Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control in South Asia after the Test Ban

SINO- INDIAN RELATIONS 37
While not entirely rejecting the view that the relationship has been
important in the nuclear and arms control policies of both countries,
the chapter argues that the linkage between the nuclear weapon programmes
of China and India is a loose one. The action–reaction model
is not particularly useful for explaining the relations between the two.
Each side appears generally indifferent to the other’s nuclear activities.
Nuclear policy and planning are not necessarily determined by
the ebb and flow of their bilateral relations. Instead, they have quite
independent orbits. On the basis of these arguments, the chapter suggests
that, in comparison with the political and economic spheres,
where cooperation has increased significantly, China and India share
few common interests in their nuclear arms control policies. While
China has been actively involved and shown flexibility in a variety of
arms control forums, India’s stance has become more sceptical. As a
result, improvement in Sino-Indian bilateral relations will not necessarily
lead to stronger commitments to international arms control.
II. Sino-Indian relations
India gained independence in 1947 and was the first non-communist
country to recognize the People’s Republic of China. Through the
1950s the two supported each other in the struggle against power
politics at the height of the cold war and decolonization. Chinese
Prime Minister Zhou Enlai and Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal
Nehru developed and signed the 1954 treaty enshrining the Five
Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, which have since advanced Sino-
Indian friendship and been adopted by many countries as guidelines
for their relations with other states.
Historical problems were soon to cloud the friendship. In the late
1950s disputes over Tibet and border demarcation came into the open.
The disputes were intensified by the intervention of the USA and
USSR, and finally resulted in the 1962 border conflict, which left
lasting hostility between China and India that took three decades to
recover from.
The Sino-Indian border is among the longest, the most rugged and
the least populated in the world. It runs through the highest range of
the Himalayas, 3 which both links the two civilizations and divides
3 The high passes across the Himalayas are at an average altitude of over 5000 m.