Chinese Moves on Kashmir

Pravin Sawhney

Writing in the New York Times, Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has demanded that India abrogate the J&K Reorganisation Act 2019 which comes into effect on October 31. Not doing so could lead to conflict. What could be the basis of his temerity? Not the support of his army chief, General Qamar Bajwa, or the latter’s assessment of India’s unpreparedness for war.

Chinese President Xi Jinping with Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Khan’s confidence comes from the recent visit of Chinese, Vice-Chairman, Central Military Commission (CMC), General Xu Qiliang who led a powerful delegation comprising all wings of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to Pakistan two days before Khan’s ultimatum on Kashmir. How seriously should Xu’s Pakistan visit be taken, especially when Khan’s demand, sounding outlandish, got little credence in India?

Xu, as number two to Chairman CMC, Xi Jinping and his confidante (their association goes back a long way when they worked in Fujian province), runs the PLA. Serving his third term as a CMC member, Xu, as the deputy secretary of the CMC’s ‘reform leading group’, was responsible for PLA’s 2015 military reforms which spurred the US to focus — after 16 years of counter-terror operations — on state-on-state wars. As the first PLA Air Force (PLAAF) head to be appointed to the CMC, Xu is responsible for the Shaheen series of annual air exercise between PLAAF and Pakistan Air Force in north Ladakh. Coincidently, Shaheen-VII — with the purpose of building interoperability (ability to fight together on common missions) — was being conducted in the Chinese city of Holton, 300km north of Leh, with PAF fighters taking off from Skardu in Gilgit-Baltistan, during Xu’s visit to Pakistan.

Shaheen series started soon after December 2010 when on the eve of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao’s visit to India, Beijing announced that its border with India was a mere 2,000km (India insists it is 3,488km). China excluded Ladakh. Incidentally, north Ladakh, with poor and mostly non-existent infrastructure, is a serious vulnerability of the Indian military.

Xu’s Pakistan visit, given the timing, had two purposes. The first was to convey Xi’s full support for Pakistan’s core concern (Kashmir). Xu came to tell Pakistan that Kashmir would be X