Appeasement Policy for China: Project Syndicate

India’s buffer with China is shrinking, and India’s leaders should have anticipated China’s incursions in the Ladakh region, suggests Brahma Chellaney for Project Syndicate. China opposed India’s designation of Ladakh as a new federal territory, and labeled its recent moves as defensive. “While India was preoccupied with the COVID-19 crisis, China was apparently planning its next attempt to change the region’s territorial status quo by force,” he writes. China’s military has “established heavily fortified camps in the areas it infiltrated, in addition to deploying weapons on its side of the Line of Actual Control (LAC), within striking distance of Indian deployments.” Chellaney suggests that India’s prime minister appeases China by demolishing local defense fortifications in Ladakh, courting Chinese investment and trade, avoiding official contact with the Dalai Lama and holding summits with China’s president. The goal of such polices was to weaken China’s ties with Pakistan. Chellaney urges less personalization in India’s foreign policy. – YaleGlobal