BEIJING – China would be forced to use a “military way” to end the standoff in the Sikkim sector if India “refuses to listen” to it, a Chinese expert has warned.
As the standoff at the Doklam area continued for the third week, the longest between the two countries, the official media in China and the think-tanks in Beijing have said that “war is possible if the conflict between India and China is not handled properly”.
“China is trying its best to use historical lessons to reason with India and show sincerity in peacefully solving the problem, but if India refuses to listen, then China would have no other choice than to use a military way of solving the problem,” Hu Zhiyong, a research fellow at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, told the state-run Global Times.
Mr Hu claimed that India is provoking China because it wanted to prove to the US that it could contain China while Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in the US. Mr Hu said that Donald Trump was not like his predecessor Barack Obama.
“Barack Obama believes India is important only because they share the same values, but (Donald) Trump is very pragmatic, and he doesn’t treat India as a valuable ally because New Delhi is too weak to confront Beijing,” Mr Hu claimed.
“Although India always treats China as its biggest rival, China does not think so, as India lags far behind China,” claimed Song Zhongping, a Beijing-based military expert. He was quoted as saying this by state-run Global Times.
“Chinese Experts also scoffed at India’s military threat after Indian Defence Minister Arun Jaitely asserted on Friday that the India of 2017 is different from what it was in 1962,” the report in state-run Global Times stated. Global Times is known for its nationalist stance.
“The gap between the militaries of China and India today is even bigger than in 1962, and I hope India can keep calm for its own good,” Mr Hu claimed.
Since the standoff on June 6, when the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) destroyed bunkers of the India Army claiming the area belonged to China, Chinese media have carried several pieces warning India for escalating border tension.
Of the 3,488-km-long India-China border from Jammu and Kashmir to Arunachal Pradesh, a 220-km section falls in Sikkim.
