China flexes muscle with new Arunachal incursion

On June 9, a day before “Ex Operation Malabar” by the navies of India, United States and Japan was set to kick off and the day deliberations over India’s bid to join the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) were to take place in Vienna, China demonstrated its intent of claiming Arunachal Pradesh as its own by sending hundreds of its troops into the state’s East Kameng district.

Four days after the development, defence sources, admitting that a “transgression” had occurred in East Kameng, said it was a “temporary” one. The Indian Army is soon expected to lodge a protest with Beijing. Defence sources also said such incursions in this sector are “not routine”.

Media reports said about 250 PLA soldiers spent nearly three hours in Indian territory before going back to the Chinese side.

Significantly, a China-centric report by the Pentagon submitted to the US Congress last month cited a September 2015 border skirmish between the two Asian giants in northern Ladakh. It said: “Tensions remain with India along their shared 4,057-km border over Arunachal Pradesh (which China asserts is part of Tibet and therefore of China), and over the Aksai Chin region at the western end of the Tibetan Plateau, despite increases in China-India political and economic relations.” Just after the report was submitted, US deputy assistant secretary of defence for East Asia Abraham M. Denmark had said: “We have noticed an increase in capability and force posture by the Chinese military in areas close to the border with India.”

Incidentally, the ongoing Operation Malabar at Japan’s Sasebo base and the Philippines Sea — with more than 100 participating aircraft and 22 naval ships, including the aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis — besides demonstrating enhanced Indo-US-Japan homilies, is also being seen as a strong signal to China to discourage possible war-like moves, especially amid escalation of tensions in the South China Sea.

“The overarching goal of Malabar is to enhance the compatibility of our maritime forces in support of our mutual desire to improve maritime security in the global commons,” Lt. Commander Sarah C. Higgins, public affairs officer of USS John C. Stennis, had told this newspaper, adding that “increasing understanding of multinational operations” is also an aim.

Already, India and the US are locked in a confrontation with China with the latter stonewalling India’s attempts to join the elite 48-member NSG, the overarching regulator of the global nuclear trade. China insists India sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty if it is to enter the NSG and that Pakistan also be made a member if any exemption is granted to India.