The Sino-Indian Conflict Scenario

China has risen and India is rising, but how will their bilateral relationship affect the world? Over time, Beijing and New Delhi could deepen existing patterns of cooperation and amity or alternatively veer headlong into intensified competition and conflict. While there is a low probability of armed conflict between China and India, such a scenario would pose significant risks to both countries, the region, and the global economy. In a recent contingency memo for the Council on Foreign Relations, I explored some of the pathways to conflict and U.S. policy options in response, but it’s worth taking another look at just what could upset the current balance between Asia’s two giants and the consequences thereof.

There are good reasons to anticipate greater cooperation. Policymakers in Beijing and New Delhi are preoccupied with domestic developments and generally hold similar views on issues that affect prospects for sustaining economic growth at home, including trade, climate change, and global governance. Sino-Indian collaboration in new multilateral settings – such as the BRICS summits, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization – has the potential to grow deeper and more significant over time.

On the other hand, past suspicions as well as longstanding and emerging disputes could poison future relations. Suspicions date to 1962, when India lost a short but decisive war to China. China occupies territory claimed by India, India occupies territory claimed by China, and both compete for access to scarce water and energy resources. Furthermore, both China and India actively pursue closer ties with each other’s traditional adversaries: China with Pakistan and India with Japan. And as India and China build increasingly capable and expeditionary military forces, their areas of operation will overlap more frequently.

Of course, conflict and cooperation are not mutually exclusive in international relationships. Judging from the example of Washington and Beijing, the most plausible future scenario is one in which New Delhi and Beijing deepen their commercial ties and cooperate in areas of mutual interest yet simultaneously remain distrustful enough of each other’s intentions to warrant diplomatic and military hedging.

A hedged mix of cooperation and competition also seems to reflect a remarkably stable equilibrium, at least at first glance. India and China have avoided serious armed clashes since the mid-1960s despite their unresolved disputes. Nuclear arsenals and deepening economic ties raise the costs of war to the point that both sides are quick to seek negotiated solutions when spats break out. Even at their worst, Sino-Indian dealings tend to lack the passionate hostility of Indo-Pakistani or Sino-Japanese relations. Then again, at their best, interactions between India and China tend to be more diplomatically correct than warm. The safe bet is to assume that India and China will steer a course of wary cooperation and bridled competition.

Upsetting Expectations

That said, sophisticated futurists argue that straight-line political projections have a poor track record, especially when considering issues as complicated as the evolving relationship between China and India. At the very least, analysts need to consider the potential for disruption. Ideally, they should assess the pathways that might lead states to end up in several alternative scenarios. As Michael Oppenheimer, author of a great new book on scenario planning, Pivotal Countries, Alternate Futures, observes, “Surprises are to be expected.”

When it comes to relations between China and India, a near-term armed confrontation is one of the most important surprises worth considering. A violent episode could serve as an historic tipping point, altering long-term patterns of expectations and policies on both sides. It might, for instance, reinforce the prevailing sentiment that the costs of war are extraordinarily high, and that both sides must work harder toward the peaceful resolution of outstanding disputes, even if that requires painful compromise. Or, to the contrary, it could heighten security concerns and exacerbate conflict, such as competitive arms races and alliance-seeking.

The other reason to reexamine the assumption of a stable long-term equilibrium between China and India is that it suffers from at least two weaknesses. The first is linked to the problem of complexity. China and India interact at many levels, through various institutional channels, and under a wide array of circumstances. Under normal conditions, that complexity is likely to be resolved without producing violence because India and China have a strong desire and sufficient capacity to prevent any single point of friction from escalating into a major confrontation. Heightened tensions over a single issue tend to focus the attention of decision-makers and bureaucracies, ensuring that relevant intelligence, orders, and diplomatic communications are delivered quickly and accurately.

Yet in the event that more than one dispute unfolds unexpectedly and simultaneously (or nearly so), the risk of Sino-Indian escalation would probably increase dramatically. Rather than prioritizing a peaceful and rapid resolution of a single dispute, leaders on both sides would have strong political and strategic incentives to avoid backing down, fearing the costs of domestic opinion and sacrificed negotiating leverage on the other dispute. In addition, multiple disputes could overwhelm the bandwidth of military and foreign policy decision-making bureaucracies in Beijing and New Delhi. The normal potential for military and intelligence failures, miscommunications, and political blunders would be compounded by the need to grapple with more than one problem at a time.

Beyond complexity, the second problem with the assumption of stable Sino-Indian relations is that the two sides are not alone in their bilateral dealings. Since at least the time of the ancient Greeks, when Thucydides described how the second-tier city-state of Corinth helped goad Sparta into conflict with Athens, lesser regional players have had the means and motive to spark conflict between neighbors.

