Challenges galore for India as President Jinping assumes unbridled power

India needs to have a well-equipped, well-trained armed forces with adequate air support and strengthened network of logistics and communication. More importantly, India has to fight its future wars without expecting any outside assistance from any country

The 20th Congress of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that concluded on October 22, was a non-event. As expected, President Xi Jinping got his 3rd five-year consecutive tenure as general Secretary of the CCP. The highest decision-making 7-member Standing Committee, 24-member Politburo and 205-member Central Committee were packed with his loyalists. With 'Xi Jinping Thought' already embedded in the constitution and school curriculum, with his critics purged, limit on term for President removed and ideological purity in the party to be enforced by cracking on corruption and dissent, he is set to reign supreme for several years unless destiny fells him by the wayside.

In his new Avatar as a quintessential dictator, Xi first raised fears of serious challenges to country's security, economic development, internal political stability and social cohesion. Then, he came up with muscular statements - he would not allow hegemonic, high-handed bullying of foreign powers to obstruct open global economy and strengthen mechanism to counter foreign sanctions by building strong ties with Russia and boosting engagements with developing world. He also spoke of promoting self-reliance in technology to minimise impact of economic coercion by US and its allies and vowed not to renounce use of force to win 'local wars', in obvious reference to India and Taiwan. In this context, he unveiled a slew of measures including increase in China's nuclear arsenal, developing strategic deterrence, modernizing PLA and raising 'new domain forces with new combat capabilities'.

The message from the 20th Congress to Delhi is unmistakable. India has to be ready to deal with Xi Jinping for a long time and remain militarily strong to prevent him from winning 'local war' along the LAC. A manicured clip of the Galwan killing of Chinese soldiers in the counter assault by Indian forces was screened at the Congress and a Galwan commander was called to attend the event as a delegate. These instances show how much casualties and criticism to the incident within army and the Party have hurt him. Given his new plans for the PLA, he will do everything to avoid a repeat and if possible, avenge it.

Hopefully, Delhi knows that China can never be trusted nor it can ever be a friend. It has a long track record of slicing away our territories. It illegally occupies vast swathe of Aksai chin since 1962, does not accept LAC or commitments made to honour it, continuously tries altering the statuesque along the northern border, the latest being in April 2020 when its army committed aggression in Ladakh, and refuses to give up its territorial claim on Arunachal Pradesh. It has also gone ahead with its China-Pakistan-Economic Corridor through PoK, has been backing Pakistan's position on Kashmir as a disputed area and actively promotes anti-India sentiments by using muscle and money in Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Maldives and Myanmar.

So, the option for India is to have a well-equipped, well-trained armed forces with adequate air support and substantially strengthened network of logistics and communication to take on Chinese misadventurism. More importantly, India has to fight its future wars with its own weapons and aircraft without expecting any outside assistance from any country, be it Russia or the US.

PM Modi's tough handling of relationship with China and his full throated Atmanirbhar initiative have so far served our security interests well. One hopes 69 years of our mollycoddling Chinese prior to 2014, will not be repeated under a different leadership and he will be less romantic and more realistic. However, Congress and Communist leaders do not inspire that confidence. This is not to say that dialogues must be frozen and relationship cut off. It is also necessary to trade but dependence on Chinese import will have to be reduced.

Ironically, both countries seem happy doing business and yet fight. Last year, bilateral trade registered a record growth of 44 per cent, with Indian exports to China increasing by 38.5 per cent nd imports by 46 per cent. It is obvious both need each other to prosper.

(Amar Bhushan worked with the Research and Analysis Wing for 24 years after briefly serving in the BSF intelligence, State Special Branch and Intelligence Bureau. He served as the Special Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat before he retired in 2005.)

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are the personal opinions of the author. The facts and opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of OneIndia and OneIndia does not assume any responsibility or liability for the same.