By dint of their geographies, partnerships, development imperatives, and broader objectives, China and India have had overlapping strategic spaces since India became independent in 1947 and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) came into being in 1949. As their interests and capabilities—and thus reach—have grown, the theater of their strategic interaction has expanded to encompass a wider geography and multiple domains. It has evolved from primarily the bilateral space and a focus on their borderlands to include regional and global spaces, as well as the diplomatic, geopolitical, economic, technological, and ideological spheres.

There has been some Sino-Indian cooperation in these spaces, but more often there has been competition—and it has become more intense over time. The phases of cooperation and contestation have been sequential, with both elements present but one dominant. This essay outlines these periods of early competition and collaboration, of coexistence and cooperation, and then a return to contestation.

Cooperation or coexistence has dominated when China and India have seen the other, on balance, as enabling their broader interests. That was the case in the 1950s and the 2000s. These were periods when there was a sense, as reflected in a 2010 joint statement, that there was “enough space in the world for the development of both India and China and indeed, enough areas for India and China to cooperate.”¹ But when Beijing or New Delhi has seen the other as constraining its diplomatic, geopolitical, or economic space—bilaterally, regionally or globally—this has led to contestation and even collision. That is the phase the countries are in today, and indeed have been in for the last decade and a half. There is not just one site of divergence (e.g., their border). Instead, the differences are about a sense of their own place and strategic space—and each country’s view that the other will impinge on rather than increase it.

Early Contestation and Collaboration

To understand the situation between China and India today, it is crucial to look back. Present-day Sino-Indian dynamics are part of a broader continuum, and their origins lie in the past. There were some early points of Sino-Indian friction, including the Chinese annexation of Tibet, which brought China in closer physical proximity to India (i.e., into India’s territorial and geopolitical space).² Beijing, in turn, was suspicious of India’s western linkages and its activities in Tibet. Moreover, there was divergence in the ideological space. Mao Zedong, like Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, was skeptical of non-Communist India. The Nehru government, on its part, saw Communism as a domestic political and an ideological threat.

But China soon came to see India as useful in consolidating and expanding its strategic space—as a nation, in the region, and indeed globally. With the bilateral Panchsheel agreement in 1954, New Delhi de facto recognized Beijing’s takeover of Tibet. In the region, New Delhi’s neutral position during the Korean War proved helpful to Beijing and Moscow. Moreover, rather than allying or even aligning with the United States or Western bloc, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru seemed to embrace more of an Asia-for-Asians attitude, including vis-à-vis developments in Southeast Asia. On the global stage, New Delhi was among the first to recognize the PRC in 1950, and it encouraged others to follow suit. It also supported Beijing taking the Chinese seat on the UN Security Council. Furthermore, it facilitated a Chinese presence and voice at the Africa-Asia summit in Bandung in 1955. All these enabling factors contributed to a “Hindi-Chini-bhai-bhai” (Indians and Chinese are brothers) phase in Sino-Indian ties.

But the bonhomie did not last, with China and India coming to see the other as a constraint. Internally, Beijing’s desire to consolidate its control in Tibet in the mid-1950s contributed to the construction of a road between Tibet and Xinjiang. But this was through territory India claimed, bringing their border dispute to the fore. The undemarcated territorial space between them, as well as Chinese suspicions of India-U.S. collusion in encouraging Tibetan protests and the Dalai Lama’s escape to India in 1959, led to physical collisions–and eventually a war between the two Asian giants in 1962.³ In addition, toward the end of the decade, New Delhi perceived Beijing’s ideological encouragement and material support to Maoist and separatist insurgents in India’s northeast as a threat to its own nation-building efforts.

Regionally, the two countries’ overlapping peripheries became contested sites. New Delhi saw Beijing’s increasing activities and influence in Nepal as impinging on India’s regional space and security. It also perceived China’s burgeoning diplomatic, military, and eventually nuclear cooperation with its other rival—Pakistan—as designed to keep India contained within South Asia. Beijing backing Pakistan in the latter’s wars with India in 1965 and 1971 only reinforced this concern.

Regionally and globally, China, in turn, saw India’s growing strategic and economic cooperation with Western countries to strengthen Indian capabilities as a problem. The United States was indeed seeking to enhance India’s power and influence in the region relative to China, in part for ideological reasons. The United States and its Western allies were initially invested in the idea of helping democratic India win the “race” with Soviet-backed Communist China—and after the Indian defeat in the 1962 war, in ensuring that India did not fail. Beijing felt its strategic space further constrained when, after the Sino-Soviet split, Moscow also jumped on the “strengthen India to contain China” bandwagon.

