China has steadily injected, in contested geographies, own resources for marking its sovereignty for nearly a decade. Through such constructed settlements of relative affluence along the regions bordering Tibet, it not only aims to strengthen its position within the disputed frontiers but also uses the classic example of salami-slicing tactics in order to imply the Chinese strategy of gradually cutting off piece-by-piece of other nations’ territory.1 The Chinese actions incorporate nibbling like a silkworm initially and then, swallowing like a whale. The prey is unaware of the small bites of the silkworm suddenly get caught into crushing jaws.2 The Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) shares the lengthiest international border with India, Nepal, and Bhutan, and Myanmar.3 While China has persistent land boundary disagreements with India and Bhutan, which have not been settled despite prolonged consultations conducted over years,4 many independent satellite descriptions claim that China is shrewdly involved in the construction of new villages along the border with India to strengthen its challenged territorial assertions, particularly around Arunachal Pradesh.5

The above could be supported by an important Chinese policy paper on TAR with a section titled “Developing border areas and improving people’s lives,” 6 released by its State Council Information Office stated that many border villages in the faraway areas were linked to highways and with improved access to modern communication mentioning that it was part of the white paper “Tibet Since 1951: Liberation, Development, and Prosperity”. 7

The paper further argued that these efforts in the border areas are for the people’s better living and working conditions.8 The Central Committee (CC) of the Communist Party of China (CPC) has enhanced financial contribution since 2012 and increasing year-by-year expenditure for border development in such difficult contested regions focussing on infrastructure creation, including water, electricity, roads, telecommunication networks, and augmenting inhabiting population. 9

In 2017, an ambitious letter was penned down by President Xi Jinping, to Tibetan herdsmen living near the Arunachal Pradesh border to put down foundations and preserve the Chinese territory.10 Clearly, it could be seen as part of larger Chinese manoeuvring for pushing its claims and enhancing pressures on counterparts claiming rights on same territories. Consequently, there had been upgrading and erection of the Chinese military facilities, involving heliports and missile bases, all along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the aftermath of the 2017 standoff at Doklam.11 India supports Bhutan’s claim over Doklam which lies at a tri-junction between India, Bhutan and China.12

Towns and administrative villages near to the tri-junction, have direct access to highways providing access to all administrative villages in the region with feeder airports like Bamda Airport in Qamdo,13 Mainling Airport in Nyingchi, Peace Airport in Xigaze, and Gunsa Airport in Ngari.14

A leading geopolitical intelligence platform has reported that an even greater level of activity and advanced build-up by the Chinese is visible from its air bases near the Indian borders. 15 Furthermore, China’s shortage of air bases close to the LAC compels it to focus more on augmenting airpower through these airports with difficult terrain.

US-based satellite operator, Maxar Technologies, images show the significant Chinese construction activity along the Torsa River valley area with the newly constructed Pangda Village in Bhutan along with military bunkers.16 Chinese media claimed  the development as South Tibet’s internal infrastructure issue and rebuffed Indian media contentions.17  Further, it is important to note that China has constructed a new village disputed with India on the banks of the Tsari Chu River in the name of a national poverty alleviation program near Arunachal Pradesh. 18

A foreign policy report19 highlights that in TAR, new villages are routinely being built by China. Communist Party Secretary of the TAR, Wu Yingjie has visited a new village, called Gyalaphug which is under Bhutan across the international border. The village is in a 232-square mile area asserted by China since the early 1980s but internationally recognized as a portion of the Lhuntse district in northern Bhutan.20 The Chinese official’s visit went noticed by the world in spite of the territory traditionally belongs to Bhutan.

Reinforcing the Tibetan borderlands is a sensational intensification in China’s long-running attempts to outmanoeuvre neighbour India and its friendly nations, in this case, Bhutan. 21 In an attempt to grab more strategic territories, China wants to force the Bhutanese government to cede territory to ensure Chinese military advantage in its larger security perspectives. It mirrors the similar tactics employed in the South China Sea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Tibet.22 Since the 1990s, China has been proposing to give up 495 square kilometres of its claims in the north if Bhutan yields 269 square kilometres of its territory in the parts of Doklam, Charithang, Sinchulungpa, Dramana, and Shakhatoe, Sakteng. 23 Bhutan declined to bog down under Chinese pressure and rejected the package deal even on bribes of huge economic aid like other South Asian countries.  

Bhutanese territory claimed by China

Chinese resorted to adventures of new claims to the Beyul and the Menchuma Valley which were shown as parts of Bhutan on official Chinese maps until the 1980s. On paradox, China through official channels describes their relations with Bhutan as the two friendly neighbours connected by mountains and rivers. 24 Beyul gives China a foothold only 62 miles from India’s strategic Siliguri Corridor.

Tibetan nomads and their families that grazed in the border regions are employed in a pre-planned manner to reinforce China’s claim to the area and further follow the village settlements, military outposts, and infrastructure creation to assert legitimacy to illegal occupations.25

The Foreign Policy report underlines that Bhutan cannot contest and compete with China and the same point also echoed by Hal Brands.26 China knows that it is breaching the 1998 accord to change the status quo of the disputed area.

Chinese presence has executed a fait accompli by creating facts favourable to their claims on the ground by calmly invading another sovereign nation that’s a grey zone. 27 This refers to the act of gently sending troops onto parts of remote terrain of other sovereign states but preventing unambiguous fleeting actions that might trigger a full-blown conflict.28

The exasperation of neighbouring states of China is that the greed of Chinese territories keeps on expanding, as it happened with India since independence from the British in 1947. 29 Chinese Gyalaphug construction issue is of high security concern, which was shown under Bhutan even in some official Chinese maps from the 1980s. A similar scenario has been played in the Chinese claims of the Bhutanese Sakteng wildlife reserve30 which does not even border China and Arunachal Pradesh of India.

It is highlighted in a study that India-China unsettled boundary led to political antagonism that enhanced militarisation of the LAC causing grievous suffering to smaller states like Bhutan.31 It is important to note that Bhutan has a long institution of cultural and religious interface with Tibet and also shares a common border with China.32 Tibetan factor with China’s geopolitical competition politics and perceptions of security in the context of India-China relations will provide many crucial junctures in coming times. Bhutan and China do not have diplomatic relations. Also, Bhutan never bogged down to China to allow to make inroads into Bhutan using trade and economic aids as it did to Sri Lanka, Maldives, Pakistan etc.to extend its strategic interests. (POREG)

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7 Ibid.

8 Ibid

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20Ibid.

21Wini F Gurung, A Ranjan, China’s Territorial Claims and Infringement in Bhutan: Concerns for India, ISAS working Paper, 1 April 2021, https://www.isas.nus.edu.sg,accessed on 29 June 2021

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27 Ibid.

28Ibid.

29 Robert Barnett, China Is Building Entire Villages in Another Country’s Territory, Foreign Policy, https://foreignpolicy.com, 7 May 2021, accessed on 11 June 2021

30 Why Bhutan’s Sakteng wildlife sanctuary is disputed by China, https://www.bbc.com, 25 November 2020, accessed on 21 June 2021

31ArzanTarapore, The Crisis After the Crisis: How Ladakh will shape India’s competition with China, Lowy Institute, 6 May 2021, https://www.lowyinstitute.org,accessed on 22 June 2021

32Thierry Mathou (2004), Bhutan-China Relations: Towards a new Step in Himalayan Politics, AACR, https://core.ac.uk, accessed on 24 June 2021