An Essay 

Ameen Izzadeen, International Relations Expert, Sri Lanka

Introduction:

When we talk of the rise of China, one cannot help but mention Napoleon Bonaparte ‘s famous saying, “There lies a sleeping giant. Let him sleep! For when he wakes, he will move the world’.

Whether Napoleon is a political prophet or another Nostradamus is not the focus of this paper.

We are here to discuss the waking up of the sleeping giant and the tremors its strides are causing in world politics, especially in South Asia.

This paper is in two parts – the first part explains the rise of China, and the second its impact on South Asia.

The world is an island. No region is free from events happening in another.

We are economically interconnected. China’s rise is too big to be ignored.

Even the big powers realize that kowtowing to China is in their national interest as it has emerged as a key source of foreign investment.

But they are also preoccupied with the thought, ‘How do we solve a problem like China? since its rise also poses a security threat.

In contrast, in many developing countries, particularly in Africa, China is more a solution to their economic woes than problem-laden geopolitical consequences.

In short, the Republic is both a problem and a solution. To what extent is it a problem and a solution to the countries in South Asia? This is the focus of this paper – with examples from Sri Lanka, in particular and from other South Asian countries, in general.

Part I

Time to Wake Up:

The world order is going through yet another period of transition.

The balance of power equilibrium is in the zone of uncertainty.

Alliance formation is a major gamble as the American-dominated world order is being undermined by China’s rise.

With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States emerged as the sole superpower and did what it wanted with consummate ease, especially during 1991-2003.

This was evident in U.S. interventions in the former Yugoslavia, in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and its threats to bomb Pakistan back to the Stone Age.

This was also evident in Washington’s use of its veto power at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC).

The U.S., from January 1990 to December 2003, used its veto on 11 occasions, while China and Russia used theirs twice each during the same period.

But since 2004, the U.S. has used its veto power on only five occasions, while China has used its veto power six times and Russia 11 times, largely against resolutions supported by the U.S (United Nations 2016).

The trend since 2004 has been indicative of a challenge from Russia and China to U.S. global dominance. It can even be an early warning that the sleeping giant has awakened.

Indeed, this trend demonstrated China ‘s political will to pursue its strategic objectives, prompting the United States and its allies to work overtime to devise a ‘Pivot to Asia ‘policy to contain China.

It is relevant to mention here the famous power formula of Ray Cline, an author on American intelligence and chief analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency.

In trying to measure power, Cline devised an equation to underline that a country’s political will to pursue its strategic objectives forms one of the key factors of power.

Cline ‘s equation read: Perceived Power (PP) = (C+E+M) x(S+W). C in this equation denotes the critical mass consisting of the size of the population and the territory, E economic capability, M military capability, S strategic purpose and W the will to pursue National Interest. With China, the most populous country in the world, making remarkable headway in the economic, scientific and military fields, no country in today ‘s context can match it in terms of Cline‘s equation.

Calculus of Power Politics:

However, the issue of China’s rise is more complicated than Cline‘s equation – perhaps, like a mindboggling calculus conundrum.

Take for instance, the huge show of force China staged in September 2015 to mark the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II in Asia.

The Beijing ceremony, while seemingly promoting pacifism, showcased China’s latest weapons.

Though China described the display as a sign of transparency, it sent a subtle but stern message to the United States and its allies in the Asia Pacific region: We can now meet fire with fire.

In another conundrum, China vigorously pursues trade and economic partnerships with the very nations that regard China as a military threat, challenge China’s claim to ownership of the disputed islands in the seas around China and are on board U.S.A.‘s pivot policy. China has, of late, not only increased the tempo of its rhetoric, but also resorted to calculated brinkmanship. The new policy is in sharp contrast to Deng Xiaoping‘s Peaceful Rise policy of the 1980s and 1990s – a policy which emphasized regional economic integration and multilateral confidence-building in an effort to assuage the fears of China‘s neighbors during its ascendance to great-power status.

With its military might mounting, the Peaceful Rise policy has gradually given way to abrasive diplomacy. Thomas J. Christensen, a professor of World Politics of Peace and War at Princeton University captures this change in policy comprehensively in an article he wrote:

‘Beijing’s new, more truculent posture is rooted in an exaggerated sense of China’s rise in global power and serious domestic political insecurity. As a result, Chinese policy-makers are hypersensitive to nationalist criticism at home and more rigid — at times even arrogant — in response to perceived challenges abroad (Christensen 2011).

