Indian Defence Review

China suffers from a superiority complex. This is not new. Genetically, it must have been there for ages, but in recent years due to the rapid economic development, the tremendous advances in the defense field (including asymmetric warfare), the awe with which Western nations look at China1 and events like the Olympic Games in Beijing, this complex has been greatly exacerbated.

The last bashing bout against India is a demonstration of the complex from which the Middle Kingdom suffers. Today, in the 21st century, Zhongnanhai’s residents2 still believe that they are the Sons of Heaven.

“¦an online poll7 conducted by huanqiu.com had “™shown that 90 percent of the participants believe India poses a big threat to China.

The People’s Daily and the Global Times, both working under the close watch of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), have recently made derogatory comments on a purely internal Indian affair, the restructuring of its defense forces in Arunachal Pradesh.

On June 11, the Global Times3 wrote: “But India can’t actually compete with China in a number of areas, like international influence, overall national power and economic scale. India apparently has not yet realized this.” The writer unabashedly continues: “India is frustrated that China’s rise has captured much of the world’s attention.”

A week later, in an editorial the Peoples’ Daily4, Li Hongmei stated: “Many Indians actually have very subtle impressions (sic) upon China, which has been translated into a very complicated mindset – awe, vexation, envy and jealousy – in the face of its giant neighbor.”

The editorialist goes onto expound his theory: “The reason for this mentality is multi-faceted, and brought about by both historical factors and reality. In 1947, when India freed itself from the British colonization and won independence, it was one of the global industrial powers, ranking Top 10 in the world and far ahead of the then backward China. But today, China’s GDP has tripled that of India and per capita income doubled, which turns out to be a totally unacceptable fact to many Indians. And with China’s galloping economic growth since its adoption of the reform and opening up policy in the late 1970s, the wealth gap between China and India has increasingly widened.”

Also read: Role of China as Pakistan’s nuclear and missile patron

While some figures might be true, one may ask, at what cost? Rampant corruption, destruction of environment, an increasingly totalitarian regime; one could also argue that in India the trains arrived on time during the Emergency and the pavements were clean, but who wants a new Emergency?

In another speech, the same General affirmed: “Marxism pointed out that violence is the midwife for the birth of the new society. Therefore war is the midwife for the birth of Chinas century.”

As often, Beijing blames the West for spoiling the Indi-Chini friendship: “Some Western powers have been inciting India to challenge China, and even insidiously convince India that China would be the ‘greatest obstacle’ threatening India’s rise. India, on the other hand, draws the Western hint trying for dear life to surpass China.”

The Pakistan angle is never omitted: “Obsessed with the crazy idea of ‘enemy’s friend being the enemy,’ India has gone out of its way to blemish the brotherly ties between China and Pakistan5, which India regards as its arch-foe, even staking out a position that Pakistan would have no courage to challenge it without the back-up of China.”6

The Global Times in the same vein wrote: “India thinks that fear and gratitude for its restraint will cause China to defer to it on territorial disputes. But this is wishful thinking, as China won’t make any compromises in its border disputes with India. And while China wishes to coexist peacefully with India, this desire isn’t born out of fear.”

A few days earlier, an online poll7 conducted by huanqiu.com8 had ’shown’ that 90 percent of the participants believe India poses a big threat to China9.

The Global Times commented: “The tension along the disputed border between the two countries has escalated in the last few days after India’s latest military move. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh claimed, despite cooperative India-China relations, his government would make no concessions to China on territorial disputes.”

The pollsters added: “About 74 percent people in the poll by huanqiu.com believed China should not maintain the friendly relations with India anymore after its military provocation. And more than 65 percent of people taking part in the poll believed India’s actions were harmful to bilateral ties and it is more harmful to India.”

Click to buy: Threat from China

This comes soon after the circulation on the Internet of a speech purportedly given by General Chi Haotian, former Minister of Defense and Vice-chairman of China’s Central Military Commission [see full text on IRD website]10. He would have said in 2005: “Hitler’s Germany had once bragged that the German race was the most superior race on earth, but the fact is, our nation is far superior to the Germans.”

A great nervousness, coupled with this age-old complex of superiority renders the situation in China extremely unstable, not to say explosive. This explains President Hu Jintaos obsession with “™stability.

