Public opinion is characterized by a blend of cautious optimism and skepticism regarding the thaw in India-China relations. While some see potential for cooperation and express pride in India's autonomy, substantial concerns persist about trust and reliability, particularly due to historical tensions and the complexities of external influence from the U.S. Comments advocate for self-reliance and careful navigation of foreign relations, reflecting a desire for India to emerge as a powerful, independent actor on the global stage.

India

China

United States

One of the smart comments i heard on TV recently was that India isn't in the league of the US-China powers who are headed into imminent hostilities. 

But the side India puts it's weight on when required could determine the course of the results. The marginal utility of India is extremely high in the high stakes fight. 

That explains a bunch of behaviours.

SubstantialSquash3

SS: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar - only the second such meeting between the two sides since 2020 - when deadly clashes in the Galwan valley in Ladakh, a disputed Himalayan border region, led to a complete breakdown of ties between the countries.

Relations are now on a "positive trend" towards cooperation, Yi said ahead of a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday.

Jaishankar said that India and China were seeking to "move ahead from a difficult period in our ties".

The two counterparts held discussions on a range of bilateral issues from trade to pilgrimages and river data sharing.

Yi is also scheduled to meet India's National Security Advisor Ajit Doval for on-going negotiations on resolving the boundary dispute between the two countries.

The visit is being seen as the latest sign of a thaw in ties between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

The rapprochement between the countries comes in the backdrop of India's worsening bilateral relationship with the US.

Earlier this month, US President Donald Trump imposed an additional 25% penalty on Indian imports for buying oil and weapons from Russia, taking total tariffs to 50% - the highest in Asia.

On Monday, White House Trade Advisor Peter Navarro wrote an opinion piece in The Financial Times in which he accused India of "cozying up to both Russia and China".

Mundane-Laugh8562

Anyone who reads Chinese history will never think this is real.... India did everything for China - recognise the country before everyone else, agreed on tibet take over, agreed on one China policy, denied signing major treaties in which China was left out, gave over the UN permanent security council seat that was offered to it, even "India-China brotherhood" government statements that failed to criticize China policies in everything. 

Yet got stabbed in the back in the war, hostile takeover of territory, support to Pakistan's terrorism, screwed India in galwan, turned down several opportunities to be friends again as offered by Modi. 

Fool me once, shame on you
Fool me several times, Chinese delight

A good relationship with India seems like it might be a very valuable thing, and the contested territories so minor, is there anything special about the territories that make the conflict worth it for China over the potential prosperous cooperation? Water?


Or is India an economic rival to the degree that territorial disagreement is just a vessel for the economic rivalry? If not for domestic nationalism I wonder if just surrendering all contested territories to be able to fully focus on countering the US might not really be a bad move for China

bxzidff

India will be china’s friend when they give back stolen territory.

Successful_Try9704

Vietnam and China should be partners, not adversaries... lol.

Westerners have nothing to worry about.

The_Keg

I don't think Indians would be as feelgood and braindead as the West in falling for the CCPs biding time with best fake smiles. Whereas Trump is a temporary phenomenon, the CCPs unrepentant ways toward India to squeeze it to limit its potential are eternal.

Linny911

Do you think China will give back Aksai Chin if India asks Nicely? you know in the spirit of friendship?

Halfie951

India will never align with China strategically.
The only time India tried being friendly was right after independence (1947) and before China stabbed India in the back in 1962 — and that was more about showing a united Asia than anything else.

Right now, India’s just taking advantage of its rough patch with the U.S. to sort out a few issues with China.

Mainly:

1. Border tensions

2. Unblocking stuff like fertilizers, rare earths, and tunnel-drilling machines

That doesn’t mean India’s suddenly teaming up with China. In fact, India shot down China’s attempt to push the idea that “India accepts Taiwan as part of China.”

In Trump’s world, all the friction between the U.S. and India can just be brushed aside by Trump, as if nothing ever happened, and ties can go back to how they were. India seems to be playing along with that idea — which is why it isn’t hitting back too hard at Trump’s remarks.

All of Trump's displeasure will disappear (as if it was never present) once the trade deal is finalized.

curiousstrider

What are they calling Trump now? Comrade America?

Edit: 🙄 Chinese people online are using this term connected to the idea that Trump is constantly doing things that end up helping China get ahead.

rathat

[deleted]

Back toward China? Back where? India was never really with China to begin with.
The only time India tried being friendly was right after independence (1947) and before China stabbed India in the back in 1962 — and that was more about showing a united Asia than anything else.

Right now, India’s just taking advantage of its rough patch with the U.S. to sort out a few issues with China. 

Mainly:

1. Border tensions

2. Unblocking stuff like fertilizers, rare earths, and tunnel-drilling machines

That doesn’t mean India’s suddenly teaming up with China. In fact, India shot down China’s attempt to push the idea that “India accepts Taiwan as part of China.”

