 Hello and welcome to Mapping Fortlines, a show by Newsclick where we look at major issues between countries, between around borders and their geo-strategic importance. Today, we are going to be talking about the recent issues between India and China which have been going on for nearly two months now. There's been a lot of uncertainty, a lot of confusion around it. There were violent incidents in the past one week but we're also going to be looking at the larger geopolitical and strategic role relevance of these issues. We have with us Prabir Burkhaistar of Newsclick. Thank you Prabir so much for joining us. So over the past few days, there's been clearly a lot of talks going on to de-escalate the situation to make sure that the conflict does not escalate. But can we first start by looking at the specific region itself and what is the geo-strategic significance of this region in the Ladakh area for India? These are areas where there's not much human habitation, areas where there's weather is very extreme. So what exactly is the key role of these eight regions? Well you know, of course this as you have already said was in the process of disengagement after a standoff and it's unfortunate that whatever may have been the reason that process of disengagement should also have led to a engagement. So to say and even if it was the scuffle, hand stones, bricks, staves, whatever it is. But it has led to the death of 20 Indian soldiers. So this is something really unfortunate and I think that's really cause for concern. Indian side of course but also the Chinese side because the Chinese have said that they do not want to disclose the casualties but they seem to indicate they also have had casualties. So that this should have happened at all during the process of disengagement shows that either the process of disengagement was not worked out in detail enough for such a thing to have happened or at least during the process of disengagement if there are differences they should have had at least a status quo before referring to other authorities and resolving the issue. It's unfortunate that such an incident should have taken place during this phase itself. What has been called also accepted by both sides of the phase of disengagement. We also have the Prime Minister statement that there is no territory under occupation and we've got all our soldiers back, there is nobody who's missing. So I hope now that India and China can work out via media at least for the short term but what you're asking is why are such issues creeping up at all and I think for that we have to look at what are the Chinese and the Indian sensibilities and it won't happen unless we also recognize there are sensibilities on both sides. For Indian side of course this has been the issue that the CPP corridor, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor which is from Khajigarh to Gwadar Port in Pakistan really passes through what we call as the Pakistan Occupied Kashmir and if that is so then of course this is something which India would like then to take cognizance of and also for Pakistan and China who want to bring the two economies closer together and also for China in which Gwadar would be really a port, warm water port directly into the Indian Ocean and from that it could then go over to Africa shortens distance significantly for the Belt Road Initiative. Therefore CPP for both Pakistan and China are extremely important. So this is one strategic part that we have to take into account. The other part and I think that's also important for India to understand is of course Jingyang Tibet Road which at that time is to call it Sinkiang, the Sinkiang Tibet Road which was built in 1957 which is completed in 1957 by China which was a pebble kind of road. It was really not an asphalt road. It's now an asphalt road. So it's an important highway that they have built. It links Tibet to Sinkiang. So that's something that is extremely important for China and they are not going to of course be quiet if that is certain. If we see the areas where we seem to be clashing with the Chinese over the last few months then you will see we have already talked about Pangmong saw in the papers that's an area we seem to have having differences. The Galwan River of course with the main clash has taken place and also the Dipsong Plains, Shaiok River. These are all areas if you see that have come into some kind of tension on the other. Now what are the disputed territory? What are the lines we love going to? But we all know that between the United Kingdom, Britain at that time, the Great Britain and China there was really no agreed border that was there. This was border on which both sides had claims, both sides had lines and this is therefore an undefined border that has been there for a very long time. The difference as you have said that these are uninhabited areas so as the countries have become more powerful, more developed they have pushed the their definition of the border leading as we know the in the earlier 1962 war where Akshayi Chin which India claims the part of India has been under occupation by China but more important than that there is also the issue and you can see that this is the part that is the basically seem to be a part of India which is under occupation by China. Now here the problem that is there is that Akshayi Chin if this is really something that India claims and the point is if it is going to severe their highway that that is something which I don't think China is going to agree to partly because it's never been a border which is defined between UK Britain and China. So I don't think India's expectation that China will hand over Akshayi Chin is ever going to really happen. I don't think these were actually even issues for a long time. India opened the Donald Big Oldie Airport about 10 years back in 2008 or so and made it enough so that even big helicopters could land there carrying a lot of goods. So we have been actually building that access to the border by strengthening the roads, strengthening airports and making that something that India could actively engage with if China also wanted to encroach further or there was any difference of opinion which leads to a clash is on the ground. So both sides and this is true for China as well. Both sides have been strengthening their infrastructure close to the border. But in the last year particularly when India talked about the Indian parliament about taking back Pakistan occupied Kashmir we also talked about taking back Akshayi Chin. This is the Home Minister's statement and we also did talk about taking it ambiguous. Of course we could argue that part of Akshayi Chin which has been ceded by Pakistan to China or did it mean the whole of Akshayi Chin but the threat that India would could take over these parts meant both the CPAP corridor was at risk as far as China is concerned as well as the Sinkyan, Tibet highway or the Xinjiang, Tibet highway both of these would be at risk. So this buildup for China seems to