Territorial disputes, the role of leaders and the impact of Quad: a triangular explanation of China-India border escalations

Abstract

This article provides a triangular explanation of the recent surge in China-Indian border escalations. It argues that although escalations stemmed from the disputed borders (the first factor), two additional factors, the policies of new nationalist leaders Xi and Modi and the impact of international politics with the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) as a case study, also triggered them. In the preceding decades, these three factors were not operational simultaneously. A grand push of events connected them in a way that developments on one side affected the other two. The article explained the linkages between different factors and subfactors and their reinforcing interplay. The ill-defined boundary provided a foundation for the conflict. The assertive policies of Xi and Modi provoked the rivalry in five ways: competition for influence, status, militarisation, changes in the line of actual control (LAC), and invocation of the Quad. The article then elaborated India’s unrivalled strategic advantages in balancing China and how the ‘China factor’ strengthened India’s ties with the US, Japan and Australia bilaterally and under the Quad. The contemporary Sino-Indian rivalry has expanded beyond disputed borders. Domestic and international politics have started influencing it, making it Asia’s foremost geopolitical challenge.

Keywords:

• China
• India
• Sino-Indian
• line of actual control (LAC)
• border dispute
• Quad
• Galwan clash

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 The 21-day-long Depsang standoff in 2013 started a few weeks before Chinese Premier Li Keqiang’s maiden visit to India. In September 2014, Modi was hosting a banquet for President Xi in India when reports of the standoff at Demchok surfaced in the media. Modi publicly asked Xi to order Chinese troops to withdraw. The Doklam standoff in June 2017 started approximately ten days before Modi’s visit to the US and therefore gained comprehensive media coverage in the US. Other border clashes include at Burtse in 2015; at the Galwan in 2020, in which casualties took place; at Yangtse in October 2021 and again at Yangtse in December 2022.

2 As multilateralism faced the challenge of reaching a consensus among many group members, countries began to develop focused group called ‘minilateralism’ to gather the “critical mass” of members necessary for a specific purpose (Tirkey, 2021).

3 Han Hua, School of International Studies, Peking University, in a Webinar ‘Emerging Trends in China-India Relations: Implications for South Asia’, organised by the Institute of Regional Studies, Islamabad, on 20 January 2022, attended via Zoom.

4 This is also referred to as the ‘Doval Doctrine’ named after its creator, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval. Under this doctrine, Indian forces claimed raids across Myanmar and Pakistani border.

5 Western analysts often mention India’s democratic credentials as a base for an alliance. In the same vein, the Quad is seen as an alliance of democracies. However, Haas (2022) neither considers India a liberal democracy at par with Western standards (he terms India as an illiberal democracy due to BJP’s oppressive measures against religious minorities and freedom of speech) nor an alliance based on democracies as a viable option to counter China. Instead, he proposes a realistic approach to include liberal and illiberal countries joining hands against authoritarian China.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ghulam Ali

Dr Ghulam Ali is Associate Professor, at the Department of Political Science, School of Marxism, Sichuan University of Science & Engineering, Zigong, PR China. He is thankful to an anonymous reviewer for helpful comments. He is also thankful to the organisers of the Tamkang School of Strategic Studies 2022 Annual Events, held by Tamkang University, Taipei, where an early version of this article was presented.