China and India Face Off at Another Himalayan Hotspot

As Chinese and Indian troops continue to confront each other across the Doklam Plateau, tensions are flaring up in another Himalayan hotspot. As the AP reports:

Indian and Chinese soldiers yelled and hurled stones at one another high in the Himalayas in Indian-controlled Kashmir, Indian officials said Wednesday, potentially escalating tensions between two nations already engaged in a lengthy border standoff elsewhere.

The Chinese soldiers hurled stones while attempting to enter Ladakh region near Pangong Lake on Tuesday but were confronted by Indian soldiers, said a top police officer. The officer said Indian soldiers retaliated but neither side used guns. […]

An Indian intelligence officer said the confrontation occurred after Indian soldiers intercepted a Chinese patrol that veered into Indian-held territory after apparently it lost its way due to bad weather.

Beijing is officially disclaiming knowledge of the skirmish, only issuing vague appeals for India to help calm tensions along the border. And according to on-the-ground reports, both sides have moved swiftly to do so. The punching and stone-throwing supposedly ceased after 30 minutes, with troops from both sides retreating to their original positions. The next day, China reportedly requested a flag meeting with India to re-establish order, which suggests that this may have been an accidental scuffle that got out of hand.

But there is just as much reason, if not more, to believe that the incursion was a deliberate provocation from the Chinese side. The timing and location of the standoff were both loaded with historical significance: the incident happened on India’s Independence Day, near a lake that saw heavy combat during the 1962 Sino-Indian War. By advancing into a sensitive India-controlled territory in Kashmir on the anniversary of Indian independence, Beijing appears to be needling New Delhi, registering disdain for India’s territorial claims while proving that China can go wherever it pleases.

Meanwhile, the original border dispute in Sikkim is still festering after seven weeks. There, on India’s Independence Day, the Chinese rebuffed India by refusing to attend a ceremonial border meeting traditionally held every year. That symbolic snub has been accompanied by a surge of nationalist, anti-Indian rhetoric in the Chinese press—and a new external effort to sell foreign publics on Beijing’s version of events. On Thursday, the state news agency Xinhua released a bizarre English-language propaganda video detailing India’s “seven sins” during the standoff. The video is already generating outrage for its mocking portrayal of India, depicted as a bearded, turban-clad man who is at once a coward, a fool, and a bully:

China’s feeble attempt at foreign propaganda is unlikely to change many hearts and minds abroad, and it certainly won’t help defuse the rising tensions that the crisis has generated. With rhetoric escalating and neither side willing to back down, the two countries’ positions have only hardened over time. China is still demanding that Indian troops withdraw fully from the Doklam Plateau as a precondition for talks, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has insisted in a defiant Independence Day speech that India is “strong enough to overcome those who try to act against our country.” With prospects for a diplomatic resolution currently looking dim, both the Chinese and Indian militaries are preparing for the eventuality of armed conflict.

That eventuality is hardly an inevitability—but given the high stakes involved, it cannot be excluded. At stake for New Delhi in Sikkim are the security of the vulnerable Siliguri Corridor, India’s reputation as a reliable ally of Bhutan, and its credibility as a major power that can stand up to China. And with Beijing stirring up new trouble in Kashmir as well, anxieties about Pakistan enter the picture. India has stridently opposed Beijing’s infrastructure plans for the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (part of which runs through Pakistan-controlled Kashmir), fearing Beijing’s growing partnership with Islamabad. For that reason, India is sure to take a forceful stance against any further Chinese incursions into Kashmir.

Hopefully, then, the skirmish in Kashmir will be quickly contained, and the Doklam dispute will stay at the level of rhetorical, not physical, confrontation. But if border disputes continue to flare up on multiple fronts, and the bad blood between China and India continues to grow, a more deadly confrontation could well erupt.

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