Why Culture Matters: Revisiting the Sino-Indian Border War of 1962

Abstract

Strategic historians and practitioners associated with the 32-day Sino-Indian border conflict of autumn 1962 have for long argued that India's appeal for US military assistance during the war led to the abandonment of India's foreign policy of non-alignment. By asking for military assistance, India entered into an alliance with the US. Triangulation of different accounts of the war, declassified US State Department Papers and correspondence between Indian leaders during the time of the war counter these claims. This article demonstrates how India's political elite, informed by cultural beliefs had in fact resisted allying with the US. Cultural beliefs, and not rational claims prescribing alliances, guided the strategic decision-making process in this period of national security crisis.

Key Words:

• India
• China
• Foreign Policy
• 1962 War

Acknowledgements

For valuable comments and suggestions I am grateful to the anonymous reviewer of this article, the editors of the Journal of Strategic Studies, Srinath Raghavan, Joshua Geltzer, Leena Chaudhuri, Aprajita Dhundia and especially Theo Farrell.

Notes

¹Other works in the early period include: Werner Levi, ‘Indian Neutralism Reconsidered’, Pacific Affairs 37/2 (Summer 1964); T.N. Keenleyside, ‘Prelude to Power: The Meaning of Non-Alignment before Indian Independence’, Pacific Affairs 53/3 (Autumn 1980); Cecil V. Crabb, ‘The Testing of Non-Alignment’, Western Political Science Quarterly 17/3 (Sept. 1964).

²Neville Maxwell, India's China War (London: Jonathan Cape 1970), 11.

³B.K. Nehru, Nice Guys Finish Second (New Delhi: Viking 1997), 408.

⁴D.K. Palit, War in the High Himalayas: The Indian Army in Crisis, 1962 (London: Hurst 1991), 343.

⁵Dennis Kux, India and the United States: Estranged Democracies (Washington DC: National Defense UP 1992), 204.

⁶Levi, ‘Indian Neutralism Reconsidered’; Keenleyside, ‘Prelude to Power’, Crabb, ‘The Testing of Non-Alignment’.

⁷Kenneth Waltz, Theory of International Politics (New York: McGraw-Hill 1979) Also see Kenneth Waltz, ‘Structural Realism After the Cold War’, International Security 25/1 (Summer 2000), 28–39. Note: This article recognises that neo-realism is not a theory of foreign policy, but it does predict that states will balance in order to survive. For a detailed analysis of neo realism and foreign policy, see Shibley Telhami, ‘Kenneth Waltz, Neorealism and Foreign Policy’, Security Studies 11/3 (Spring 2002), 158–70.

⁸For an account of the explanatory core of neo-realism, see Jeffery Legro and Andrew Moravcsik, ‘Is Anyone Still a Realist?’, International Security 24/2 (Autumn 1999), 5–55.

⁹For an elaborate discussion on cultural beliefs, see Alastair Johnston, ‘Thinking About Strategic Culture’, International Security 19/4 (Spring 1995), 32–64.

¹⁰For an ensuing debate see: Michael Desch, ‘Culture Clash: Assessing the Importance of Ideas in Security Studies’, International Security 23/1 (Summer 1998), 141–70. Also see John Duffield, Theo Farrell, Richard Price and Michael C. Desch, ‘Isms and Schisms: Culturalism Versus Realism in Security Studies’, International Security 24/1 (Summer 1999), 156–80.

¹¹Peter Katzenstein, The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia UP 1996); John Gentry, ‘Norms and Military Power: NATO's War Against Yugoslavia’, Security Studies 15/2 (April–June 2006), 187–224; Theo Farrell, The Norms of War: Cultural Beliefs and Modern Conflict (London: Lynne Rienner 2005); For a review, see Theo Farrell, ‘Constructivist Security Studies: Portrait of a Research Programme’, International Studies Review 4/1 (Spring 2002), 49–72.

¹²John J. Mearsheimer, ‘The False Promise of International Institutions’, International Security 19/3 (Winter 1994–95), 9–11.

¹³Waltz, Theory of International Politics, 104.

¹⁴Johnston, ‘Thinking About Strategic Culture’, 34.

¹⁵Stephen Peter Rosen, ‘Military Effectiveness: Why Society Matters’, International Security 19/4 (Spring 1995), 5–31; Stephen Peter Rosen, Societies and Military Power: India and its Armies (New York: Ithaca UP 1996); Jeffrey W. Legro, Cooperation under Fire: Anglo-German Restraint during World War II (New York: Ithaca UP 1995).

¹⁶For a review, see Theo Farrell, ‘Memory, Imagination, and War’, History 87/285 (Jan. 2002), 61–73.

