Replies

from the article - "Like Mao Zedong in 1962, President Xi Jinping—his legitimacy increasingly in question as China’s economy slows—likely sees border crisis as a political tool. For the most part, they are low-risk, high-yield opportunities to profit from nationalism: few countries, after all, are likely to see a gain in escalating a crisis with China."

“border crisis...they are low-risk, high-yield opportunities to profit from nationalism”

Let’s see, what are the ingredients to this stew? India weak in conventional forces...India nuclear power...India’s current leader possibly less predictable than ever.

Everybody seems to think that going nuclear is never an option. Well, it depends on how threatened the guy with the button feels. China is extremely aggressive and they need control of the Indian Ocean to guarantee oil shipments from the Persian Gulf. Their strategy all along has been to establish a position from which they can split India into little pieces. This is a conflict that India can’t afford to lose. To lose up in the mountains is to lose all of India.

I wonder if China has ever considered being such a good neighbor that it doesn’t need to destroy a country in order to safely transit goods through that nation’s border. Also, China has threatened practically all of the countries it shares a border with. What will they do if they perceive that China’s attention is suddenly elsewhere?