{"id":35473,"date":"2018-10-31T17:43:59","date_gmt":"2018-10-31T12:13:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.forumias.com\/?p=35473"},"modified":"2018-10-31T17:43:59","modified_gmt":"2018-10-31T12:13:59","slug":"the-doklam-miscalculation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/the-doklam-miscalculation\/","title":{"rendered":"The Doklam miscalculation:\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/opinion\/columns\/the-doklam-miscalculation-4808955\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Doklam miscalculation<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Context<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The ongoing stand-off between Indian and Chinese soldiers in the Doklam tri-junction area looks like a calculated provocation, the underlying strategic motives as also the timing of this action, remain unclear.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is it a warning to India about its deepening US relationship; or a move to prise Bhutan out of the Indian embrace; or to express annoyance with the Indian rejection of OBOR? Or is it a combination of all the above and the intent is to \u201cteach a lesson\u201d to a disconcertingly resurgent India?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>China\u2019s present condition<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">China is presently confronting critical issues of strategic import, such as the North Korean crisis, the deepening US defence relationship with Taiwan, the rising tensions in the South China sea.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To add is the logic and the timing of the confrontation with India in a remote corner of the Himalayas.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">President Xi Jinping is also coming up for re-election for a second term in the crucial 19th plenum of the Communist Party to be held in October.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">An armed conflict could risk derailing the OBOR project in which Xi is heavily invested.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When Xi took over in 2012, China stood tall among the ruins of Western capitalism devastated by the great recession of 2008.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The most important task facing the Chinese economy was the rebalancing necessary to address the structural problems created by the weakening of the export engines and the over reliance on investment, which together had been the primary drivers of its spectacular growth.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Since China requires rising prosperity to justify the draconian curbs on individual freedoms, allowing growth to slow is a risk which Xi has been unwilling to take.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In effect, the Chinese economy remains precariously leveraged and investment-driven with escalating risks of a hard landing in the future.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On the political front, Xi\u2019s anti-corruption campaign mainly targeted at opponents has fostered fear and riven the party into several factions.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thus, despite Xi being designated as \u201ccore\u201d leader and his re-election for another term virtually certain, the insecurity in the party leadership is palpable.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Growing state repression is an expected response from an authoritarian regime to internal problems.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Under Xi, this has been accompanied by an aggressive articulation of territorial claims as an important plank of foreign policy.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Issue of Doklam<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Doklam issue is almost certainly a Chinese miscalculation.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was likely born of the confidence that the strategy of threats and belligerence, which proved so effective against some South-East Asian nations.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However, given the unwavering stand taken by India, supported by Bhutan, there do not appear to be any winning options for the Chinese at present.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The abiding India-China hostility is only partly explained by a shoving for strategic space between powerful neighbours .<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The threat to China from a rising India is not military. It is from the demonstration effect of a successful democracy which could prove potentially destabilizing to a totalitarian system under visible signs of strain.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Doklam miscalculation:\u00a0 Context The ongoing stand-off between Indian and Chinese soldiers in the Doklam tri-junction area looks like a calculated provocation, the underlying strategic motives as also the timing of this action, remain unclear. Is it a warning to India about its deepening US relationship; or a move to prise Bhutan out of the&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/the-doklam-miscalculation\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">The Doklam miscalculation:\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[555],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-test-1","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","views":{"total":0,"cached_at":"","cached_date":1704842639},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35473"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35473\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}