¹⁷Jeffery Legro, ‘Military Culture and Inadvertent Escalation of World War II’, International Security 18/4 (Spring 1994), 66–107.

¹⁸Theo Farrell, ‘Strategic Culture and American Empire’, SAIS Review of International Studies 35/2 (Summer–Fall 2005), 3–18.

¹⁹Latha Varadarajan, ‘Constructivism, Identity, and Neoliberal (In)Security’, Review of International Studies 30/3 (2004), 319–41.

²⁰Inder Malhotra cited in K. Subramanyam, Shedding Shibboleths: India's Evolving Strategic Outlook (Delhi: Wordsmith 2005), vii.

²¹Ibid., 27–8.

²²Jaswant Singh, Call to Honour (New Delhi: Rupa 2006), 99.

²³George Tanham, ‘Indian Strategic Culture’, Washington Quarterly 15/1 (Winter 1992), 130. Also see George Tanham, Indian Strategic Thought: An Interpretive Essay (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corp. 1992).

²⁴Tanham, ‘Indian Strategic Culture’, 130.

²⁵See, for instance, Subramanyam, Shedding Shibboleths, 3–8.

²⁶For other works that lightly touch upon culture and Indian strategic studies see: Swarna Rajagopalan (ed.), Security and South Asia: Ideas, Institutions, and Initiatives (New Delhi: Routledge 2006).

²⁷See Desch, ‘Culture Clash’, 158.

²⁸K. Shankar Bajpai, ‘Engaging with the World’, in Atish Sinha and Madhup Mohta (ed.), Indian Foreign Policy: Challenges and Opportunities (New Delhi: Academic Foundation 2007), 83.

²⁹New Delhi, Nehru Memorial Museum & Library (NMML), V.L. Pandit Papers, Second Instalment, Sub File No. 16, ‘An article on the policy of non-alignment’, undated.

³⁰Subimal Dutt, With Nehru in the Foreign Office (New Delhi: Minerva Associates 1977), 9.

³¹Ibid.

³²Robert Scalapino, ‘“Neutralism” in Asia’, American Political Science Review 48/1 (March 1954), 49. For an objective review see Vincent Shean, ‘The Case for India’, Foreign Affairs 30 (1951–52).

³³Ibid., 77.

³⁴Robert McMahon, The Cold War on the Periphery: The United States, India, and Pakistan (New York: Columbia UP 1994), 11.

³⁵Ibid., 11–15.

³⁶For details see Vijay Lakshmi Pandit, The Scope of Happiness (London: Weidenfeld 1979), 253.

³⁷Ibid., 59.

³⁸‘Means to Combat India's Policy of Neutralism’, Washington DC, 30 Aug. 1951, in Foreign Relations of the United States, (FRUS) Vol. VI: 2 (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office 1977), 2172–3.

³⁹Robert McMahon, ‘United States Cold War Strategy in South Asia: Making a Military Commitment to Pakistan, 1947–1954’, Journal of American History 75/3 (Dec. 1988), 812.

⁴⁰Ibid., 195.

⁴¹[NMML] D.D. Eisenhower Papers, Eisenhower to Nehru, Washington DC, 25 Feb. 1954.

⁴²Nehru's Statement in Lok Sabha, 1 March 1954, in Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Second Series Vol. I (New Delhi: Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund and OUP 1999), 341.

⁴³‘US Military Aid to Pakistan’, The Hindu, 24 Dec. 1953.

⁴⁴[NMML] G.L. Mehta Papers, 3rd and 4th Instalments, G.L. Mehta to Nehru, Washington DC, 6 Jan. 1954.

⁴⁵Nehru's Letter, 1 Dec. 1953, in Letters to Chief Ministers, Vol. 3 (New Delhi: Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund and OUP 1988), 455.

⁴⁶For details, see McMahon, Cold War on the Periphery, Chapter 8.

⁴⁷Ibid., 287.

⁴⁸Ibid., 11–15.

⁴⁹Chen Jian, ‘The Tibetan Rebellion of 1959 and China's Changing Relations with India and the Soviet Union’, Journal of Cold War Studies 8/3 (Summer 2006), 80–9.

⁵⁰For details, see Chattar Singh Sharma, ‘Panchsheela and After: Sino-India Relations in the Context of the Tibetan Insurrection’, Asian Survey 21/3 (May 1962), 426–8.

⁵¹Jian, ‘The Tibetan Rebellion of 1959 and China's Changing Relations with India and the Soviet Union’, 85–6.

⁵²A detailed report on India's boundaries in these sectors can be found in P.B. Sinha and A.A. Athale, History of the Conflict with China, 1962 (India: Ministry of Defence 1992), 1–5.

