China made quiet border advances as ties warmed, Indian critics warn
Buffer zones meant to ease India-China tensions along their shared border have disproportionately restricted Indian forces from patrolling, former officials say.
NEW DELHI — In 2020, after Indian and Chinese soldiers brawled with stones and spiked rods in the thin Himalayan air along their countries’ contested border, nationalist fury gripped India.People smashed Chinese televisions and torched effigies of Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The Indian government banned dozens of Chinese apps and vowed it would not mend ties with its geopolitical rival until border issues were resolved.Five years later, India-China commerce has revived and direct flights between the countries have resumed. At a recent summit in Tianjin, China, Xi met his Indian counterpart, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and the leaders pledged to strengthen relations, with the Indian side touting “the maintenance of peace and tranquility along the border areas.”In New Delhi, however, and along the steep mountain passes that divide the countries, a chorus of critics contend that agreed-upon buffer zones meant to ease tensions have, in practice, disproportionately restricted Indian forces from patrolling in areas they once routinely accessed. With India’s quiet acquiescence, they allege, China has been able to effectively push the boundary lines in its favor.“Some of the buffer zones created are mostly in areas previously patrolled by us and on our side,” said a retired lieutenant general who has overseen these parts of the border. “We are supposed to try and get back our territory, but in the foreseeable future, it is a pipe dream,” he added, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic.Warnings about the shifting boundary lines — from former military officials and ambassadors, as well as sitting members of Parliament and border residents — have grown louder and more frequent. The claims are difficult to prove, since foreign journalists are denied access to the area. But the criticisms present a challenge to the Indian government, analysts said, as it mends ties with Beijing and seeks to rebalance its global relations amid an ongoing diplomatic feud with the United States.The Indian army referred questions from The Washington Post to the External Affairs Ministry, which did not respond to requests for comment. The Indian Defense Ministry, the Chinese Defense Ministry, and the Chinese Foreign Ministry did not respond to requests for comment. Chinese officials have urged India not to let the boundary question “define” the relationship.The Chinese strategy is “two steps forward, one step back,” said Jabin Jacob, an associate professor who teaches Chinese foreign policy at India’s Shiv Nadar University. “Then they still have one step in their possession.”A frozen boundaryIndia and China went to war over the border in 1962. More than half a century later, it remains undefined and bitterly disputed.The nuclear-armed neighbors still have drastically different interpretations of the de facto boundary — known as the Line of Actual Control, or LAC — and the soldiers deployed there have periodically come to blows.The most recent confrontation came in June 2020, in the border territory of Ladakh. At least 20 Indian and four Chinese soldiers were killed in the fighting, according to official counts. Tens of thousands of troops were rushed to forward positions, and, even after subsequent pullbacks, both sides have maintained a heightened military presence.Since the conflict, the two sides have struck a series of agreements to prevent flare-ups in the most contentious areas. The new protocols allowed some patrolling to resume, but also gave Chinese troops more favorable positions in several key spots, according to former officials, analysts and local leaders.“Around 450 square kilometers of land was converted into a buffer in my constituency alone,” Konchok Stanzin, an official in Chushul, one of the last villages on India’s eastern border, told The Post. “This land belonged to India but now our soldiers cannot set foot there.”As Indian forces have acceded to the new protocols, they have blocked pastoralists from grazing animals in areas where they once roamed freely. That has stirred anger in Ladakh, a restive Indian territory where locals have campaigned for greater political rights and environmental protections. Four people were killed in late September when police in the regional capital of Leh opened fire on people protesting for statehood, according to Human Rights Watch, and a political office belonging to Modi’s party was torched.In the aftermath, prominent environmental activist Sonam Wangchuk was arrested by Indian authorities under a national security law for allegedly inciting the violence, a claim he denies. Some of his supporters believe he was targeted, in part, for being outspoken about the loss of pasturelands and Chinese encroachment along the border.“It was not sitting well with government narratives that China is not taking our land,” said his wife, Gitanjali J. Angmo. “What Sonam has been fearing for a long time is that we can’t afford as a border state not to address the demands of the Ladakhis who have so far shown India love and passion.”Increasingly, the warnings from border communities are being echoed within the Indian establishment. A 2022 report by a senior police official in Ladakh said Indian forces no longer had a “presence” at 26 of 65 former patrolling points, highlighting what she called her country’s “play safe” strategy.“The Chinese absolutely have come in and established a position that is more advantageous to them than before,” said Ajai Shukla, a defense analyst and former military official, drawing on conversations with contacts on the ground. “The only question is, how much have we lost?”J.S. Bajwa, a former Indian lieutenant general, said “it is not just salami slicing,” referring to previous Chinese tactics that gradually changed the facts on the ground. “They actually took the whole belly of the pork,” he said.Strategic ‘opacity’The Indian government has been careful and sparing in its descriptions of the situation along the border.Last October, the government said it had reached an agreement with China to restore patrolling rights in two key areas, Depsang and Demchok, and that troops on both sides had pulled back slightly along all friction points. In December, however, Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar told Parliament that agreements in areas outside of Depsang and Demchok were “temporary and limited.”The MEA then said there had been a “resolution of the issues that emerged in 2020.” But when pressed by reporters and members of Parliament, Jaishankar and his colleagues have avoided stating categorically that patrolling rights have been restored at all friction points. Responding to similar border questions under the country’s right of information laws, the government has repeatedly called them “vague” and “speculative” and, therefore, not answerable.“The opacity is a way of dealing with the problem,” said Ashok Kanta, the Indian ambassador to China from 2014 to 2016. “If you don’t put it out in the public domain, then you don’t need to defend it publicly.”Some former military officials say Chinese troops have also lost access to previous patrolling points, while others reject the notion that India has surrendered any ground.“In all places, the Chinese have gone back to the original points they were at,” said Manoj Mukund Naravane, the army’s chief general during the 2020 conflict.A pragmatic truceIn late August, amid deteriorating U.S-India relations, Modi visited China for the first time since the clash in Ladakh. Videos of the countries’ two leaders engaging in a lighthearted exchange with Russian President Vladimir Putin rapidly went viral.India and China have since agreed to allow exchanges of scholars and journalists, cooperate on transboundary rivers, resume direct flights and reopen Indian access to a pilgrimage in Tibet. India has termed it a “gradual normalization of bilateral relations.”Rakesh Sharma, a former lieutenant general who served on the border from 2013 to 2015, said these are “logical” moves, mirroring China’s own increasingly relaxed posture. Some former officials argue that Jaishankar’s description of border measures as “temporary” signals India’s expectation that the issues will be addressed in future talks.“From the Indian side, the story is not over, but you have to live with Beijing next door, so you have to find some sort of an equilibrium,” said Manoj Kewalramani, a China studies fellow at the Takshashila Institution in Bangalore.“The danger,” Jacob warned, “is that this becomes permanent out of sheer inertia until the next crisis.”For now, analysts said, India has more pressing problems, like steep U.S. tariffs and sluggish manufacturing growth — and it needs Chinese investment.“We essentially cannot do without China,” said Manoj Joshi, distinguished fellow at the Observer Research Foundation.The hard reality, said Daniel Markey, a senior Stimson Center fellow focused on South Asia and China relations, is that “India does not have an easy, cheap, or effective solution to the broader threat posed by China militarily.”And it is that recognition, according to former Indian brigadier Deepak Sinha, driving the country’s current approach. “We remain intimidated and terrified of a conflict with China escalating,” he said. “It’s a fact of life.”Christian Shepherd in Singapore, Shams Irfan in Srinagar, Indian-administered Kashmir, and Supriya Kumar contributed to this report.