Cockiness:

China’s brash self-confidence is also evident in its latest defence white paper issued in May 2015, days after U.S. surveillance aircrafts were spotted in the skies over the Spratly – a series of South China Sea islands, which China controls, in spite of five other claimants, namely, the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam.

Demonstrating China’s growing confidence in its military prowess, the policy paper warned, “we will not attack unless we are attacked, but we will surely counterattack if attacked‘ (Xiaokun 2015). Unlike past defence white papers, this time the message was as perspicuous as it was stern — and, simply put, it says the new military strategy, which it describes as China’s ‘maritime security struggle‘ was designed to confront new security challenges, including the United States‘ defence buildup in the region, Japan‘s decision to overhaul its defence policy and ‘provocative actions‘ by neighboring countries in the South China Sea (Hong 2015).

Claims and counterclaims over the disputed islands in the South China Sea and the East China Sea have increased tensions in the region, as seen in October 2015 when a U.S. warship sailed close to an artificial island built by China.

Given these territorial disputes in the region, countering China’s s military rise has become a major defence headache for countries in the region.

On November 7, U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said the U.S. was not seeking a new Cold War, but is determined to oppose the rising global powers – Russia and China – to protect the U.S.-dominated ‘international order’ (RT 2015). In recent years, the United States has enhanced its military presence in the region in such a way that China feels it is being encircled by hostile forces. At the same time, China also frowns upon defence arrangements such as the now defunct Quadrilateral Security Dialogue between Australia, Japan, India and the United States and Japan’s nationalist (former) Prime Minister Shinzo Abe‘s legislative drive to enable the deployment of Japanese soldiers for overseas military activities (BBC 2015).

It is amid such saber rattling and the confusion of war and peace that a question looms large: Will China start a war that will spell doom to the whole world when it relies heavily on world peace to sustain its economic growth?

Part II

China in South Asia – Impacts:
It is said that when elephants clash, ants on the ground get crushed. A case in point is the recent Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) the United States and 17 Pacific states signed with the exclusion of China.

The agreement is seen as an economic counterforce to check China’s clout (Hsu 2015). But countries like Sri Lanka have to pay a big price. If the TPP comes into force, Sri Lanka‘s garment exporters will not be able to compete with TPP countries which will receive duty concessions.

China’s growth has significantly changed the geopolitical balance of power.

Big powers are on a scramble for allies through economic and defence cooperation – sometimes through coercion. In a reaction to China’s growing influence, the United States considered its domain, the then U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2012 said the U.S. was committed to ‘a model of sustainable partnership that adds value, rather than extracts it’ from Africa.

Unlike other countries, ‘America will stand up for democracy and universal human rights even when it might be easier to look the other way and keep the resources flowing ‘(Smith 2012). Her remarks, probably, indicated that the hare (the U.S.) in Aesop‘s Fable was losing the race to the tortoise (China).

The Case of Sri Lanka:

International relations, according to political realists, are a constant struggle for power.

New power games emerge when countries try to enhance their soft and hard power through alliances and economic and cultural cooperation.

With China trying to increase its power, Africa, South Asia, Central Asia and other world regions have become virtual theatres of a new and subtle cold war.

However, the presence of China in these regions has its positive effects, too. South Asia derives immense economic benefits from China’s rise.

But China’s so-called largesse does not arise from altruist China’s presence in South Asia has created diplomatic dilemmas for some states, requiring a realignment of their relations with other powers.

In South Asia, smaller countries cannot throw in their lot with China without earning the displeasure of regional power India and world power United States. Nothing explains this dilemma more vividly than the case of Sri Lanka.

With Sri Lanka‘s separatist war entering a decisive phase in 2006, China extended unconditional support, selling aircrafts and weapons at concessionary terms.

India desisted from providing direct military aid due to domestic political compulsion arising from its own 70 million Tamil population in Tamil Nadu.

This prompted Sri Lanka to turn to China, Pakistan and Israel. While the country’s resources were being eaten up by a costly war, the economy was salvaged from doom largely due to China’s aid.

