What are Chinese troops doing in Kashmir?

No one has been focusing on this issue of Kashmir, who are the powers behind it? Who stirs trouble in Indian Kashmir? What are Chinese troops doing in Pakistani Kashmir, and why is there more Indian troops in Indian Kashmir, than US troops in Afghanistan?

The conflict is huge, and clearly hidden.

The claim that more than 7,000 Chinese troops have been handed "de facto control" of Gilgit-Baltistan, a northern part of Kashmir, by Islamabad, has set alarm bells ringing in Delhi. India – which, like its nuclear-armed rival Pakistan, claims the entire state – has long been worried that the People's Liberation Army was working on roads and railway projects in the Karakoram mountains.

www.guardian.co.uk...

China is pushing through Pakistan, towards India, while Pakistan is using its influence on Muslim Kashmiris to stir trouble within Indian Kashmir and cause Kashmir to divide from India. This is a battle between China and India.

The question then is, why the heck is India risking its friendship with the US and trying to make deals with Iran?

he will be met with pleas from the government against the imposition of US sanctions on a consortium of Indian state-run oil firms that plan to invest nearly US$8 billion in Iran's rich Farsi gas fields.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Why is India trying to get closer to Iran? And risk loosing US support, without that support, China and Pakistan would put huge pressure on India and force it to collapse.

The reason I suspect is, that everyone knows the US is loosing influence in that part of the region therefore the whole political arena has been transformed. Everyone is taking different sides, and making new alliances. Pakistan is already fighting a proxy war against the US in Afghanistan, in that sense the US needs India to put pressure on Pakistan, but India is under pressure from China. In that sense, India knows it has much to loose from staying in the US pact, and much to gain from shifting alliance, and keeping the relationships stronger at local level, hence Iran is in the same continent as India, and to have better relations, and to have more trade at local level.

Despite India’s historically established territorial claims to the region, China terms the area “disputed,” a description that it has now begun to extend to the whole of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir.

www.project-syndicate.org...

China is slowly talking the talk, then walking the walk.

Now, why does India have more troops in Indian Kashmir than US troops in Afghanistan? Maybe because China and Pakistan has already stirred deep trouble in Kashmir, the protests are growing by the day, and people are even willing to leave their homes when curfew is implemented, and an order to shoot those opposing the curfew is given.

It seems people want freedom, but that is the political mistake of India, because those people who want freedom will always be used as tools for other powers (for example the Afghan Mujahideen).

India should have know, and given independence to Kashmir. That way, India won't have to worry about falling in to pieces, or loosing other territories with much less separatist voices.

What do you think will happen to the Maoist separatists? After the Kashmir uprising reaches a boiling point, and gains independence? The next effort will go to the Maoists, and they will gain moral support from the Kashmiris, and also military and other support from Pakistan and China during the Chaos of independence.

Very interesting times.

What are your thoughts?

This speaks of the decline of the US as a superpower, and of the other countries of the world who are growing more powerful adjusting to the changes, both geopolitically and geostrategically that brings.

Pakistan was once a strong ally of the US, but the war in Afghanistan and having foreign soldiers on your doorstep fighting insurgents who Pakistani tribes can often feel a tribal affinity to means that has changed.

Pakistan, struggling and staggering from political and security instability, has turned to a strong ally to help ward off from the growing distrust of US interference in Afghanistan, encroachment in Pakistan and of growing Indian power: Namely China.

India in recent years grew quite close to the US and Israel in the "war of terrorism" but perhaps is beginning to realise that on a regional level and a growing international level that this could be harmful to it's interests, especially in relation to the American decline, and is beginning to review it's relations more closely.

I should imagine reports of the People's Liberation Army being in Kashmir may draw India back to the US, perhaps that was the aim of the story.

China meanwhile, capitalises, making friends with Pakistan, perhaps going so far as to prop up Pakistan, and to confront a regional rival in the shape of India who handily, Pakistan also have a rivalry with.

All in all, the prospect of a new Indo-Pakistan War could be made all the more dangerous if that was possible.

Whereas in the past, Pakistan found support with the US, and India could find support from Russia, now we see that Pakistan finds support with China, and India with the US.

In short, a new Indo-Pakistan could threaten to become a new Sino-Indian War, if not by proxy, than by direct clashes, and further, could become a Sino-US War, with Pakistan and India as their proxies respectivly, or with direct clashes.

Quite frankly, it's a tinderbox. Much is made of the dangers of The Middle East being a tinderbox, and rightly so, but South-east Asia is also worthy of such a description.

reply to post by Regensturm


The US must have a trick up its sleeve to still have such a heavy presence in that region.

What do you think that trick is?

Kashmir issues go way back, The Pakistanis and India have had issues over the land before you were even born, born than likely. The Chinese are probably doing the same things that America continues to do in the Koreas, Bosnia/Kosovo area. It's peace keeping for it's own interested....Pakistanis have ties to plenty of oil, which China desperately needs. China and India together have a population of over 1/3rd of the worlds population....if anything the worry should be these two huge nations joining to seek land and food. China easily has the largest military and the Indians have nukes. But all and all I see China just doing some keep peacing between two valuable neighbors.

reply to post by OmiOra

Despite India’s historically established territorial claims to the region, China terms the area “disputed,” a description that it has now begun to extend to the whole of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir.

This play has a long time left, China is also playing closer to home against the US, hence the disputed Islands, which both Japan of the US and China claims..

Before China makes any moves, the Kashmiri separatists need to become militarized like the Palestinians. For now, China will focus all its attention on Japan of the US.

Originally posted by oozyism
reply to post by Regensturm

 

The US must have a trick up its sleeve to still have such a heavy presence in that region.

What do you think that trick is?

The transition from the support of Pakistan to India who are a rapidy developing candidate for superpower status, only I think India will try to forge their own path which being a superpower will naturally bring.

The hope that the US has would be for India, supported by the US, to keep Pakistan restrained under the threat of war, and to also be a bulwark against China spreading it's influence.

The US would hope India would be to South-East Asia what Israel is to The Middle East: a powerful 'ally' through which to maintain control of the region.

In essence, the trick for the US as a declining superpower, would be to feed the tensions between the two candidates who look set to succeed the US: China and India.

Another advantage the US is that the US still has a blue-water naval fleet in the region to project their power and protect their interests, while China, and India are some way behind in this regard.

And of course, a presence in the region would be helped by access to Afghanistan's material riches: Minerals, gas, opium, and the fact Afghanistan is strategically important in geopolitical and geostrategical terms in Central Asia, with a means to contain Russia as part of the overall NATO objective since the fall of The Soviet Union.

Hence the US, with it's presence and influence, hopes to achieve access to resources, achieved by a presence in countries with resources, and to further geopolitical and geostrategical position by containing it's rivals through it's presence and positioning, it's rivals being Russia, China, India (Who it hopes to influence) and to a lesser extent as yet, the EU who may yet become a superpower in itself.