Even before the Covid 19 catastrophe, the USA was doing everything economically possible to lose its multiple battles to the Chinese. Its dollar hegemony was getting steadily eroded as segments of trade were steadily moving out to multiple other currencies. President Trump was succeeding in antagonizing most global leaders, he was under attack at home, his trade war with China had hurt economic growth for most economies, and his domestic ratings were dropping. What made emperor Xi Jinping decide that 2020 was the year that he dethroned the USA and establish the RMB as the new reserve currency is the world?

Let’s see if some forecasts of economic parameters for 2019 and 2030 by a few American think-tanks make sense. They projected that in Purchasing Power parity terms, in 2019 the Chinese GDP was already larger than the USA’s GDP and by 2030 it could be up-to 70% larger. As a share of Global output China would grow to 32% from 20% currently, as opposed to the USA declining from 16% to 10%. In terms of Global Market Capitalisation the Chinese would grow to 25% from 5% in 2019, whilst the USA would decline from 40% to 18%. China’s share of global exports would rise to 18% from 12% whilst the USA would be static at 8%. The above forecasts were supported by massive Chinese investments in Education in the fields of Mathematics, Science, Technology, Medicine and rapidly improving the quality of education. The number of STEM students would outnumber the USA by a factor of five times. Chinese ranking in Fintech is number 1, Wearables , Virtual Reality, Education Tech, Autonomous Driving is 2, and in Artificial Intelligence they are a close third behind the USA and UK. 34% of the world’s unicorns are Chinese as opposed to 47% for the USA, but in terms of market capitalization they were on par.

Starting with the 1980’s the Chinese had successfully got the world’s manufacturing supply chain to relocate to China, and were truly the “factory of the world”. From a pure labour arbitrage offering, they created world class infrastructure (Cities, Roads, Ports, Airports) to support it. The top 2500 corporates outside China all had a business presence in China. This aggressive export led growth model allowed the Chinese to radically improve per capita income, and in the process also create a massive domestic consumption engine. A 40% domestic savings rate supported the huge developments that happened on their Eastern Seaboard. Till 2012 the Chinese government was sitting on Foreign Exchange Reserves of close to $5 Trillion. Over time Chinese labour had become a very skilled workforce, moved up the value chain and was no longer cheap. China now imported/consumed 45-50% of virtually every commodity in the world even though more than half of it was re-exported.

Chinese leaders till 2012 had made the country keep a low profile , hiding their strengths, whilst they relentlessly gained market share from the world. Asian growth engines Japan and South Korea had also felt compelled to move/make tangible manufacturing investments in China. The Chinese had mastered the skill of acquiring the world’s IPR ‘s by any means-true implementers of Chanakya-Niti(sama, dama, danda, bheda). Their Chinese Communist Party(CCP) command and control structure had also silently expanded their Foreign Ministry with requisite resources to create a Public Relations repository in every major country, to manage the national discourse on any prickly subject in their favour. This three decade profile started changing with Xi Jinping’s ascension to Chairmanship in 2012.

The Chinese strategists now started believing that the Middle Kingdom deserved to rule the world. They changed the nomenclature of the 21 st. century being an Asian century to a Chinese century. They mapped that post 2008 Global Financial Institutions were weakened, substantially dysfunctional and lacking leadership. They unleashed a project of achieving complete Chinese dominance in the manpower of every multilateral agency and United Nations body in the world. Chinese students were encouraged to study overseas and many persuaded to join these organizations, and as so many FBI investigations are now showing made instruments of Government policy.

The collapse of the USSR in the 1990’s and the profligacy of the US financial sector in 2008 had left a leadership vacuum in many areas. Xi Jinping moved rapidly to occupy the vacancies. China needed to secure its supply chain as it neither produced adequate food for its population, nor was endowed with  manufacturing or energy raw materials. Chinese leadership wanted to avoid supply side shocks and created strategies to acquire assets surreptitiously. They moved rapidly to fund every country and project that the World Bank or rest of the world would not find viable. The Chinese wanted to eventually acquire the underlying asset and default was hence a preferred option for them. This juggernaut covered 150 countries and nearly $5 Trillion in loans/investments. The new Chairman had successfully
over-invested the Chinese USD reserves, and left his country very vulnerable. They desperately needed their Dollar engine( Foreign Direct Investment, Foreign Portfolio Investment, and Foreign Currency Loans) to keep firing quickly to recoup their position, or alternately fast track their long term vision to get global trade out of the dollar and into the RMB.

Unluckily for the Chinese two things changed the landscape in 2017. President Trump had won the US election and was a wildcard that the Chinese read wrongly. Secondly the world economy started topping out, and growth started stalling. The Chinese engine was not designed to handle economic contraction. Fault-lines in the domestic economy led by huge non performing loans in domestic State Owned Enterprises. Ghost cities started appearing, as domestic demand stalled, whilst domestic real estate started going belly-up. The country was overbuilt and no more infrastructure spending was needed. Trump started the trade war and insisted that the Chinese reduce the Trade surpluses. President Xi erred massively in not giving Trump a cheap victory, and getting the Americans riled.

American strategists had clearly war-games that the days of the USD hegemony were numbered, and if their political dominance was to be extended, a war with China was not an option, the only question was timing. By a strange coincidence the two technology hardware giants USA and China were tangibly dependent on Taiwan for their Semiconductor underbelly. Taiwan has a dominant share in the Semiconductor foundries globally, and both the USA and China are dependent on them. The Americans had anticipated this and a JV with the Taiwanese would go operational in Arizona in 2023. Till then any military threat to Taiwan would be an attack on their technology dominance, an intolerable thought for them. Democrat Presidents had soft-pedaled on the One China policy, and the Chinese had succeeded in getting away with their wish-lists. The Americans had celebrated access to a large consumption market, but landed up creating a rival.

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army(PLA) in manpower terms is the largest standing armed force on the globe. The PLA and CCP moved fast to upgrade weapon systems, stealing blueprints and buying where they could not .Theoretically they are a lethal strike force. However the navy is their Achilles heel, and they lack best in class aircraft carriers and submarines. This limits their ability to protect their interests spanning 150 countries.75% of Chinese oil still moves in tankers through the narrow Malacca Straits. To reach the Arabian sea by land they invested in a bankrupt Pakistan by constructing the CPEC which links Xinjiang to Gwadar Port and is a dedicated economic corridor. They also engaged east European and European countries to construct the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) for creating dedicated freight corridors to 50 European cities. In the process they have de-risked their trade supply routes, but their oil buy routes lie exposed.

The nightmare for China achieving dominance is that Indian land illegally occupied by Pakistan is being used by CPEC and India reacquiring POK by use of military power could render their $66 Billion investment in Pakistan useless, blocking oil supply. The Chinese realized that economic sanctions against Iran had crippled the proud country, that it had 15% of the world’s oil, needed investments, and so decided to bust sanctions on Iran imposed by the United Nations (they were party to imposing them). China and Iran signed a 25 year Trade and Military alliance in June 2020. China has bet on the USA exiting Afghanistan in 2020, and by using the Pakistani’s to install a puppet regime in Afghanistan, they could take a pipeline from Iran to Xinjiang. In turn the Chinese have to pump in the equivalent of $400 Billion into Iran’s development, which they can crank their RMB economy to deliver. Where does that leave the Pakistani’s?

