G20 Hamburg: India Rerated & China In The Dock

G20 Hamburg: India Rerated & China In The Dock

Between the 11th G20 Summit, the first ever hosted by China at Hangzou in September 2016, and the  12th one at Hamburg on July 7-8, 2017, the Chinese Dragon has begun to breathe fire.

This has shot the "China question" to the top of the unofficial agenda at Hamburg, even as the protestors outside, out-flanked by events, are readying to take on the right-wing policies of new President Donald Trump.

China has deliberately picked a fight with a number of countries. It has blatantly flouted the ruling of the Hague's Permanent Court of Arbitration with regard to the South China Sea and its dispute, initially, just with The Phillipines. Instead of complying, it tried, with some success, to buy off  the impoverished country and its needy leader Duterte.

This even after China had earlier ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) demonstrating its selective application and attitude to international law and convention.

Glaringly, despite near universal condemnation, China continues to pursue a ham-fisted claim to the whole of the South China Sea, all the expected oil and gas in it, and the islands that dot it,  including some new man-made ones constructed by it.

Typifying the problem, another unrelated but recent tally had it that China has land and territorial disputes with 23 countries small and large. It seems to underline a self-serving interpretation of cartography and an insatiable urge towards expansionism.

In the South China Sea, it is sharply militarising the passage, and warning off  all ships from any country that enter or pass through it including those from the US.

Closer to our bailiwick, it has developed another dispute and stand-off at the Sikkim/Bhutan borders with India and Bhutan, accompanied by daily threats and rising rhetoric of a millitarist kind.

This is in addition to its loud claims and warnings with regard to Arunachal Pradesh, and elsewhere along its long border with India.

China is also thuggishly aiding and abetting its vassal state Pakistan's terrorism in Kashmir, and  helping to suppress all protest against its One-Belt-One-Road  (OBOR) road leading through Pakistan, from its Xinkiang Province, into PoK/Gilgit-Baltistan, via Islamabad, and on to the port of Gwadur in Baluchistan on the Arabian Sea.

China, while claiming to be restraining North Korea at American request, is apparently and tacitly encouraging its near unhinged belligerence vis a vis America, South Korea, Japan and others.

The sheer aggression and bluntness of its foreign policy of late, unmindful of all opinion, has raised a serious question in the minds of many China watchers and analysts. As in Pakistan, who's really in-charge?

Is it the Communist Party political leadership, headed by President Xi Jinping, or the People's Liberation Army (PLA), led by General Fan Changlong, and his phalanx of other generals?

While President Xi Jinping is technically the Chairman of the PLA too, it must be remembered he came to his more genteel, suit- wearing civilian job, via the fatigues of the PLA too.

And now that Xi Jinping is heading for the Chinese version of an election in November 2017, at the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the question arises, is he being put under deliberate internal pressure? Why are so many undiplomatic fights being picked? Is the PLA acting on its own?

So, while, the 12th G20 Summit at Hamburg, Germany, may have well wanted to address an array of other issues, the problem of a runaway, possibly out-of-control China, may have to be urgently, if unofficially catapulted to the top of the agenda.

 In the formality of the Summit, there are mostly heads of Government from 20 member countries, the leaders of a number of invited participating countries, and world bodies.

All are on their way to Germany even as I write this piece.

The "official" and likely deliberations, and some of the bilateral, "pull aside" discussions expected, are also already in the air.

How will President Xi Jinping of China respond to demands from the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) members (Britain, France, Russia, America and China), all expected to be present, to  rein in the provocations of its protectorate North Korea?

Has President Xi Jinping sought to preemptively blunt the expected pressure on this, during his recently concluded 6th visit to Russia and its President Vladimir Putin?

Will President Trump of the US, the allegations of Russian links  notwithstanding, develop a much better working relationship with  President Putin? This particularly, now that ISIS has been nearly wiped out in Iraq and Syria.

Significantly, the Bashir Assad Government has survived the maelstrom intact.

Trump, unlike Obama before him, will probably not seek the instability of "regime change" in Syria, having learnt from the chaos of the "Arab Spring", on his predecessor's watch.

And that should go down very well with Putin, an Assad backer. Even if it doesn't play quite so well in Tel Aviv. But Israel won't, mercifully, be present at the Summit to say so.

Meanwhile, the remnants of  the "bad" as in anti-Assad ISIS, seem to be already regrouping in Somalia, curiously, with a degree of safe passage afforded by the US.

Will Prime Minister Narendra Modi, his stature enhanced by two back-to-back economic/security partnerships with the US and Israel, arrive at a solution to the China-India stand-off at the Sikkim/Bhutan border?

