'Indian subcontinent crucial to China's defence strategy'

The Indian subcontinent and Myanmar will always be the highest priority of China in its preparation for the "ultimate confrontation" with the West.

China's firm commitment to communism and its growing economic prowess will have a decisive influence on the region and the country will concentrate on the subcontinent either for forming regional defence blocs or exerting a strong influence on the West.

"Undoubtedly, along the Pacific rim, China has already emerged as an undisputed superpower," says Group Captain (Retd) M Kamaluddin of the Bangladesh Air Force in his latest book 100 F-16s And Agni: The Balance Of Poverty. The book's been published in India.

However, sale of missiles along with sensitive military technology to the underdeveloped countries, including Pakistan, by China, will certainly make it ''unfriendly'' for the nations adversely affected, the author says while stressing that only a proper appreciation of issues of national security in countries of South Asia could contribute towards reduction in defence expenditures.

The substantial ''peace dividend'', thus accrued, could be applied towards developmental goals to declare a war on poverty, plaguing these countries.

Calling for re-orientation of the defence policy to improve the quality of life of ordinary citizens, Kamaluddin refers to Pakistan, saying the issue of ''national security versus need versus cost versus affordability'' had never been subjected to scrutiny by the nation except by the professionals who ''gleefully expanded their empires with no hope in sight of ever solving the problems for which they have been milking the country dry''.

Besides devoting a detailed chapter to China and how a meaningful relationship between the Asian giant and the countries of Asia is imperative for Asian and global peace, the book deals with arms race in South Asia, which only accentuates poverty, and the cataclysmic disintegration of the Soviet Union.

Following the global change in the balance of power after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the author suggests, if India and Pakistan could set goals for removing obstacles impeding their social and economic progress, it would make the subcontinent the third important decision making centre after the United States and western Europe.

Delving into history, he says it had been a Chinese obsession to try to isolate India and alienate its neighbours against it. The benefit of China's 1962 attack on India was the gain of Pakistan as a ''dependable friend'' in the region and ''without even thinking, Pakistan leapt right into China's overstretched arms'', he feels.

On March 2, 1963, then Pakistani Foreign Minister Z A Bhutto and his Chinese counterpart Chen Yi signed a hurriedly executed border pact in Peking under which Pakistan was given 1,350 square miles while China retained 2,050 square miles on a portion of land which is an integral part of Kashmir, Kamaluddin says.

Listing the strategic advantages accruing to China from the deal, he says it thwarted the possibility of a solution to the Kashmir issue between India and Pakistan as ''any solution will require dissolution of the agreement which China will not allow Pakistan to do''. Besides, the pact allowed China to secure and extend the Sinkiang-Gartok Road across the Northeast Aksai Chin Bulge and have a permanent foothold in the strategically important region. ''It also injected a heavy dose of lasting poison in Indo-Pak relations.''

''China's major and vital point of strategic focus will always be in central Asia, especially on both the flanks of the Aksai Chin Bulge. Hence Chinese help anywhere in the region must be observed and evaluated carefully, more so by the recipient country,'' the book says.

The entire western, southwestern and southern China being a chain of rugged mountains, the Chinese army in this terrain will always feel at home in offence as well as in defence.

China is alarmed at the possible withdrawal of the United States forces from Southeast Asia because it would lead to major strategic shift in the balance of power favouring Russia, Japan and the ASEAN countries which till today are suspicious of China, the author says.

Kamaluddin also analyses the 1965 Indo-Pak war and concludes that Ayub Khan's decision to plunge Pakistan in the war was based on his perception of the situation not as a statesman or political leader of a nation, but as a soldier.

He says ''Ayub had vested himself with the 'trinity' of war -the people, the government and the military... And went to war against the better judgment of most of his senior military advisors.''

He also discusses the backlashes Pakistan suffered as a conduit of the inexhaustible supply of US weapons for Afghan rebels following the entry of the former Soviet Union in Afghanistan in 1979.

Pakistan now has the dubious record of having the largest number of weapons per head in the world which has given a fillip to ethnic, communal and political killings across the country. With increased opium production in Afghanistan in the aftermath of the Soviet intervention, Pakistan has become the most important country in the Golden Crescent for the drug business, he concludes.

UNI