Chinese rubber stamps

What do you need to do in order to win Pakistan if you are not India? Easy. Just antagonize India and Pakistan government will bend over backwards to lick your boot. That is precisely how Pakistan behaves with China.

So when Pakistan toed the Chinese whip of not attending Liu Xiaobo's Nobel ceremony I was not surprised. This whip or bullying also showed the countries who quake at the prospect of differing with China. Below is my take on some of these countries:

Russia: A lot has been said about their own human rights record in west. It is quite natural for them to side with China. Who knows, a dissident from their country may be next Nobel laureate.

Pakistan: If you remember a highly tragic and unfortunate train accident happened in Pakistan few years ago. Three trains were involved and the loss of lives was immense. There were reports that one reason for high death toll was the quality of coaches which were purchased from China. Pakistan didn't even register a protest let alone ask for compensation. The rulers of Pakistan (read military) are so wretched that to keep themselves in power they don't hesitate to risk their own people's lives. What these leeches ensure is that they not only keep Pakistan poor but also hamper India's growth.

Saudi Arabia: Representative of greater evil pervading the pure land of Arabia. The land which disseminated so much knowledge in medieval times has now got bunch of clowns ruling it. The kings and their families, all short on IQ run their writ on unfortunate populace. If there is one thing on which I support Osama Bin Laden, it is his wish to get Saudi rid of its king. All the vices are committed by ruling families but they are the ones who preach morality most. They openly criticize Israel but have never taken a sensible step in resolving the conflict. The Wikileaks have now exposed their ambivalent policy on Iran. The moral science classes always warn about the demerits of wealth acquired without effort. Saudi is a good example of it.

The Game of Nations

The 60th anniversary of 'democracy', as the communists will have us to believe, was celebrated with much fervor and show of strength. China is rising as a world power and its GDP is expected to overtake that of the US in coming decades. They have ambition to be a superpower. And when your aspirations that pretty high, you don't want your neighbor to be as strong as you or even able to challenge you. That is where the India-China problem begins.

Tensions have heightened courtesy some 'incursions' and some really stupid statements in media on both sides. Add to it the statements made by chiefs of armed forces of India. These have combined to induce paranoia in minds of those who are concerned about India's hawkish neighbor. After going through a lot of articles related to this subject written by experts in defence and diplomacy I have found one thing common to all of them. They all acknowledge the superiority of armed forces of China but add that China wont attack India if sanity prevails over them. Considering that there is so much at stake (in terms of economy) and India of 2009 is much different from India in 1962 (even if fusion was fizzle fission is sufficient to be deterrent). China may have advantage as far as military might is concerned but the difference between military strengths of the two nations is not so much as to decimate India and lave China with minor scars. As one article puts it, "China of today is not the Maoist country that argued that power grew out of the barrel of a gun and that even if 300 million Chinese perished in a nuclear war 300 million would survive to build a glorious civilisation. Times have changed since the ideology of countryside surrounding the cities was advanced during the Cultural Revolution". However, India needs to increase its defence budget in order to match China's strength. This would act as deterrent and also remind China that we are not cowed down by its vacuous threats. Also, we should try to address our economic problems and combine together to achieve double digit growth in coming decade. On diplomatic fronts we should take up the border dispute issues with Chinese government. If Vietnam can stand up to them why can't India? Again quoting from the article, "There can be firmness in dealing with the LoAC or other issues where there are attempts at exploiting unequal advantages in situations. India has arrived at a stage in international politics when it has to demonstrate maturity in playing the game of nations".