The 2,400-kilometer-long Himalayas include the highest peaks,
beautiful landscapes and some of the most
contentious areas in the world. The mountainous region
separates two rising superpowers that contain over a third
of the planet's population. And there's a big problem. It's not well-demarcated. There are not signposts everywhere. It's not even very well-populated. Very few people live up there. It's very tricky to have a
sense of who's controlling what bits of that very long border. And it's very easy for
accidents to happen. Boundary disagreements led to a deadly military clash between the two sides for
the first time since 1975. Adding to the border disputes is China's Belt and Road Initiative, a massive infrastructure project aimed at spreading Beijing's
influence all over the globe, including countries which
are at odds with India. We know that Pakistan is a big part of China's Belt and Road Initiative. We know that China has
been investing in ports. They've been investing
in roads in Pakistan. And India and Pakistan do share a very contentious
relationship also. In response to all of this, India has increased
military on the border, banned Chinese apps and improved ties with strategic partners to try and prevent the
spread of Chinese influence. India believes that China
wants a unipolar Asia that is dominated by China, where China sets the rules of the road and where countries acquiesce
to Chinese needs and wants. While a war may be unlikely, China has made it known it aims to take back what it
sees as its territory. Xi Jinping has made it
his goal to put China at what he says is the
center stage of the world. And he's also said he wants China to stand tall in the world. I think with that sort of rhetoric, it leaves very little
room for China to be able to maneuver and give concessions. The late 1940s saw China's
Communists overthrow the ruling government to
form what it is today, the People's Republic of China. The hero of the revolution was Mao Zedong. That same decade, India
gained independence from Great Britain to create their current
democratic government. India was one of the first countries to recognize the People's
Republic of China. And they did have the
first few years where India and China really did
partner with each other and saw each other as countries that could move forward together. There was a little bit of an
Asia for Asians, or India-China brothers' kind of atmosphere
or at least friends. But that didn't last long. Shortly after establishing the
People's Republic of China, the government exerted
its control over Tibet. During the revolution in which
the Chinese Communist Party took control of the country, in the late '50s, they
then sent troops into Tibet to take control of that region, which had been semi-autonomous, semi-independent up until that point. As a result of that,
the Dalai Lama in 1959 fled to India, took refuge in India. The Dalai Lama declared that his escape would
not have been possible without the loyal support of his people. Although they'd signed an agreement meant for both sides to respect each other's
territorial integrity, India and China began to confront
each other on the border. China became convinced then that not only was India at fault for
accepting the Dalai Lama and these refugees, but also accused India of
actually colluding with the U.S. and the U.K. to engineer his escape. And so by the early '60s, you really saw a relationship where there was very
little trust and a sense that the agreement had
essentially kind of broken down, or as far as India was concerned, was not being respected by Beijing. The first skirmishes took place when India discovered China
had been building roads through what it viewed as its territory. And just a few years later, the most significant
border conflict occurred. The point at which India
and China sort of disputes really reached their climax was in 1962 when the two sides fought a
war over the same territory that they're fighting over
now up in the Himalayas. Thousands died on both sides, with China reaching its goal
of retaining a large area of land near northwestern
India called Aksai Chin. Since then, there have
been numerous conflicts along what's now the longest
disputed border on the planet. The areas of contention: the
northwestern Himalayan region known as Ladakh; the Doklam plateau, a territory that intersects China, Bhutan and India; and Arunachal Pradesh, the eastern territory in
India that China claims is part of southern Tibet. There have been borders drawn up by various British
cartographers in the past. There's the Ardagh-Johnson
Line marking the border in Ladakh; the Macartney-MacDonald Line, another proposed marking in Ladakh; and McMahon Line, which marks the border of Arunachal Pradesh. We have a definite cartographic vision about our boundaries based on what the British has thought about. It's based on a little bit of geography, a little bit of ethnicity, a little bit of history. So it's very well-defined boundaries, which has not been recognized by China. Although some British-drawn
lines were agreed upon by past governments in Tibet, they were never formally
accepted by Beijing. And this is precisely where the clash is because there is no
second line at the moment where both agree, especially in these
disputed areas in the north and the east where the actual border lies. But there have been many periods since the 1962 war when