That is not all: “We all know that on account of our national superiority, during the thriving and prosperous Tang Dynasty, our civilization was at the peak of the world. We were the center of the world civilization, and no other civilization in the world was comparable to ours. Later on, because of our complacency, narrow-mindedness, and the self-enclosure of our own country, we were surpassed by Western civilization, and the center of the world shifted to the West.”

He asked the audience of Chinese Generals: “Will the center of the world civilization shift back to China?”

In another speech, the same General affirmed: “Marxism pointed out that violence is the midwife for the birth of the new society. Therefore war is the midwife for the birth of China’s century.”11

This attitude is not new in China, as pointed out by General Chi himself: “According to the research conducted by most Chinese scholars, the Chinese are different from other races on earth. We did not originate in Africa. Instead, we originated independently in the land of China. Therefore, we can rightfully assert that we are the product of cultural roots of more than a million years, civilization and progress of more than ten thousand years, an ancient nation of five thousand years, and a single Chinese entity of two thousand years.”

Historically it is debatable if Tibet, Xinjiang or Inner Mongolia were parts of the Chinese ‘entity’ before the middle of the 20th century.

Condescending attitude: The Great Han Chauvinism

This condescending attitude is not reserved for Western nations or India, but is also prevalent in Beijing’s rapport with China’s ‘nationalities’12. Since the time of the Nationalist Revolution, it has been known by non-Hans in China, as the Great Han Chauvinism.

The Chinese media may poke fun of India: “Proud of its “˜advanced political system, India feels superior to China. However, it faces a disappointing domestic situation which is unstable compared with Chinas”, but the Indian democratic process is a security valve16 which does not exist in the Middle Kingdom.

Bapa Phuntsok Wangyal, the first Tibetan Communist who was instrumental in bringing the PLA into Tibet in 1950 and who, during his long years in solitary confinement studied the intricacies of Marxist theory, realized that Han Chauvinism “is one of the most serious hindrances to our nation’s current work on nationality relations.”13

He explained to several generations of Chinese leaders, including Deng Xiaoping, Zhao Zyiang and Hu Jintao that: “In socialist states, the majority nationality does not (or should not) oppress the minority nationalities. All should be equal, and there should be complete unity and cooperation among nationalities.”

His conclusion is that most of the problems faced by China today are due to the Great Han Chauvinism. According to the Chinese Constitution, the Central Government in Beijing should guarantee equality amongst nationalities14. The tension and instability in ‘ethnic’ areas is created by the fact that the reality is different.

The superior attitude of the Han leadership, whether it is towards their own ‘nationalities’ or vis-à-vis their neighbors (like India) has the same patterns: intolerance, condescension and the need to dominate others.

In a different context, Prof. Samdhong Rinpoche, the Tibetan Prime Minister, recently told us15: “The [Chinese] leadership has become very arrogant, very proud. If you compare with Mao Zedong’s or Deng Xiaoping’s period, there was then some kind of human behavior. … Today, they are proud, arrogant and they have cut themselves from the reality, from the people. It is a sign of the forthcoming fall. Look at the Mahabharata or the Ramayana, before falling down, Ravana becomes so arrogant and self-confident, it is the sign that he is soon going to fall.”

The arrogance seems to have proportionately increased with the impotence of major players in Beijing to impose their own personal views like Mao or Deng did.

The Leadership’s Nervousness

A great nervousness, coupled with this age-old complex of superiority renders the situation in China extremely unstable, not to say explosive. This explains President Hu Jintao’s obsession with ’stability’. China is fast changing, becoming more complex and ultimately an unmanageable entity. The leadership, particularly President Jintao often speaks of a ‘harmonious’ society, probably in contrast with the ‘chaos’ so much feared by the ancient Emperors. The Chinese word for ‘chaos’, ‘luan’ means the condition of a society falling into a disordered situation or an uncontrolled state. The Emperors used to lose Heaven’s Mandate to rule when ‘chaos’ prevailed.

Also read: Security threats facing India

The Chinese media may poke fun of India: “Proud of its ‘advanced political system’, India feels superior to China. However, it faces a disappointing domestic situation which is unstable compared with China’s”, but the Indian democratic process is a security valve16 which does not exist in the Middle Kingdom.