A similar logic must be applied to China and India. For decades, Pakistan has relied on China as an external balancer against India. Vietnam, to a lesser extent, has recently established economic and military ties with India as part of its effort to deter Chinese aggression. Clearly, neither China nor India would wish to be pulled into a conflict with the other by the actions of bit players, but then again, they may also fear the strategic and reputational costs of abandoning friends in need. Moreover, Sino-Indian relations take place in a regional and global geopolitical context still defined in important ways by American power. The broader strategic calculations associated with that triangular (U.S.-China-India) relationship, especially questions about the extent to which Washington would assert itself, are likely to further complicate matters in the heat of a crisis.

Of the various plausible near-term scenarios for armed confrontation between China and India, the disputed territory along their shared border is the most likely cause and locus. A border conflict is then most likely to be compounded by one of three other sorts of disputes: Tibetan political turmoil, an Indo-Pakistani war, or an escalation in maritime competition. Each of these contingencies deserves a closer look.

Land Border Disputes

In September 2014, commandos from India’s elite special forces unit Para 9 were deployed to positions fewer than five kilometers from the “Line of Actual Control” that separates India from China. At the time, more than 2,000 Indian regular army troops were locked in a tense standoff with a similar number on the Chinese side. Although the crisis was resolved without violence, a senior Indian officer interviewed by the Hindustan Times observed that “the Army had seriously considered the possibility of launching special forces had the situation worsened.”

The incident was apparently sparked when Chinese troops started building a road on territory claimed by India near Chumar. It captured the attention of India’s most senior policymakers, and even intruded on summit meetings in New Delhi, where Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi demanded that Chinese President Xi Jinping withdraw Chinese forces. Subsequent military-to-military negotiations ended the standoff soon after, but the episode demonstrates the potential that the Sino-Indian border could – even in the absence of other tensions – cross the threshold into violence.

It is revealing that the Chumar incursion came only a year after China and India signed a Border Defense Cooperation Agreement intended to reduce the likelihood of such skirmishes. That agreement was motivated by an April 2013 incident in which a Chinese platoon encamped in the Depsang Valley – territory claimed by India – leading to a three-week standoff resolved by a negotiated settlement.

Indeed, every year China and India claim hundreds of incursions by the other across the line that separates them in the Himalayan region, near the politically sensitive areas of Kashmir and Tibet. Many of the flare-ups can be traced to the practical challenge of managing a contested border in difficult, mountainous terrain; over time, forces on both sides have developed signals to warn the other and avoid deadly clashes.

There is no doubt that the pattern of border incursion, response, negotiation, and withdrawal is likely to persist, but the frequency and aggressiveness of probing patrols appear to be on the rise in ways that make violence more likely. Both China and India have expanded and modernized their military forces deployed to the border region. In 2013, the Indian government authorized a new mountain strike corps of forty thousand troops to address the perceived threat of China’s border presence. Along a more heavily militarized border, miscalculations and accidents will have greater potential to escalate from nonviolent tussles to tit-for-tat incidents of harassment and even exchanges of fire.

Trouble with Tibet

Since 2006, Chinese officials have added Tibet to a short list of “core national interests” that also included Taiwan and Xinjiang, indicating the high priority that Beijing places on the enormous western region bordering India, Nepal, and Bhutan. China’s military hold over Tibet is not seriously in doubt, but the terms of Chinese political control are contested. Beijing views the Dalai Lama as a political threat, refuses to enter into serious negotiations with the Tibetan exile government, and has used various means to dominate the Tibetan lama hierarchy as a way of consolidating its political power.

Playing into Beijing’s anxiety, the Dalai Lama, who turned 80 in July 2015, has publicly hinted that he could name his successor before he dies and that his next incarnation might live outside Tibet. Having been born beyond Beijing’s control, the next Dalai Lama could then lead a new generation of protests for Tibetan political autonomy. One location often mentioned as a potential birthplace for the next Dalai Lama is Tawang, in Arunachal Pradesh, home to an important Buddhist monastery. India administers Arunachal Pradesh as one of its 29 states, but China disputes that claim and calls the region “Southern Tibet,” making it a top potential flashpoint for protests.

The death of the Dalai Lama could be the spark that sends Tibet into a new crisis. But even without that triggering event, the protest movement inside Tibet has taken on a new dimension in recent years; since 2009, more than 140 Tibetans have self-immolated as a means to demonstrate anti-Chinese sentiment. The end of 2014 saw three self-immolations in a single week.