By 2008, while the war was still raging, China overtook Japan as Sri Lanka‘s main donor, increasing its economic aid to Sri Lanka five-fold in 2007, the year in which President Mahinda Rajapaksa undertook a state visit to China to mark 50 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

It is worthwhile to cite here a relevant news report: Sri Lanka‘s Foreign Secretary Palitha Kohona said that Sri Lanka‘s ‘traditional donors,‘ namely, the United States, Canada and the European Union, had ‘receded into a very distant corner,‘ to be replaced by countries in the east.

He gave three reasons for this: the new donors are neighbors, they are rich and they conduct themselves differently. ‘Asians don’t go around teaching each other how to behave,’ he said (Zee News 2008). Sri Lanka‘s 30-year separatist war ended in May 2009 with the military defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

But the end of the war marked the beginning of another crisis. Accused of committing war crimes, Sri Lanka was pushed into a situation where the U.S.-led Western world threatened to take the country before an international war crimes tribunal.

Again, it was China – also Pakistan and Russia – which came to the rescue of Sri Lanka at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC). India, once again, yielding to domestic pressure from its Tamil Nadu state, supported the UNHRC resolution sponsored by the U.S., or, at best, abstained. But India’s stand had a geopolitical objective.

It was probably India‘s way of punishing Sri Lanka for getting close to China.

That India was agitated over China’s entry into Sri Lanka in a big way was evident when New Delhi demanded that it be allowed to set up a consulate in Hambantota where China was developing a deep water port for Sri Lanka.

Indian defence analysts espouse a theory that ports being developed in Gwadar (Pakistan), Hambantota (Sri Lanka) and Chittagong (Bangladesh) are part of a plan to encircle India.

It was obvious to any observer that the move to set up a consulate office in a backward district, where India hardly had any interest, was to keep close tabs on China.

Commenting on India‘s Foreign Minister‘s impending visit to Sri Lanka in November 2010, a Times of India report put it succinctly: Foreign minister S, M Krishna will be in Sri Lanka over the weekend to do a couple of things — open consulates not just in Hambantota but in Jaffna as well — and send a message that with India‘s expanding presence in the island nation, it‘s not playing second fiddle to the Chinese (Baghchi 2010).

Sri Lankan leaders know that antagonizing India could be an invitation to more troubles.

India was at one time arming, training and financing the LTTE. It is still capable of rekindling ethnic tensions in Sri Lanka. This is perhaps why President Mahinda Rajapaksa (2005-15) personally took charge of matters relating to India.

But he found it difficult to maintain the required balance vis-à-vis Sri Lanka‘s relations between India and China as he had to depend more and more on China‘s aid to keep the economy going.

China unofficially became the most favored nation. So much so that the mega projects Sri Lanka has undertaken are ‘unsolicited projects’ from China.

This includes the $ 1.5 billion Colombo Port City project. This project has raised eyebrows in India, for it offers Chinese ownership of the freehold of 20 hectares of land next to the Colombo Port, where Chinese submarines in recent years have made secret visits.

The site is also a stone‘s throw away from the Indian High Commission and the U.S. embassy.

The project has been put on hold until such time the issues raised by environmentalists are sorted out and fears raised by India are allayed.

Despite worries about Chinese projects in Sri Lanka, China’s presence here is more acceptable to Sri Lankans than India’s presence.

This is because of fears that stem from India‘s past words and deeds. They include K.M. Panikkar‘s doctrine of linking India and Sri Lanka in a security tie up; and the Indira doctrine, India‘s assistance to the separatists and interference in Sri Lanka‘s internal affairs.

India’s assistance – such as building houses for tsunami victims, restoring rail India’s ‘s recent proposal to build a road bridge connecting the two countries – in keeping with Modi‘s vision of connectivity – drew much opposition in Sri Lanka with newspaper articles warning of consequences such as the spread of disease and an influx of Indians from Tamil Nadu to create trouble in Sri Lanka.

As Sri Lanka-China ties grew stronger, Japan, the United States and India resorted to coercion and cooperation to prevent Sri Lanka from becoming another North Korea, China’s maverick ally in its backyard.

Neglecting the balancing act with which almost all previous Sri Lankan governments have conducted their foreign relations, the Rajapaksa regime behaved like a desperate casino player.