When Chi Haotian received his education, he was probably taught to listen to the leaderships in the Party and keep quiet, but it is no more the case in China.

The China Brief of the Jamestown Foundation reported in its June issue: “Widespread anger at the callousness, corruption and other misdemeanors of cadres, particularly those at the level of counties and below, is deemed a main factor behind the tens of thousands of riots and protests that occur every year. The latest such disaster, where some 10,000 peasants from Shishou town, Hubei Province clashed last week with police due to the latter’s alleged cover-up of the suspicious death of a local resident, has followed upon the heels of similar incidents in Hainan, Guizhou and Yunnan in the past year. In all these cases, law officers and other grassroots personnel offered protection to the rich and powerful instead of helping citizens who were victimized by corrupt cadres or triad elements.17″ Countless cases like the above are reported by the local media every year.

However, while an authoritarian regime facilitates faster building of roads, airports or new cities, a one-Party system undermines the State in many other fields. One of these is long-term stability, which has serious military and strategic implications.

The Importance of Democracy for a Stable State

It is ironic that the secret journal of the former Premier, Zhao Ziyang who was demoted after the 1989 democracy protests on Tiananmen Square is titled ‘Prisoner of the State‘. A Premier, prisoner of his own State18!

Zhao Ziyang’s biography published on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the student’s massacre, explains why China is so unstable. By the end of the book, Zhao praises the parliamentary democracy system as the only way for China to solve its problems of corruption and the growing gap between the rich and the poor (and one could add the frequent ‘people’s’ riots).

Click to buy: Threat from China

For decades, ‘upholding social stability’ has been the core concern of the CCP. For China today, there is no reason to look at its southern neighbor in a patronizing way: India’s example proves that a multi-party rule (even if there are far too many) ultimately makes a State steadier.

Instability at the Borders

A case in point is Tibet, which 60 years after its ‘liberation’ is still under undeclared martial law. For Beijing, Tibet is a strategically important region as it is the physical base (with Xinjiang) for any land or missile attack against India.

Chinas younger generation is fast changing. The Internet and other modern communication means (text messages, blogs, etc.) have accelerated the process of change.

The riots which erupted in spring 2008 at different places on the Tibetan plateau demonstrate the precariousness of the Chinese defense preparedness. The leadership in Beijing, due to the one-party political system, seems unable to cope with the situation.

In March/April 2008, the Party immediately blamed the ‘Dalai Lama and his clique’ for the unrest. The morning after the first riot, a government official in Lhasa told Xinhua that there was enough evidence to prove that the events in Lhasa were “organized, premeditated and masterminded by the Dalai clique”. This has remained the official version of the two-month turmoil on the Tibetan plateau.

When the Dalai Lama dared to state that resentment was the main cause for the violent happenings, he was accused by Zhang Qingli, the Party Boss in Lhasa: “Those who do not love the motherland are not qualified to be human beings”. Shifting the blame on others has been an old practice of the Party’s apparatchiks.

Another factor concurs to make the present regime more unstable: China’s younger generation is fast changing. The Internet and other modern communication means (text messages, blogs, etc.) have accelerated the process of change. Despite the number of restrictions imposed by the State19, news has never circulated so fast and wide in the Kingdom.

An eye-opener

In this context, a report20 prepared by a Chinese think-tank, Beijing Gongmeng Consulting on the 2008 riots in Tibet is an eye-opener. It entirely contradicts the Party’s official version. The authors, Li Kun, Huang Li, Li Xiang and Wang Hongzhe are lawyers “committed to building a modernized China and promoting human rights, democracy, and rule of law in China.21″

Also read: China-Pak spy web in Northeast

Their research team spent one month in Tibet “interviewing Tibetan monks, nomads, farmers, scholars, migrants, artists, and business people”. Their objective was to come into personal contact with voices which can give “a clear and objective outline of ordinary people’s living conditions in Tibetan areas.”

When the Dalai Lama dared to state that resentment was the main cause for the violent happenings, he was accused by Zhang Qingli, the Party Boss in Lhasa: “Those who do not love the motherland are not qualified to be human beings”. Shifting the blame on others has been an old practice of the Partys apparatchiks.

The lawyers first point out “major errors in government policy” after March-April 2008 protests. One was ‘over-propagandizing of violence’; another, encouragement of racist sentiment towards Tibetans: “The excessive response of government all over Tibet was to regard every tree and blade of grass as a potential enemy soldier.”

