Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Why China will not attack India.

 In recent times there has been a speculaion that China may attack India to redeem an internal turmoil. My thoughts are different.

There is a bit of contradiction when we say that an aggressive China will go to war with a pacifist India. It is just futile to maim or kill a pacifist when by a mere threat of violence much can be extracted from the pacifist!

Consider the economy of India and China. China is second and India fourth in size of economy by GDP. India is ranked a lowly 160th and China a bit better at 130th in per capita GDP adjusted for PPP. Neither China nor India is savouring the state they are in.

In case you did not know -  (Adjusted to PPP (Purchasing Power Parity) – suffice to say that non traded goods/services will cost less in India as compared with the USA – ie for ten US $ we can play more golf in India than in the USA! Or for one US $ we can get more hair cuts in India than in the USA. The calculations for realistic comparison are done on PPP basis rather than at normal exchange rates of currencies.)

For a comparison, the USA is ranked 1st  in GDP and 8th in per capita GDP. First 5-6 places in per capita GDP rankings are taken by Scandinavian countries.

A war will not make China any better. The econmy of India and China are different.

Whereas the Indian economy is driven more by domestic consumption, China depends more on its exports. Top five Chinese exports in 2010 have been computers, household goods, toys and sporting goods, computer accessories and video equipment. World economy is convalescing post recession weakening the Chinese export market.(Hence the Chinese reluctance to up-value the Yuan).  None of these five areas is the core competency of China. Core competency of China is building infrastructure – roads, dams, rail, power lines et al. The biggest market for China in these areas is India.  This will be a win – win situation for both, if China is involved in India’s infrastructure programmes. Tell me, why should China kill the hen that lays the golden egg? In this case you may have a question about the future once India has its infrastructure in place - that will take a minmum of fifty years though. By then the two countries could join hands and call the shots in an Esat lookinhg world...In the long term China needs India not North Korea or for that mater Pakistan.

India and China are already in talks for China to take on infrastructure projects in India. China is already in India on a couple these projects. The only hurdle in the way of big time arrangements being that China wants to bring in its own cheap labour while India wants it to deploy local labour.

In all this time, yes, China will threaten, flex muscles, show eyes and cock a snook; but an overt all out war in the current world disposition – I doubt it.  Yet the relevant question remains – Are we ready for China?

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