In Goldfinger, one of Ian Fleming’s most memorable novels that was subsequently made into a film, a character says the following words: ‘Mr Bond, they have a saying in Chicago. Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it’s enemy action.’
The behaviour of the Chinese too, even if not enemy action as yet, is beyond coincidence because of the sheer number of border and maritime disputes it is engaged in. Now China is large not only in terms of population where it will soon be overtaken by India, if we have not done so already, but even in terms of its land mass.
It has a border with fourteen nations including India and with several of them. It has an ongoing border dispute. It even has disputes with countries with whom it does not share a common border such as Japan and the Philippines. Yet China plays innocent and claims not to have any imperialist designs with any of its neighbours. The frequency and intensity of border and territorial water disputes greatly increased once China became conscious of its own economic and military power. Is its behaviour so different from a rich landlord in a village in India who seeks to usurp and grab the lands of adjacent land owners of smaller plots, a recurrent theme in Bollywood cinema of the sixties and seventies?
As long as the present leadership of President Xi continues, the hunger of the Chinese state will never be satisfied – unless there is resistance from those whose territories it seeks to grab. To be sure, China is currently one of the most unloved countries on the planet, and also the one with the fewest friends.
Why is China so greedy for more land? It is not the case that its landmass is insufficient for its population, as the case with Bangladesh or Singapore. India is nearly three times more densely populated than China. Aside from strategic advantage, the first and the most obvious benefit is that underneath the surface of land China may grabs lie precious metals and other substances for which China’s manufacturing sector has an insatiable hunger. For instance, the Spratly Islands, where China’s claims are disputed by the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, Vietnam and Brunei, hold oil and natural gas reserves upwards of seventeen million tonnes. It is also one of the world’s most productive areas for commercial fishing.
China has started to flaunt its power and might just like the bully in school does. However, even a school bully, if he is intelligent cannot pick up too many battles at the same time. A bully also makes sure that he has at least a few friends to back him up. In a global community of one hundred and ninety-five nations, as on date, leaving aside Russia’s current dependence due to the situation in Ukraine, China’s only two friends are Pakistan and North Korea, the first the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism and the second ruled by Kim, the despot. Even these two nations must internally be questioning their relationship with China. Pakistan has realised too late that the belt and road initiative had not been of much help to it, and the so-called friendship that is ‘deeper than the ocean and sweeter than honey,’ may have, in fact, contributed to the current financial crisis it faces.
Countries like India can and have pushed back when it comes to its own territory, but it has not taken up cudgels on behalf of other, weaker nations whose territory China is also seeking to grab. Should India stand up for weaker nations or should it first slowly develop its strength in economic and military terms before doing so? In a discussion on an Indian news channel on China’s behaviour, the Indian origin, Singaporean national Kishore Mahbubani, the author of a book on China suggested that India first concentrate on building up its own internal strength. Be that as it may, the risk of inaction is that it is often interpreted as a sign of weakness.
Whichever side you may be, on the Ukraine-Russia conflict, at least there Russia had a reason to attack Ukraine, in that it viewed the possibility of Ukraine joining NATO to be an existential threat for it. China is not being threatened in any way by the various nations where it is carrying out its infamous salami slicing operations. It is rather, plain and simple bullying, and China is confident that it can get away with it because no one will stand up for the little guys, even if what they are doing is terribly unfair. Neither the US nor Europe have thought it fit to get involved in those issues, treating them as minor matters because they concern small nations. This is however precisely why they should get involved. If they have no interest in building up a coalition on such and other matters that concern the rest of the world, why then should they expect the rest of the world to stand with it on the issue of Ukraine?
It makes no sense for India to take the border dispute to the International Court of Justice because in any event China does not accept its jurisdiction. In 2016 when an international tribunal in the Hague ruled overwhelmingly in favour of the Philippines, in respect of the South China Sea, China simply refused to accept its verdict. It does not make any sense for India, Japan or any of the other smaller nations to take their disputes to the UN Security Council in view of China’s veto powers.
What can be done then to confront the bully in the class or rather the community of nations, knowing that the EU and even the US are too self-centred and self-obsessed to step up to the plate? Even as it explores other options India could and should try and stitch up a coalition of countries to collectively move a joint resolution before the UN General Assembly, which even if lacks teeth, does represents a larger community of nations. Such an exercise will not be without merit and would enhance India’s global reputation. Naming and shaming are important, as is calling out the class bully.
Rajesh Talwar is an author of 36 books across multiple genres, and has worked for the United Nations for more than two decades across three continents.