It is conceivable that a new wave of Tibetan turmoil would have little to do with India. That said, because it plays host to the Dalai Lama and more than one hundred thousand Tibetan refugees, India has been implicated in the China-Tibet dispute since the Tibetan uprising of 1959. China remains extraordinarily sensitive to the history of externally sponsored Tibetan unrest (including by the CIA in the 1950s and 1960s). China has repeatedly pressed India to muzzle Tibetan protestors and has often gotten its way. During the 2008 Olympic torch procession, for instance, the Indian government yielded to Chinese demands to establish a security cordon against Tibetan demonstrations and practically had to shut down the center of New Delhi for the event.

However India’s current government, led by the Bharatiya Janata Party, is more likely to take a tougher line on Tibet. In May 2014, Modi invited Lobsang Sangay, the political head of the Tibetan government in exile, to his inauguration. A month later, Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj demanded that China follow a “one India” policy, cleverly turning China’s refrain about Taiwan into a reference to India’s belief that Arunachal Pradesh is an essential part of India. To emphasize a similar point, Modi traveled to Arunachal Pradesh in February 2015 and unveiled plans for a $6 billion road project. Several months later he pointedly requested that China “reconsider” its stance on Arunachal Pradesh.

Few Indian analysts would go as far as the bellicose Bharat Karnad, who has called for India to “play the Tibet card” by supporting an anti-Chinese uprising to unsettle Beijing. However, far less provocative Indian actions – perhaps even the benign neglect of Tibetan protesters in the heat of a crisis sparked by the Dalai Lama’s death – would give Chinese officials fits. If it unfolded while Chinese and Indian troops were already eyeball-to-eyeball along the Line of Actual Control, a Tibetan crisis of this sort could tip the scales from a diplomatic kerfuffle to a violent exchange with the potential to escalate into a serious military confrontation.

Another Indo-Pak War

In November 2008, a team of terrorist commandos laid siege to Mumbai, killing 166 people and wounding more than 300. Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) handlers directed the attackers’ every move via satellite phone, even delivering explicit instructions to murder innocent civilian hostages.

Seven years later, the Pakistani state has failed to bring the masterminds of the attack to justice, claiming inadequate evidence for prosecutorial efforts and other legal tangles. LeT leaders and their affiliates still enjoy significant freedom inside Pakistan, and their anti-Indian hostility has not abated. Indian counterterror defenses have improved since the attack, but will never be foolproof. In short, another Mumbai-like attack is a realistic possibility.

The 2008 attack did not lead India to war against Pakistan, but it could have. And the next time India suffers a similar blow, there are good reasons to anticipate it would show less restraint. As then-U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates observed during a visit to India in 2010, “I think it is not unreasonable to assume Indian patience would be limited were there to be further attacks.” As in the past, India’s government would face domestic pressures to retaliate. But unlike the owlish Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who held the reins in 2008, India’s current leadership has already shown itself more inclined to seek an eye for an eye. During Modi’s tenure, the Indo-Pakistani border has seen renewed shelling, diplomatic dialogues have lost steam, and plans to enable freer trade have been shelved. In the intervening years since Mumbai, the Indian military has also worked hard to provide its civilian masters with new, more flexible strike options that could be launched to punish Pakistan.

China would be implicated in any Indo-Pakistani war because of its extraordinarily close ties with Pakistan. For decades, Beijing and Islamabad have worked closely on matters of supreme national interest, including nuclear warhead and missile programs. China counts Pakistan as one of its few real “friends” in the world. That said, Beijing has gradually shifted from a full-bore backing of Pakistani adventurism against India to a position that favors the maintenance of a stable status quo in South Asia. In recent Indo-Pakistani crises, including those of 2008 and 2001-2, China has worked behind the scenes with the United States to urge caution and restraint in conversations with top Pakistani leaders. That remains Beijing’s preference.

Yet Chinese leaders would be less inclined to pull Pakistan from a fight if they were simultaneously engaged in a tense standoff of their own with India. It is also hard to imagine that China would permit Pakistan to suffer a humiliating defeat at India’s hands. Presumably India knows this, and under normal conditions would also see it as one more reason for restraint in any offensive campaign. But if New Delhi already faced a two-front crisis, the extreme stress on India’s leaders would heighten their own threat perception and could lead them to take uncharacteristically risky moves. Although unlikely, even preemptive strikes against Chinese forces could not be ruled out.