According to them, this further strained the relations between the local Tibetans and the Han migrants: “The fascination that Han citizens have expressed toward Tibetan culture changed to fear and hatred of the Tibetan masses, and Tibetans were rendered as a people incapable of gratitude.”22

One of their conclusions is: “Understanding is a pre-condition for discussion, unity and development. If the promotion of healthy development in Tibetan areas is truly desired then there must be a change in thinking and an adjustment in thinking behind the current nationality theories and policies.”

‘Stability in ethnic areas’ has for a long time been central to the Central Government policies. The leadership in Beijing (and perhaps even more the PLA) understands the importance of stability to ‘defend China’s borders’. Soon after the Tiananmen massacre, in October 1989, the “Summary of the Central Politburo Standing Committee’s Forum on Tibet Work” already pointed out two main issues ‘to firmly grasp the Tibet work’: stability of the political situation and economic development. Since then the dual mantra has been constantly repeated, though ’stability’ has never been achieved. The Lawyers’ report has tried to find out why.

Tibet’s safety is the entire country’s safety

During the 11th Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) held in early March 2008 in Beijing23, President Hu Jintao met a few ‘Tibetan’ delegates and told them: “Tibet’s stability has to do with the entire country’s stability, Tibet’s safety has to do with the entire country’s safety.”

In a recent interview, Prof Samdhong Rinpoche told that some 500 reports, articles, websites, etc criticizing the Chinese government have come to the notice of his Administration. These reports circulate freely in China. It is truly a sign of change (or at least an increase in the “˜chaos).

According to the Lawyers’ Report, one of the issues which makes Tibet (and China) so unstable is the emergence of a new aristocracy. The Chinese Revolution is supposed to have wiped out the old aristocracy and emancipated the masses. However, the Report found that in Tibet, the difficult terrain has created “locally fixed power networks, which inevitably lead to a high incidence of corruption and dereliction of duty.” For the Chinese lawyers, this new aristocracy, which is ‘legitimized by the Party’, is even more powerful than the old one.

The Report analyses in detail the rapport between the new aristocracy and the masses: “there is a lack of any effective supervision over the local officials. …’Foreign forces’ and ‘Tibet independence’ are used by many local officials as fig leaves to conceal their mistakes in governance and to repress social discontent …elevating everything to the level of splittist forces in order to conceal their errors.”

The final conclusions are not far from the Tibetan Diaspora’s views: “Earnestly listen to the voices of ordinary Tibetans and on the basis of respecting and protecting each of the Tibetan people’s rights and interests”.

Regarding ’stability’, the Lawyers’ conclusions are lucid: “Due to the special nature of the political environment in Tibetan areas, ’stability’ in the state’s Tibet policies has special significance. The Center considers that, ‘If there is not a stable social environment, then all talk of development is empty’. Even though ‘development and stability’ are the two trains of thought for government work in ethnic areas, in the actual exercise of power, ’stability’ takes on an overwhelming importance.”

The problem, according to the Report, is that “there are many people who have learned how to use stability to protect themselves”.

This Report arrives at similar conclusions than the 70,000 character petition sent by the previous Panchen Lama to Premier Zhou Enlai in 1962, for which the former spent 17 years in jail.

The CCP General Secretary Hu Yaobang had also presented a report in the same vein after a visit to Lhasa in May 1980. He was soon removed from the political scene, though his disciple, Zhao Zyiang continued as Premier till the Tiananmen events.

In a recent interview, Prof Samdhong Rinpoche told us that some 500 reports, articles, websites, etc criticizing the Chinese government have come to the notice of his Administration. These reports circulate freely in China. It is truly a sign of change (or at least an increase in the ‘chaos’).

Red and Experts?

Interestingly a few months back, the CCP Organization Department (CCPOD) launched an unprecedented large-scale campaign to ‘re-train’ grassroots-level personnel ranging from civil servants to police officers and judges. The objective is to prepare a new generation of Party cadres who will be ‘red and expert’. In Communist jargon, it means that they will be taught to be politically correct, morally honest and professionally competent. Unfortunately, ‘redness’ will continue to prevail over ‘expertise’ and the discontentment of the masses (whether in Tibet or in the main land) will keep increasing, rendering the system more and more instable and ‘chaotic’. But it is a catch 22 situation for the leadership.24

Also read: China’s threat perception

Recently, President Hu Jintao has begun the process to select the Sixth Generation of leaders who will lead China after a decade or so. Strangely they all, like him, belong to the Chinese Youth League (the Party School). In other words, all Red!