In the interim President Xi got the CCP to appoint him as the leader for life and emerged as an emperor. The CCP decided that by its 100th anniversary in 2021, they would stamp themselves as “numero uno” in the world. A few pinpricks remained. Taiwan and Hong-kong as independent democracies were an eyesore, and raised aspirations of good life in mainland Chinese youth. They had to be acquired by coercion or force at the earliest. The South China sea had $4 Trillion of supply chain that transited the route. China laid claims to territories/islands of all its neighbours and started constructing artificial islands as missile bases. They started bullying and humiliating Australia since 70% of Australian mining exports were bought by China. Singularly none of the Asian countries could take on China, but many could exact a heavy toll if it came to conflict. The Chinese flirted with conflict with all their neighbours using “wearing down” tactics.

The success of this gambit hinged on the continuity of their trade with the USA, heavily skewed in their favour. President Trump not getting an early trade war win, upped the ante, imposing a $250 Billion annual hit on China. Chinese perhaps felt that US corporations would not listen to their government and continue business as usual. They floated a trial balloon by abrogating the agreement with Hong Kong which would have lapsed in 2047, and suppressing protests with brute force. Then they ostensibly colluded/ manipulated the WHO and unleashed the Covid 19 pandemic on the world infecting every country on the planet. This collapsed world economies and has created a very strong anti-China sentiment.

It has resulted in fast tracking the creation of the Quad, an alliance of the USA, Japan, Australia and India to take on the Chinese. UK, France and Israel are openly in support of the Quad, whilst Vietnam, Myanmar, Philippines, Indonesia ,Taiwan and South Korea have alerted their armed forces for battle readiness. In the Chinese camp are North Korea, Pakistan, Iran and Turkey with anti-India squeaks emerging from Nepal, Bangladesh and SriLanka.

With China designated as world enemy number 1, even Joe Biden has ratcheted up the anti-China rhetoric, lest President Trump steal the thunder and a potentially lost election by a war with China before November this year. The Indian and Chinese armies are facing off across 3400 Km. border, and a tense peace prevails currently. The Middle East has so far stayed quiet, but by default will have to choose sides as a Shia Iran and a Sunni Pakistan and Turkey side with the Chinese. It is an uneasy time for the Saudi’s and the UAE. It is ironic that the OIC and its 54 member countries including the” Turkish caliphate” maintain a studied silence on China incarcerating nearly 3 million Uyghur muslims in Xinjiang, and possibly Chinese money silences their conscience when no Uyghur child can have the name Mohammed(as per media reports).

The Koreans however had seen this coming two years earlier and Samsung had moved an $18 Billion annual capacity out of China to Vietnam. Japan has incentivized its corporations to exit China totally. India has banned Chinese Telecom equipment and Apps with immediate effect. There is a very strong anti-Chinese imports movement starting in India, and may set an example for the world to follow. China’s partners in BRI and in Africa are resenting the usurious conditions in their loan agreements. The Americans are shutting off access to their Capital markets to the Chinese, and cancellation of the Hong Kong treaty will kill the USD supply route to China. The Chinese Balance of payments is negative for the last few months, and days of surpluses are now a memory. They still need to buy food and oil and commodities.

Even nature seems to have conspired to ruin Emperor Xi’s timing. China is being ravaged by the worst ever floods in the last 100 years with 29 of its provinces impacted, and the survival of the showpiece Three Gorges Dam under threat from heavy rain which could affect nearly 400 Million people as downstream cities including Shanghai could be impacted. Scams like fake Gold collateral has shaken China’s $5 Trillion Shadow banking industry as the Kingold default is by a powerful former CCP member. It also puts a question mark on the credibility of China’s domestic gold production which is part of its National Reserves, as to how much of it is gold plated copper. Will anyone in the world now ever trust a Chinese certification of gold. This scandal has seriously damaged China’s plans of having a partial gold backed alternate currency to replace the dollar.

The silent spectator in the entire game is Russia. They are happy selling their weapon systems to China, India and Turkey. In the EU, the Germans have broken ranks with France and chosen to placate the Chinese. They have removed Taiwan’s flag from their website and refused to criticize Chinese action in Hong Kong, leaving a non-state flag of Palestine intact .It is ironic that this once proud industrial giant is now subservient to a regime with ambitions very similar to Hitler. Early days but it signals the cracks in the EU, and are its days as a common market nearing a close?

The world now sits on a powder keg in the midst of the Covid crisis. Funnily it is China’s 150 debtor countries (especially Pakistan) that must be praying for a fall and dismemberment of their Lender, for them to escape losing their sovereignty which they have so negligently mortgaged. President Trump and Emperor Xi now have gone too far for either of them to back-down without losing their crowns. For Trump it’s just an election, but the world knows what happens to deposed Chinese dictators. The South Asian countries all want Tibet to regain its independence after being annexed by the Chinese in 1950 so that they all get their fresh water security back.

The Chinese till the last four years maintained an inscrutable long term game plan in every sphere and slowly and steadily acquired a position of dominance. It is inexplicable that with chips falling in their favour by default, why did they have to speed up the time table. The USA was busy scoring self goals, and vacating its global presence, and in five years would have handed the Chinese global dominance on a platter. Thus the trigger to the timeline was not a global prod, but very compelling domestic reasons. China’s banking regulator has advised domestic banks to be prepared for sharp rises in bad loans once the Covid moratorium period is over. It has guided banks to conserve capital by not paying dividends and bonuses. Three Chinese banks have collapsed in the last three years, and 15% of the Financial sector is supposedly past a high risk stage. Tax revenues have grown under 5%, and budget deficits exceed 11%. In the Hebei province (population 70 Million) bank depositors cannot withdraw their own money
without genuine reasons to prevent a run on the banks. The season of discontent for 1.4 Billion Chinese has arrived.

China created the BRI to use the surplus capacity in its construction materials and equipment sector, and to keep Chinese labour occupied. Experts estimate that this project needs another $ 5Trillion over the next five years to complete it. The money given to 150 countries cannot be recalled. The Hong Kong door may be closed by the Americans if push comes to shove. The FDI and FPI flows post Covid may flow outwards. China’s $10 Trillion foreign debt is realistically supported by $2 Trillion of reserves. With Balance of Trade going negative, even diehard Chinese supporters are a highly nervous lot. If China’s trading partners do not agree to settlements denominated in the RMB, a run on the currency is highly possible.

The dilemma for the Xi led CCP is what do they tell their domestic audience. In the age of the internet, you can censor but not hide. News spreads like wildfire with every citizen carrying smart-phones. Do the Chinese need to beat the war-drums to transfer the blame for their miscalculations. The world scenario is evolving every week, and 2020 threatened to be a very long year indeed.

Sanjit Paul Singh (Managing Partner S&S associates)

It is time for the people to question the Government, especially KP Oli, for turning a blind eye to Chinese high-handedness

The recent border issues raised by Nepal show structural deficiencies in building trust and willingness to keep relations with India healthy. The self-centred politicisation of centuries-old peaceful ties exposes the darker side of Nepalese Prime Minister KP Oli. He has not only derailed the prospects of peace and cooperation between Nepal and India, but his hollow projection of nationalism, solely based on anti-India manoeuvring, exhibits his short-sightedness to serve vested interests in the political and diplomatic space of Nepal. This includes his growing closeness and frequent interactions with China.

