For the first time in 75 years, an American President has expressed willingness to heal rather than sour relations between China and India. In a joint news conference with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on February 13, President Donald Trump said that his government was ready to offer assistance to mend relations between India and China.
New Delhi has chosen to dismiss Trump’s offer, declaring that India will deal with such issues through a “bilateral approach”. Even the media has disregarded the offer in favour of issues such as F-35 stealth fighters, tariffs, Tahawwur Rana’s extradition, etc.
While pursuing a bilateral approach is legitimate, Indian mandarins often forget that the India-China dispute originated in the Cold War politics fostered by the United States. India and China had a cordial relationship in the 1950s, though both nations felt the need to settle differences in their boundary maps. The drift occurred during the Cold War when the US took exception to India’s non-alignment policy, Nehru’s rhetoric of Asian unity, and his soft spot for China. The Panchsheel Agreement of 1954 infuriated the Americans. Nehru refused to be dragged into the US-China conflict in Korea, and the United States waited for the opportunity to foment a China-India rift.
While the border dispute remained open, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) quickly stoked the flames by inciting a rebellion in Lhasa in March 1951. China’s military forays into Tibet didn’t concern Nehru, for he didn’t think Tibet was legitimately independent. India only sought an autonomous status there to reduce China’s military presence, protect India’s commercial interests, and thwart any Tibetan irredentist aspirations to the Himalayas.
In any case, the Dalai Lama’s government had already signed the Seventeen Point Agreement with China on May 23, 1951, affirming Chinese sovereignty over Tibet. India liberated Tawang in February 1951. Neither China’s annexation of Tibet nor India’s action in Tawang impacted ties. Instead, the two countries started concluding a peace deal in 1953.
Tibet’s reassertion of independence in the 1950s was linked to its desire to have the 1914 Simla Treaty nullified through Britain or India. They never ratified it because China never accepted the McMahon line. Nehru sternly rebuffed the ploy and told the Dalai Lama in 1956 to return home and cooperate with China.
The groundwork for trouble was laid in the early 1950s when US Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, approved a verbal message sent in August 1951, asking that the Dalai Lama avoid Communist control and denounce the Seventeen Point agreement. The US support was contingent on Dalai Lama’s public disavowal of the agreements under “duress”.
President Eisenhower meanwhile authorised the CIA to train Tibetan guerillas at Camp Hale in Colorado before parachuting them into Tibet under the ST Circus programme. The Chinese army outnumbered them. A May 2007 CIA/RSS DD/I Staff Study provides declassified details.
The Dalai Lama’s asylum put India in an awkward situation. Tensions arose after he was officially welcomed in March 1959. China charged that Nehru’s administration covertly supported CIA operatives and sowed the seeds of war. Nehru was unaware that Kalimpong had been turned into a den of spies. Even though the CIA abandoned the Tibetan guerrillas after 1972, Indian involvement in the clandestine operations had a long-lasting effect on Sino-India relationship.
The deep state had laid the field guide in the 1950s when it started funding the Congress for Cultural Freedom (CCF) to propagate the Western Cold War narrative in India. It managed to entice a wide section of prominent Indians to machinate a divergent ideology and persuade Nehru to embrace the idea of “Chinese danger”.
Despite Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev’s advice to engage in negotiations, fiery public speeches invoked the rhetoric of Indian invincibility. Nehru became “captive” to domestic hysteria and was forced to renounce friendship with China. He chose a “forward policy” instead, and by sending ill-equipped soldiers on border patrol, China humiliatingly beat us in 1962.
If the idea was to resolve the boundary dispute, the Dalai Lama’s escape meant Beijing denied the option and America never let it happen. The CIA assessment suggests the US casting its lot singularly on the Dalai Lama for a sustained period altered the India-China game, though without resolving the Tibet issue.
Although the 1962 battle was short-lived, China emerged victorious, India refrained from making a formal settlement and left the boundary dispute “theoretically unresolved”. Beijing referred to the border with India as an “imperialist fabrication” following the CIA’s Tibet operation, even though it settled the line with Burma using the McMahon Line principles. It also accused India of “meddling” and aiding “Tibetan separatists” while India accused China of aggression. For decades, the Tibetan people suffered the repercussions.
In this way, the CIA achieved its objective of pitting India and China against one another. There are numerous accounts on the subject, most of which focus on Nehru’s blunder, China’s betrayal, Mao’s love of using force, etc. However, little is known about how the deep state weaponised the Tibetans to incite insurrection during the East-West conflict, and they continue to do so today.
The 33-day war irreversibly split China and India against one another, destroying over 3,000 years of deeply ingrained civilisational links between the two countries. There have been wide-ranging repercussions, with both sides using alliances and proxies to restrain one another. China counters India’s proxy Dalai Lama game by supporting Pakistan. The US factor still weighs in on the India-China rivalry, without comprehending what the two sides want or need. As he brings about a major shakeup in the geopolitical arena, President Trump’s willingness to alter the rules, if only by reducing the scope of the deep state, is an interesting departure.
The writer is a specialist in defence and security
