Editor’s Note
The Chinese worldview of being at its centre, with neighbouring countries being vassals, continues to influence its leadership even today. As a result, Sino-centrism clouds its strategic outlook. The article examines the relationship between such irrationality in thought and the Chinese incursions into Eastern Ladakh in 2020. It also provides a broader perspective of the Chinese approach by reference to the Chinese engulfing Tibet, nibbling into Nepal, and tightening the tourniquet around Bhutan.
Army Chief General Upendra Dwivedi’s annual press conference provided the military perspective on the prevailing situation along India and China’s Line of Actual Control (LAC). That the security situation continues to be “sensitive and complex”, particularly after the violent clashes in 2020 is a given. The Army Chief highlighted that India’s defence strategy was focused on maintaining a balance between a strong military posture, securing its borders and using diplomacy with neighbouring countries.
Despite the October 2024 agreement on disengagement and de-escalation in Depsang and Demchok in Ladakh, the LAC continues to be a focal point of military attention. Post the 2020 Chinese intrusions, India had stationed an additional 50,000 troops in eastern Ladakh. These troops will remain there for the foreseeable future.
Deployment by the Indian Army and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) remains on a state of high alert. This analysis focuses on China’s border incursions in 2020 to better understand the geographic and historic underpinnings of their constant westward movement in Eastern Ladakh.
Imperial History
Military advances made by China in Aksai Chin since 1962 can be contextualised in terms of the expansionist ambitions of Imperial China. Bharat Karnad asserts that China’s rulers have “shared the world-view of the Middle Kingdom ruling over most of the continental and seaward Asia and treating the remaining countries in this extended region as tributary states or lesser entities.” China’s frontiers, which it has sought to expand over a period of time, consist of physical barriers like the Himalayas, as well as socio-cultural ones, like Islam in Central Asia. It has done so physically with India, Nepal and Bhutan since the 1962 border war with India. The best brutal instance of Chinese expansionism is in the occupation of Tibet in the fifties.
In Xinjiang, the great westward expansion and subsequent Hanisation of the Uyghur allowed China to expand its frontiers in the West. In some cases, Russian imperial expansionism of the 18th and 19th centuries provided the rationale. Further, in the nuclear age, additional territory was a premium for China in terms of affording strategic depth and a chance to protect the Han population by putting them in Mongolia, Sinkiang, and Tibet.
Geography
The primary argument is that China seeks to maximize its territorial gains in Eastern Ladakh, first gained by stealth and illegal occupation in the 1950s and by force—the 1962 border conflict with India. The objective is to penetrate in depth to maintain military pressure on India from the Karakoram Pass down to Chumar. Additionally, with its de facto possession of the Shaksgam Valley since 1963 and Pakistan’s de facto control of the rest of Gilgit-Baltistan, China aims to move westward in Eastern Ladakh in inches.
That is why India’s control over the Siachen Glacier is so important. Without an Indian presence on the Glacier, the Chinese would be able to cut off the Karakoram Pass at will.
A perusal of China’s claim lines of 1956 and 1960 shows the gradual manner in which Beijing has engaged in cartographic aggression. What China has done since 1962 is to slowly inch its way westwards in Eastern Ladakh by first occupying the eastern end of Aksai Chin stealthily in the 1950s and then by force in the 1962 border war. At the end of the war, China proposed the withdrawal of forces from both sides to a distance of 20 km from where the respective forces were arrayed.
Troop Enhancements in 2020
In 2020, as part of an annual military training, the PLA and Border Guarding Regiments became active in the rear areas of Eastern Ladakh, well away from the LAC. The proximate cause of the clash in mid-2020 in Galwan was the move in April 2020 by two divisions from the Western Theatre Command (WTC), i.e., the 4th Motorised Infantry and 6th Mechanised Infantry Divisions, which moved towards the LAC in eastern Ladakh to reinforce existing deployments.
These two units, which were conducting training exercises in Hotan, did not return to their bases. Instead, they moved south towards Aksai Chin along Highway 219 and then turned West towards the LAC. Subsequent clashes in Galwan involving troops from these divisions were a consequence of the PLA building structures in what India claimed to be its territory.
The Ladakh stand-off gained maximum traction in the Indian media because of the clash in Galwan Valley, where Chinese troops had pushed across the LAC and wanted to reach the meeting point of the Shyok and Galwan rivers. The Chinese objective was to stop Indian troops from patrolling up to the point they thought was the border/LAC. In 2020, the Chinese PLA focused its attention on five areas: Galwan River Valley, the northern bank of the Pangong Tso, Depsang Plains, Hot Springs/Gogra, and the Charding Nala area of Demchok. In each place, the objective was to prevent Indian troops from patrolling up to the point they thought was the LAC.
All these are geographic points where some inroads had been made earlier, and the Chinese objective was to penetrate deeper. It is not the first time or the last time that the Chinese pushed India in eastern Ladakh. They had done so earlier in Depsang in 2013, 2014 and again in 2015. In 2012, the Chinese wanted to construct a bridge across the Chipchap River near Samar Lungpa in Ladakh. Being just 30 km east of the Karakoram Pass would have meant allowing the Chinese to move troops to threaten the Karakoram Pass. Little wonder the Indian Army did not allow this to happen. What the Chinese did in 2020 was to alter the status quo of the LAC. A robust Indian military and diplomatic response has stalled China’s immediate plans to move forward.
Story in the Maps
India-China Border Map A
A perusal of the map of Eastern Ladakh published by the Indian government in January 1963 shows three lines. The first shows the Chinese actual control line of 1959. The second shows the ‘Line’ separating Indian and Chinese forces on 7 September 1962, and the third shows the line reached by the Chinese after the invasion of 20 October 1962. From this line, China offered to withdraw 20 km and proposed the same to India. The last line shows that China occupied Galwan Valley in 1962. The 1956 Line, which Chou en-Lai claimed to be the Chinese boundary, approximates the second line of 7 September 1962, while the Chinese claim line of 1960 corresponds to the line of occupation on 20 October 1962.
India-China border, Map B
Conclusion
Yun Sun, Director of the China program at the Stimson Centre, wrote in June 2020, concluded his analysis of the crisis by stating, “Tactically, China appears to be aiming for what it achieved in the 1962 war.” This tactical view coincides with the strategic Chinese objective of maintaining military pressure on India in Jammu and Kashmir from all three sides: Pakistan in the West, China in the Shaksgam Valley, and Aksai Chin.
The Chinese have always attributed Indian infrastructure activities on its side of the LAC to justify its forward movement. The reality is that these are tactical excuses for a long-term foothold in Ladakh, one that echoes its battlefield position in the 1962 war at the time of the ceasefire and perhaps beyond. Any future forward movement on LAC will require a fairly robust Indian military response. Missing the tactical picture in the short term could prove costly for the Indian military in the long run.
Dr. Bhashyam Kasturi (Former Director, National Security Council Secretariat)