Competition at Sea

In December 2012, Indian Navy Chief Admiral D.K. Joshi declared that India would be prepared to defend its interests in the South China Sea, explaining that, “When the requirement is there, for example, in situations where our country’s interests are involved, for example ONGC ... we will be required to go there and we are prepared for that.” Joshi was referring specifically to the oil exploration efforts of India’s leading international oil company, ONGC Videsh Limited (OVL), which held a stake in exploration block 128 off Vietnam’s coast in waters China considers its own. The admiral delivered his remarks immediately after Vietnam had angrily accused China of sabotaging one of its own exploration operations.

To be sure, India’s interests in the South China Sea are relatively minor compared to those of Southeast Asian states like Vietnam or the Philippines. But maritime competition between China and India is growing, as both sides hold important interests in the waters of the Indo-Pacific as transit routes, spheres of political influence, and points of military vulnerability. Each is rapidly building its capacity to project naval power by modernizing its fleet while developing naval ties with neighboring states in ways that unnerve the other.

For its part, China has built long and close naval ties to Pakistan, having recently sold surface ships and submarines and poured capital into the new Arabian Sea port of Gwadar. India is keenly aware of Chinese arms sales to Bangladesh and the possibility that it might seek naval access to Chittagong port. And China’s development of Hambantota port in Sri Lanka also bothered New Delhi. From India’s perspective, China’s naval presence in the Gulf of Aden, as part of an international counter-piracy operation, was a worrisome demonstration of its impressive naval reach across India’s maritime backyard.

Although India’s naval developments are less threatening to China, Beijing has been irritated by New Delhi’s official statements on the South China Sea, which echo American support for the principle of freedom of navigation and the peaceful resolution of territorial disputes. India’s closer naval ties with the United States and Japan have caught China’s attention, as few Chinese defense analysts anticipated that New Delhi would be willing to work so closely with either Washington or Tokyo. Worse, India’s weapons sales and training programs for Vietnam, principally geared to defending Hanoi’s interests against Chinese predation, strike a raw nerve in Beijing.

In this context, a scenario of Sino-Indian escalation in the Indo-Pacific is now possible. In 2012, China appears to have responded to official Indian statements on “maritime freedoms” by providing an unexpected – and unwelcome – 12-hour “escort” to Indian warships transiting contested waters of the South China Sea. The 2012 Scarborough Shoal incident between China and the Philippines and the 2014 oil-rig standoff between China and Vietnam offer examples of ways in which China and India might find themselves at odds. With each escalation of the maritime conflict, the potential for violence through mishap, miscommunication, or intention increases. A Sino-Indian flare-up at sea – off Vietnamese shores, for example – would seriously complicate India’s management of other disputes over land borders, Tibet, or Pakistan.

Consequences of Sino-Indian Confrontation

Any of these contingencies between China and India would jolt global markets, hurt regional economic growth, and undermine current Sino-Indian cooperation on regional and global issues, even if a serious military confrontation was averted.

Over the long run, the implications of an armed confrontation between China and India would depend on three main factors. The first is how the conflict ends. A costly and inconclusive conflict would probably encourage caution and greater investments in diplomatic and other mechanisms to avoid similar experiences in the future, but there is also the chance that it would encourage a military buildup intended to break the stalemate the next time around. If such a conflict ended with a clear victor and loser, the behavior and lessons learned by each would be crucial. A humiliating defeat by one side would most likely cow the loser into a period of peaceful submission. Then again, it could inspire preparations for revenge.

The second factor is whether the conflict provokes a significant American intervention. U.S. policymakers in the past two administrations have professed their desire to build a “strategic partnership” with India. At the same time, it is clear that the United States would prefer not to find itself at odds with China in yet another major regional dispute (added to Taiwan, Japan, North Korea, the South China Sea, etc.). If, in a Sino-Indian crisis, Washington appears too eager to take India’s side it would risk Beijing’s ire and tilt the world further in the direction of long-term conflict between China and the United States. Likewise, abandoning India to China’s mercies would jeopardize prospects for the India-U.S. partnership, breaking one of the most important new pillars in American grand strategy.

The third factor is whether the conflict helps to “resolve” one of the main Sino-Indian disputes, either directly by force of arms or indirectly through a subsequent political settlement. Paradoxically, a serious border confrontation might finally force Beijing and New Delhi to reach a deal on Arunachal Pradesh or one of the other regions disputed between the two. That, in turn, would helpfully eliminate causes for future conflict. Costly confrontations could also shorten Beijing’s patience with Pakistan or curtail India’s ties with the Tibetan opposition.

In sum, an armed confrontation between China and India is a low probability but high risk contingency that deserves special attention because of its potential to disrupt the equilibrium in Sino-Indian relations and, as a consequence, to transform the future character of the global order.