruption became less widespread after the state government put a large amount of its activities online, from permits that companies need to build or expand, to bids for contracts. To plow through a multiyear backlog of court cases, and prevent day laborers from losing income, Mr. Modi asked judges to work extra hours in night courts.

Mr. Modi uses a chief executive style of managing the bureaucrats who work under him, according to associates and business executives in Gujarat. He gives promising people positions of responsibility, sets goals and expects people to meet them. Nonperformers are pushed aside.

It may seem an obvious way to administer a state with more than 50 million people and a budget in the billions of dollars.

But this approach runs counter to India’s tradition of cronyism. In a recent reshuffle of India’s national cabinet ministers, for example, the minister of highways who substantially missed targets for road-building was made minister for urban development, a crucial position for a rapidly urbanizing nation struggling to build livable cities.

Even in another state considered pro-business, Tamil Nadu in the south, the ruling party, D.M.K., has been dogged by accusations of corruption.

In Mr. Modi’s case, the accolades once would have been unthinkable. After the Hindu-Muslim riots a decade ago, he was considered a liability for his political party, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. But these days, with Gujarat’s soaring economy, Mr. Modi is sometimes mentioned as his party’s most likely candidate for prime minister in 2014, when the next general election is expected.

Despite his lack of executive experience, Mr. Modi’s supporters credit him with a politician’s innate sense of marketing. Images of Mr. Modi were plastered on billboards throughout Gujarat during the investment summit meeting, proclaiming the state’s support not only for investment but for social programs like support of girls’ education – a particularly important subject in India where there is a large literacy gap between men and women.

Within Gujarat, which has a centuries-old reputation for business acumen, even Mr. Modi’s fans sometimes grumble that he and his image makers may be taking outsize credit for its economic growth. And they say that the headline numbers that Mr. Modi’s government trumpets can be misleading.

For example, the $450 billion in “memorandums of understanding” – essentially, pledges to do business in the state – that the government says were signed during the January investment summit meeting double-count some deals, according to businessmen in attendance, because they include loans and investments for the same projects. Mr. Modi’s spokesman confirmed there might be some redundancy in the $450 billion figure, but said it was impossible to break out the loans from the investments.

Yet, no one disputes Gujarat’s rapid growth. And Mr. Modi’s supporters say India’s economic success will depend on each state’s adopting many of the same measures he has employed. India’s central government may apportion budgets and write overall laws, they say, but it is the states that are responsible for overseeing everything from land allocation to electricity distribution.

“If you are an investor in India,” said Mr. Somers, of the United States trade group, “Gujarat must be at the top of your list.”

India and China talk trade deals and friendship, but they are bitter rivals

Like tectonic plates grinding up against each other in the Himalayas, China and India are locked into a rivalry that is going to set the global agenda for decades.

For three days this week, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited New Delhi, signed trade deals, dined with Indian politicians and spouted the rhetoric of friendship.

“China and India are partners for cooperation, not rivals in competition,” he told an Indian business conference, after a Chinese trade delegation signed 48 deals worth more than US$16-billion.

“There is enough space in the world for the development of China and India,” Mr. Wen insisted.

But beneath the polite diplomacy and mutual compliments, India and China remain wary of each other, locked in a volatile Cold War-style rivalry that is filled with conflict, mutual distrust and resentment.

As their economies grow, the world’s two most populous nations – home to two-fifths of the global population – are competing for energy resources, food and opportunities. They have conflicting global aspirations; a 4,000 kilometre-long disputed border, a history of war and a decades-old struggle for regional influence.

When Mr. Wen arrived in New Delhi on Wednesday, Chinese engineers in Tibet were blasting through the last part of a mountain tunnel to link the last isolated county in China to the mainland’s main highway system.

China celebrated the feat as a nation-building marvel and broadcast the event on national television.

Indian newscasts, however, noted the new tunnel, in a region bordering the disputed northeastern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, will now enable China to rush troops to an area, which Beijing claims is really part of Tibet.

In almost the same breath, Indian experts also note China’s stranglehold on Tibet gives it control of most of the headwaters of India’s main rivers.

New Delhi has long feared China may one day dam and divert those waters to replenish its parched western provinces and China has talked recently of diverting up to 200 billion cubic metres of water annually to the Yellow River from the Brahmaputra River, which enters India at Arunachal Pradesh, before flowing on to Assam and into Bangladesh.

“Simmering tensions over territory, overlapping spheres of influence, resource scarcity and rival alliance relationships ensure that relations between the two rising Asian giants will be characterized more by competition and rivalry than cooperation for a long time to come,” warned Mohan Malik, a professor at the Asia-Pacific Centre for Security Studies in Honolulu.

“The main objective of China’s Asia policy is to prevent the rise of a peer competitor to challenge its status as the Asia-Pacific’s sole ‘Middle Kingdom’,” he said. “As an old Chinese saying goes, ‘One mountain cannot accommodate two tigers’.”

