China has made an overture to India which could be the best thing for the project I term Eurasia.
Ask a child to look at the world map and he would see a cascading flow of landmass from Europe and Russia which widens to Middle East and China and tapers down to India flanked by seas: Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Ocean.
A common sense would tell you that the dominant powers of the world (The Anglo-Saxons: US, Canada, US, Australia and New Zealand) are in control of the Oceans, encircling the landmass I have mentioned, and it’s in their interest that Eurasia never happens.
How do these Powers go about it?
The United States would just be an island if Europe is out of its orbit. It’s Europe which gives it the base to cause anarchy in Russia, Middle East, China. (India too which I would come to later).
Think about the occasional anarchy you witness in Hong Kong, Kazakhstan etc and trouble which is sowed in Ukraine and in Taiwan and you would get the drift.
Now Europe itself is split between Eastern and Western Europe—put it to religious schism and machinations —which don’t allow Russia to integrate. Anglo-Saxons, be it Britain or the United States, have always feared the union of Germany and Russia in the old Continent.
The United States simply hasn’t been good for humanity. It breaks up the Yugoslavia, Iraq, Libya, Syria of our world and we are not even counting the cost which Afghanistans, Vietnams, Somalias, Cubas etc have paid.
It’s not been the best of friends to anyone but keeps its hold because of its some 800 sprawling military bases around the world, and the control of its Bretton Woods system which makes Dollar the reserve currency and which it could print without the collateral guarantee of gold.
It allows the United States to destroy anyone which wants to be an independent sovereign nation; it prefers stooges, or serfs in power in various countries who are your elites controlling the levers of globalization.
Its main weapons are Washington (military), Wall Street (dollar) and technology which drives their propaganda through media and other organs like NGOs, think tanks etc.
What keeps India and China apart?
One of course is the unfortunate border disputes which has led to wars/skirmishes. Two, is its support to Pakistan with whom we have had multiple wars and which sows trouble in our border states of Jammu & Kashmir and Punjab. We have also supported Dalai Lama for decades much to China’s annoyance. Then there is that old geopolitical maxim which perhaps guides China: Never let your neighbour get too strong!
(China draws this lesson from its own history: How the Zhou dynasty in due course was overtaken by its own neighbouring Qin region; as India could recall why Duryadhona wasn’t willing to give even five villages to Pandavas from Mahabharata).
Doklam, and then Galwan Valley, of course hasn’t help.
What has changed?
The events since February 24 when Russia embarked on its military operations in Ukraine. The US-led West has done everything, short of a nuclear war, to destroy Russia. One, it ensures that Western Europe continues treating Moscow as its enemy and remains beholden to Washington; two it disrupts China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) which threatens to integrate the landmass I refer to as Eurasia.
The pretence is over: The world is plainly split.
The Road Ahead
India has shown its support to Russia in its silence on global forums. New Delhi knows that US is a fair-weather friend and India is vital to its urgency to encircle China. West leaves no stone unturned to support anarchy in India through its resolutions in its Congress, United Nations, EU and UK parliament, Human Rights and Press Freedom forums etc.
Yet, India sees a threat in China for the support it extends to Pakistan and the standoff it has on borders. Then there is worry on sea lanes to secure its energy imports.
China and Russia, who are looking after each other’s back, could create a New World Order. China knows Taiwan could be made into a new Ukraine for the mainland by the West. It’s also very wary of QUAD in which India is a vital cog.
It was mutual interest which made China and Russia forget their old antagonism from the early Communist days. In due course they also resolved their border issues. If China could bend Pakistan in its stance towards India, border issues between us are manageable.
China still is India’s most valuable trading partner, marginally behind the United States. Both China and India are among European Union’s 10 most valuable trading allies (see below). Our civilizational ties go back to times when Europe was in dark ages. India and China have much more to gain by being together than by being apart.
Both India and China have suffered immeasurably at the hands of colonial powers. The imperialism has been based on looting land, labour and resources of other countries. Such forces don’t disappear overnight: They just take new shapes. They don’t mean good of us. They like if we are divided in Asia, like Europe is divided between itself. Their support is illusory, their damage real. They torch your home with Occupy Street tactics, working on the faultiness of gender, caste and ethnicity. Media is their propaganda machine.
When both China and Russia, and India, know who the real enemy is, its suicidal to fight on trivia and ignore the larger interest. It’s a pivotal moment in history. This could well be their century. They must not let it go. Both Xi and Modi, secured for coming years, need to show the Statesman within which they are.
