Well from quite a time there are many speculations in the Geopolitical movements and changes in the strategy of China and other countries. Relatively, By banning 59 Chinese apps Indian has uncovered the loophole in International Law which allowed any country to block apps and services, in the garb of national security using the section 69A of the IT act 2000, while New Delhi has used a very sharp loophole to ban these applications and made sure that these apps cannot re-enter the market, making sure that every way these apps can be blocked, from banning these apps from play store to making sure that the ISP providers block the servers to access from Indian domain even using VPN, this masterstroke, however, raises eyebrows on the net neutrality issue, but then nothing comes above National Security…..does it? Well, today we will discuss the geopolitical repercussions of these decisions, how India has become a hero with this single move and what are the other nations learning from India from the past few months.
Banning creates a domino effect
Banning the apps has created a ripple effect in the world market, now, every Nation knows that these apps can be banned from their nation without inviting the wrath of world trade organizations even if you are a signatory of their treaties, the WTO and the General Agreement on Tariff and Trade (GATT) is not violated if you decide to ban any application on the pretext that it violated your national security and thus is harmful to the integrity and sovereignty of the nation, after knowing that this is possible there is a wave of decisions taken by world’s leading nations viz USA, EU and other nations (see the list here) who have repeated the gesture by banning the apps along with its hardware products as well, For example, many nations who were in a dilemma about what should be done of Huawei, whether to include it in 5G trials or not, finally countries have taken a clear and single stance by saying no to these tech giants, the repercussions are clear that the chines makers will lose a huge amount of business.
Repercussions on market, China and World
while nothing is unknown and hidden that due to this ban there will be a huge chunk of loss to the Chinese Companies, but to have a vantage point of view we forget that when every country follows by banning these applications it means that there shall be repercussions, meaning loss of jobs and alarming levels of unemployment rates in China, while China already has many mouths to feed, in these difficult time if all the countries continue banning the applications and hardware components this will lead to huge loss financially as well as rising unemployment levels, which in turn will fuel anger and aghast among the young and working-class of the nation, there might be protests at various parts of China against the foreign policy and immense pressure from the people to maintain good and cordial relations with other nations (other than friend nations). That’s a double hit on the national economy and employment index, apart from these two major issues, there will also be some sub-major issues like, receding foreign exchange and depleting relations with all the nations with which China had good trade relations.
Attitude problems
It looks like China and its leadership is too proud of itself that may lead to their destruction, how is it? Even after all that has happened China doesn’t seem to budge or even apologies to the world for hiding crucial information about COVID, it doesn’t seem to care a lot about how other nations feel when it makes laws pertaining to its own national security which may malign other countries right to personal security. China being a totalitarian country has a law which states that any country which has its servers located on its lands have to share data unquestioned, and it can exercise this right even if there is nothing suspicious about the app, hence it has an alternative to every app from WhatsApp to Skype, it has its own enterprise and other website are banned, meaning the whole data produced by Chinese resides inside the country and makes it impossible for the world to know what’s happening in Main land China, in addition to this it is also a precarious situation as when State has total control of what you are browsing and what you are talking about it means that you aren’t free, the state doesn’t trust their own people and has a close watch on their daily activity, Data is the new oil and China foresaw this long back and we all were blind to it. In addition to all these the major advantages that china has when it has its apps are, these companies create employment, make sure that their money stays inside their nation and makes its economy stronger in a way.
Next move
What can be next move of China? Well, we cannot expect anything new from China as the way it has conducted its affairs, it seems like there is a pattern to its reactions and set of old strategies which it tends to follow more frequently whenever there is a problem which can instigate an outrage in the hearts of its citizens, it creates a dispute with its neighbouring countries, in 1962 there was a conflict with India, and now same actions are being taken by them despite signing numerous MoU’s and treaties, it tends to violate them from time to time to create an issue so that the public which is very loyal towards their motherland get busy towards these issues. What can we say, India has Cricket, Gods and Festivals, China just seem to have its nation to divert its citizen’s attention, they all have their way….
If China tries and repeats its patterns this time there shall be a few problems which they would have to overcome
1. Since all the nations have started to wake up and stop Chinese products to enter their markets, be it either apps or hardware components or raw material, this shall beat the market and manufacture industry which will lead to less revenue and hence weak economy
2. With weakening economy, the people will start to protest and when this happens, China will start disputes with India, and its border sharing countries.
3. This dispute if further aggravated may lead to a war-like situation which China won't be able to win quite clearly with bans and receding economic paucity, the fight may weaken, and this mission would mean going on a suicide mission, China won't like to do that.
The other unpopular and irrelevant step that can be taken by China would be to impose retaliatory sanctions and bans on the other nations which sell and have a trade relation with China, but that would hurt China more than anything else as the whole world is against China today there are high chances that if China decides to impose sanctions on these trading nations they may find an alternative market, in such a case India will be the biggest benefactor of this condition, as well as other smaller countries like Bangladesh, Vietnam, Philippines etc, which will be a double loss for China.
Alternatives
We all have to give china its share of praise for its diplomatic brilliance, China has excellent diplomacy in many areas, it has handled many difficult situations with ease, there is a huge chance that it may change its strategy lets us see what they can be
Exploiting the Bonds
We are aware of the malicious bonds that China has been giving to poor nations and in the garb of helping them it has bought strategic positions in the world to be used in difficult situations, I guess this is the time these positions will be used in efficient way viz the Hambantota port of Sri Lanka can be used to intimidate Indian sea routes and other routes to show the world that the ball is still in its court.
China also has friendly relations with Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Lanka, which means it has surrounded India from all the sides and if it cannot harm India directly at least it can intimidate and create an image in the heart of Indian minds.
While we can go on analyzing the possibilities of what china may do and what I may not, we are yet to see what it does, if any view has been left out let me know about it.
Comments
Post a Comment