Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
The depth and durability of the Sino-Pakistan entente cordiale compels Indian
defense planners to consider the possibility that China or Pakistan will enter any
large-scale conflict between India and the other. By doing this Beijing has
compelled India to split its military forces. In effect, the Sino-Pakistan entente
cordiale confronts India with a two-front threat.
India unsuccessfully resisted the creation of the existing status quo of the Sino-
Pakistani entente cordiale . In the mid-1950s India's leaders hoped to use India's
friendship with China to persuade Beijing to keep its distance from Pakistan. By
demonstrating Indian friendship for China through fostering China's ties with
non-communist developing countries and defending China's interests in the
United Nations against United States criticism, while also conceding the essence
of Beijing's claim to Tibet in 1954, New Delhi hoped to convince Beijing that
China had no need to adopt hostile measures toward India. Indeed, India would
create incentives for Beijing to foster continued Indian friendship.
Nehru's strategy of appeasement worked, for a time, on the litmus-test issue of
Kashmir; Beijing did not come down on Pakistan's side of that issue until the
1960s. But Nehru's friendship policy toward China did not prevent China's
Premier Zhou Enlai and Pakistan's Prime Minister Muhammad Ali Bogra from
reaching at the Bandung conference in 1955 a highly effective understanding
regarding the parallel interests of their two countries vis-à-vis India. Bogra
assured Zhou that the enhanced strength Pakistan was gaining from its alliance
with the United States would not be used against China. Zhou accepted Bogra's
assurances. 30 Several years later this understanding regarding convergent
interests would blossom into a solid Sino-Pakistan strategic partnership.
India exerted considerable national effort in 1965 and again in 1971 to punish
and diminish Pakistan. In neither case did Indian military victories translate into
durable gains. In both cases China helped rebuild Pakistan's shattered military
power and confidence (as did the United States). Pakistan's 1971 defeat did
indeed threaten to overthrow the structure of power in South Asia (which since
1947 has rested on a balance between India and Pakistan).
But China stepped in with large-scale military assistance. Chinese tanks,
warplanes, artillery, small arms, and defense industrial plant. Most crucially, first
nuclear weapons technology and then ballistic missile technology flowed from
China to Pakistan. By about 1990 Pakistan had acquired the nuclear 'great
equalizer' with substantial Chinese help. Indian protests to Beijing, and to
Washington, were ineffectual. Pakistan revived from its catastrophic 1971 defeat
and within 20 years constituted a greater than ever threat to India.
As the process of Sino-Indian rapprochement gained momentum in the late
1980s and 1990s, New Delhi attempted to persuade China to draw away from
strategic partnership with Pakistan for the sake of improved Sino-Indian
relations. Beijing threw New Delhi a few concessions; the most important of
these was neutrality on the Kashmir issue and other intra-South Asian disputes.
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