When leaders from 26 countries gathered in Beijing on Wednesday, September 3rd, to celebrate China’s victory against Japan in the “People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression” and the “World Anti-Fascist War”—that is, the Second World War—India’s mainstream media stayed silent about why Prime Minister Narendra Modi was not invited to China’s V-Day commemoration.
Two days earlier, India’s mainstream media and the prime minister’s far-right supporters had enthusiastically celebrated his presence at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s (SCO) annual summit in China’s Tianjin.
Yet, they remain tight-lipped over Mr Modi’s absence from a crucial event in China, where the countries that have been supporting the call for a multipolar world order have assembled.
While New Delhi’s far-right geopolitical experts suddenly began singing praise for India’s greater role in the multipolar world, outside American influence, they tried to conceal the fact that the multipolar world’s architects do not trust India, but merely use it for their convenience.
By not inviting Mr Modi to China’s V-Day commemoration event, Beijing has delivered a diplomatic message that’s not too difficult to decrypt.
Who was invited to China’s V-Day celebrations and why?
While Mr Modi was not invited to China’s V-Day commemoration, several other world leaders were, including fellow SCO member countries.
Those who participated included Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni, Congolese President Denis Sassou Nguesso, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel, DPR Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov, Lao President Thongloun Sisoulith, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu, Mongolian President Ukhnaa Khurelsukh, Myanmar’s acting-president Min Aung Hlaing, Nepali Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli, Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, Tajik President Emomali Rahmon, Turkmen President Serdar Berdimuhamedov, Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, Vietnamese President Luong Cuong and Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
Leading officials from Singapore, South Korea and Venezuela also participated.
Several reasons explain why these leaders were invited to China’s V-Day commemoration, but not others.
First, many of these countries are former Soviet republics. Since the Soviet Union supported China throughout its “People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression”, Beijing naturally invited the former republics.
Second, countries such as Cambodia, Indonesia, North and South Korea, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore and Vietnam also suffered Japanese aggression, occupation and repression during the Second World War. Their people fought against Japanese occupation for national salvation.
Kim Jong Un‘s grandfather, Kim Il Sung, not only took part in the anti-Japanese liberation movement but was also a Soviet Red Army officer.
Their shared history of suffering makes it natural for China to invite these countries to participate in the V-Day commemoration in Beijing.
Third, other communist-ruled governments with whom China shares warm relations attended. From Cuba to Nepal, the Chinese welcomed their fellow communists to the celebration.
Finally, leaders from countries with whom China shares strong ties also participated despite having no shared history of resisting Japan directly. Among these were Iran, the Maldives, Pakistan, Serbia, Slovakia and Venezuela.
In this entire scheme, Mr Modi did not fit for several reasons.
Why did Modi not fit for China’s V-Day commemoration?
Despite Mr Modi’s presence at the SCO summit two days earlier, he was not invited to China’s V-Day commemoration for several reasons—historical and ideological.
While India was under British rule during the Second World War, there was still support for the Chinese national struggle against the Japanese.
Dr Dwarkanath Kotnis, one of many physicians from India who volunteered to help the Chinese, died in China while serving patients.
However, Japan’s hostility toward the British and its influence on a section of Indian nationalists created a positive image regarding the fascist aggressor in the subcontinent.
Although during the Second World War the Communist Party of India carried out large-scale propaganda against the Japanese fascists and the threat they posed to South Asia, Tokyo managed to retain a positive image, thanks to the massive influence of a section of nationalists associated with Japanese fascism.
Although India’s government maintained a critical stance regarding the role of Japanese fascism, especially in South Asia, and hailed China’s victory against it in the initial years after independence, the 1962 Sino-Indian War changed the equation.
Driven by xenophobia, India started vilifying China and the Chinese gradually. Under Mr Modi, this tradition has continued.
Mr Modi’s government shares strong ties with Japan, and Japan has invested heavily in India.
Both New Delhi and Tokyo are members of the American-led anti-China entente Quad.
Before visiting China, Mr Modi visited Japan and reaffirmed India’s commitment to containing China’s influence in the “Indo-Pacific“.