represent for them at least in their understanding a threat and I think a part of the problem that India has got is that it has taken all of these individual incidents as a matter of Chinese encroachments, Chinese trying to set new boundaries but they have not understood the strategic threat that they think India poses to their two major projects. One can argue that the Chinese reaction was certainly not well timed it was not diplomatic much more efforts should have been made to see that this does not go out of hand but at the same time it is very difficult for us to conclude who at that height of 14,000 feet cast the first stone so to say which led to this kind of clashes all we can say is this has been building up for quite some time why is it that we did not try and see that these issues are resolved in a different way instead of leading finally to what we see as a Galwan river clash and all that too in the process of disengagement. Indian diplomacy should have been harnessed to the task much sooner than leaving it to left-wing generals, major generals to sort out what has seen to be a border issue and not seem to be a much larger geo-strategic issue as you have raised and not understanding the geo-strategic importance that China was giving to this kind of issues I think what we have done is therefore let tactic determine our strategy and therefore local low-level clashes now have escalated to the level where now both countries have hair-trigger alert, they're too nuclear to armed powers and this is not good for anybody in the world. In the aftermath of this clash there's been a lot of jingoism going about in the Indian media as usual hashtags late night debates all of it so but even among say certain experts in the strategy community there's been a call for a much more harsh approach and one of the strategies people are talking about is that does it make sense to move closer to the United States and its allies in the region although the fact that India is moving closer to the US or the Quad was maybe one of the reasons for China becoming a bit more varied. So how do we see this demand in this context? Well you know you've almost answered the question yourself that if we look at one of the aspects of the current clash it is also that China is much more wary of India now partly because of its attempts to build up all of this infrastructure in a very sensitive border area which is strategic significance not so much for India but certainly for Pakistan China CPP Corridor and for China in the Jinjiang Tibet highway so I think that that part of it is something that India is missing that if on top of that you are also getting very close to the United States and Australia and Japan and you are talking about how as a Quad you are now part of containment of China in the South China Sea now if you look at the South China Sea it's not really close to the India to close to India it is South China Sea after all neither India nor Australia nor in fact the United States is anywhere close to it so when they want to say that we are protecting South China Sea now that's power projection the US has been doing it but for India and Australia and Japan to join in US power projection doesn't really make too much sense as far as China is concerned it is seen to be a threat so the if you see our build up in that area coupled with our joining what you said the Quad then automatically the threat perception regarding India it becomes more for China and I think that's one again of the misunderstanding the Chinese have I'm saying it misunderstanding I do not believe that India poses a serious threat of war on China or trying to take over the CPP Corridor whatever various shall we say jingoistic late night experts on television might say so if you leave that out so I think this is signals being given which are either not fully intended or basically a kind of gamemanship which is also the problem now if we look at the United States well you know there has been somebody who has said I don't know who it is now who said that the you know it's a very big threat to be an enemy of the United States the only bigger threat it is actually becoming its friend so because these are the first thing the United States will do is betray its own friends Mr. Trump has said he wants to mediate between India and China so he's not saying that his interests lie with India his interests are in mediating between India and China that he can perhaps get more benefits regarding what China will concede in terms of trade to the United States in this trade war so if you see all of that the United States plays a very simple game what is of interest to be is all that matters to be everything else is secondary and therefore going in with a party who is who has that embedded in its genetic makeup so to say is I think extremely foolish for India because India has strategic autonomy has tried to preserve a strategic autonomy unfortunately under the previous UPA regime as well as the current India BJP led regime we have been slowly eroding the strategic autonomy and trying to close come close to much more to the United States this has been a progression from 1990 to today but we have discovered on various occasions that it backfires on us and we pull back to a more strategic autonomy position I think if we use a border clash of this kind both India China was in the process of disengagement and we take a strategic decision based on that I think it would be extremely foolish and certainly it's not an India's larger interest so I think tying strategically with the United States against China would be an extremely foolish mistake apart from the fact that as we know a huge part of India's trade and it's not only India's trade with China that's at stake but India's trade with other countries depend a lot on parts and manufactured items that we get from China as Rajiv Bajaj hence Bajaj Autos has said that you know we export 15,000 crores work of equipment motorcycles and two-wheelers from India 1,000 crores is what we import from China but without that we'd be endangering half 15,000 crores of export so one shouldn't see this kind of things without looking at the much larger picture and I think we are letting the shall we say the military view or shall we say the television military view of the world take over both our media and our good sense and I think this is time that we should assert our good sense and talk about peace it will not help our soldiers who have died by having a war with China in which both sides are going to lose and with India now in the grip of a COVID epidemic I think this is suicidal for India to engage in any of this kind of adventure as it has been called and it is also extremely foolish on India's path to align with the United States because in the process of disengagement we had a clash and our soldiers died that is not the larger view of the world we need to take today thank you so much for if you're talking to us that's all we have time for today keep watching news click