The Future of China-India Relations
2020/02/13
abstract
CHINA and India are rising almost simultaneously. Their bilateral relationship is of critical significance to the regional and world pattern, but this relationship is very complicated. With the advancement of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in South Asia and India Ocean Region, India’s strategic suspicions of China have accumulated. Indian strategists government believe that there is some geostrategic design behind the BRI. India has adopted opposing, delaying, and hedging measures toward different parts of the initiative. Donglang (Doklam) standoff revealed India’s strategic ambition and its dissatisfaction towards China’s regional policies. India hopes to counterbalance China through strengthened strategic and security cooperation with countries including the United States (US), Japan, Australia, Vietnam, etc. However, the Sino-Indian relationship is, in essence, a competitive symbiotic relationship. India’s China strategy must still strike a careful balance between cooperation and competition, economic and political interests, and bilateral and regional contexts. President Xi and PM Modi have reached many consensuses during Wuhan informal meeting, but India’s adjustment of policy towards China is a tactical one, not a strategic one. It is very difficult to change the mindset of India’s strategic elites who will decide India’s policy towards China in the future.
Liu Zongyi