What is the desirable state in the India-China relationship? If the Indian strategic community can start thinking about that, then perhaps they can start to think about how to get there.
“We try to talk about what the nature of the challenges and along with that, what the nature of opportunities that are because of China’s rise,” said China scholar Manoj Kewalramani, who heads the Geo-strategy programme at the Takshashila Institution. “Then we come to what is the desirable state that we think the India-China relationship should aspire to?
He was a guest on The Gist along with his colleague and PLA specialist Anushka Saxena. They were talking about their book, Taming The Dragon: A Manifesto For A New Modus Vivendi With China.
“It’s time that India starts thinking about what is the nature of the relationship that we should have with China, what is our desirable end state given the changes that have taken place, and how should we try to get to that desirable end state?, he said.”
From her background on studying the PLA, Anushka Saxena pointed out that “The goal is to not just look at Chinese military capabilities or its security architecture from a very passive point of view of what India has to respond to.
“But rather to actively think about Indian institutional capacity, India’s approach to say, a very real prospect and challenge, which is, let’s say, a two front conundrum and then put Indian capabilities in and give them a reality check.”
They believe that China’s substantial edge over India stems from the structural approach of the Chinese system to long term planning and long term thinking and while everything does not go according to plan, there is an outlying vision of what the goal is. This is in sharp contrast with India where “fire fighting” is the norm.
Tune in for more in this conversation with Manoj Kewalramani and Anushka Saxena of the Takshashila Institution.
