LIMITS OF CHINA-PAKISTAN ALLIANCE

The role of China in the latest round of skirmishes between India and Pakistan has once again revived the debate in the strategic circles whether Beijing will be an active participant in future Indo-Pak conflicts.

- Prakash Nanda

The point that is being raised is whether India should be prepared for a “two-front challenge” from China and Pakistan simultaneously.

But then, the fact is that India has always faced this challenge in all the wars imposed on it by Pakistan. In that sense, it is not exactly a new challenge.

After all, the concept of a two-front challenge has broadly two dimensions or levels. It could be what experts call “collaborative” or “collusive”. In the “collaborative” front, one country openly aids the other militarily in a coordinated manner; they fight jointly either at one front or at different fronts separately, forcing the enemy to divide its resources and attention.

In the case of the “collusive front”, one country aids the other morally, politically and militarily through material and logistics support, either openly or covertly.

Of course, the two are not exclusive as the transition from the collusive threat to the collaborative threat could occur seamlessly. But so far, China seems to have followed the collusive approach, if the history of various Indo-Pak conflicts are any indication.

When one is talking of China, it is the communist or the People’s Republic of China that came into being in 1949. So it had no role in the first India-Pak war in 1947-48. In the second Indo-Pak war in 1965, few facts are notable with regard to the Chinese role.