The stark discrepancies between democratic India and authoritarian China were on display in New Delhi just two days before Mr. Wen arrived. In an effort to warn off Tibetan protesters preparing to demonstrate against Mr. Wen, a nervous Chinese ambassador, Zhang Yan, told reporters bilateral relations with India are “very fragile, very easy to be damaged and very difficult to repair.”

“They need special care in the information age,” he said. “To achieve this, the [Indian] government should provide guidance to the public to avoid a war of words.”

India’s Foreign Minister, Nirupama Rao, responded coolly but politely saying China has nothing to fear from India’s “vibrant and noisy democracy.”

Two events have permanently strained relations between Beijing and New Delhi – China’s 1950 invasion and occupation of Tibet and China’s defeat of India in a brief 1962 border war.

India now plays host to more than 120,000 Tibetan refugees, including the Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet in 1959 following a failed uprising.

China brands the Dalai Lama a separatist and insists he is using his base in the northern Indian hill town of Dharamsala to fuel rebellion inside Tibet.

After riots broke out in Tibet in March 2009, China’s government-controlled news media were filled with anti-Indian rhetoric calling New Delhi “reckless and arrogant” and warning India not “to misjudge the situation as it did in 1962,” when China successfully staged a month-long war against India all along their Himalayan border.

India still lives in the shadow of that conflict, resenting her defeat and complaining China illegally occupies 26,500 square kilometres of Indian territory.

“The wounds of the 1962 Chinese invasion have been kept open by Beijing’s public and assertive claims to Indian territories,” said Brahma Chellaney of New Delhi’s Center for Policy Research. “China continues to occupy one-fifth of the original state of Jammu and Kashmir. Its recent claim over the entire Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh and aggressive patrolling of the border region signify that China is not interested in maintaining the status quo.”

As a result, India has moved two army divisions close to its Himalayan border and built three new airstrips in the foothills.

“The India-China strategic dissonance is rooted not only in their contrasting political ideals and quiet rivalry but also in Beijing’s relentless pursuit of a classical, Sun Tzu-style balance-of-power strategy,” Prof. Chellaney said. “In order to avert the rise of a peer rival in Asia, China has sought to strategically tie down India south of the Himalayas.”

India has long resented China’s close ties to its traditional rival Pakistan, arming Pakistan’s military, helping Islamabad build nuclear weapons and promoting Pakistani claims to Indian territory.

But New Delhi has watched in frustration recently as China also increased its strategic assistance to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Burma [Myanmar] – countries India always regarded as part of its sphere of influence.

Nearly 90% of Chinese arms sales go to countries located in the Indian Ocean region. In addition, Beijing has helped build ports in Gwadar, Pakistan, and Humbantota, Sri Lanka, as well as in Burma and Bangladesh, in what analysts have called a “string of pearls” strategy to build naval bases and military listening posts across the Indian Ocean.

The Chinese-built Gwadar port and naval base, near the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz and close to Pakistan’s border with Iran, is one of the world’s largest deep-water ports and could allow China to park submarines in India’s backyard.

It may also serve as the terminus for an energy pipeline taking oil from the Gulf region, through Pakistan, directly to China.

A similar pipeline is planned from a Chinese-built port on Burma’s Ramree Island to transport oil from Africa and the Middle East to the Chinese province of Yunnan.

“This effort to encircle India by sea with strategically positioned naval stations from Hainan in the east, to Gwadar in the west, and on land by promoting bogus Pakistani claims that undermine India’s territorial integrity, takes the ‘Great Game’ to a new and more dangerous level,” warned Jaswant Singh, India’s former defence and foreign affairs minister.

China’s rising economic and military power is driving formerly non-aligned India into seeking a loose alliance with the United States and its Asian partners (Japan, South Korea, Australia) to counterbalance Beijing.

But New Delhi has also sought to engage China, promoting its white-collar, services-led economic growth as a natural counterpoint to China’s blue-collar, manufacturing-driven economy.

Bilateral trade between the two Asian rivals has surged from a mere US$262-million in 1991 to an expected US$60-billion this year.

During Mr. Wen’s visit, the two countries set a bilateral trade target of US$100-billion-a-year by 2015.

But sharing their new wealth has also produced new tensions. China is India’s biggest trade partner. But that trade is skewed heavily in China’s favour, with China exporting almost twice as much to India as India sells to China.

Nearly 70% of India’s exports are low-cost raw materials compared with China’s more expensive manufactured goods.

It is no coincidence India has initiated more anti-dumping complaints with the World Trade Organization against China than anyone else.

“A Sino-Indian rivalry in southern Asia and the northern Indian Ocean may well be a dominant feature of Asian geopolitics in the 21st century,” Prof. Malik said.

National Post

pgoodspeed@nationalpost.com