<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Craven response to Chinese thrust</b>
Swapan Dasgupta ( Pioneer )
A contribution of the "great, glorious and correct Communist Party of China" to Marxism-Leninism was the elevation of self-flagellation into an instrument of mass politics. The use of grovelling self-confessions to expose "conspiracies" had begun in the Soviet Union with the inquisition of the 1930s. But whereas Stalin was content tormenting rivals and free-thinking apparatchiks, the Chinese comrades turned self-criticism into a mass parody.
During the Cultural Revolution, hysterical Red Guards dragged symbols of the old order through the streets, forcing them to confess the error of their ways. The assumption, wrote historian Robert Service in Comrades (Macmillan, 2007), "was that if you had been arrested, you must be guilty and must therefore confess to your crime and reform your thought. To protest your innocence only confirmed your depravity and earned more severe punishment... In extreme cases, a defendant would be forced to confess before kneeling down and receiving a bullet in the back of the head."Â Â
Four decades after the Cultural Revolution, China has allegedly turned a new leaf. Yet, the suspicion persists that the technique of self-criticism has actually been further refined and turned into an effective instrument of foreign policy. What else can explain Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's craven obsequiousness towards Chinese President Hu Jintao when they met on the sidelines of the G-8 summit in Germany last Thursday?
In normal circumstances, Manmohan's claim to "speak for all people regardless of their political affiliation" in describing China as our "greatest neighbour" would have been construed as part of the hyperbolic tripe that some people mistakenly equate with diplomacy. Yet, this gush-gush flattery - which, incidentally, was not reciprocated by the Chinese side - happened within a week of Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi telling his Indian counterpart that China felt no longer bound by its earlier commitment to not disturb "settled areas" while pursuing its claims along the MacMahon Line.
In plain language, China has informed India that it was now reviving its claim on the whole of Arunachal Pradesh, including the Tawang monastery town and not merely tracts of uninhabited grazing lands along the Line of Actual Control. Read with the assertion by a BJP MP from Arunachal Pradesh that Chinese incursion into Arunachal has assumed alarming proportions and the denial of Chinese visas to Indians from Arunachal, it suggests that Beijing's India policy is now marked by a new aggressiveness.
The normal way of dealing with Chinese bellicosity is a blend of firmness and frostiness. Yet, for reasons that have as much to do with the imperatives of coalition politics as with the compromised Sinophilia of our own diplomatic establishment, India pretends that the Chinese border threat does not exist.
The Government, for example, chose to suppress the news of China's decision to abjure a bilateral agreement on conflict resolution. Second, the Prime Minister didn't raise the denial of Chinese visas to visitors from Arunachal in his talks with Hu. And finally, Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon - who is rapidly acquiring the reputation of becoming the foremost practitioner of Neville Chamberlain's appeasement legacy - declared pompously that Sino-Indian relations have evolved into more than a "single-point relationship". Cut out the verbiage and it means that while the People's Liberation Army pursues its "forward policy" along the border, fellow Stephanian Mani Shankar Aiyar will be hosting a kabaddi game in the Forbidden City.
The Red Guards of yore with their silly little Red Books couldn't have done it better. You kick our butt and we promise enduring friendship!
For China, things have never looked more promising. The present Government of India, it has by now concluded, is anatomically deficient. It will endure snubs, rebuffs and humiliation without demur. And just in case the nationalist worm turns, there is always the option of leveraging the strategic clout of the political party which now resembles a fully-owned subsidiary of the Chinese Communist Party.
<b>At this rate, we shouldn't be surprised if the Prime Minister suddenly proclaims that his heart goes out to the people of Arunachal. It would be a fittingly Nehruvian gesture.</b><!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Swapan Dasgupta ( Pioneer )
A contribution of the "great, glorious and correct Communist Party of China" to Marxism-Leninism was the elevation of self-flagellation into an instrument of mass politics. The use of grovelling self-confessions to expose "conspiracies" had begun in the Soviet Union with the inquisition of the 1930s. But whereas Stalin was content tormenting rivals and free-thinking apparatchiks, the Chinese comrades turned self-criticism into a mass parody.
During the Cultural Revolution, hysterical Red Guards dragged symbols of the old order through the streets, forcing them to confess the error of their ways. The assumption, wrote historian Robert Service in Comrades (Macmillan, 2007), "was that if you had been arrested, you must be guilty and must therefore confess to your crime and reform your thought. To protest your innocence only confirmed your depravity and earned more severe punishment... In extreme cases, a defendant would be forced to confess before kneeling down and receiving a bullet in the back of the head."Â Â
Four decades after the Cultural Revolution, China has allegedly turned a new leaf. Yet, the suspicion persists that the technique of self-criticism has actually been further refined and turned into an effective instrument of foreign policy. What else can explain Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's craven obsequiousness towards Chinese President Hu Jintao when they met on the sidelines of the G-8 summit in Germany last Thursday?
In normal circumstances, Manmohan's claim to "speak for all people regardless of their political affiliation" in describing China as our "greatest neighbour" would have been construed as part of the hyperbolic tripe that some people mistakenly equate with diplomacy. Yet, this gush-gush flattery - which, incidentally, was not reciprocated by the Chinese side - happened within a week of Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi telling his Indian counterpart that China felt no longer bound by its earlier commitment to not disturb "settled areas" while pursuing its claims along the MacMahon Line.
In plain language, China has informed India that it was now reviving its claim on the whole of Arunachal Pradesh, including the Tawang monastery town and not merely tracts of uninhabited grazing lands along the Line of Actual Control. Read with the assertion by a BJP MP from Arunachal Pradesh that Chinese incursion into Arunachal has assumed alarming proportions and the denial of Chinese visas to Indians from Arunachal, it suggests that Beijing's India policy is now marked by a new aggressiveness.
The normal way of dealing with Chinese bellicosity is a blend of firmness and frostiness. Yet, for reasons that have as much to do with the imperatives of coalition politics as with the compromised Sinophilia of our own diplomatic establishment, India pretends that the Chinese border threat does not exist.
The Government, for example, chose to suppress the news of China's decision to abjure a bilateral agreement on conflict resolution. Second, the Prime Minister didn't raise the denial of Chinese visas to visitors from Arunachal in his talks with Hu. And finally, Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon - who is rapidly acquiring the reputation of becoming the foremost practitioner of Neville Chamberlain's appeasement legacy - declared pompously that Sino-Indian relations have evolved into more than a "single-point relationship". Cut out the verbiage and it means that while the People's Liberation Army pursues its "forward policy" along the border, fellow Stephanian Mani Shankar Aiyar will be hosting a kabaddi game in the Forbidden City.
The Red Guards of yore with their silly little Red Books couldn't have done it better. You kick our butt and we promise enduring friendship!
For China, things have never looked more promising. The present Government of India, it has by now concluded, is anatomically deficient. It will endure snubs, rebuffs and humiliation without demur. And just in case the nationalist worm turns, there is always the option of leveraging the strategic clout of the political party which now resembles a fully-owned subsidiary of the Chinese Communist Party.
<b>At this rate, we shouldn't be surprised if the Prime Minister suddenly proclaims that his heart goes out to the people of Arunachal. It would be a fittingly Nehruvian gesture.</b><!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->