there wasn't conflict. What they did between 1993 and 2012, 2013, in the two-decade period, they set up a series of agreements, which essentially established that a lot of those territories that both countries claim would be both man's land, so to speak. Neither side would disturb the status quo, both sides would get
to patrol those regions and both sides would not
establish a permanent presence in the region. This solution is known as the Line of Actual Control, and it's a temporary border where both sides maintain the status quo. But even that line's location
isn't fully agreed upon. In 2013, a dispute occurred in the Demchok valley near Ladakh, and another in 2015 where
Indian soldiers destroyed a Chinese-built structure in what they saw as their territory. Then things really started to heat up near the Doklam plateau. There was one boundary crisis in 2017, where it actually involved
the boundary dispute between China and Bhutan, which again, it's not quite demarcated, but there's an understanding about it. India, as an ally of Bhutan, got involved to help
push China back or get it to reverse its movement
or its unilateral change of the status quo there. China brought heavy
road-building equipment into the disputed region and
began constructing a road, one that would give China a direct route to the Siliguri Corridor,
or chicken's neck, where all land-based military
and commercial traffic travel between India's northeastern
provinces and the rest of the country. So if there ever is a war or a major conflict
between China and India, this would be strategically
significant land. Bhutan allowed India's military to enter their country
to stop the construction. For months the troops faced off, but no casualties were reported. After that incident, India and China appeared to have put their differences behind them. China's relationship with India, that had sort of looked promising. As recently as 2019, Xi
Jinping traveled to India, had this two-day summit with Modi, and just before that, Modi came to China and had a multi-day summit
with Xi Jinping here. The two countries were sort
of finding a common ground where they can work together. India and China had actually
established economic ties that were perhaps at their
greatest point in history. China had become India's
largest trading partner. But you also saw Chinese
investment for the first time going into India in a significant way, and
China was seeking to enter in an even bigger way, particularly in India's
telecommunication sector and the 5G network. Then in 2020, the pandemic happened. The breaking news is about
the confirmed coronavirus in Kerala, where a student studying in China's Wuhan University
has tested positive with the deadly virus... Because of China's handling of Covid, India started becoming concerned
about its overdependence on China in certain sectors, the lack of transparency of
certain Chinese companies, their links with the state and whether the Chinese state
would use its economic ties for whether it was coercion
or economic influence. Up until this point, most of the standoffs had been non-violent because of agreements between both sides not to use firearms. The majority of the confrontations
during the 20th century used loudspeakers to taunt
each other from far away. Chinese troops have set up loudspeakers that belt out Punjabi numbers
at their forward posts. Let's take a look. But soon after the pandemic broke out, the border confrontations turned deadly. In May 2020, China surprised
India by deploying troops in the disputed region of Ladakh and Pakistani-occupied Kashmir. China says India's recent
construction of roads, tunnels and the refurbishment of airfields in the area along the border
changed the status quo and forced China to respond. After weeks of skirmishes, 20 Indian soldiers and at least
four Chinese soldiers died in hand-to-hand combat. And it came at a time
when economic relations between the two countries
were at its peak. This is a question that
continues to baffle a number of experts who focus
both on China and India. Why would Beijing essentially
put at stake a relationship with India that has been
growing in importance and that China has in part pursued to keep a country like India away from its main adversary, the U.S.? Why would China put this at risk? And the answers that we have
had are kind of twofold: One, they believed that this was a tactically
significant piece of territory, and that they did not anticipate
the backlash from India. They thought like in other parts of Asia that they would essentially
establish their claims, then India would accept that and that they would go
back to business as usual. Although the confrontation ended, building along the border didn't. In early 2021, China completed the construction
of a new village high in the mountains near the
Doklam plateau called Pangda, the latest addition to a handful
of villages China has built to fortify the Tibetan borderlands. But there's another problem. Some of these villages are located inside land claimed by Bhutan. It's the classic possession is nine-tenths
of the law phenomena. It is China saying, we're just going to change
facts on the ground, establish a presence. And the idea has been that
nobody will push back. Experts refer to their tactic as salami slicing, and it reflects the wider strategy of China's leader Xi Jinping to assert the country's
territorial claims in small steps, while not addressing it head on. China's overall strategy