On the other hand, Nepal’s ruling Communist Party (NCP) has intensified its demand for Oli’s resignation for failing to contain COVID-19, derailing the economy, endangering the right to freedom, including that of the Press, and accusing India of conspiring against him politically. Amid all this, Oli can be seen misusing his power to influence the office of the President in unilaterally issuing ordinances to ease the process of splitting a party to protect his position as Prime Minister in case his party splits.

Although the Standing Committee of the NCP has lashed out at Oli for misusing his power and accusing India, Oli has turned a deaf ear to such calls and is openly entertaining Chinese assertiveness in the domestic and foreign affairs of Nepal. If reports in the Nepalese media are to be believed, it is Oli’s arrogance that has driven his pro-China campaign, at the cost of destroying friendly ties with India. While Oli’s new-found love for China is a challenge to India, a pro-active and meddling Beijing is a bigger concern for Nepal itself.

Even though China has penetrated the Nepalese political space, Oli is not paying heed since recent moves by the Chinese Ambassador in Nepal are aimed to protect his interests. Ambassador Hou Yanqi has been meeting with the members of the NCP to keep Oli in office. Her direct meetings with the Prime Minister are cherry on the cake for China. However, Yanqi attracted criticism after she held a one-on-one meeting with the President of Nepal on June 5, a day before the Standing Committee of the NCP was to decide on Oli’s fate. While the agenda of the meeting was not revealed, it is clear that China wishes Oli to continue as the Prime Minister.

On his part, Oli is hell-bent on bringing a Chinese-style one-party rule in Nepal. Members of the Communist Party of China were invited to provide training to the Central Committee members of the NCP before its second convention was to begin in Kathmandu on February 15. At the convention, NCP allegedly passed a resolution to amend the Constitution to make Nepal a “People’s Democracy” from the existing “People’s multi-party Democracy.” In case, the NCP pushes to remove the word “multi-party” from the Constitution, it will further lead the country towards a one-party rule.

This pro-China inclination may be considered an independent sovereign act of a country. But allowing Chinese intervention in the political affairs of Nepal is dangerous. While the high-handedness of Yanqi is not a hidden fact, pumping of Chinese funds through the Madan Bhandari Foundation, named after a late Communist leader seen as a source of Oli’s political aspirations, needs to be seen.

It was  Yanqi who had convinced Oli and his administration to sign a extradition treaty during Xi Jinping’s visit to Nepal last October. While the treaty was not signed due to internal opposition, Oli gifted a Treaty on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters on the lines of the extradition treaty to China. The treaty has not only jeopardised the fate of 13,000 Tibetans living in Nepal but Kathmandu has also risked violating the pact with the UNHCR to protect the rights of Tibetan refugees.

The frequent meetings between the Chinese officials and officers of the Nepal Army give a clear understanding of the Chinese mindset in Nepal for two reasons. One, the army has always been looked upon as the most stable institution in Nepal. No matter the political party in power, a stable relationship with the army will prove beneficiary for Chinese interests in Nepal. Two, in the last three years, the security cooperation between China and Nepal has moved from minimal to an advanced level. To promote ties in the security sector, China and Nepal have continued to strengthen cooperation through the exchange of visits of security personnel, joint exercises and training, disaster prevention and reduction, personnel training and supply of arms and ammunition to the Nepalese army.

Also, the Chinese business community in Nepal has been defying domestic laws of the host country, but local political support has kept it safe. Thamel, a tourist spot in the heart of Kathmandu known for lavish restaurants and hostels, has a complete area allegedly owned by the Chinese. They are known to lease properties from Nepali owners on a maximum bid and run these hotels and restaurants with all-Chinese staff, who allegedly visit Nepal on tourist visas. Similar cases of fraud have come into the public sphere where Chinese-run hotels in Nepal accept payments through the China-owned WeChat app. Meaning, the Chinese tourists do not make cash transactions in local currency or on local online payment platforms. Therefore, revenue contribution by the Chinese tourists has negative implications for the Nepalese tourism industry.

In December 2019, 122 Chinese nationals were arrested by the Nepal Police for their involvement in cybercrimes and bank frauds. Later, these criminals were deported at the request of the Chinese Government and to provide an explanation to the media, the police claimed that it had failed to frame charges against them. China is known to have little respect for the laws of other countries but local support from the Prime Minister’s office is indeed a sell-off. It is believed that Oli had personally attempted to avoid embarrassing China by deporting these criminals. In February, the editor of a leading English daily in Nepal was also forced to resign after the newspaper ran an op-ed on the Coronavirus and questioned the Chinese Government’s intentions in hiding its spread.

For years, leaders in Nepal have propagated a neutral position between India and China, knowing the importance of both the neighbours in trade, transit and security. They have also understood the geographical compulsions of a landlocked Nepal, but with his hollow acts of ultra-nationalism, Oli has merely served his personal aspirations.

In reality, a Chinese-style political system in Nepal will be a curse on Nepal’s long fight for democracy, where thousands had sacrificed their lives. Nepal has examples of Chinese debt-traps in Sri Lanka and Africa and brain-washing in Pakistan. Therefore, it is time for the people to question the Government, especially Oli, for turning a blind eye to Chinese high-handedness.

(Writer: Rishi Gupta; Courtesy: The Pioneer)

It would be nice if the UK could give citizenship to three million Hong Kongers with BNO status. But it would also be quite surprising

We will grant BNOs five years’ limited leave to remain (in the United Kingdom), with the right to work or study,” British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab told the UK Parliament on July 1. “After five years, they will be able to apply for settled status. After a further twelve months, with settled status, they will be able to apply for citizenship.” The stunning thing about this promise is that it applies to all three million people in Hong Kong — almost half the population of the city — who have British National Overseas(BNO) status by virtue of having been born there before the former British colony was handed back to the People’s Republic of China in 1997. They don’t even need to have an actual BNO passport (as 3,00,000 of them do). All three million of them qualify: “All those with BNO status will be eligible, as will their family dependents who are ordinarily resident in Hong Kong. The Home Office will put in place a simple, streamlined application process. There will be no quota on numbers.”

This is an unprecedented commitment and it’s not even a legal requirement. Britain voluntarily gave asylum to 30,000 Ugandan Asians in 1972 when the dictator Idi Amin confiscated their property and expelled them from the country. But we’re talking about potentially a hundred times as many people in Hong Kong. It is a debt of honour, however, as Britain negotiated an agreement with China that Hong Kong would keep the rule of law, free speech and freedom of the Press for 50 years after the handover in 1997. China has broken that “one country, two systems” deal, and Hong Kongers can only expect a thinly-disguised Communist dictatorship from now on.

