India on front foot in East Asia

Does art imitate life or does life imitate journalism? Two weeks ago, The Economist trumpeted a looming China-India rivalry as its cover story. One week ago, a series of fresh tensions arose in the China-India relationship. Today I have tried to make sense of some of this in an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal.

The gist of my argument is that India would do well to keep a cool head, despite needling from China and the concerns – some sensible, some paranoid – of its own media and commentariat. Better still, if India is serious about advancing its own influence as a global power – and increasingly its interests will demand such a status – then it should be getting onto the diplomatic and strategic front foot in its dealings with China.

This would involve, for example, greater Indian engagement in East Asia – a trend excellently examined by C Raja Mohan and notable emerging analysts such as David Brewster and Nitin Pai. One of the challenges for India is to be the active player in building such partnerships, not – as this remarkable account of Lee Kuan Yew's 'Mission India' suggests — the passive one.

Photo by Flickr user Photoportunity, used under a Creative Commons license.