What the Chinese have achieved in the last three decades is indeed awesome. That it is striving to challenge the US’ global supremacy is worthy of admiration.

But all this does not mean that the country is without problems and vulnerabilities. Given that the country is not a democracy the challenge of perpetuating regime legitimacy is in itself a problem, which will continue to get increasingly complex. Then it also has ethnic minorities to contend with. Besides Tibet it has other provinces in the North West that are not entirely stable. To cap it all is the Chinese obsession with Taiwan. The way things are indicate that the problem does not have easy answers.

Militarily also the Chinese have yet to achieve satisfaction levels with there modernisation plans. Access to technology is again relatively more difficult for them. The percentage of vintage equipment with the PLA is much higher than what our armed forces have. They do have the advantage of numbers but we all know that just numbers need not necessarily be decisive. Given the distances from the mainland and also the intervening rugged terrain, force build up and the attendant logistics pose serious handicaps notwithstanding the new rail line recently completed. Add to this the factor of an unfriendly population in the area of operations. The emerging picture from our perspective is then not so daunting.

So why are we behaving so meekly? After all despite the humiliating defeat of ‘62 we did not think of surrendering territory. We stuck to our territorial claims and maintained that the area of Aksai Chin under Chinese occupation — was illegal. In 1986-87 we stood firm over Sumdorong Chu and demonstrated that we would not be deterred by the prospects of a military confrontation. Our offensive military deployment for Operation Falcon perhaps had the desired effect. The attitude of Beijing softened. This led to Rajiv Gandhi’s visit to China in 1988. The positive outcome was the agreement of 1993 to hold border negotiations according to the principle of ‘mutual and equal security ‘. What has slipped since then-political will or military capability? Did we go nuclear for nothing?

... contd.