It’s right there in the new “security” laws imposed illegally last month by the regime’s rubber-stamp National People’s Congress in Beijing. New crimes include separatism, subversion, terrorism and “collusion with foreign forces”, the same vague catch-all charges that the Communist regime uses to suppress dissent in the People’s Republic. The maximum sentence for these “crimes” is ten years in prison. These laws will be enforced by China’s “security” (i.e. political) police, who will now operate in Hong Kong. The charges they bring may be tried in Hong Kong’s courts, but if there are “certain circumstances” or “special situations” the accused can be extradited to mainland courts, entirely under the regime’s thumb, where the conviction rate is well above 99 per cent. In other words, it’s over. The police now hoists a purple sign warning protesters that their chants could be criminal. Along major roads throughout the city, neon-coloured flags hailing a new era of stability and prosperity stand erect as soldiers. It’s not just freedom that’s over. As Christopher Francis Patten, Hong Kong’s last British Governor, wrote recently: “If China destroys the rule of law in Hong Kong, it will ruin the city’s chances of continuing to be a great international financial hub that mediates about two-thirds of the direct investment in and out of China.”

The decision has been taken and Hong Kong’s residents have two good reasons to leave: Their freedoms are gone and the economic future is grim. Many will decide to leave but where can they go? For the 3,00,000 Canadian citizens in Hong Kong, the 1,00,000 Australian citizens, the 1,00,000 British citizens and the 85,000 Americans, it’s easy. Most are ethnic Chinese from Hong Kong who understood that you could never trust the Communists and took out an insurance policy long ago by emigrating to another country and acquiring a citizenship.

Most of them even bought houses in the countries they adopted. But then they moved back to Hong Kong to be with the wider family and make better money. Many will go soon, because the Chinese regime may start forbidding people to leave (it doesn’t recognise dual citizenship). Others will gamble on staying for the time being, in the hope that if it gets very bad they will still be able to get out later. For the three million more who have BNO status, it’s a harder choice. They have much less money and no houses, no contacts, no jobs waiting for them in Britain. But they’re ambitious, they’re well-educated and a lot of them are young. It would be surprising if at least half a million of them didn’t take up the British offer. Just one little problem: The children of people with BNO status who were born after 1997 but are too old to qualify as dependents — the 18 to 23-year-olds — are not currently eligible for BNO status. That includes a majority of the young adults who were active in the protests and have most to fear. But the British Government says it is considering their case.

And one little doubt. It is still hard to believe that an ultra-nationalist British Government that won the Brexit referendum with a wave of anti-foreign rhetoric and a Home Office that still stubbornly maintains a “hostile environment” for immigrants, will really keep these promises. It would be nice if UK can keep its word to give citizenship to three million Hong Kongers with BNO status, but it would also be quite surprising.

(Writer: Gwynne Dyer; Courtesy: The Pioneer)

With China facing serious backlash both domestically and internationally, it wants to divert its people’s attention to the India-China border

For the last two months, India and China have been involved in a military and diplomatic stand-off along the Line of Actual Control (LAC). The current skirmish is not isolated from the main politics of China. It is but an extension of the Communist Party of China’s (CPC) domestic policy. The developments at the border have come at a time when the CPC is facing international backlash over the outbreak of the pandemic. Back home, too, the Chinese are frustrated over the CPC’s role in covering up the spread of the Coronavirus in Wuhan city, which eventually led to the deaths of thousands of people. As per the database leaked from the National University of Defence Technology in Changsha city, China could have had 6,40,000 cases instead of the official 84,000. This revelation has further alienated the CPC from the Chinese people.

What, however, is worrying is that 70 years on, India’s Tibet dilemma remains. Before Tibet was invaded by China, there was no sign of well-made road along the India-Tibet border. However, trade routes for pack animals existed. From Srinagar, a route runs to Leh and thence through Southern Tibet to Shigatse and Lhasa. From Lhasa, a much-used route goes to Chamdo. In short, there was hardly any sign of a good road or any major bridge in Tibet. All of this changed drastically after the Chinese invasion of Tibet. China became India’s new neighbour and with this new development, the tranquility across the Himalayas was hijacked by an authoritarian party-State.

Ever since the invasion of Tibet, the development of strategic roads became a top priority for the CPC. It undertook massive infrastructure development projects for more than two decades. And by 1975, China had completed 91 highways totalling 15,800 km, with 300 permanent bridges in outer Tibet alone, effectively connecting 97 per cent of the region’s counties by roads. Then the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) started focussing on Tibet. Ever since, the number of exercises and overall military activities in the Lanzhou and Chengdu military regions have been noteworthy. In one of the early instances, in October 2011, the PLA was reported to have carried out two joint exercises in the Chengdu and Lanzhou military regions.

The Global Times reported on January 5, “In the new year exercises, the PLA Tibet Military Command has deployed helicopters, armoured vehicles, heavy artillery and anti-aircraft missiles across the region: From Lhasa, capital of Tibet, with an elevation of 3,700 metres to border defence frontlines with elevations of more than 4,000 meters.” It further noted, “China’s latest weapons, including the Type 15 tank and the new 155-millimetre vehicle-mounted howitzer, were deployed in Tibet as the PLA began the first round of exercises in 2020.” Because of its continuous infrastructure development, today, the PLA is in a position to carry out numerous military exercises even on the inhospitable terrains of Tibet.

One stone at a time: CPC’s territorial strategy for future claims and control: Early in 1995, after the Philippines Government discovered that  octagonal bunker-type structures were being constructed on a previously unoccupied reef, the then Chinese Foreign Minister, Qian Qichen, had claimed that it was built by the authorities of Hainan for the convenience of Chinese fishermen around the Spratly Island. Following this incident, there was a series of diplomatic exchanges and visits by heads of both countries to satisfactorily resolve the issue. Despite numerous diplomatic engagements, China continued to upgrade its physical presence on the Mischief Reef. Later these structures became the base for the CPC laying sovereignty claim  over the islands.

On November 26, 2016, satellite images released by the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI) showed a series of hexagonal structures now in place on each of the seven islets. They appear to be large anti-aircraft guns and close-in weapons systems (CIWS), AMTI said. In fact, this weapon system can also be used on land to protect the military base. By 2018, the reef had been turned into a militarised artificial island equipped with anti-ship cruise missiles.

As it is said, “Old habits die hard.” Despite pressurising India to stop the construction of roads in the Galwan Valley and Pangong Tso, China continues to develop an enhanced transport network and military infrastructure across Tibet’s regions bordering India. The Indian Government should not allow the installation of any temporary or permanent structures by the PLA on the disputed territory. Any physical structure, either temporary or permanent, built by the PLA should be either dismantled or a similar structure be installed in the area claimed by the CPC. Else, it may argue in the future that the structures are nothing more than shelters for the PLA soldiers lost in the Galwan Valley. And the construction of roads or any other permanent military installation near the disputed border may become a source of future claims and control by China.

Dear CPC, home is where your threat is: In the history of China, the Chinese population is a major factor for the dethronement of a number of dynasties. China was not only invaded many times by nomadic people from outside its borders but was also turned upside down many more times by its own citizens, mainly peasants. In all, there were 1,109 main military conflicts between the Chinese and the northern nomads from 215 BC to AD 1684 and as many as 225,887 recorded armed rebellions between 210 BC and AD 1910 within China. In 20th century China, there were two mass movements, mostly led by young students, scholars and literary figures. Later, people from all walks of life joined in. The two crucial movements were: The 1919 May 4 Movement and the Tiananmen Square protests. In both these movements, poor governance, rampant officials’ corruption, high unemployment rate were the main causes for the outburst.

