Since the 1962 war, China assiduously cultivated ties with India’s neighbors, preventing Bhutan from encircling the world’s largest democracy and using them to inhibit New Delhi’s legitimate global role. The client state of China, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka, under the Rajapaksa regime, attempted to undermine India through cross-border terrorism and allowed Beijing to virtually establish a naval base at Hambantota in Sri Lanka and Gwadar in Balochistan. China’s close relations with communist Nepal, Myanmar and Khaleda Zia’s BNP in Bangladesh ensured that India got bogged down with its neighbors while Beijing played the big game. This Dragon game is now looking at China with all the client states reeling in a severe economic crisis and their old adversary Japan growing rapidly in the East along with the QUAD group.
By reaffirming that Article V of the US-Japan security treaty applies to the Senkaku Islands disputed by China and by bolstering the US military presence on Okinawa’s Yonaguni Islands, just 120km from Taiwan, Tokyo and Washington have sent a great signal to Beijing. The joint statement issued after the US-Japan two-plus-two dialogue in Washington this morning makes it quite clear that China will have to reckon with Tokyo militarily in its belligerent spree against India, Taiwan and Australia. Clearly, Japan has thrown its post-WWII pacifism into the Sea of Japan and revised its national security doctrine by identifying China as the biggest strategic challenge. Just as the Indian Army carries the legacy of the 1962 war on its shoulders, China has a similar past with the Japanese Imperial Army in the early 19th century.
The Asian security paradigm has now shifted as China has a close ally in Russia, while Beijing faces counter-pressure from Japan to the Philippines to Australia to India or what could be loosely defined as counter-encirclement. Unlike in past decades, when Japan had invested billions of dollars in China, the scenery has now changed a lot much to the chagrin of President Xi Jinping, as Japan has returned to its former ally, the United States. “Facing a severely contested environment….the forward posture of US forces in Japan should be improved….positioning more versatile, resilient, and mobile forces with increased intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, anti-ship, and transportation capabilities,” the joint statement stated.
The joint statement also recalled the July 12, 2016 award in the South China Sea arbitration that went in favor of the Philippines but was rejected by China. In addition to outlining their basic positions on Taiwan, the two plus two statement expressed serious concerns about Hong Kong’s autonomy and human rights violations against the Uyghur Sunni Muslim community in Xinjiang.
Just as Japan agreed to meet the Chinese challenge, India also faced the PLA belligerence in East Ladakh with Army Chief General Manoj Pande declaring today that no less than 55,000 soldiers and 400 weapons were deployed to counter the PLA challenge. along the 1597 km. limit in Ladakh.
Both India and Japan have strengthened ties with Australia and the Philippines, with Canberra covered by the US security pact and Manila remaining a close ally of Washington. Plot these economically advanced countries on the map and you will see that Beijing fell into the strategic trap that it set for its adversaries.