⁵³Details on other territorial issues in the Western sector can be found in Alastair Lamb, The China–India Border (Oxford: OUP 1964), 7–8.

⁵⁴For Chinese perceptions of India's position on the border between 1950 and 1962 see: Jian, ‘The Tibetan Rebellion of 1959 and China's Changing Relations with India and the Soviet Union’; Niu Jun, ‘1962: The Eve of the Left Turn in China's Foreign Policy’, Cold War History International Project Working Paper No. 48 (Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars 2005).

⁵⁵Ibid., 7–13.

⁵⁶Sarvepalli Gopal, Jawaharlal Nehru: A Biography, Vol. 3 1956–1964 (Delhi: OUP 1984), 207–8.

⁵⁷D.R. Mankekar, The Guilty Men of 1962 (Bombay: Tulsi Shah Enterprises 1968), 45.

⁵⁸For a brief analysis of early Chinese advances into Indian territory, see Lorne J. Kavic, India's Quest for Security (Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univ. of California Press 1967), 169–72. Note: Determining which side actually started the war is an issue that continues to be debated. The debate falls outside the scope of this article, for a reappraisal, see Srinath Raghavan, ‘Sino-Indian Border Dispute, 1948–1960, A Reappraisal’, Economic & Political Weekly (Sept. 2006).

⁵⁹Mankekar, The Guilty Men of 1962, 46.

⁶⁰Maxwell, India's China War, 305.

⁶¹Mankekar, The Guilty Men of 1962, 46.

⁶²B.N. Kaul, The Untold Story (New Delhi: Allied Publishers 1967), 358.

⁶³Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 219–21.

⁶⁴Kaul, The Untold Story, 367–8.

⁶⁵Romesh Thapar, ‘Handling the Chinese’, Economic Weekly 14/41 (1962), 1611–12.

⁶⁶Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 224.

⁶⁷Ibid., 209.

⁶⁸Ibid., 223.

⁶⁹For details see: Kavic, India's Quest for Security, 173.

⁷⁰Kaul, The Untold Story, 382.

⁷¹Mullick, My Years with Nehru, 361.

⁷²Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 225.

⁷³Mullick, My Years with Nehru, 361–2; Maxwell, India's China War, 340; Kaul, The Untold Story, 386.

⁷⁴Mullick, My Years with Nehru, 362.

⁷⁵Kaul, The Untold Story, 386.

⁷⁶Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 227.

⁷⁷Ibid.

⁷⁸Maxwell, India's China War, 340.

⁷⁹Ibid.

⁸⁰B.K. Nehru, Nice Guys Finish Second, 344. Read with Kaul, The Untold Story, 320.

⁸¹For variations in the accounts see: Kaul, The Untold Story, 386; Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 232; Sinha and Attale, History of the Conflict with China, 101; Mullick, My Years with Nehru, 363; Mankekar, The Guilty Men of 1962, 50; Maxwell, India's China War, 34–342.

⁸²Waltz, Theory of International Politics, 111.

⁸³For details, see Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History (Princeton UP 1995), 1.

⁸⁴For a conceptual analysis of resistance, change and the Sino-Indian conflict, see Steven Hoffman, India and the China Crisis (Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univ. of California Press 1990), 198.

⁸⁵Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 242.

⁸⁶Sinha and Attale, History of the Conflict with China, 436–9.

⁸⁷Kaul, The Untold Story, 396–7.

⁸⁸Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 273.

⁸⁹S.S. Khera, India's Defence Problem (New Delhi: Orient-Longman 1968), 230.

⁹⁰Mullick, My Years with Nehru, 403–4.

⁹¹See John Lall, Aksaichin and the Sino-Indian Conflict (New Delhi: Allied Publishers 1989), 282.

⁹²Galbraith, Ambassador's Journal, 443; Hoffman, India and the China Crisis, 165.

⁹³State, Washington DC, to Embassy in India, 27 Oct. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 352. Note: Appeals were also made to other states, See Hoffman, India and the China Crisis, 197.

⁹⁴State, Washington DC, to the Embassy in India, 27 Oct. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 352.

⁹⁵Galbraith to State, New Delhi, 29 Oct. 1962, ibid., 361.

⁹⁶Memorandum from Kaysen to Kennedy, Washington DC, 3 Nov. 1962, ibid., 364–8.

⁹⁷Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 301–2.

⁹⁸Sinha and Athale, History of the Chinese Conflict, 439–40.

⁹⁹Note: The accounts of events on the 17/18 Nov. night remain contradictory. See Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 315; Kaul, The Untold Story, 412–14; Maxwell, India's China War, 402–4.

¹⁰⁰Kaul, The Untold Story, 416.

¹⁰¹Palit, War in the High Himalayas, 321.

