Mallika Dureja
China, a “near peer level competitor” of the United States, has the ability to alter the rules-based order in every sector and across multiple regions, according to a US intelligence report released on Wednesday. The report also concluded that relations between India and China will remain “strained” over the next year, and that low-level friction at their shared border has the potential to escalate rapidly.
In its annual threat assessment report, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) — the apex of the United States’ extensive intelligence apparatus — identified two significant strategic threats to US interests. The first is the strategic competition between the United States and its allies and Russia and China. The second relates to shared global challenges, such as climate, health, and human security.
The report warns, “These two strategic challenges will intersect and interact in unpredictable ways, resulting in mutually reinforcing effects that may challenge our ability to respond.”
The report was drafted at the beginning of February and disclosed on Wednesday, as intelligence community leaders briefed the US Congress on threats to national security.
In a section on potential interstate conflicts, the report mentions India-China relations, indicating that despite bilateral border talks and “resolved border points,” relations will remain “tense” in the wake of the deadly clash in 2020. This is a reference to the skirmish between Indian and Chinese soldiers in Ladakh’s Galwan Valley, along the Sino-Indian border, in June 2020. Twenty Indian soldiers and at least four Chinese forces perished along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) for the first time in 45 years.
“The increased military postures of both India and China along the disputed border increase the likelihood of armed conflict between two nuclear powers, which could pose direct threats to U.S. persons and interests and necessitate U.S. intervention. Previous standoffs have demonstrated that persistent low-level friction along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) can quickly escalate.
In the same section, there is also a fleeting mention of the India-Pakistan dynamic, with ODNI warning of the possibility of an escalation cycle between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.
“After both parties renewed a cease-fire along the Line of Control in early 2021, New Delhi and Islamabad are probably inclined to maintain the current tranquilly in their relationship. Pakistan has a long history of supporting anti-India militant organisations, and under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, India is more likely than in the past to respond militarily to perceived or actual Pakistani provocations.
However, the report focuses primarily on China and Russia. ODNI suggests that during his third term, Chinese President Xi Jinping will “work to press Taiwan on unification, undercut US influence, create wedges between Washington and its partners, and promote norms favourable to its authoritarian system.” China claims Taiwan as a province and has sworn to reunite it with the mainland by any means necessary.
According to the report, Beijing combines its growing military power with its economic, technological, and diplomatic influence “to strengthen [Chinese Communist Party] rule, secure what it regards as its sovereign territory and regional preeminence, and pursue global influence”.
The section on China elaborates on Beijing’s aggression and objectives in Taiwan, the South China Sea, and the East China Sea, as well as its use of the Belt and Road Initiative, the Global Development Initiative, and the Global Security Initiative as alternatives to U.S.- and Western-dominated international development and security frameworks. In addition, the report provides information about China’s military, nuclear, cyber, space, technological, and developmental capabilities, as well as its “malign influence” operations.
The US intelligence community has predicted that China will “maintain its diplomatic, defence, economic, and technological cooperation with Russia in order to continue attempting to challenge the United States despite reducing its public support.” In February 2022, Moscow and Beijing reached a deeper strategic understanding, and in recent weeks, the United States has warned that Beijing is contemplating providing lethal arms support to Moscow for its war in Ukraine, despite the fact that China has not yet done so.
According to the threat assessment, Russia’s conflict in Ukraine is a “tectonic event” that is reshaping Moscow’s relationships with the West and China, as well as on a broader scale, in ways that are still developing and remain highly uncertain. It asserts that Russia will continue to pursue its interests in “competitive and sometimes confrontational and provocative ways” and that an escalation of the conflict between Russia and the West carries a greater risk “that the world has not confronted in decades.”
ODNI asserts that Russia’s operation in Ukraine has not produced the results that President Vladimir Putin had hoped for. It suggests that Russia will continue to confront “issues of attrition, personnel shortages, and morale challenges” as a result of Putin’s miscalculation of the capabilities of the Ukrainian military.
The complete effects of Russia’s partial mobilisation may not be seen until the spring and summer of 2023, according to the report, and while Russia will continue to focus on Donbas, Moscow will “probably” not be able to seize the entire region this year.
The US believes that the war has diminished Russian capabilities, citing a report that states, “Moscow’s military forces have suffered losses during the Ukraine conflict that will require years of rebuilding and leave them less capable of posing a conventional military threat to European security and operating as assertively in Eurasia and on the global stage.” However, it serves as a reminder that Russia maintains the “largest and most capable stockpile of nuclear weapons” and “continues to expand and modernise its nuclear weapons capabilities.”
