For those of us who believe that China and Chinese tend to be opaque, never transparent about their aims, they are not wrong! But a study of Chinese white papers on defence since 1998 when the first one was released, also suggest the contrary.
Capt Kamlesh Agnihotri, a retired naval officer has co-authored a book on Chinese defence white papers with Capt TSV Ramana, also ex-Indian Navy.
As he recalled the 1998 white paper “was an opaque kind of document wherein not much even after reading could be discerned with regard to how China’s defence is structured, what is their aim, what do they want to do with the world?”
Nevertheless, as he told BharatShakti at an Indo-Pacific seminar in Delhi earlier this week, it was a great initiative by China to put out the first white paper for the consumption of the world and that too in English.
The white papers are being released every two years, the last one was in 2025 and today there’s a fair degree of understanding on how the Chinese military is structured, where it sees its role and the million dollar question, “can the military support China’s rise as an international power”.
The white paper of 2016 was a crucial one, Capt Agnihotri believes, because it not only detailed the organisation but also the reform process underway. It could have been a tactic, he admits, to persuade the world that China can win without actually fighting a war.
Tune in for more in this conversation with Capt Kamlesh Agnihotri, ex-Indian Navy.
Surya Gangadharan is a senior Indian journalist with 30 years of experience in print and news television. He is the Editor of an upcoming portal on strategic affairs, Strategic News International. Formerly, he was International Affairs Editor at CNN IBN, a leading English language TV news channel. He has covered the Arab Spring beginning with the Tahrir Square uprising in Egypt and later the civil war in Syria. Other assignments include the civil war in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal and the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka.
He was in Rwanda following the genocide and also in Somalia. He has worked in senior positions at NDTV, PTI, the Indian Express, India Today and has worked for the Straits Times Group in Singapore.
