Territorial disputes, the role of leaders and the impact of Quad: a triangular explanation of China-India border escalations

Abstract

This article provides a triangular explanation of the recent surge in China-Indian border escalations. It argues that although escalations stemmed from the disputed borders (the first factor), two additional factors, the policies of new nationalist leaders Xi and Modi and the impact of international politics with the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) as a case study, also triggered them. In the preceding decades, these three factors were not operational simultaneously. A grand push of events connected them in a way that developments on one side affected the other two. The article explained the linkages between different factors and subfactors and their reinforcing interplay. The ill-defined boundary provided a foundation for the conflict. The assertive policies of Xi and Modi provoked the rivalry in five ways: competition for influence, status, militarisation, changes in the line of actual control (LAC), and invocation of the Quad. The article then elaborated India’s unrivalled strategic advantages in balancing China and how the ‘China factor’ strengthened India’s ties with the US, Japan and Australia bilaterally and under the Quad. The contemporary Sino-Indian rivalry has expanded beyond disputed borders. Domestic and international politics have started influencing it, making it Asia’s foremost geopolitical challenge.