Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of maps -- Acknowledgements -- Notes on contributors -- Introduction -- Part 1 Bilateral perspectives -- 1 India's relations with China, 1945-74 -- 2 Foreign Secretary Subimal Dutt and the prehistory of the Sino-Indian border war -- 3 From 'Hindi-Chini Bhai-Bhai' to 'international class struggle' against Nehru: China's India policy and the frontier dispute, 1950-62 -- 4 The strategic and regional contexts of the Sino-Indian border conflict: China's policy of conciliation with its neighbours -- Part 2 International perspectives
The Sino-Indian War of 1962 delivered a crushing defeat to India: not only did the country suffer a loss of lives and a heavy blow to its pride, the world began to see India as the provocateur of the war, with China ‘merely defending’ its territory. This perception that China was largely the innocent victim of Nehru’s hostile policies was put forth by journalist Neville Maxwell in his book India’s China War, which found readers in many opinion makers, including Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon. For far too long, Maxwell’s narrative, which sees India as the aggressor and China as the victim, has held court. Nearly 50 years after Maxwell’s book, Bertil Lintner’s China’s India War puts the ‘border dispute’ into its rightful perspective. Lintner argues that China began planning the war as early as 1959 and proposes that it was merely a small move in the larger strategic game that China was playing to become a world player—one that it continues to play even today.
For a hundred years, British and Chinese territorial claims in the Himalayas conflicted, with Indian historians claiming that the region was the fountainhead of Hindu civilization. In the halcyon days of the Raj, London saw Afghanistan and Tibet as buffers against Russian and Chinese imperialism. In 1913, an ephemeral agreement between Britain, Tibet and China was signed, recognizing the McMahon Line as the border of the disputed territory. China, however, failed to ratify the agreement, while India protested against a loss of historical land.After the Second World War, India became independent of Britain and Chinese Communists proclaimed a peoples republic. Despite cordial overtures from Indian Prime Minister Nehru, in late 1950 the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) invaded Tibet. In the ensuing twelve years, Indian diplomacy and Chinese cartographic aggression were punctuated by border incidents, particularly in 1953 when armed clashes precipitated a significant increase in the disposition of troops by both sides. In the spring of 1962, Indian forces flooded into the Ladakh region of the state of Jammu and Kashmir, to check the Chinese.In a spiralling game of brinkmanship, in September, ground forces were strategically deployed and redeployed. On 10 October, thirty-three Chinese died in a firefight near Dhola.Embittered by Moscows support of India against a sister communist state, and in a bid to clip Nehrus belligerent wings, on 20 October, the PLA launched a two-pronged attack against Indian positions.
This is one of those rare books that puts an entirely new light on a chapter of history, and it must be read by anyone concerned with international affairs. Although cool and scholarly it unrolls like a fascinating thriller. It is an important work of revisionist history and a gruesome study of the way in which wars start, superbly documented (largely from official Indian sources but also from secret Indian papers) and beautifully sustained. By showing how India led the world up the garden path it demolishes and throws to the wind a pillar of the 'contain China' doctrine -- the belief that in 1962 India was the victim of unprovoked Chinese aggression. Maxwell's book is magnificent on every count, an historical achievement of the first rank.
This book explores Sino-Indian tensions from the angle of state-building, showing how they stem from their competition for the Himalayan people's allegiance.
"What happened when India and China last went to battle with each other? China won? Wrong, India won. The sole India-China conflict that remains etched in our collective memory is the 1962 war, which India tragically lost. But five years later, in 1967, India and China faced off once again in the heights of Cho La and Nathu La at the Sikkim border. This time, overcoming the odds, India triumphed.The fallout of these forgotten battles was immense. China shied away from actively allying with Pakistan and the US during the 1971 India-Pakistan war. And despite several stand-offs in the half century since then, Beijing has never again launched a military offensive against India. This incredible book tells us why these battles ushered in an era of peace. Full of thrilling international intrigue and nail-biting battle scenes, this book is based on extensive research and interviews with army officers and soldiers who participated in these historic battles. It aims to rectify a blind spot in history and shine the spotlight on a story of incredible bravery that India should be proud of "-- Provided by publisher.
Humanly compelling, beautifully told ... brings to light a forgotten chapter of Indian history, one we need to remember in these troubled times' PRATAP BHANU MEHTA '[Joy Ma and Dilip D'Souza] have seamlessly woven together historical facts with personal stories about how the Chinese- Indians lost the country of their birth' YIN MARSH The untold account of the internment of 3,000 Chinese-Indians after the 1962 Sino-Indian War. Just after the Sino-Indian War of 1962, about 3,000 Chinese-Indians were sent to languish in a disused World War II POW camp in Deoli, Rajasthan, marking the beginning of a painful five-year-long internment without resolution. At a time of war with China, these ‘Chinese-looking’ people had fallen prey to government suspicion and paranoia which soon seeped into the public consciousness. This is a page of Indian history that comes wrapped in prejudice and fear, and is today largely forgotten. But over five decades on, survivors of the internment are finally starting to tell their stories. As several Indian communities are once again faced with discrimination, The Deoliwallahs records these untold stories through extensive interviews with seven survivors of the Deoli internment. Through these accounts, the book recovers a crucial chapter in our history, also documenting for the first time how the Chinese came to be in India, how they made this country their home and became a significant community, until the war of 1962 brought on a terrible incarceration, displacement and tragedy.
In this case study of the Sino-Indian conflict between 1959 and 1962, the author explores the attitudes that shaped India's policy toward China and traces the network of misunderstandings that led to a war unwanted by both sides.
"On 1 October 1949, the People's Republic of China came into being and changed forever the course of Asian history. Power moved from the hands of the nationalist Kuomintang government to the Communist Party of China headed by Mao Tse Tung. All of a sudden, it was not only an assertive China that India had to deal with but also an increasingly complex situation in Tibet which was reeling under pressure from China. Clearly, newly independent India, with Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru at its helm, was navigating very choppy waters. Its relations with China progressively deteriorated, eventually leading to the Indo-China war in 1962. Today, more than six decades after the war, we are still plagued by border disputes with China that seem to routinely grab the headlines. It leads one to question what exactly went on during those initial years of the emergence of a new China"--Publisher's summary.
The earliest accounts of the Sino-Indian boundary dispute cast India as the victim of Chinese betrayal and expansionism, but a more favorable image of China vis-a-vis India has appeared since the 1970s. Since then, China has been portrayed as the victim of India's self-righteous intransigence, with the 1962 India-China war occurring because China was provoked into practicing a justifiable form of realpolitik. These two seemingly irreconcilable academic schools of thought still exist. In this case study of India's decision-making between the years of 1959 and 1963, the critical first years of its border conflict with China, Steven A. Hoffmann takes an important step in reconciling the conflicting views of the crisis and of the ascribed reasons for the war that ensued in 1962. Drawing on interviews with Indian officials, military officers, and political leaders and on memoirs and other sources gathered during concentrated research in India, England, and North America between 1983 and 1986, the author provides previously unknown material on the perceptions and realities of Indian decision making. A model for international crisis behavior, as proposed by Michael Brecher, is used to help establish a balanced treatment of information and offer insights into such questions as why India and China both failed to understand one another's frontier psychologies and strategies, and why the Nehru government did not succeed in managing the conflict. This richly detailed and carefully researched approach is invaluable in this time when India and China are once again exploring ways to establish a solid relationship. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1990.