Before the Tiananmen Square protests, by October 1988, the population of migrant labourers in Beijing had reached one million and was growing continuously. In Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong Province, more than 2.5 million rural labourers flooded the city over a short period between February and March 1989. Not only this, thousands of university graduates failed to get jobs of their interests and the unemployment rate was high. Rising inflation added to the woes. All these developments sowed the seeds of mass protests. In modern times, too, despite the CPC having an iron-fist control on the Chinese people, between 1993 and 2008, there were a total of 614,100 protests across China.

This year, with the CPC  attempting to cover up information pertaining to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Chinese people realised the importance of freedom of expression and access to the free flow of information. It was the denial of these rights that led to the death of Li Wenliang and the spread of Coronavirus in China. This pandemic didn’t take a long time to spread and brought the global economy to its nadir.

China, being the source of the virus, has been the worst-hit economically. In late April, a report by Shandong-based Zhongtai Securities Brokerage Company in China concluded that the unemployment rate in China is at 20.5 per cent with some 70 million people out of work. While the official jobs data released by China’s national bureau of statistics on May 15 put the unemployment rate in April at six per cent.

Later, the report was retracted and Li Xunlei, the director of the research unit of Zhongtai Securities, was removed from his post. This shows the CPC’s hyper-sensitivity towards unemployment problems in China. The one thing that the CPC fears the most is the spectre of unemployment. During a conference on employment and entrepreneurship related to general colleges and universities graduates on May 13, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang demanded more emphasis be put on key groups by offering college and university graduates targetted job-seeking services. One of the main reasons behind China’s erratic behaviour in Asia is to divert the attention of aggrieved, frustrated and millions of jobless people.

Xi’s predecessor, Mao-Zedong, too, had declared a war on India on account of growing unpopularity in China because of his failure of the Great Leap Forward, which led to the death of around 45 million people. Bertil Linter, author of China’s India War, concluded that “the border dispute was only an excuse to  launch the 1962 war.” To secure his power firmly and to divert the attention of the Chinese people, war was declared against India amid the Cuban crisis. In a bid to divert the attention of the Chinese people on account of joblessness,  the CPC is behaving erratically with its neighbours. In other words, in the coming days, developments inside China will shape its foreign policy because the real threat for the ruling party lies within.

(Writer: Tenzin Tsultrim Wangdu; Courtesy: The Pioneer)

Many short-term measures imposed now may have a long-term influence on both national and international governance and political ideology

Though the economic fallout of the pandemic is more vivid, its impact has political dimensions, too. Many short-term measures imposed now may have a long-term influence on both national and international governance and political ideology. The political impact, in the national context, seems to be arising out of four factors: Nature of response by countries; manner of response; deepening of societal fault lines and nature of the regimes vis-à-vis their effectiveness in controlling the virus.

It might impact the world order, too, due to the shifting of the balance of power and the ideological debate on global cooperation vs isolationism and liberalism vs authoritarianism.

Normally, the response to a disaster is 3R: Rescue, Relief and Rehabilitation. But in the case of the Corona, a fourth R has crept in and this is Regulation. The lockdown resulted in complete disruption of all movement, the economy and  personal liberty. Across countries, not only the framework of regulations but the manner of imposition has a common pattern.

The executive, with or without the consent of the legislature and other stakeholders, gave itself absolute powers and responded by executive decrees. The differential impact of sudden economic disruption on different strata of society has exacerbated the strain across the existing societal fault lines of rich vs poor, urban vs rural, region vs region, local vs migrants, employer vs employees and so on.

The crisis has also fuelled debate on the effectiveness of authoritarian regimes vis-à-vis democracies as major democracies like the US, Germany and Italy faltered in their effort while authoritarian regimes of Singapore and Vietnam controlled the virus well. Now, let us see the likely impact. The first political impact is the centralisation of power. The ruling elite in Hungary, the Philippines, China, El Salvador and Uganda have used the crisis to accredit themselves with emergency powers, moving them further away from democracy. In India, the invoking of the National Disaster Management Act, too, resulted in centralisation of powers in the national executive.

The second is the abridgment of fundamental rights, expanded State surveillance and banishing of protests. In Hungary, Jordan, Chile, Thailand and so on, punishments were prescribed for spreading misinformation, which opens the possibility of muzzling any voice of dissent. Invasive surveillance systems in Israel, South Korea and Singapore, unthinkable earlier, are being hailed as effective measures for slowing infections.

Plus, the social strains caused by economic disruption may change political alignments and the landscape of political debate by creating more fractured societies. The spirit of federalism has also been impacted due to excessive centralisation of power.

Another impact of this outbreak may be reduction in the influence of the neo-liberal trend of decreasing role of the State, considering the strong, dominant and pivoting role played by the State to counter the virus. Given the experience of the current crisis, it will be difficult to argue that the private sector and philanthropy can be a substitute for a competent State during a national emergency.

While it may be argued that these are emergency measures and were needed to tackle an unprecedented situation with a firm hand, it cannot be predicted with certainty that all these measures will be done away with once the crisis is over. More so because this contagion is going to stay for some time. The longer it prevails, the more difficult it will be to dismantle emergency powers. Forget about authoritarian or tending to be authoritarian regimes, it may tempt even democratically-elected governments to continue the emergency measures in the same or modified form, to centralise powers and strengthen their hold on the polity, given the comfort it provides to the ruling elite. The most dangerous possibility is posed by the use of high-end technologies for surveillance, which opens up many possibilities for misuse during normal times, too.

The current crisis has also brought to the fore the debate over the future of a new world order. There may be two types of impacts on the world order. First may be the shift in balance of power and resultant shifting dominance over international organisations. The second might be a boost to the ideology of isolationism vis-à-vis global cooperation and authoritarianism vis-à-vis liberal democracy.

The global distribution of power seems to be shifting away from the US and Europe, which are faring badly in containing the disaster as compared to the East Asian countries which have fared well. The slogan of “America First” under the Trump presidency and its unwillingness to take the position of a global leader, before and during the pandemic, has led to the beginning of China’s dominance and aggression in the new world order. Beijing was already silently working towards domination in the economic order, global trade balance and supply chains, spreading hegemony over the ruling elite of developing countries, in Africa and Asia through debt-trap diplomacy and more recently in capturing the United Nations institutions. The outbreak has only accelerated this process.

At the ideological level, the disruption of global supply chains, the leading role of State actors and centralising tendencies may lead to a dominance of nationalist, isolationist and illiberal ideologies on the international arena. Globally, at the national level, we may see a rise in authoritarian, centralising tendencies and changing political landscape on account of fractured societies. At the international level, in the absence of a change in US policy and its hesitation in providing a rallying point for liberal democracies, it would be a free road for China to advance its ideology, technology and politico-economic dominance in the emerging world order.

Some scholars point to the lack of goodwill of China as a counter argument to its rising influence but we must remember that global politics is not a popularity contest. Hard politico-economic facts cannot be ignored. Second, the failure to ensure global cooperation in tackling the pandemic may lead to rising nationalist and isolationist tendencies and wear out the effectiveness of international organisations.