His visit coincided with Japan’s diplomatic endeavours to request its allies to desist from taking part in China’s V-Day commemoration in Beijing.
Japanese diplomats have alleged that the event’s theme and tone attack Japan and portray it in a poor light.
By using such a campaign, Tokyo reaffirmed China’s allegations that the Japanese rulers are resorting to revisionism and are in a denial mode regarding Japan’s atrocities against the Chinese people.
Japan started reviving its militarist-fascist spirit under former prime minister Shinzo Abe’s leadership.
Though Mr Abe had been killed, the present Japanese leaders have continued the trend by involving Japan in military blocs headed by the US-led collective West.
This increasing militarism and provocative acts, including Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba reportedly sending an offering to the Second World War-linked Yasukuni Shrine last year, have not only irked China, but also long-term American ally South Korea.
Amid this wave of Japan’s militarist revivalism, Mr Modi has continuously emphasised India-Japan ties, especially strategic defence ties.
India-Japan defence and security cooperation aims to strengthen anti-China forces in the South China Sea and East Asia.
When Japanese diplomats were lobbying Western countries to boycott China’s V-Day commemoration in Beijing, it was unwise for China to invite a Japanese ally such as India.
Moreover, there is a deep ideological issue.
Mr Modi’s ruling far-right Bharatiya Janata Party‘s (BJP) parental body, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), founded 100 years ago, was also a vocal supporter of Nazi ideology until the beginning of the Second World War.
The RSS has not just idolised the Nazi Third Reich, but its ideologues also advocated emulating the German exercise in the Indian context, replacing Jews with Muslims.
For years, the BJP has been accused by its critics of spewing Islamophobia to polarise India’s majority Hindu community in its favour. The BJP and the RSS have been accused of stoking communal hatred and inciting pogroms in various Indian states, targeting minority Muslims and Christians.
For years, the Indian far-right under the RSS has been labelling Mr Modi’s opponents as those funded by China. Sinophobia has been amplified in India following the COVID-19 pandemic and the mid-2020 clash between Indian and Chinese soldiers.
In these circumstances, inviting Mr Modi to such a crucial programme, deeply connected to the history of modern China, would have been problematic and embarrassing for Beijing.
What does this exclusion mean for India?
Although Mr Modi has endorsed the Tianjin Declaration, which even sharply condemned the American-Israeli nexus, and used his time at the SCO summit to take various photographs with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Mr Putin, unlike Russia, China cannot trust him and his government.
For China, India continues to remain a rival, although both countries have started working on resolving their disputes. Yet, Beijing knows this period of friendship is temporary.
Indian foreign policy hawks are extremely Sinophobic and are trained by Western diplomatic standards.
Thus, their principal goal will always be to stay with the American-led collective West and use membership of multipolar platforms as bargaining chips.
Therefore, while India’s foreign policy experts and mainstream media outlets have started hailing the resetting of Sino-Indian ties and are expressing hope regarding the frozen Russia-India-China axis, Beijing wants to go slowly, checking each step.
China knows India’s antagonisms with it will continue, especially over disputed sectors in the unsettled border areas. Whenever India’s relations with America warm up, it will return to its previous position.
Similarly, due to China’s strong friendship with Pakistan, India will always remain wary regarding the duo’s ties. This will ensure it creates counter-pressure on China and gets entangled in the American-led hegemonic scheme repeatedly.
Moreover, China’s growing influence in Bangladesh and Myanmar, as well as the strong ties it shares with Sri Lanka and the Maldives, will continue to create problems for New Delhi, which wants the countries in the region to accept its sole hegemony.
With China’s defence capabilities exceeding India’s manifold, New Delhi will not engage in any direct conflict with Beijing in the region. However, in the long term, it will create geopolitical obstacles as part of the American-led camp.
This is why, despite resetting ties with India, China will not allow it much space unilaterally and will remain mindful of its next steps.
Meanwhile, Mr Modi’s supporters have to face disappointment as neither China nor Russia will pin their hopes on the Indian prime minister; rather, they will try to consolidate the bloc that arrived in Beijing for China’s V-Day commemoration.
From a purely geopolitical perspective, this is not great news for India.
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