As China and India sought to expand their influence in the developing world, that became a site of contestation too. They tried to undercut each other in Africa and Southeast Asia. Beijing critiqued India’s military and economic performance and asserted that New Delhi had given up nonalignment. New Delhi, on its part, accused Beijing of violating the five principles of peaceful coexistence and nixed a second Africa-Asia summit, which China sought to convene in 1965.

Coexistence and Cooperation to Enhance Space

While this competitive phase largely persisted for the rest of the Cold War, both China and India did make occasional efforts to normalize relations in order to expand their diplomatic and decision-making space, especially vis-à-vis the superpowers. In the late 1960s, New Delhi tried unsuccessfully to stabilize relations with Beijing so it could reduce Indian dependence on Washington and Moscow. Subsequently, after the Sino-U.S. rapprochement and a deterioration in India-U.S. relations, India signed a 1971 treaty with the Soviet Union as an insurance policy against China. But then Beijing and New Delhi moved to stabilize bilateral ties. Beijing was motivated by a desire to slow or stall the deepening of Indian-Soviet ties, while New Delhi wanted to reduce its overdependence on Moscow. This led to the restoration of ambassadors in 1976, the first visit by an Indian minister to Beijing in a decade and a half in 1979, and Beijing encouraging Washington to stabilize India-U.S. ties. But India’s continued support for Vietnam, China’s support for Pakistan, and persisting differences on the border limited the prospect of a real rapprochement.⁴

Toward the end of the 1980s and in the early 1990s, there was a shift to a phase where China and India once again saw each other as useful in maintaining or expanding their own strategic space. India was facing headwinds from the Gulf War, the collapse of its Soviet partner, and a balance-of-payments crisis. China was dealing with the international fallout from its crackdown on the Tiananmen Square protests. In addition, both countries worried about a unipolar world order and desired diplomatic options and the time and space to develop economically. Moreover, they wanted to avoid another military standoff—such as the one in 1986–87—that could complicate their broader objectives.

India and China concluded that a reset of their relationship would help alleviate these concerns. Consequently, they negotiated a series of bilateral agreements to manage their boundary dispute, which in turn created the space for cooperation. The two countries established economic ties, with China seeing India as a market and investment destination and India seeing its own economy as benefiting from Chinese growth. They also began military and diplomatic dialogues, including on regional issues such as Afghanistan. China shifted from a pro-Pakistan to a more neutral role on the Kashmir dispute and also played a helpful role in defusing a crisis between India and Pakistan in 1999.⁵

Globally, India and China sought to expand their diplomatic and economic space through non-Western platforms—e.g., the Russia-India-China trilateral, BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), and eventually the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank—and via cooperation in the multilateral sphere.⁶ At the Copenhagen summit on climate change, for instance, Beijing saw New Delhi as bolstering China’s stance; at the Doha Round of the World Trade Organization negotiations, India blocking consensus drew Western flak toward New Delhi rather than Beijing. The two growing energy consumers also undertook joint projects and considered forming an Asian buyers’ cartel in order to increase their leverage vis-à-vis producers.⁷ In international forums, the two sovereignty hawks also saw each other as useful in keeping other major powers out of their domestic spaces.

Contestation Redux

By the late 2000s, China’s and India’s capabilities, interests, and areas of operation expanded—consequently, so did the canvas on which the two countries interacted. But this did not lead to greater cooperation. Instead, around 2006–9, contestation intensified, with each once side again seeing the other as impinging on its own space.

Geopolitically, Beijing looked askance at the India-U.S. civilian nuclear agreement, as well as efforts in 2007 toward the U.S.-India-Australia-Japan Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (later known as the Quad). As China’s confidence grew, along with the gap in Sino-Indian capabilities, New Delhi perceived Beijing to be more assertive vis-à-vis India and the region more broadly—particularly after the global financial crisis.⁸

With India enhancing its capabilities too—albeit at a slower pace—this was a period when both countries had a more expansive idea of their diplomatic and geographic space and “rightful place” as re-emerging powers and old civilizations. Both also had a greater desire to shape developments within and along their borders, which meant bumping up against each other much more than in the past—sometimes literally. For instance, enhanced infrastructure on first China’s and then India’s side of the border meant that both militaries could now reach spaces that were earlier inaccessible. After Xi Jinping took office, India accused China several times of using that access to try to change facts on the ground unilaterally at the Sino-Indian (2013, 2014) and Sino-Bhutanese (2017) borders, leading to military standoffs.