It placed all its chips on one suit — the red heart symbolizing China, which placed no human rights conditions on aid and readily invested billions of dollars in Sri Lanka ‘s infrastructure projects.

In the end, this policy became a case of a casino owner lending the gambler more and more to play again, lose again and borrow again. The gamble virtually made Sri Lanka a satellite state of Beijing. Raising serious alarms in the United States, Japan and India, Sri Lanka signed defence and maritime security agreement with China in September during Chinese President Xi Jinping ‘s visit to Colombo.

It is alleged that the U.S. and India played a behind-the-scenes role in the 8 January defeat of Rajapaksa.

The new government that came to power in January 2015 renewed its relations with the West and refreshed Indo-Lanka relations.

Resetting ties with the West and winning back the confidence of Sri Lanka ‘s giant neighbor, India, have helped Sri Lanka to work out a formula to extricate itself from the war crimes tangle and win promises of close economic cooperation.

As a reward for this shift in foreign policy, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, his deputy Nisha Biswal and India ‘s Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Sri Lanka.

But the shift has stoked fears that Sri Lanka is moving towards a U.S.-India-Japan axis from the China-centric foreign policy of the previous regime.

The Maritime Silk Route (MSR):

Energy-dependent China’s bid to set up a maritime silk route connecting the South China Sea with the Indian Ocean countries, all the way to Africa has the potential to increase trade between the connecting states. Sri Lanka, whose ties with China go back to nearly 2,000 years, has backed the 40 billion dollar Chinese-funded MSR.

So has the Maldives. India’s response to China‘s invitation to join the MSR has so far been lukewarm, because, India feels it will undermine its ‘big brother‘ status in the region. Geethanjali Nataraj, a senior fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi sees it differently. She sees greater benefit for India if it joins the MSR:

India is located at such a prime position that it can‘t miss out on the opportunity to be part of MSR.

Both the maritime and continental Silk Roads are going to traverse India’s periphery. India could gain a lot from being an active partner to the initiative.

India has expressed its desire to attract Chinese investments and being part of the MSR will certainly help with that.

It would also help India to develop its northeast and further its Act East Policy of prioritizing relations with East Asia.

And it could prove to be a perfect platform to enhance India’s regional and bilateral cooperation.

Indian investment in neighboring littoral countries could help in reducing China‘s sphere of influence and dominance in South Asia to some extent (Nataraj 2015).

India’s ‘Chinaphobia‘ seems to influence policy.

But Sri Lanka cannot ignore China completely.

The amount of money Sri Lanka needs to develop the country can come only from China.

The new government understands this. That is why it has not shut down the Port City project.

That is why it won‘t let the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, visit Sri Lanka. China has been sending high-level envoys to Sri Lanka since the new government came to office to win assurances that the billions it has invested are safe.

Sri Lanka needs China, which has stood by it in times of crisis and has all the money in the world to assist a country trying to survive after a devastating 30-year war, although Beijing, like all donor nations, has an agenda behind the aid it dishes out.

But the new government in Sri Lanka finds itself in a situation where closer China ties can come only at the expense of earning the displeasure of the U.S., Japan and India.

The fear is that the U.S. and its allies could again haul Sri Lanka before an international war crimes tribunal and that even economic sanctions could be slapped on the country.

This is the dilemma of a small country like Sri Lanka.

India as a regional power despite political differences and territorial disputes seeks to improve economic ties with China in a mega way.

India and China are partners in BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) and in the China-led new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

Trade between India and China was a mammoth $ 75 billion in 2014, whereas Sri Lanka-China trade was around $ 3,227 million. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government plans to develop India’s infrastructure with Chinese aid.