(Writer: Dipak Kumar Singh; Courtesy: The Pioneer)

After Nepal, Beijing is confabulating with Pakistan to open two fronts, by moving troops and pushing terrorists into Kashmir

Clearly, a bruised China, which had so far been used to India cowering before its military and economic might, hadn’t quite expected our Army to pay back the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in its own coin in Ladakh. And now that “Emperor” Xi Jinping, the new moniker emblematic of the Chinese President’s desire to universalise the “Chinese dream,” is affronted by India standing up to his grand design, he is unleashing his proxies and opening up new fronts. If Beijing got Nepal to wage a cartographic war with us, it has now deployed Pakistan, which has started moving 20,000 troops in the Gilgit-Baltistan area. This even as India and China are in negotiations to restore the status quo at Galwan Valley in Ladakh, which China is claiming to be its own and building up pressure by way of ingress, marking lands with its maps and reinforcing its presence. By bulldozing India and synchronising joint pressure points, it wants us to give up on our strategic gains and positions inimical to its interests in Aksai Chin, Xinjiang and, of course, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), part of which runs through Gilgit-Baltistan. And it is hoping for a mutual “back-off” deal. But perhaps it had not bargained for India’s acquired strengths by way of improved border infrastructure and connectivity, persistence and most importantly, its practised mountain warfare that could sustain an ambush. Such is its desperation and hurt ego that there are reports of the Chinese army holding talks with terror organisation Al-Badr to incite fresh violence in Kashmir. There have also been reports about a new terrorist threat to the iconic Taj Mahal hotel in Mumbai. Given Pakistan’s state of the economy and its own battle with the pandemic, opening two fronts, one in Kashmir and another in the mainland, is not only over-ambitious but nonsensical. But if that is the diktat of its all-pervasive “master,” it will escalate threats for India, which, too, is writhing under the spiral of the pandemic. Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), egged on by the Chinese, has reportedly stepped up infiltration in a bid to fire up the Line of Control (LoC) and contain India with a pincer attack. This is evident from the recent spate in terrorist killings in Kashmir and given the improved local intelligence, even flushouts in key terrorist strongholds. But post abrogation of Kashmir’s special status, it is not being able to galvanise local militancy and is quite frustrated on that front. So the Chinese strategy seems to be wearing us out on both the Line of Actual Control (LAC) and LoC while keeping up the pretence of negotiations. The Corps Commander-level dialogue on finalising modalities for the disengagement of troops from various standoff points in eastern Ladakh lasted 10 hours on Tuesday with little to show on the ground. China is hardly interested in withdrawing from its “new claim lines” in Galwan Valley, Pangong Tso and a number of other areas, which let it keep a hawk’s eye on our troop movements. With Galwan, it intends to wrest the advantage it had in northern Ladakh before India built a key highway and commanded the heights.

Diplomatically, too, with the US and France offering help to India in its border crisis, China is not sitting idle. It has got its vassal States like Nepal and Pakistan to turn world opinion against India for attempting to destabilise their respective nations. Nepal Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli, who is finding himself increasingly isolated within the ruling Nepal Communist Party, has blamed India for engineering a rebellion. And Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has now decided to extend his support to Oli, joining the chorus of India-bashing. Earlier Khan had blamed India for the Balochi attack in Karachi without so much as lining up credible evidence. Even China proposed a condemnatory statement in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) but was held back by other members who expressed reservations on uncalled for statements by Pakistan. The rebuff was sharp but such is China’s avarice for global domination that it forgets that without peace with India, the second largest Asian entity, it cannot convince the rest of Asia about its supremacy or “dreams.” Worse, it’s pushing India further towards the US in a new bipolar tussle. India has to scale up its diplomacy, use its favourable image in the West and even its friendly vibes with Japan and Australia. It must make a global case for its patience despite China’s ceaseless “wolf warrior” attacks. It must further use the US, which is anathema to China at the moment, to corner the latter and drive home the futility of its acquisitions at the border which might end up in a worldwide diplomatic censure. Not that it cares about goodwill but post-Wuhan, China will find it very difficult to justify its intentions or positions in world affairs. We need to use every multi-national forum, alliances and reinvigorate bilateral ties with the neighbourhood to make enough noise about the asymmetric relationship with China. Our studied silence for strategic peace has been clearly interpreted as weakness.

(Courtesy: The Pioneer)

While the world is reeling under the onslaught of the pandemic, China has intensified its belligerence and is indulging in aggression in the SCS and on the LAC

On June 15, India was elected unopposed as a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) for a two-year term starting from January 1, 2021. India secured a comfortable vote of 184 out of 192 at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), which was more than the two-third majority votes required (128 votes) to become a member. India was a candidate from the Asia-Pacific region for the non-permanent seat for the term 2021-22.

Last year, India’s candidature was unanimously endorsed by the 55-member Asia-Pacific group, including China and Pakistan. Historically, India had been the non-permanent member of the UNSC seven times starting 1950.

While the UN has completed 75 years of existence, its achievements have been mixed. Its five organs achieved certain milestones in healthcare, economy, social welfare, human rights and environmental issues, concerning mostly the developing nations. At the same time it saw many aspirations of the five UNSC permanent member countries i.e. UK, France, Russia, US and China getting realised.

There have been situations where these veto-powered nations did not respect the verdicts of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and made a mockery of the organisation for which they acted as superlative leaders. Therefore, the universal objective of justice and peace has been halfway realised.

The global order is still based upon hegemony and domination. Earlier the world was bipolar, whereby global politics was dominated by two superpowers, the former Soviet Union and the US.  Now it is unipolar.

Even after the end of the Cold War, the smaller States are still struggling to align with the bigger powers in order to secure their sovereign status. Imperialism and expansionism still exist in many forms in the international arena like trade blocs, illegitimate access and exploitation of maritime resources, building power structures for future wars, manufacturing cheaper goods and dumping the same in developing countries despite those developing countries having a substantial workforce to manufacture the same commodities.

Such tactics and exploitative aspirations are often realised by bigger powers by funding various governments in order to incline their foreign policy towards themselves, creating animosities among the neighboring countries, funding and managing the facilities of other countries. In such a scenario, the concept of NAM (Non-Aligned Movement) seemed to be very relevant as it rose against the concept of power blocs by drawing on the principles agreed at the Bandung Conference initiated by Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Indonesian President Sukarno with Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser and the Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito. The purpose of the organisation was very clear: Sovereignty, territorial integrity and security of non-aligned countries in their “struggle against imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism, racism and all forms of foreign aggression, occupation, domination, interference or hegemony as well as against great power and bloc politics.”

Thus, from the very beginning our leaders foresaw the possible dangers of aligning with bigger powers. The current situation is very clear, where the world is demanding more multilateralism because the majority of the members of NAM had to look either left or right as the NAM could not rope itself tightly. India started looking towards the West as China attacked it in 1962, Indonesia started looking at the US to balance the influence from China or the Communist Bloc.

The best example which elucidates the above statement is the rise of an assertive China, which is not conflict- free. Several sovereign States in the vicinity or in the neighbourhood have been experiencing the pressures of its imperialistic, aggressive and belligerent attitude, especially in the South China Sea (SCS), as well as in other bordering States like Bhutan and India. China’s imperialistic attitude is reflected in the form of illegitimate access to their exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and building structures in the common waters.

