Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
the Indian side had made preparations to allow the planned Chinese offensive to
unfold, push through successive but expendable lines of resistance, and than
made India's main defensive stand at a supportable southern position, perhaps at
Bomdila. Suppose that the planned PLA offensive had transpired and depleted
PLA stockpiles.
Then suppose that once China's opening offensive had been contained, and
clearly tarred China as the aggressor, Indian forces had opened their counter-
offensive. Suppose the objective of that counter-offensive had been a drive
directly up the Chumbi Valley by a Tibetan-Indian force to seize Shigatze.
Suppose
that
offensive had taken the PLA by surprise and once the Dalai Lama
and his Government in Exile was installed in Shigatze the Tibetan liberation
army was rapidly expanded with locally recruited ardently anti-Maoist young
Tibetans.
Regardless of what happened next, a sequence of events such as imagined
here, bold and effective Indian moves to impose Indian interests on China, would
have had a deep and abiding impact on Chinese perceptions of threat emanating
from India. The fact that this did not happen and than, instead, events went
according to Beijing's script meant that China subsequently felt little threat from
India. It was India, rather, that perceived threat from China.
COUNTER-FACTUAL PROPOSITION III:
WHAT IF INDIA HAD ABORTED THE SINO-PAKISTAN
ENTENTE?
Still another major Indian policy failure—and converse Chinese policy success—
has had to do with Pakistan. China was able to establish and maintain an entente
cordiale with Pakistan premised on parallel interests
vis-à-vis
India. By keeping
Pakistan militarily strong, China kept Pakistan free from Indian domination and
confident enough to pose a continual challenge to India. Beginning in 1964
China began supplying military equipment to Pakistan. Following US suspension
of arms sales to Pakistan during the 1965 and 1971 wars, China became
Pakistan's main supplier of munitions—a situation that continues into the twenty-
first century.
During the 1970s Beijing began covert assistance to Pakistan's secret nuclear
weapons program. Beijing then began assistance to Pakistan's ballistic missile
program, thereby giving Pakistan an assured ability to deliver its new nuclear
weapons against Indian targets. By the 1980s and 1990s, China and Pakistan
were partners in joint research and development efforts for new model fighter
aircraft. Beijing also extended large scale assistance to Pakistani efforts to
further develop its military-industrial base. The close strategic partnership
between China and Pakistan is one of the defining elements of the international
structure of power in Asia at the opening of the twenty-first century.
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