History, they say, repeats itself for nations whose leaders are stupid enough not to learn from its lessons. For the present government in New Delhi, the history of China's attitude to India in the late 50s and early 60s of the last century does not seem to matter at all. Obviously, the Chinese are aware of it and enjoy forcing India to a corner.

First it was Arunachal Pradesh. The reiteration of China's claims to this region, even as our Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was preparing to go to Beijing, went virtually unchallenged. In Beijing Dr Singh and Chinese Prime Minister Hu Jintao crafted a wonderful vision of India and China working together. If Dr Singh got any assurances regarding the Chinese claims in the Tawang area, this was not revealed to our people. Perhaps emboldened by the UPA government's pusillanimity, the Chinese are upping the ante at every turn. Now they have advanced claims to northern tip of Sikkim despite their acceptance of Sikkim's position as part of India which Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee as the Prime Minister extracted from them in 2003 soon after he demonstrated to them that India would not be afraid of going nuclear despite their disapproval. Not only is China advancing this claim on part of Sikkim but officially has said that its Army has the right to demolish structures on the Indian side of the border, structures that it does not approve of. The Chinese reaction came in response to the mild protests that India has been raising to several incursions by the Chinese military into Indian territory and even razing of some of our defence structures.

The Chinese obduracy has to be read in the context of what our external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee was doing in Moscow where foreign ministers of India, China, Russia and Brazil met and made some wonderful noises about the emerging multi-polar world. At the same meeting India is reported to have assured the others especially China that New Delhi would not use outer space for weapon purposes. Why this unilateral offer was made despite the Chinese refusing to endorse India's claim to permanent membership of the UN Security Council, is a mystery.

Perhaps it is not a mystery, as the Congress right from the time of Jawaharlal Nehru has this tradition of playing to the Chinese gallery. The Chinese Communist rulers are unlikely to forget that it was Mr Nehru who gave the Communists in China a big break in international arena when he introduced PM Chou En-Lai at the Bandung conference of the non-aligned.

The whole drama of principles of co-existence or Panchsheel was signed between the two countries without extracting one single word of acceptance of our concern from the new leaders of China. Then came the surrender over the exact position of China in Tibet (whether it was suzerainty or sovereignty) New Delhi gave up its right to station a force in Lhasa without getting a single counter offer from China, Mr Nehru believing in the good conduct assurances of the crafty Communist leaders.

All these few years, Beijing's rulers have sought to ring India with their naval bases, develop the long arm of nuclear submarines and upgrade the rail-road infrastructure in the Tibetan region, enabling it to move manpower and equipment to reach right up to India's borders. The missile bases that China has set up in Tibet have now been exposed through satellite photos. Surprisingly, none of these issues came up at the Moscow conference and our external affairs minister was content to go along with the others in mouthing some noble sentiments and draw up some visions of the future without asking for progress at ground level on the issues that raise India's concerns vis-à-vis China.

The UPA government's kow-towing to China and eerie idealism contrasts with what the NDA government and specially Mr Vajpayee did when he was in power. Analysts have recalled how Mr Vajpayee as the external affairs minister in the Janata government was visiting China when Beijing launched an invasion of Vietnam. Mr Vajpayee did not hesitate to underline his protest against this Chinese aggression by cancelling his visit midway and return home.

As the Prime Minister, Mr Vajpayee did one better. His decision to demonstrate India's nuclear weapons capability through Pokhran II drew sharp reactions from Beijing (and also from our Communists who are now claiming to protect India's right to its nuclear options). But soon afterwards Mr Vajpayee drew the Chinese Communists to recognise that Sikkim was part of India and also to push them to place the border negotiations on a workable footing.

The UPA government has failed to get a single concession from China while we have swallowed their insults like calling the Indian ambassador at dead of night to lodge a protest on the demonstrations against China's Tibet policy, the refusal to endorse India's application for permanent membership of the Security Council etc. are evidence of New Delhi's genuflection before Beijing's bosses. To add insult to injury, only the other day China gave Pakistan's President Musharraf a big hand by signing a nuclear supply and reactor construction agreement with him while refusing to say anything about supporting India's need for uranium fuel at the forthcoming NSG meeting.

In any case Beijing knows that its fifth column in India is ready to block any Indian move to obtain fuel from outside. All that our ministers, including the Prime Minister, say time and again is old stuff of downplaying China's threats. All this despite several mutual visits from Indian and Chinese leaders of the government including one from Congress president Sonia Gandhi to Beijing.

Many close observers of the Pakistan scene also believe that the unprovoked firing by the Pakistani Army across the international border just on the eve of the first Indo-Pak talks after the recent elections there is also the handiwork of the Chinese who have friends in the Pakistani military. One recalls here that President Musharraf was in China recently even while he was being marginalised in Pakistan after the election. The attempt to provoke an Indo-Pak incident fits in well with the overall Beijing strategy of keeping tension alive on the Indo-Pak border.

Obviously an improvement in Indo-Pak relations does not suit China's strategy in the subcontinent where it is promoting fear of India as the "Big Brother." Given the UPA government's vulnerability to Left pressure and the Congress history of inability to stand up to Chinese blackmail, it is no wonder that Beijing rulers are working on a strategy to create misunderstanding between Indian and the new Pakistani regime. Mr Mukherjee has let it be known that his visit is merely an attempt to assess the situation in Pakistan and build an one-to-one contact with the new rulers in Pakistan. Earlier, he had visited Nepal following the elections there. How well he succeeds remains to be seen.

What, however, should cause most concern in India is the government's refusal to prepare the country as a single powerful force to stand up to China's pinpricks. By dismissing the Chinese claims and incursions in the northern tip of Sikkim as "minor and local," the UPA government is reminding us that this was the same reaction that the crypto-communist V.K. Krishna Menon gave to the country in 1961, and his famous "not a blade of grass grew there" description of Chinese occupying portions of Aksai Chin. One only hopes that history does not repeat itself in the context of India-China relations.

Courtesy: www.asianage.com, June 17, 2008