However, things have changed. A smaller country is visibly more powerful now than what it was during the colonial period, but it is still reeling under the new colonialism carried out by the bigger power in name of development or aid.

The UN has expanded its member base from 50 to 193.  In such a scenario, we need a stronger UN based upon the inclusivity and multilateralism which would emphasise upon human rights, democracy and other issues facing the world. Indonesia is a member of the UNSC and has a bigger say in terms of its geostrategic importance, population and economy.

In an IPI (International Peace Institute) virtual event held on April 24 with the President of the UNGA Tijjani Muhammad-Bande, the Chair and former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said that while the COVID-19 pandemic was the most “urgent” challenge the 193-nation body had ever faced, it could be best addressed through the global “interconnectedness” represented by the UN.

Rudd emphasised that “pandemics are the very essence of the reason why we have a multilateral system of global governments, and we know the reason for that is because epidemics and pandemics have no respect for international borders.” He further added, “This has tested not just our institutions of national government around the world, but it has truly tested our system of global governance.” He observed that the creation of the World Health Organisation (WHO) in 1948 and the International Health Regulations in 2005 had been “anchored” in the UN Charter. Thus, India at the west frontier and Indonesia at the east can play a very important role in seeking a multilateral world.

As the whole world is reeling under the onslaught of the pandemic, China has intensified its belligerence, overshadowing humanity by indulging in fierce aggression in the SCS as well as on the Line of Actual Control with India. This clearly demands revamping and strengthening of the UN in order to isolate such belligerence and create a peaceful global order.

(Writer: Gautam Jha; Courtesy: The Pioneer)

The rise and assertion of China is undeniable but it is also losing its crucial ‘soft power’ in the bargain. Nations must get together to call its bluff

The Chinese management of its narrative has been exceptionally crafted and has seen unprecedented levels of intra-coordination within different layers of governance. This was possible because it is a one-party State. The seemingly seamless integration of its economic, diplomatic, military, strategic and psychological imperatives into the making of the Chinese juggernaut has fructified the patience alluded to by Deng Xiaoping when he said, “Hide your strengths, bide your time.” China’s transformation from being a predominantly agrarian nation with a bloated and antiquated People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to that of the world’s second-largest economy with ocean-roaming nuclear submarines, intercontinental ballistic missiles, stealth bombers and cyber-capabilities has been astonishing.

With a slew of geo-strategic initiatives (for example, the Belt and Road Initiative and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor among others), Beijing is easing its purse-strings to debt-trap other nations. It is also carefully calibrating limited military engagements (for example, challenging US Navy capability in the South China Sea or the recent Galwan Valley face-off with India). China has been asserting its expansionist and hegemonic instincts. Behind this ruthless clarity of thought and action are “cultural” and “political” reflexivities that define its nonlinearity of action. China can simultaneously charm, buy out, intimidate or coerce others towards its end. Such behaviour is extremely difficult to read as it deploys and postures asymmetric stances that are predicated on deceit.

Between 2014 and 2018, over 70 per cent of Beijing’s arms imports came from Russia, which sold its state-of-the-art SU-35 fighter jets and S-400 anti-aircraft systems, only to see its technology brazenly ripped and reverse engineered, in line with China’s patented theft of technology. The Russian state-owned conglomerate Rostec’s chief of intellectual property was left fuming: “China alone has copied aircraft engines, Sukhoi planes, deck jets, air defence systems, portable air defence missiles and analogues of the Pantsir medium-range surface-to-air systems.” But nothing came out as cash-strapped Russians recognised the price of doing business with China.

Further, the US military and its suppliers have been “under cyber siege” for long as Beijing relentlessly seeks to build its military capabilities by stealing and hacking into critical military information, all this without having to fire a single shot. Besides espionage, this Chinese cyberwarfare infrastructure and capability are used for intimidation, and cause deadly disruptions that can create havoc in civic and political realms. Recently, when Australian Prime Minister Scott Morison lamented that a “sophisticated State-based cyber actor” was trying to hack all levels of Government, personal, business and infrastructure-related information, the finger was unmistakably pointed towards China. It is owing to such fears that the US, Australia and NATO countries are putting barriers and blocking the Chinese conglomerate, Huawei, from developing the 5G network. The intermingling and cross-ownership of industry makes them  suspect all Chinese conglomerates in order to realise the goal of “Chinese century” through any means possible.

However, it is China’s unapologetic and amoral realpolitik in international diplomacy that stuns and shocks the opponents, who consistently fail to understand the deceit levels born of Chinese ambitions. Be it the Nehruvian naivety of Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai (India and China are brothers) or the brazen bailout afforded to an international terrorist like Masood Azhar on “technical” grounds at the UN or the most recent backstabbing in the Galwan Valley — the Chinese have always reneged on their word. Chairman Mao had once explained the Chinese aphorism “to seize someone’s pigtail” and then added that in the Sino-India dimension they “do not seize each other’s pigtail. We are not on the alert against each other.” This was said just before 1962. China patronises roguish nations like Pakistan and North Korea and turns them into vassal States. In the Chinese manual of practicality, there is no contradiction in being the “all-weather friend” of Pakistan, an avowedly “Islamic” country, while it is a “communist” country as long as the ends justify the means. Even domestically, it is the deceitful commitment towards its “one country, two systems” principle that defines Hong Kong’s concerns as China goes about surreptitiously dissolving the political-social-cultural boundaries with its project of “Mainlandisation”, akin to Tibet earlier and one that haunts Taiwan  always.

It is said that unlike the Western notions of war and diplomacy, which are essentially based on overwhelming force and technology, the Chinese are masters of strategy and stratagems. It has produced military classics like Sun Tzu’s Art of War and has institutionalised strategic tenets like ingyizha li (war is deception), sheng-dong ji-xi (point to the east but attack the west), shang-bing fa-mou (critical to attack enemy’s strategy), chu-qi zhi-sheng (win by doing the abnormal), bishi ji-xu (attack the enemy’s weakest point and stay clear of its strengths), yi-yuwei-zhi (take the most devious route to surprise and overcome), yin-di zhi-sheng (emerge victorious by changing the tactics according to the situation, don’t be fixated), yi-rouke-gang (against the hard, be soft and gentle to win), hou-fa zhi-ren (retaliate and go up on the enemy after it has started the fracas) and such dialectics that underline and reflect Chinese actions.

Unlike the US or India, not only does China have a “strategic culture” but it also incorporates the same in its State functioning with the additional advantage of being able to deploy diplomacy, commerce, military and psychological wherewithal in perfect unison. It remains impossible to decipher and it exploits the “strategic configuration of power” unabashedly and confidently.

Therefore, for all its militaristic posturing, China has not taken on any resource-draining commitments in the global conflict, for example, the Middle East, and bides its time as the West slowly burns and exhausts its resources and enthusiasm. The rise and assertion of China is undeniable but it is also losing its crucial “soft power” in the bargain as the COVID-19 world licks its wounds at the utterly deceitful Chinese ways of “managing” the same. The littoral States surrounding the South China Sea, Japan, Taiwan, India, Australia and the Western world are realising that they have been truly outsmarted through deceit, more than once by a hawkish China. Only in this honest realisation lies the future recourse of calling and mitigating all future bluffs of Chinese deceit.