When asked whether India was concerned about China’s presence in Sri Lanka, BJP government minister and Shiv Sena Advisor Suresh Prabhu, said:

We have no problem with that. We want Sri Lanka to progress and the help can come from China, India or anywhere. But we feel China should not use its economic investment in Sri Lanka to create some geopolitical tension in the region. They must make economic development – absolutely no problem. The underlying message is that India is at unease when Sri Lanka gets closer to China. This is because India is still guided by the Indira doctrine – a doctrine that prompted India to punish Sri Lanka – by supporting the separatists cause – during the height of the Cold War in the 1980s when the then government sought closer ties with the U.S. But with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, India wasted no time in wooing the United States, promoting itself as a bulwark to check China: It is under such strategic compulsions that the U.S.A. threw bait to India to become a bulwark against China in return for huge material benefits. The latter readily took the bait because of its own burning ambitions of becoming a regional and a world power. It is happily playing the game since the very thought of being tipped as a bulwark against a potential super power gives myth-loving and megalomaniac Brahmans an inner pleasure and boosts their mythical beliefs (Raja 2011).
This explains why there exist closer India-U.S. defence ties, why they both signed a 2008 landmark nuclear agreement, why the two countries play a strategic partnership role in Afghanistan and why the Kashmir dispute hardly gets mentioned in U.S. policy statements. In the power game India plays, together with the United States in some cases, almost all South Asian nations are in a dilemma and have suffered.

The Case of Nepal:

Take the case of Nepal, which has become another theatre of a cold war tussle between China and India.

Like Sri Lanka, Nepal is trying to stand on its feet after years of civil war but unable to follow a ‘free ‘China policy and derive maximum benefit from China’s economic resurgence because of fears that it may hurt India’s sentiments and pave the way for economic blockades or even lead to an Indian-sponsored regime change.

Memories of the economic blockade India imposed on landlocked Nepal in 1989-90 India’s India‘s high-handedness, many in Nepal resented the 1950 agreement, which governs people and goods movements between the two nations and establishes cooperation on defence and foreign policy matters.

Over the years, Nepalese governments have tried to maintain a balance between India and China, promoting the country as a land bridge between two Asian giants. Nepal, like Sri Lanka, has endorsed a one-China policy and has advocated the move to grant Beijing observer status within South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC).

Nepal has also increased defence cooperation with China in a calculated show of defiance despite India’s overwhelming influence in the Himalayan kingdom ( now a Republic).

China believes strong ties with Nepal are a sine qua non, given the separatist tendencies in Tibet.

In recent years, high-level visits by Chinese and Nepalese leaders to each other‘s capitals have further cemented their ties. China’s aid and investment flow to Nepal doubled between 2007 and 2011.

Some Indian analysts saw this as Chinese expansionism. Perhaps to counter this, Indian Premier Narendra Modi during his visit to Katmandu in 2014, pledged to finance a hydropower project following Beijing‘s decision to invest in a $ 1.6 billion in a hydropower project in Nepal. According to Dr. Harsh V. Pant, a strategic analyst on security policy issues:
‘ China’s reach in Nepal is indeed growing and is now quite substantial; something that Indian policy planners had not expected just a few years back. China has made Nepal a priority primarily because it allows Beijing to control Tibet better…. For India, this is a major challenge as China’s control over Nepal makes India very vulnerable to Chinese pressures. But, most of it is New Delhi‘s own fault. By not taking Nepal seriously, by not developing its own border infrastructure and by not making Nepal a part of India’s economic dynamism, India has provided China the strategic space which it has quite happily filled (Seghal 2014).

Yet India is still a big player in Nepal.

It is still Nepal‘s biggest donor.

It was only in June 2015 that India pledged $ 1 billion in aid in the aftermath of a devastating earthquake.

The offer comes in addition to India’s $ 1 billion development aid over the next five years.

China‘s earthquake relief aid was around $ 740 million.

The disparity apart, China is fast narrowing the gap.

The current crisis on the Nepal-India border over the Madhesi people‘s protests over underrepresentation in Nepal‘s new constitution has also overtones of a Sino-India tussle.

Many Nepalese see the refusal by Indian oil companies to send fuel to Nepal citing security reasons as state sponsored.

The crisis has created severe shortages of fuel and other essentials in Nepal, prompting the government to turn to Beijing for emergency fuel aid.

The dilemma Nepal faces is yet another example of smaller South Asian nations suffering due to power rivalry between India and China.

The mutual mistrust between the two powers has hindered Nepal‘s bid to benefit from both neighbors and prosper.

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# Text courtesy: Islamabad Policy Research Institute (IPRI) journal, 2017.
Consent from the distinguished author received.
#Thanks IPRI and the Author Ameen Izzadeen, Colombo.
The author is an Expert on International Relations: Upadhyaya N. P.
# Part two of this academic article will be published soon: Ed.