In Trump’s world, all the friction between the U.S. and India can just be brushed aside by Trump, as if nothing ever happened, and ties can go back to how they were. India seems to be playing along with that idea — which is why it isn’t hitting back too hard at Trump’s remarks.

All of Trump's displeasure will disappear (as if it was never present) once the trade deal is finalized.

Edit: Spell

That's a good thing I guess, always hate it when two neighboring countries don't see eye to eye

HollyShitBrah

Unlikely. India doesn’t trust China much either. The US may well push India away from itself but India isn’t gonna trust China anytime soon.

mahavirMechanized

&gt;Prime Minister Narendra Modi had been moving to align India with the United States and freeze out China. Now, efforts to rebuild ties between the Asian giants are gaining momentum.

Western strategic analysts usually find India to be a disappointment because their dream of India turning into the heart of an Asia-Pacific NATO-like arrangement to contain China have been slow to translate into reality.

Unfortunately, Indian politicians and strategic planners are instinctively skeptical of American intentions and friendly towards Russia, even though America has a lot more to offer and Russia doesn't actually care about India as much as Indians believe it does.

But there has been steady progress, and Modi, despite coming from a strain of politics that historically opposed integration with the West, and despite being personally disliked by most Western commentators for being a Hindu nationalist, was paradoxically the post overtly pro-American Prime Minister in Indian history. Though this was mainly economic and strategic pragmatism rather than any affinity to Western values.

I could be surprised but I don't see an easy return to the old trajectory after this, particularly if Modi's government is replaced by his Opposition, who are more pro-Russia and anti-American than he is and partly caused this chain of events by berating Modi about failing to stand up to Trump.

1-randomonium

Makes sense, they’re physically next to one another. China is going to need India for labor.

Uneeda_Biscuit

This is a bad analysis.

Every good analyst knows that India has always held a third unaligned position and will do only what is good for India. That is not going to change, they are never going to align with the US or China.

China's and India's economies are not complementary at all, they are mayor competitors and they have long standing border conflicts that even resulted in a war a few decades ago.

The US does well in giving India something to lose with the tariffs, if they don't work with them. If India wants to benefit from American markets they should benefit American interest in return. That is a mutually beneficial relation. America doesn't need India's cheap labor to replace China's, there are plenty of other countries in the world that can offer the same, like Mexico or Vietnam.

MarzipanTop4944

Indians: The US crossed a red line by supporting Pakistan!!!1!1!1! We will never buy an American product again!1!1 

Also Indians: The bond between India and China is unbreakable. It is stronger than the finest steel, deeper than the darkest depths of the ocean, higher than the peaks of Everest and more enduring than time itself. Should the stars collapse and the galaxies scatter, one truth will remain immutable: the eternal fraternity of these two nations, whose friendship is nothing less than the gravitational force holding the world together.

refep

Chinese consumers will not replace US consumers. India looses big by not playing with the US. They need to cut ties with Russia. In 6 months India will bend the knee

pamar456

Of course it is beneficial to keep India close but at what cost?

India had been superficially close to the US but in practice has been helping US adversaries.

I am just not sure what we are getting when eating up the big trade deficit from India while letting India financing Russia to conquer Ukraine.

DaySecure7642

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Yes, this arises due to the narrative being promoted that all countries are on a path to development(undeveloped, developing, developed) and given enough time, all countries will converge which is not true many countries are experiencing high growth but there are also many who have stagnated or declined. continuous economic growth is very hard to achieve and should not be taken for granted.

Extra-Importance5796

India is at least 100 years away from current China or any Western society, in my opinion.

This is a mindset problem, and even in 100 years, we will not attain China holistically. In statistical terms like GDP, etc, we may be 20-25 years  away, but in order to achieve what China did in the last 10 years, it will take us 50 years to build the equivalent

India is surrounded by mediocrity, and we reward mediocrity - everything is mediocre, be it infrastructure, planning, or even the social and demographic aspects, for every step we make sometimes we go 2 steps backwards  

Couple of months ago, I was passing through bazaars and colonies in Hyderabad (old and new), new ones except for the gated communities and the upscale look like slums - no uniformity, no town planning, no civic sense, no proper infrastructure like pedestrian walkways, no parks or community grounds, thrash every where, temples and religious places popping up randomly on the already narrow and crowded roads, Old colonies atleast had some planning while I  was growing up like community grounds and parks etc, what this says is our progression is not linear, rich people are buying life style by moving into gated communities as the governments became incapable of planning and enforcing any policy or framework and sometimes people are too rigid for a change, what I felt is that the existing status quo will not change until people's mindset changes and hold people incharge responsible.

sf_warriors

Indis was richer and ahead of china in Education, manufacturing and general economy in 1970s

Since 1980 china grew as India spluttered.

