First the US, now China tries to woo India

Yet despite such good words, there are many reasons for China and India to view each other as rivals rather than friends.

China has long maintained a close military and strategic partnership with Pakistan, India's nuclear rival. Just days before his visit to China, Wen signed a series of deals with Pakistan, including a plan to manufacture a jointly designed fighter aircraft called the JF-17. This announcement came just days after India announced its intention to buy F-16 and F-18 fighters from the US, including technology that allows India to produce F-16s itself.

More worrisome to Chinese negotiators this week may be the Indian-US plan for India to send its Navy to patrol the Straits of Malacca between Indonesia and Malaysia, a crucial shipping lane. China has long considered Southeast Asia to be its own backyard.

It was in this context that China's ambassador to India, Sun Yuxi, warned against India becoming too closely aligned with the US. "We have nothing against India's growing ties with the US," he told the Calcutta Telegraph. "But Indo-US ties should not be directed against a third country."

One retired Indian diplomat, who requests anonymity, says that China is more interested in building up its future status as a global economic and military superpower. "They're not much bothered with the immediacy of public relations, and what little the Americans can do with India," says the diplomat. "But in terms of the Indian Ocean, and where it merges with the Pacific, they will watch this very carefully."

"China has the point of view that they are a rising naval power," the diplomat adds. "The British took over the world because of naval power. The Americans replaced the British and took over the world because of their technology and naval power, and now the Chinese feel they are bound to be the next superpower of the world."

But the key to that "superpowerdom" is pure economics. China's economic prosperity has been restricted to the southern coast, while its populated central and western provinces have lagged behind. As such, China has been hammering out numerous deals with its neighbors in South Asia. Most visible are two major highway projects: the Kodari highway through civil-war-torn Nepal, which should be ready by 2008; and a similar highway through Burma (Myanmar) to the Bay of Bengal. During talks this weekend, Chinese negotiators may begin discussing similar routes through India's Sikkim territory into Indian markets, or to India's trading ports in Calcutta.

India, too, has gone on a building spree, developing an East-West trade corridor called the Tamu-Kalleva highway, from its northeastern province of Manipur through Myanmar and into Thailand. The motive, like China's, is to spur development in a cut-off region where disaffection is rising.

"This investment in cross-border infrastructure has made the whole region sit up and take notice," says Nimmi Kurian. "The Chinese economic presence, because of its investment, is becoming a magnet. It's pulling the region into its orbit."

INDIA CHINA
Population ('03) 1.065 billion 1,298 billion
GDP ('03) $3.0 trillion $6.4 trillion
Growth rate ('04) 6.5% 9.5%
Foreign Investment ('03) $4.3 billion $53.5 billion
Living on < $1/day ('04) 33% 16%

SOURCES: CIA Factbook, Asia Development Bank, World Bank, UN World Investment Report 2004

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