What South China Sea rivals can learn from the Doklam border dispute

Resolution of the India-China border dispute is testament to the strength of boundary management protocols

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Chinese television footage of a live-fire military exercise in Tibet during the standoff with India on the border. Photo: Handout

Published: 11:02am, 3 Sep 2017Updated: 11:01am, 3 Sep 2017

Just as imperceptibly as China and India were locked into a standoff in mid-June on a narrow plateau near the China-Bhutan-India trijunction area in the Sikkim Himalayas, so the standoff was wound down imperceptibly with deft diplomacy by both sides.

On August 28, a week before President Xi Jinping was due to host Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Xiamen for the ninth BRICS summit, New Delhi and Beijing began implementing the terms of their disengagement understanding, commencing with the withdrawal of Indian troops and equipment from the Chinese side of the border. The offending Chinese road construction activity that had constituted a “significant change in the [security] status quo” in India’s view and triggered its trespass across the border in the first place, is likely to be withdrawn in the days ahead.

An Indian national flag and the Chinese national emblem at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Photo: AP

The plateau in question, the Dolam Plateau in the Doklam area, once again reverts to its former status as the subject of a legal dispute between China and Bhutan, under the effective control of China, and holding an important security interest to India.

A host of questions abound regarding the timing of the denouement. Did Xi blink in order to remove a dark cloud over the impending BRICS summit as well as the forthcoming 19th National Party Congress? Was Modi read the riot act that forced him to move first? Was Bhutan a silent bystander through gritted teeth all along?

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Larger questions abound regarding the motivation and chosen course of action by both parties. What prompted Beijing to build a road of marginal military value in a sensitive security zone where it suffers obvious tactical disadvantages? How wise was it for New Delhi to militarily intervene on Thimpu’s behalf to uphold the latter’s feebly-articulated claims of sovereignty over a patch of territory that had all along been under Beijing’s effective control? Shouldn’t New Delhi have made its point and withdrawn much earlier, as it has in previous instances along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) – its undefined border with China?