China’s unilateral actions to change the status quo in 2020 at various points of the disputed border in eastern Ladakh were more significant and proved to be an inflection point in Indian perceptions of Beijing’s intentions.⁹ The crisis that resulted—and continues to this day—has also had implications in the economic space. The Modi government went from seeing economic and technology ties with China as an opportunity that would help India’s capabilities and influence grow to judging them to be more of a vulnerability. This has led to policies to indigenize and to diversify economic ties with more trusted partners who are also seeking to de-risk from China.¹⁰

Assessments of Beijing’s motivations have included trying to put India in its place, retaliating for India’s ties with the United States, and consolidating control of its territorial space.¹¹ The latter concern vis-à-vis Tibet has also driven China’s border infrastructure, boundary negotiations with Indian partner Bhutan, and increased engagement with Nepal, which lies between Tibet and India. Beijing’s Xinjiang objectives have meant more involvement with Afghanistan and Pakistan. Overall, this has meant more Chinese interest in South Asia—a space traditionally dominated by India.

China’s interest in Pakistan has particularly complicated India’s objective to secure its own space. New Delhi sees Beijing as giving cover to Islamabad and Pakistan-based terrorist groups targeting India, even as Beijing has pressed Islamabad to act against those targeting Chinese interests.¹²

This has also been a period of China’s and India’s economic activities—and consequently strategic interests—expanding in each other’s traditional peripheries. The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, which India asserts violates its territorial integrity, has further expanded Sino-Pakistan economic ties. China has also increased its economic engagement with Nepal, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Maldives via the Belt and Road Initiative. Significantly, such engagement and developing defense ties with those countries have resulted in unprecedented Chinese strategic influence all across India’s immediate territorial and maritime neighborhood, making it a more contested space.¹³

With more economic interest and citizens in the Middle East and Africa, China’s interest and presence in India’s extended neighborhood has also expanded. The strengthening of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy and China’s desire to reduce its vulnerabilities—from piracy, a regional crisis, or a blockade—have meant more PLA Navy forays, as well as port development and access in the Indian Ocean region.

Both the visit of a PLA Navy submarine to Sri Lanka in 2014 and the establishment of a military base in Djibouti in 2017 sparked concern in New Delhi.¹⁴ So have the invoking of Zheng He’s historical forays into the Indian Ocean, the naming of features, and frequent visits by survey—or, as New Delhi sees them, surveillance—vessels. India’s former navy chief outlined the country’s concern: that it does not want Beijing’s South China Sea “playbook” replicated in the Indian Ocean.¹⁵ More broadly in the Indo-Pacific, India believes that it has a different organizing principle (multipolar vs. unipolar) and view of the United States’ role (resident vs. external actor) than China does.¹⁶

China, meanwhile, sees India as intruding on its regional and global space. New Delhi’s partnerships with Southeast Asian countries have expanded in quantity and quality. It has gone beyond consolidating traditional ties with Indonesia, Singapore, and Vietnam to now include defense ties with a nontraditional partner like the Philippines.¹⁷ India’s growing partnerships with Australia, Japan, and the United States—including via a revived Quad—have been of particular concern to China, which sees this as part of a U.S. encirclement strategy.¹⁸ Moreover, India is cooperating with these and other partners—e.g., European ones, the United Kingdom, and South Korea—globally as well.

The global arena has also shifted from being a cooperative to a contested space for China and India. Each is seeking to limit—if not undercut—the other’s influence in BRICS and the global South more broadly. New Delhi now sees China as trying to modify BRICS from a non-West to an anti-West grouping. It, in turn, is participating in minilaterals that are designed in part to offset Chinese advantages regionally and globally. India is also cooperating with China’s rivals to shape the leadership and agendas of multilateral institutions. Reports indicate that New Delhi has worked to block both Chinese attempts to garner endorsements for the Global Security Initiative in BRICS and to create obstacles for AUKUS at the International Atomic Energy Agency. China, on its part, has hindered Indian membership in the Nuclear Suppliers Group and the UN Security Council.¹⁹

Sino-Indian competition has returned to the ideological space as well. For instance, India has highlighted its democratic nature as a reason for it to be a trusted technology partner and a safer space for investment. Chinese commentators, in turn, highlight their country’s own model and deride the messiness of Indian democracy.²⁰ This competition is spilling over into the global South, where New Delhi is making the case that its way—for instance, on digital public infrastructure and open RAN (radio access network) in telecommunications—offers more transparency and alternatives. Moreover, contestation has returned to the spiritual realm as well, with both countries highlighting their Buddhist links.²¹

Conclusion

When thinking about China-India contestation, there is a tendency to see it as recent and narrowly focused on the two countries’ boundary dispute. However, as this essay has detailed, their rivalry is not new, though it has become more fierce. It is also broader than just their disputed border, encompassing how China and India view each other in terms of their own strategic space—as a hindrance rather than help, as a constrainer rather than an enabler. It is important to keep this in mind as the two countries try to resolve their current border crisis—that might be the beginning of a conversation, but it would not end their broader contestation.

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Tanvi Madan is a Senior Fellow in the Center for Asia Policy Studies in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C.

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IMAGE CREDITS

Banner illustration by Nate Christenson ©The National Bureau of Asian Research. Map 1 credit.

 

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