¹⁰²Maxwell, India's China War, 405.

¹⁰³Galbraith, Ambassador's Diary, 487.

¹⁰⁴Kux, India and the United States, 207.

¹⁰⁵B.K. Nehru, Nice Guys Finish Second, 404.

¹⁰⁶Boston, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum (JKPLN), NSC Papers, Correspondence between Nehru and Kennedy, 19 Nov. 1962, NSC Box 111.

¹⁰⁷Ibid.

¹⁰⁸Ibid.

¹⁰⁹Galbraith, New Delhi, to State, 19 Nov. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 397. Note: The contents of this letter were revealed only in 1965. See Sudhir Ghosh, Gandhi's Emissary (London: Cresset Press 1967), 309.

¹¹⁰The ceasefire was implemented on 21 Nov., Kavic, India's Quest for Security, 182; Gopal, Jawaharlal Nehru, Vol. 3, 234–9.

¹¹¹Kux, India and the United States, 204.

¹¹²Henry Bradsher, ‘Nehru agrees India needs American arms’, Washington Post, 29 Oct. 1962.

¹¹³Maxwell, India's China War, 384–5.

¹¹⁴Crabb, ‘The Testing of Non-Alignment’, 538.

¹¹⁵‘Nehru Vows to Fight On: May Accept Arms Help’, Washington Post, 26 Oct. 1962.

¹¹⁶Jawaharlal Nehru, ‘Changing India’, Foreign Affairs 41/3 (April 1963), 463.

¹¹⁷Hoffman, India and the China Crisis, 165.

¹¹⁸Ibid.

¹¹⁹This has been confirmed in the following correspondence, Galbraith, New Delhi, to State, 24 Oct. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 350; Galbraith, New Delhi, to State, 25 Oct. 1962, ibid.; Memorandum from Kaysen to Kennedy, Washington DC, 26 Oct. 1962, ibid.

¹²⁰The first was given on 11 Oct. at the PM's house, and the second on 23 Oct. at Kaul's residence in New Delhi.

¹²¹The fact that Kaul's views were still ‘valued’ by Nehru has been adequately investigated by Hoffman, India and the China Crisis, 198.

¹²²Waltz, Structural Realism After the Cold War, 34.

¹²³Galbraith, Ambassador's Journal, 431.

¹²⁴Ibid., 445–6.

¹²⁵NMML, TTK Paper, TTK to Nehru, ‘Meeting Minutes taken on the Meeting of 14 Secretaries Called by the Minister Without Portfolio’, New Delhi, 6 Nov. 1962.

¹²⁶Romesh Thapar, ‘NEFA and all that’, Economic Weekly 14/42 (20 Oct. 1962), 1650.

¹²⁷Galbraith, New Delhi, to Kennedy 13 Nov. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 382.

¹²⁸Kaysen to Kennedy, Washington, 3 Nov. 1962, ibid., 367.

¹²⁹NMML, TTK Papers, Correspondence with Nehru, TTK to Nehru, New Delhi, 16 Dec. 1962; NMML, TTK to Nehru, New Delhi, 26 Dec. 1962.

¹³⁰Ibid.

¹³¹Memorandum of Conversation from Robert Komer to President Kennedy, Washington DC, 16 Dec. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 435–7.

¹³²Y.D. Gundevia, Outside the Archives (London: Sangam Books 1984), 248–310.

¹³³Memorandum of Conversation, Sino-Indian Dispute, Nassau, 20 Dec. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 448–50.

¹³⁴Galbraith, New Delhi, to Rusk, 30 Nov. 1962, FRUS, Vol. 19, 414–17.

¹³⁵London, The National Archives, FO 371/170637, Message from Kennedy to Macmillan, Washington DC, 23 May 1963.

¹³⁶Ibid.

¹³⁷Gopal, Jawaharlal Nehru, Vol. 3, 251–3.

¹³⁸State, Washington DC, to Embassy in India, 18 June 1963, FRUS Vol. 19, 612–13.

¹³⁹Galbraith, Ambassador's Journal, 513.

¹⁴⁰Ibid., 505.

¹⁴¹See Ann Swidler, ‘Culture in Action: Symbols and Strategies’, American Sociological Review 51/2 (April 1986), 273.

¹⁴²Desch, Culture Clash.

¹⁴³Paul Kapur and Sumit Ganguly, ‘The Transformation of US-India Relations: An Explanation for the Rapprochement and Prospects for the Future’, Asian Survey 47/4 (July/Aug. 2007), 642–56.

¹⁴⁴For details, see T.V. Paul and Mahesh Shankar, ‘Why the US-India Nuclear Accord is a Good Deal’, Survival 49/4 (2007), 111–22.