Or will both Modi and Xi studiously avoid the topic, possibly avoid each other, and leave it, if at all, to the professionals in their delegations? China is smarting at the US upgrade afforded to India, and may be unwilling to make any bilateral moves.

The official discourse at Hamburg might well discuss the pressures on "free" trade, harder to come by these days, and its allied topic, what host Angela Merkel calls "competitive taxation".

There is most likely going to be new trade initiatives discussed, with regard to Africa, the continent with massive untapped potential.

The contentious Islamic refugee policy and not just from Syria, may be put on the table. On it, there is uneven consensus, even within the EU, and neighbours like Switzerland and Britain. The US, of course, is implacably opposed.

And yes, despite Trump's  scowling presence on the topic, things like carbon footprints, credits and climate change may take up some of the Summit's time.

The Chinese thrust with OBOR could be on the official discussion list, because it has elicited already concern with regard to its propensity to bankrupt the participating nations. Earlier efforts along the same lines have seriously rocked the financial boats of Laos, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and some countries in Africa and threaten to do so very shortly in Pakistan.

India has kept out of the initiative citing the illegitamacy of driving the road through technically Indian territory in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir and nearby Gilgit and Baltistan. Some say its non-participation has further geopardised the viability of the project and angered/embarassed Xi Jinping.

But,  nevertheless, the expectedly financially distressed nations would probably turn to the global lending institutions like the International Monetary Fund(IMF), the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and so on, in turn, expecting to be rescued.

This could  set off its own chain of financial crises in the lending institutions too given the size of the requirements.

While President Putin may prefer to sit on the fence on this one, as Russia  assesses it could benefit from OBOR, President Trump may well decide to use it as a lever to exact concessions from China, albeit obliquely.

Some others may also be on board the bus designed to rein in Chinese ambition, including India, Japan, South Korea, and Australia, affected directly because of their geopolitical location. The EU countries,Britain, perhaps some others, could chime in too, acting in solidarity.

NATO may, or may not, figure in the G20 Summit,  because the main bone of contention, participation of its constituents, with soldiers, equipment, armaments, and money, has already been addressed by President Trump at the G7 Summit in May 2017.

Besides all this serious to grim stuff, the port city of Hamburg, located on the Elbe River, has quite a lot to offer culturally  for the masses of visiting delegates. There is art, architecture, theatre, museums, music, history.

It was in Hamburg, in the neon-lit and sleepless nights of the Reeperbahn,  that the legendary, but then unknown Beatles, once polished their  unique repertoire. This was over 50 years ago now.

The G20 Summit itself will be held at the Messehallen Convention Centre, and no doubt be backed up by salubrious retreats for quiet discussions, and well out of town.

India's Narendra Modi, now in his third year in power, will be treated to the joys of being rerated by the assembly, even as the benefits of his recent bilateral diplomatic coups will take time to play out.

However, the likelihood of him remaining Prime Minister for another 7 years will be noted.

Besides the US and Israel are all-weather allies, and for India to join them within Prime Minister Modi's characteristic bear-hug, is extremely significant.

History has played its part in delaying these accords through the non-alignment years, the years of being a Soviet satellite, the misguided years of dogmatic socialism, and the questionable if haughty moralising.

But now, it is here.

It is  indeed partially a lateral gift occasioned by a risen  and assertive China. Changed geopolitical stakes in the Asian and Pacific theatre have pushed up India's importance.

Be that as it may, it is also, inevitably, reworking the unofficial pecking order at  the G20.

India's improved relationship with America and Israel comes on top of and not at the expense of a long-standing and tested one with Russia.

Russia still supplies two-thirds of India's military needs. But growing fast is the military and civil cooperation with both America and Israel.

The sale of Guardian unarmed drones for surveillance from the US,  and the possibility of F-16's being manufactured in India, are in addition to the sale of light-weight 55mm howitzers, and military transport aircraft, all ongoing.

From Israel could come the much sought after armed Heron drones, and a small arms joint venture in  short order, apart from missiles already on order and extensive training, intelligence sharing and so on.

This in addition to several MoU's, just signed, spanning agriculture, water, and space, and their further modernisation along with Israel. The military relationship with Israel could also provide vital R&D and innovation inputs, in addition to setting up a joint venture ecosystem to make it much easier to make defence equipment of various kinds, including planes, in India.

The new US President, on his part, has seen fit to meet with the Indian leadership, following closely on a similar bilateral with the Chinese leadership -both within six months of taking over.

This new equivalence, it is apparent, is between a rapidly growing  and necessary India, both economically and militarily, and a much bigger, somewhat threatening, but slowing, China.

So, just how long will China manage to stave off India from joining the Nuclear Suppliers' Group (NSG) and the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) going forward?

For: The Sunday Guardian
July 6th, 2017
Gautam Mukherjee