Today Indias imports from China have gone up by 23%

Today India is dependant on China to maintain its 5th largest economy. 

Most of Indias needs in raw material and semi finished goods come from China

According to Global Economic studies India would need decades to catch up as in the last decade India is falling behind in Education, Training, Meaningful job creation, reforming, mired in communal and religion differences,

Outrageous-Tart3374

India needs to change its fundamental education system if it want to catch upto China someday.  
.  
We need to get rid of the concept of IITs along with the IITs. Why? IITs are the gigantic evidence of the elitist mindset of this country that only a select few are worthy to have access to world class education and teachers while the rest of us non - IIT folks can go ahead and die in a ditch. That is the message these IITs convey. Most importantly our IITians study on our tax money and then just fuck off from the country instead of creating companies here. We are literally paying them to leave the country. Our education system makes us memorize things instead of making us understand the fundamentals behind anything. We memorize everything and anything. I remember a video I saw on youtube where I think a chinese class 7/8 kid was being shown in school how to open up a machine without damaging its parts and most probably the teacher was explaining the fundamentals and functions of each parts and the kid never looked away for a second. Think about how interested would you be in studies if somebody opened up a phone and explained the machinery to you and school curriculum actually included that as a lesson. It would help you to make or think of new techniques of your own.  
My point we need to revolutionise the way we look at education.  
.  
If anybody finds it hard to believe me, please do some research on Chinese Education infrastructure and you will understand what I mean.

Witty_Attention2208

That's why china is no where our comparision. They are way ahead and it's unique. They have optimised dictatorship in favour of public well being. We couldn't optimise democracy in favour of public well being. 

It is impossible to follow china program.  India needs its own program which cannot be taken from any country in the world. Every country has its own story. .no other country has same story like India. We have many road blocks. We have to grow financially and also protect ourselves from 3.5 war. 

So people should make peace in their mind by keeping china away. Just because we both are oldest civilisations in world, we don't mean any commonality. 

What India needs is honest, responsible people in bigger positions and middle positions who believe in common goal. We need a common goal where public and government can trust each other. That is not happening due to lack of common unanimously accepted goal. 

A section of politics want freebies.  A section of politics say we need entrepreneurs and investments. 
Both are not sincere in both goals.

Latter_Mud8201

You are right. We will never be on equal footing until the system changes. Our system is designed for unnecessary social activism, their system is designed for industrialization and urbanization.

Global_Maize_8944

Proper question should be how many generations are we behind happy nations

Appropriate-Bug-755

100 years to get an inch closer to china, anyone who has been to china can tell you why.

Gullible_Studio_2758

The point of the post aside I really should start going to the gym

zenitsuisrusted

ratbearpig

China is on level with USA and Europe . We are live two levels below that . More in line with African countries

Mr_manifestor

* Economy (Nominal GDP)	~17 years
* Per Capita Income	~17 years
* Infrastructure	~15–20 years
* Technology &amp; R&amp;D	~10–15 years
* Military	~15–20 years
* Human Development	~15 years

Aggressive-Gene-9663

15-20 years depending on the sector.

I recently compared Indian Pharma Contract Research Organizations to Chinese ones. Found that our companies are at the scale and doing now what Chinese companies did between 2002 to 2008 or so.

larrybirdismygoat

With religion and caste 100 years without it 30 years

Jazzlike_Finger5697

Years behind isnt hust a measure to catch up. When people say India is 10 years behind China, it just means that India is still in adoption phase of solutions which China had adopted 10 years back.

Njoymadi

India is where China was in the early 2000s.

anonymousman898

The reality is that not a single relatively large economy (&gt; 50 million population) has truly surpassed another relatively large economy that started its major development phase earlier in most metrics, because it’s pretty much impossible.

GDP, GNI, PPP only measure the amount of wealth newly gained, not the total amount of wealth saved. An economy that started its major development phase earlier will almost always have more wealth saved, which leads to higher quality of life for its citizens through more and longer history of investment in welfare, education, infrastructures, etc.

So there you have it, some countries may be more advanced in certain industries, but being the large economies that entered the game later, India will never surpass China, and China will never surpass USA when it comes to quality of life.

Cyanecdote

Yes and no.

 It is misleading, sure, but it isn't inaccurate. Being "x years behind" any country means that our metrics and our development is at a point that the other country was at 'x' years ago. Say, for example, we are 20 years behind China because their economic and social metrics and situations were very similar to what they are in India today. Same goes for being 50 years behind the USA. New york was riddled with slums and their cities were so incredibly polluted to the point that their rivers caught fire.