While Democratic challenger Biden is picking up in the polls, ruling out Trump is a mistake that few should make

When Donald Trump won the 2016 US  presidential poll, he didn’t just shake up the American polity but visibly the entire world. As political commentators in India and elsewhere tried to figure out the nuances of the US’ bizarre electoral college system and how the winner of the popular vote actually lost an election, the world prepared for Trump. It has been a roller coaster ride since January 2017 when Trump took office. From his market-moving Twitter tirades to the many self-aggrandising press briefings, Trump has said a lot of things to a lot of people.

But as the US heads into the next presidential election cycle later this year, can Democratic Party candidate Joe Biden, who was also former President Barack Obama’s Vice President, defeat Trump? Biden has maintained low profile during the Coronavirus pandemic. Even during the racial protests that engulfed certain American cities, he maintained studied silence, possibly in order to avoid his legendary gaffes. This is in sharp contrast to Trump’s bombastic statements. By all accounts, Biden is leading Trump in the polls across several important American “battleground” States where the 2020 election will be won and lost. The average of national surveys has put Biden up over Trump. However, this discounts the latter’s extremely good ground game; last time his team knew they had an upper hand even before the election. This is why they allowed the mainstream media to portray him as weak, which doubled the surprise of his victory. It has been 28 years since an incumbent US President lost re-election. Putting Trump on the backfoot might actually spur him to revitalise his base. The riots now, with their senseless and wanton destruction, will actually play into Trump’s core support base of White voters. Trump likes playing the insurgent card when it comes to electioneering. And with the media and analysts sitting in their ivory towers in America’s coastal cities, they forget how electorally important this base is. For Biden to ensure victory, he will have to reach out to Trump’s core voter base. While he has the polling lead for now, he has not started that outreach. Keep in mind that as the first votes were counted on that fateful November night in 2016, Hillary Clinton had a 96 per cent chance of being the US’ 45th President.

(Courtesy: The Pioneer)

It is unfortunate that for certain democracies, the military willy-nilly becomes an inadvertent piece of the political legitimisation framework and is milked for partisan purposes

Democracies across the globe have seen the sudden rise of the far-Right and the neo-nationalists, who posture muscular stances in a bid to undo the “weaknesses” of the past. From Washington, DC, to Rio de Janeiro, to Budapest, Ankara and Manila, the template is the same: Supposed “strongmen” recklessly pander to the basest instincts. The common playbook for the leadership entails “majoritarianism”, “illiberality” and “discomfort” with constitutional restraints. Profundity of patriotism is replaced by supremacy of unbridled nationalism. The tone and tenor accompanying such leadership is decidedly “unapologetic” and “aggressive.” Another commonality in such nationalistic fervour and rhetoric is the dangerous appropriation of the apolitical military to buttress the political credentials of the “strongman.” Herein, the leadership seeks to dovetail, champion and posit the military as its natural supporter and ambassador. This affords it political legitimacy in the eyes of the citizenry to do many more dangerous unconstitutional acts. The military willy-nilly becomes a partisan accompaniment, a tool and an inadvertent piece of the political legitimisation framework.

Ironically, these adopters of militaristic symbolism are usually not from military background or sensibilities. Take the example of Presidents Donald Trump, Rodrigo Duterte, Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Their formula of nationalism entails interventionist, revisionist and authoritarian agenda that necessitate the subliminal endorsement and usurpation of the military imagery. In all such democracies, these tendencies unsettle the traditional rectitude of the armed forces, which unequivocally disdains topical politics, societal divides and reckless liberties. The required “distance” between the political leadership and the relatively-independent and professional domain of the military gets compromised. The military then stands to assume a partisan slant and preference. Under the garb of “recognising” the military, condescending platitudes are routinely dished with no material benefit for it. The institution is only milked to serve partisan purposes. Given its regimented and disciplined ethos of not speaking up to the national leadership — even when related to personal and career considerations — often, the senior leadership in the military does not do enough to stop the politicisation of this institution. Thus, the armed forces risk compromising their constitutional commitments.

Trump has displayed child-like glee for militaristic trappings such as parades, weaponry, language and self-claimed obsession with “quick action,” ignoring the fact that behind the powerful symbols of the institution resides the purest, noblest and the most constitutionally adherent spirit in action. Combat units do not encourage “divides” as the US military is disproportionately populated by minorities like the Hispanics and African-Americans. This political polarisation would prove to be a natural anathema to the institution. But fragility in the military-political relationship in the US started brewing after most veterans voted in favour of Trump when he seduced them with his uber-nationalistic bluster and bravado. But the military was getting increasingly restless with the interferences; with the hallowed chain and command passing  the buck to the “Generals” on operational failures; and with the institution being dragged into the theatrical politics of Trump.

One defining moment of this tenuous military-civil equation in the US came forth when the President strolled down to a nearby church, accompanied by a posse of his team, and dramatically held aloft a Bible. The photo-op caught the Washington police by surprise as they had to crudely and forcibly push away the peaceful demonstrators. The Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington was “outraged” at the use of the church as a political stage. Even worse was the sight of the senior most US military General Mark A Milley in combat fatigues, forming the backdrop of that overtly dramatised “moment” and he being used as a willing prop.

Yet again, willingly or unwillingly, Trump had drawn the avowedly apolitical institution into extremely politically-loaded “moment.” The optics also inadvertently signalled the institution’s alignment on the way security was being handled and worse, it sought to be further handled by invoking the military. What followed next was an unequivocal and bipartisan roast of the apparent conduct of the top General. The military’s cherished political abstention was visibly compromised — all eyes turned on Gen Milley but not much was expected as Trump has routinely interfered, fired and bulldozed opposition.

But Gen Milley demonstrated the highest levels of military courage, uprightness and morality when he apologised for the optics, knowingly earned  presidential ire and risked getting fired. Milley unambiguously said, “I should not have been there” and that “my presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.” In one sweep, Milley restored the larger dignity of the regrettable situation, the institution and the nation. Gen Milley’s apology does not show him in  weak light. On the contrary, both he and the institution have been strengthened by reiterating the supremacy of the US Constitution as opposed to the vanity and whims of any individual — even if he happens to be the Commander-in-Chief. Gen Milley salvaged the situation from getting dangerously and irreparably undermined. This is especially applicable for the military, which holds the coercive instruments of sovereign power. Gen Miley’s extraordinary public apology also included a very telling and direct comment when he told his troops to “defend the Constitution” — the distinction between the President and the Constitution was unmistakable.

Gen Milley may join the revolving door of the White House administration that has seen the fired backs of some of the most decorated, valourised and respected veterans. Ironically, veteran affairs and the military were signature Trump issues in his politics but the treatment meted out to the institution, its traditions and values will make the most Republican Party supporting veterans think twice. The humility in Mark Milley’s words, “As a commissioned uniformed officer, it was a mistake that I have learned from, and I sincerely hope we all can learn from it” is both rare and thoroughly inspirational.

(Writer: Bhopinder Singh; Courtesy: The Pioneer)