Thread by @Kautilya33

On this anniversary of Galwan clash, let me note that there is still no widely accepted explanation of why the clash and the entire border confrontation happened.

Here is my take. /1

I hold that there is nothing really new here. It is the same old game of trying to contain India so that it won't challenge China's own rise. But there are some twists and turns along the way. /2

The story begins with the BJP coming to power in 1998. The nuclear tests, the Kargil War, then reaching an entente with the US, which eventually led to a civil nuclear deal.

Remember that the road to Finger 4 was laid in the midst of the Kargil War. /3

That means to me that the PLA was given the green signal to reactivate the border conflict soon after 1998. The PLA was always unhappy that it was made to withdraw after the 1962 war, without being able to consolidate its borer position. /4

The PLA also knew that the old maps were lousy and they could be interpreted which ever way it wanted, so as to consolidate the border position. So it gave itself a whole bunch of targets along the border and started building infrastructure to prosecute them.

The 2013 Depsang Standoff was considered a big deal at that time, even though it now looks relatively lame. According to R. N. Ravi, the Mamohan Singh govt. promised not to patrol beyond the botteneck. If that is true, we didn't keep that promise for very long. /6

The return of the BJP under Modi was greeted by China with two spectacular incursions: (1) Laying a road towards PP16, across the Jianan Pass, (2) Laying a road towards its claim line in Chumar. The latter apparently led to massive standoff. /7

Both of these were in progress even while Xi was visiting India. After Xi returned, both were rolled back, and the PLA was even forced to dig a trench across is its own road on the Jianan Pass. I presume we made some promises in order to achieve these results. /8

Then the Doklam standoff in 2017 and the Kashmir integration in 2019 cancelled whatever understanding had been reached in 2014. The absence of any western reaction to the Kashmir adventure, and brushing off of the China-Pakistan axis led to a reset. /9

The PLA again got the go-ahead to prosecute its ambitions. Throughout the interim period, it had been building infrastructure. The Tiankong Highway had been completed, and the road through the Galwan Valley was about halfway up. /10

In this situation, Covid turned out to be a heaven-sent opportunity. PLA was able to catch India napping. So it moved all the way up to its desired positions and entreched itself.

India's "mirror deployments" could only hold fort. They couldn't push back the PLA. /11

The Galwan clash was probably a misunderstanding, just like the 1959 Kongka clash was. But it serves the same ends. It raises the temperatures to an extent that a reconciliation becomes impossible.

Still, we persisted with negotiations without getting into an armed conflict./12

If that deserves credit, the diplomatic side doesn't. Diplomatically, we gave up on China and moved closer to the West. That means that the border tensions will perhaps continue indefinitely. /end