MrNobodyISME

We need such support from people too. And still can't beat in another 200 years with this friendly relationship with neighbors, pathetic governance which is getting scrubed as shame on Indian stance in the world, PRs tearing our remaining chaddis in front of illetrate Foreigners. Talents leaving India, subsidies gobbled by govt friends in name of development. Still and new type of Mai tu. Loan write off without dignity to corrupt. Indonesia is better this time in precision machines. Our talents went to US and EUROPE. Their kids will grow and work for those countries we lost 70% of best humans for next 50 years at this rate. Leaving, Moron Media, gutless govt bodies,  spineless leaders, Biswa Sarma and Nirmala like Jokers here.

4ghori

Many people don't get that China has a different society than us if anyone has read their history then they will know unlike us which for if we left mauryan was never a one nation because no king has that gall and even if delhi sultanate or mughal did come close were not indian but outsiders who yes than indianized but their ideology was different which has only led to making indian ideology more conservative than it ever was before islam rise and unlike us they never had like that for much of their history they was single nation whether it was qin han sui  tang ming and then two non han Dynasty yuan and qing and had one language central authority they wouldn't had much problem like us whose people have been teaming I'm their close space for at least a thousand years  with different languages ethnicity caste religion they have always been martial dynasty people unlike us they got their independence by fighting with their own by sacrificing.we only waste the sacrifice of those all great revolutionaries who tried to do sacrifice For nation who tried to remove social malpractices caste discrimination from this nation I think the indians that right now has been divided right now if they  would have been during pre independence time than britsh wouldn't even have to left they would have rules fur much more time any nation can not simply become developed without catering these social issues 
And secondly I don't know much about economics but I have heard that license raj didn't do much good for the nation and then there was not much better opportunity for private players to grow man even china at least used capitalism albeit in their own way.i think at last that we as democratic nation wouldn't be able to pass china until it itself degrade it

Classic_Ninja_1586

Idk what you mean. India is 30 years ahead of China.

Smart-Ad-237

Visible_Shift6632

Good-Bedroom9257

India can compete with china in future but only when it increases its manufacturing

Dry-Flamingo3768

just curius, what makes you think anything india does would make tibet more free? 

as the factors behind why china holds sutch a strong grip on tibet is multi facited. all from military to economical reasons.

mahakala_yama

India has had normal relations with China since 1950.    
[https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/why-was-nehru-in-a-rush-to-recognise-communist-china/articleshow/108202911.cms](https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/why-was-nehru-in-a-rush-to-recognise-communist-china/articleshow/108202911.cms)

Since then Tibet has been colonized and culturally genocided by PRC.

Mediocre_Cat_3577

this is an Indian's average take on geopolitics.

bro what in god are you talking about? like two countries in the world recognize taiwan as a country (and even then as the ROChina)

In what universe does the alignment of china and india mean positive outcomes for those who wish for tibet to be separated from china? Actually it sounds much more like the killing blow towards the dying "free tibet" movement

Key_Schedule9349

The conflict over Tibet is not only about territory or politics. It is a clash of worldviews. Tibetan Buddhism centers inner freedom and the sacredness of life, while the CCP is built on material control and enforced uniformity. One vision liberates, the other dominates. That is why the occupation is so fierce, and why Tibet matters far beyond its borders.

Vulfmann

This is definitely a hint to the US that India and China, although they have big differences, may join forces because of Trump.

Any-Original-6113

If India's resumption of giving visas to PRC citizens and the newly added ridiculous requirements is any indication, this is just temporary &amp; symbolic middle finger to US (done the predictable Indian way of course)

slowwolfcat

Also just stopped [direct flights to Washington](https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/air-india-suspends-delhi-washington-flights-due-plane-shortages-pakistan-2025-08-11/)

reddragonoftheeast

Submission Statement:

India and China are set to resume direct flights as soon as September — the announcement likely around the time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visits the eastern neighbour at the end of August — as the two countries seek to reset political ties after years of tensions, sources have said.

Direct flights between India and China were halted after the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, forcing people to travel by hopping flights through hubs like Hong Kong or Singapore.

The renewed push to resume direct flights and improve bilateral ties between the two Asian countries comes against the backdrop of heightened tensions over US President Donald Trump's tariffs on India, which he doubled from 25 per cent to 50 per cent due to New Delhi's oil purchase from Russia.

Top-Flatworm8201

Trump for Nobel peace prize. He just bought two bitter rivals/enemies who went to war with each other in the 60's and had constant border conflicts ever since   together. Bravo Orangutan.

lastkni8

This is amazing news, since these two having good, or at least better relationship is one of the ways to lower global conflict the most

ale_93113

Recent developments indicate a thaw in India-China relations, driven by shifting geopolitical dynamics and high-level meetings aimed at enhancing bilateral cooperation.

India-China Relations and Geopolitical Shift

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