Articles By Claude Arpi
As Tibet becomes Xizang, Delhi faces a new concern
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 25 Nov , 2023
US President Joe Biden greets China’s President President Xi Jinping at the Filoli Estate in Woodside, California, on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperative conference. (AP) The...
To Integrate Border Areas, Devise a New Philosophy
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Net Edition | Date: 05 Nov , 2023
French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau had once said: “Nothing is so gentle as man in his primitive state, when placed by nature at an equal distance from the stupidity of brutes and the fatal...
Why New Delhi should worry about instability in China's PLA ranks
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 02 Nov , 2023
New commanders may be inclined to please the Emperor in order to consolidate their position in the hierarchy and therefore take a more belligerent stance towards Taiwan and India. The planet is in...
Revisiting 1962
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 09 Sep , 2023
A recent visit in the forward areas of the Tawang sector opened my eyes wider. Though I have been studying different aspects of the 1962 border war with China for years, it is only by seeing the...
Son, roll down this nalla
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 26 Jul , 2023
On the occasion of the Kargil Vijay Day, Claude Arpi’s interview with Param Vir Chakra, Yogender Singh Yadav. Yogender Singh Yadav survived 15 bullets while capturing Tiger Hill in the Kargil War...
How Indo-French ties have evolved into an epitome of strategic, economic and...
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 14 Jul , 2023
This year, France and India are celebrating 25 years of their strategic partnership. The visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi as the chief guest for the parade on the French National Day...
The Barahoti saga: Failure of 'Nehru doctrine' and deceitful nature of Dragon
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 22 Jun , 2023
The Hindu recently reported that new posts of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) had sprung up some six-seven kilometres north of the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Middle Sector on the...
China in suspense as Xi, 70, has junked succession plan
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Courtesy: http://claudearpi.blogspot.in/ | Date: 17 Jun , 2023
After Xi Jinping was given a third five-year term as China’s president in March 2023, AP News commented that he was “on track to stay in power for life at a time of severe economic challenges...
What lies behind China’s new role as ‘peacemaker’
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 13 Jun , 2023
China has become a peacemaker, or at least would like to project itself as the world’s new ‘peacemaker’; we have seen it in the Middle East (between Saudi Arabia and Iran), we witness it now...
The US primarily looks after its own interests: Can Washington be a good ally?
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 22 May , 2023
A question has been going around in the strategic circles in the recent weeks: should India enter into a military alliance with the US and will the US be a good ally? Quoting several experts, The...
Digging the Tank Dens
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 03 May , 2023
In the recent times, the Chinese social media has been agog with ‘tank dens’ being built by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in Tibet; one article speaks of “fully underground design, to...
The Political Importance of the Reincarnations
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 13 Apr , 2023
‘Reincarnation’ is the fascinating topic for the media for several reasons, the main one being that it has a mystic aura, at a time when we live in a world where everything is...
The Importance of Pangchen
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Courtesy: http://claudearpi.blogspot.in/ | Date: 10 Apr , 2023
China has recently renamed 11 places in Arunachal Pradesh. The first-named is Pangchen; it is an important location, mainly because the border in this sector partly depends on the traditional...
Should China's Arunachal Name Changes Worry India?
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 07 Apr , 2023
China has done it again. China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs has standardized the names of 11 places in Zangnan, a new name for Southern Tibet – ‘Zangnan’ is an abbreviation of (Xi)Zang = Tibet,...
China is preparing the Dalai Lama’s succession
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 14 Mar , 2023
China is at it again: “Recognition of new Dalai Lama must be conducted in China”, asserted an article in The Global Times on February 22. The mouthpiece of the Communist Party explained that...
LAC vs IB: Why India's assessment of the length of Border along China is...
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 22 Feb , 2023
What is the length of India’s border with China? You may think that it is easy to answer this question, but unfortunately, it is not. The Ministry of Home Affairs states: “India has 15,106.7...
Why clear demarcation of LAC is a prerequisite to ensure India and China...
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 23 Dec , 2022
It is important to understand how the northern border of India has been delineated. From the end of the 19th century, the main factor for fixing a boundary in the Himalaya, in particular with...
Indianness of Arunachal is not to be proven to anyone: Pema Khandu
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Courtesy: http://claudearpi.blogspot.in/ | Date: 15 Dec , 2022
This is the second part of my interview with Pema Khandu, the Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh, Indianness of Arunachal is not to be proven to anyone. ‘Our love for our great nation — Bharat is...
Changing Ladakh
By: Claude Arpi | Date: 22 Nov , 2022
I still remember my first visit in 2002. There were hardly any roads outside Leh and the approach from Manali in Himachal Pradesh or Zoji-la in Jammu and Kashmir was not an easy one; only a few...
The Heroes Who Saved Ladakh For India
By: Claude Arpi | Issue: Net Edition | Date: 18 Nov , 2022
Several years ago, I had the opportunity to interview one of the most renowned Indian mountaineers, who had chosen to live like local folks in the Himalaya. She recounted an anecdote which took...