The wider world has largely forgotten that short border clash 55 years ago, playing out as it did in the shadows of the more momentous Cuban missile crisis at the peak of the cold war. But in this part of the world, the ghost of that war still lurks – it is the key to how the world’s two most populous nations imagine one another.
Read Here – South China Morning Post
More than the global and domestic situation, the biggest difference between the two stand-offs is their respective locations. Forty years ago, the two armies were confronting each other on territory claimed by both India and China. Now the face-off between India and China is in a plateau contested between Bhutan and China.
From the Indo-Pacific to the Mediterranean, a diplomatic transformation is underway. The winds of change are blowing not from Beijing, but from Delhi. President Donald Trump has an opportunity to harness some of that power to help fill the sails of America’s global leadership.
Donald Trump and Narendra Modi both rose to power as the result of popular rage against longstanding political elites. Corruption, insider politicking, and common people’s perceived lack of access to power were prominent themes in both campaigns. Both campaigns fed, as well, on the real distress of the have-nots in our respective societies.
China’s creeping encirclement of India confronts New Delhi with the choice of either accommodating itself to Chinese primacy or of hedging in partnership with the US and Japan against China’s advances, fuelling the regional rivalry even further.
Narendra Modi’s arrival in Israel marks not only an epochal moment in India-Israel relations, but also the final rejection of the psychological Raj that has hampered Indian diplomacy for so long – since independence in 1947. While Jawarhalal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, fought for freedom from Britain, he and the wider political establishment that surrounded him were very much creations of the British and inheritors of their limited thinking.
In the last three weeks, as the Modi government’s dispute with China has become increasingly more acerbic, Beijing has been issuing a series of warnings to New Delhi, the most serious of which has been its observation that India has not learned the lessons of history and has not forgotten its humiliating defeat in 1962. These are a small step away from an ultimatum.
Also Read: Six Expert Views on How India Should Look at the Latest Border Stand-Off With China
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Only a select few world leaders receive Israel’s grand reception at Ben Gurion International Airport: people like the President of the United States, and the Pope. So it did not go unnoticed that India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi received the same red carpet treatment.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi being received by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on his arrival in Tel Aviv on July 04, 2017. Photo/PIB
Israel has long complained that India treats it like a mistress: glad to partake of its defense and technology charms, but a little embarrassed about the whole thing and unwilling to make the relationship too public. With Narendra Modi’s visit to Israel – the first ever by a sitting Indian prime minister – it will be like the two countries arriving hand in hand to opening night of the opera season, lit by a barrage of flashing cameras.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi leaves for a historic visit to Israel on July 4, the first ever by an Indian premier. Photo/PIB.
Defence, agriculture, trade, diplomacy and water management will dominate talks during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ongoing visit to Israel — the first Indian Prime Minister to visit the Jewish homeland. Apart from from his scheduled official engagements, Modi is also expected to meet Moshe Holtzberg, a survivor of the 2008 Mumbai 26/11 terrorist attack. Moshe was two years old when the attack happened.
