China Clashes Are Pushing India Away From the US
While Narendra Modi’s government knows the Indian military needs more Western weapons, it can’t afford to be seen as too close to Washington right now.
India’s forces on the border are outgunned by China.
Photographer: Money Sharma/AFP/Getty Images
India’s unquiet and unsettled border dispute with China has flared up again. In 2020, two dozen Indian soldiers were killed in a clash on the western sector of the border, at Galwan in Ladakh. Now soldiers have been injured in a scuffle to the east, in the Tawang sector of the state of Arunachal Pradesh.
China does not recognize Arunachal Pradesh as Indian territory and has steadily added military infrastructure on its side of the Line of Actual Control, as the disputed border is known. India has struggled to keep pace.