for a lot of things, and I'm extrapolating at this
point to include the border, is to try and push questions
that cannot be resolved today into the future. And the thought behind
that is that any issue that China has to tackle today, if it can tackle it in five,
10 years down the road, China will be in a stronger
position at that point. China's end goal is unknown. But considering the sparsely populated, inaccessible areas along the border, the reasons for claiming new
territory seem to be less about wanting the land for economic or strategic, military reasons. There are other explanations, of which the primary
one is that Xi Jinping and the Communist Party of China, wants to prove to their own public, that even though they had
made some missteps at home in terms of handling Covid, they could help take
over these territories or establish their presence in
territories that China claims on their sovereignty grounds. And so essentially this
was a nationalism argument. China's obviously become
much more assertive in its territorial claims. I think a lot of people have talked about this Wolf Warrior diplomacy where Chinese diplomats
are much more aggressive in verbally defending,
rhetorically defending China's position. China's obviously backed that
up with more military spending but you've also seen it
reflected in Chinese state media. They go to greater lengths to celebrate Chinese
military accomplishments. They go to greater lengths to show that Chinese territorial claims are being upheld and defended. In the South China Sea, few are willing to fight
back China's claims. But India is different. The problems in the South China Sea, including a number of different
claimants who are smaller or perhaps not willing
or able to take China on, those don't relate to
the China-India situation where India has the
ability to hold its ground. Although India lags behind China in terms of military, technology and infrastructure, it may be one of the few countries willing to contest China in the region. India has already opposed
China's Belt and Road Initiative, which some estimate involves
as much as $8 trillion aimed at creating economic
ties all over the globe. It was one of the first
major countries to announce that it was going to boycott
the first Belt and Road Forum. And it does not do so because it says that it does not respect standards like financial sustainability,
environmental sustainability, transparency and territorial integrity. That last bit is important for India and one of the key reasons
it does not subscribe to the Belt and Road Initiative. India believes that China, through its China-Pakistan
Economic Corridor, in what India considers disputed territory between India and Pakistan. It's likely that India will continue to boycott the Belt and Road
Initiative for the near future. China's handling of
Covid, the border crisis and the Belt and Road have all led India to look elsewhere for economic ties, determined to become
less reliant on China. After the 2020 flareups, India banned dozens of Chinese apps, and Prime Minister Modi
doubled down on the Quad, an association of four democracies, Australia, Japan, India and the U.S., committed to preventing the Indo-Pacific from becoming Beijing's
geopolitical domain. It's cemented a group
of strong democracies that will work together going forward to secure a free and open Indo-Pacific. And this is great news for the U.S. who's looked to increase
ties with India for decades. U.S. policy makers have seen India as a geopolitical counterbalance and economic alternative and a democratic contrast to China. Even if it's not an ally and the fact that it does have a rivalry with China, that China would have to
dedicate a certain amount of its own resources in defending against India
or in tackling India. And so that in and of itself could help with the balance of power in the Indo-Pacific. And
therefore they have also talked about not just approving of India's rise, but it is in U.S.
national security interest to support India's rise. If you look at India, the pace of growth, the
size of the population, it's a huge market. You have Chinese companies
like TikTok, Huawei, all of which thought they were
going to have big businesses in India, and that's obviously
changed in the recent past. Although India has a history of non-alignment dating
back from the Cold War, the intense standoff in recent years may have finally pushed
them to choose sides. The U.S. and India have a lot to gain if they can hold the line against China, and much to lose if they can't. I think the Chinese do see
as the greater issue here India sort of forming this
alliance with the U.S., joining the Quad. I think Beijing is
calibrating its response to the border dispute to try and to defend its territorial claims
but also not to do so much that it pushes India into
the American embrace. We will work together,
closer than ever before. The best case scenario
for how this plays out between India and China is they
resolve the border dispute. They pull their troops
back. Trade resumes. But I think that that is
also a very unlikely outcome, given the recent Indian
participation in the Quad, given how much effort the U.S. has put into strengthening
that relationship and how poorly the relationship between China and the U.S. is going. It does seem unlikely that India and China are going to have happy days anytime soon.