The new aristocracy will surely be well equipped to suppress the aspirations of the different nationalities and quell dissident voices, unless the Middle Kingdom, without the safety valve called democracy, implodes under its own contradictions.

In the meantime, the PLA and the old Generals like Chi Haotian will keep advocating an ever harder line. The recent bashing bout against India is part of this scenario. It is probable that they will keep lashing out at India and other neighbors who refuse to toe their line of thought. But this latent instability is the Achilles’ heel of the Middle Kingdom.

Notes

1. Already Napoleon, one of greatest military strategists of all time, had prophesized: “When China awakes, the world will tremble”. He knew the propensity of the Chinese to dominate other nations and people.
2. Zhongnanhai is a residential and office complex in Beijing, adjacent to the Forbidden City. The top leadership of the Party resides inside this compound.
3. The Global Times editorial, June 11, 2009, see http://opinion.globaltimes.cn/editorial/2009-06/436174.html
4. The People’s Daily, Veiled threat or good neighbor? June 19, 2009 see: http://english.peopledaily. com.cn/90002/96417/6682302.html
5. Just a few years after Pakistan was created, on the occasion of the establishment of the diplomatic ties between China and Pakistan, Chairman Mao spoke of the millennia-old friendship between the two nations! Mao usually had a better sense of history.
6. Several recent articles tend to prove that India is right to wary about the Islamabad-Beijing axis. See for example Deepening Naval Cooperation between Islamabad and Beijing, China Brief, Volume: 9 Issue: 13, June 24, 2009 by Itamar Lee. Available at: http://www.jamestown.org/programs/chinabrief/single/?tx_ttnews[tt_news] =35173&tx_ttnews[backPid]=25&cHash=a99c92ed79.
7. These polls mean nothing in China, except to pass a message from the Chinese Government to the Indian public and politicians.
8. The poll was probably ordered by the Party, as part of their plans to intimidate India.
9. This was after India announced it would dispatch additional troops to Arunachal Pradesh.
10.  See: https://www.indiandefencereview.com/spotlights/is-nazi-china-emerging/
11. Let us not forget that this individual was Defense Minister of China till 2003. It is difficult to imagine a former Indian Defense Minister speaking this language. When George Fernandes dared to say that China was perhaps Threat No 1 for India, the media began immediately to scream and the opposition asked for his resignation.
12. After all, China built the Great Wall to protect itself against the ‘barbarians’ from outside. This included ‘nationalities’ like the Tibetans, Uyghurs, etc.
13. Baba Phuntsok Wangyal, Witness to Tibet’s History, (New Delhi, Paljor Publication, 2007). It contains three letters written by the author to President Hu Jintao.
14. For example by not imposing the Chinese language over a ‘nationality language’ such as Tibetan.
15. See Interview at http://sify.com/news/imagegallery/galleryDetail.php?id=jgyaKPdjjfd &title=China_s_change_is_for_good_Tibetan_PM.
16. In spite of its own aberrations, like leaders installing statues of themselves, or shifting from one party to another with every monsoon.
17. China Brief, Volume: 9 Issue: 13, June 24, 2009.
18. In China, the State and the Party are one and the same thing.
19.  Such as banning search engines or filtering websites, blogs and personal mail.
20. Translation of the report is available at http://www.savetibet.org/media-center/ict-news-reports/bold-report-beijing-scholars-reveals-breakdown-china%E2%80%99s-tibet-policy.
21.  Several members of this think-tank attended the prestigious Beijing University Law School.
22. Note a similarity in the relation with India: there is a fascination for the Indian system of governance and at the same time, Beijing bitterly complains about the lack of gratitude from India towards the Great Han nation.
23. A few days before the beginning of the riots in Tibet.
24. The last-minute decision to postpone the controversial filtering software on computers sold in China is one of the many examples of the dichotomy in which the Chinese leaders are caught and in one way of the ‘chaos’.