On October 21, the governments of India and China announced that their four-year military stand-off at their disputed border along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in Ladakh has ended. New Delhi claimed the agreement on patrolling and disengagement along the LAC was designed to lead to “disengagement and a resolution of the issues that had arisen in these areas in 2020.” In Beijing, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson has confirmed that China and India had been in “close communication” and that both sides have arrived at “a resolution on the relevant matter, which China views favorably.”
In June 2020, Indian and Chinese troops clashed in the Galwan River Valley along the LAC in eastern Ladakh in the Himalayan region. In their worst fight in decades, at least 20 Indian soldiers were killed. The Chinese government denied reports in the Indian media that more than 40 Chinese soldiers had died. In 2021, the Chinese military’s official mouthpiece acknowledged four deaths, although doubts about the true death count remained. Since then, both countries have continuously deployed over 100,000 troops in testing weather conditions in the western Himalayan region along the disputed border.
Since the military standoff in Galwan, Indian and Chinese military officials at the senior level have held several rounds of deliberations to work out details of easing tensions in the region – especially troop disengagement plans leading to the withdrawal of forces from the tense area. Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said in New Delhi on Monday that the agreement was the result of “patient and persistent diplomatic efforts.” Importantly, he said, the agreement would restore military patrol arrangements before the 2020 stand-off: “We will be able to do the patrolling which we were doing in 2020,” Jaishankar emphasized.
This return to the status quo ante had been India’s consistent demand for disengagement, as China had reportedly advanced beyond traditional patrolling points into areas previously controlled by India in the lead-up to the Galwan Valley clash.
“In this way, we can say that our disengagement process with China has been completed,” Jaishankar concluded.
In reply to questions at the routine press conference held on Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian acknowledged the border deal, but refused to offer any details on what, precisely, had been agreed upon – especially the question of the patrol arrangements. He merely said that “China commends the progress made and will continue working with India for the sound implementation of these resolutions.”
Military analysts and diplomacy experts in the two countries, barring a few exceptions, have generally welcomed the much-awaited easing of tensions on the border as a result of the new patrolling agreement. The impact could go far beyond the security realm by easing tensions in the overall political relations between New Delhi and Beijing and thus paving the way for new opportunities for future economic cooperation between the two sides..
Although official sources in the two countries have been tight-lipped, reports in the Indian media in particular have speculated that the timing of the border patrol pact may lead to a meeting between India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and China’s President Xi Jinping at the 16th BRICS Summit in Kazan, Russia, this week.
Some Indian experts saw the deal as a “win” for India. “Restoring patrolling rights is the closest we can get to attempting to reach the pre-2020 situation,” said Deependra Singh Hooda, a retired lieutenant general who led India’s Northern Command, which covers part of the border with China. “It also sets the stage for repairing the ties between the two countries.”
But one of India’s leading national security analysts, Bharat Karnad, did not consider the border deal to be a breakthrough. Karnad, a well-respected and widely influential strategic affairs expert with one of India’s oldest think tanks, the Delhi-based Centre for Policy Research, argued that “China is stringing India along by agreeing in principle.” He predicted, “It will take years by the usual Chinese timetable to negotiate the modalities of patrolling.”
What about the view from China?
Song Zhongping, an influential military affairs commentator on Chinese social media, expressed approval that the deal would prevent the United States from playing China and India against each other. As developing countries, he argued, India and China have much in common. The U.S. government “hopes that India can become an important part of America’s Indo-Pacific strategy and to turn India into a bridgehead or important chess piece for containing China,” Song told the New York Times.
On the other hand, Chinese popular opinion – generally considered “hostile” and “unfavorable” toward India – was less sanguine about the agreement. The first reactions were unsurprisingly highly skeptical and severely critical of the official Indian government stance on the new border agreement.
Putting the entire blame on India for the four-year military stand-off, a signed Chinese commentary published within hours of the border pact news going public said: “In April 2020, India unilaterally undermined the consensus reached by the two sides in multi-level talks and meetings on multiple occasions, illegally crossed the line and occupied areas such as the Galwan Valley, openly provoking and causing tension on the border.”
A Chinese observer in Tianjin called Jaishankar’s reference to the “2020 position” vague. In a “letter to editor,” the Chinese observer pointed out that Jaishankar “did not say whether ‘restored to 2020 position’ refers to the position of the LAC being restored to 2020, or the position of the confronting troops restored to 2020.”
Some Chinese think the border patrol pact and Jaishankar’s claim are typical Indian “face saving” short-term tactics. “If we maintain moderate tension on the border with India, the other side will certainly suffer more than us. De-escalation is beneficial to India. As for investment and economic and trade relations, India only wants to take advantage of us and we will get nothing,” a newspaper reader from Sichuan province wrote in the comments section.
“Now India is under great pressure to get funds and technology, so it is just making a gesture for the time being. Once there is an opportunity, it will turn against China at any time,” the commenter added.
A person from Shanghai wrote: “We have to believe that the Chinese government will not give up an inch of its territory, otherwise it would not have taken so many years. So this incident is probably because Bharat [India] has woken up, for two reasons: winter has arrived and India has completed the second bridge over Pangong Lake.” With October soon ending, the winter conditions generally make activities in the high-altitude region of the LAC difficult. Many Chinese commentators have observed that due to unfriendly weather conditions, the border patrolling in the region will come to a halt anyways – thus implying the patrol agreement is hollow.
What is significant is that beyond than the “nationalist” tabloids such as the Global Times or the largely “anti-India” official mainstream Chinese media, the popular opinion as reflected in the readers’ views columns in both mainstream Chinese and English language newspapers is overwhelmingly opposed to China cooperating with India – be it in technology transfer, investment, or setting up factories. Several Chinese readers expressed either fear or lack of confidence in the Chinese government, worrying about its naivety vis-a-vis the Indian “game” or “cheap tricks.”
Early indications suggest that the Chinese public thinks India lacks moral ethics and principles, and views the border agreement through that lens. As one commentator wrote:
India’s economy is in doldrums, India has fallen out with Canada, within the Quad group of four nations India recently differed with Japan and opposed the new Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba’s idea of ‘Asian NATO,’ and foreign funds and technologies have not been flowing into India as expected. But more importantly, the Indian political elite is beginning to fear the return of Trump into the White House, so New Delhi is suddenly desirous of ‘normal’ business relations with China.
Meanwhile, some security analysts and strategic affairs experts in China think their own government is buying time to focus on another territorial dispute. “Let us keep the Indian bully by the side for the time, but let us give death to bullies like the Philippines,” one commenter wrote, referring to China’s maritime disputes with the Philippines in the South China Sea.