A new Pentagon report has raised apprehensions in New Delhi, claiming that China considers India’s Northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh a “core interest,” along with Taiwan and other contested islands in the South China Sea, such as the Senkaku Islands.
As such, Beijing considers China’s reunification with these contested territories as “a natural requirement” for national rejuvenation.
Furthermore, the report claims that China is preparing to take Taiwan by “brute force” by 2027. However, the report has not provided any timeline for China’s goal of reunifying Arunachal Pradesh or the Senkaku Islands.
The Pentagon’s annual report on military and security developments relating to the People’s Republic of China was submitted to the US Congress on December 24.
The report also highlights the growing collaboration and partnership between Beijing and Islamabad.
However, the most dangerous aspect of the report, at least from India’s perspective, is China’s description of Arunachal Pradesh as its “core interest,” elevating it to the same level as Taiwan.
“China’s National Strategy is to achieve “the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation” by 2049. In this vision, a rejuvenated China would have raised its “influence, appeal, and power to shape events to a new level,” and it would field a “world-class” military that can “fight and win” and “resolutely safeguard” the country’s sovereignty, security, and development interests,” the Pentagon report says.
Further, it adds, “China claims three ‘core interests,’ defined as issues so central to China’s national rejuvenation that their official position is not subject to negotiation or compromise. These include: 1) the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) control, 2) promoting China’s economic development, and 3) defending and expanding China’s sovereignty and territorial claims.”
“China’s leadership has extended the term ‘core interest’ to cover Taiwan and China’s sovereignty claims amid territorial disputes in the South China Sea, the Senkaku Islands, and the northeastern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh.”
If the Pentagon report’s assessment is correct, this would be the first time Beijing has listed Arunachal Pradesh not only as its “core interest,” reunification with which is key to “national rejuvenation,” but also placed it on the same priority list as Taiwan and the Senkaku Islands.
If Beijing indeed views Arunachal Pradesh as its “core interest,” this could have grave implications for India.
Notably, India’s recent two military stand-offs with China occurred along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the middle sector (Dokhlam 2017) and the western sector (Ladakh 2020).
During both crises, the eastern sector of the LAC, along the Arunachal Pradesh border, remained relatively calm.
However, according to the Pentagon’s assessment, China could open a new front with India along the border in Arunachal Pradesh in the coming years.
In fact, in light of the report, specific actions by China in the recent past, seemingly bizarre and abrupt, now appear to be part of a thoughtful escalation.
For instance, in November 2025, an Indian citizen named Prema Wangjom Thongdok was detained for approximately 18 hours at the Shanghai Pudong International Airport during a layover, sparking a diplomatic dispute between India and China.
Chinese immigration officials allegedly declared Thongdok’s Indian passport “invalid” because her place of birth was listed as Arunachal Pradesh, a region China claims as its own territory. Beijing calls the region Zangnan, part of southern Tibet.
Thongdok, a UK resident travelling from London to Japan, reported being subjected to harassment, verbal intimidation, and degrading comments. She stated that staff laughed at her, suggested she apply for a Chinese passport, and denied her adequate food or the ability to communicate with her family.
India’s Ministry of External Affairs had lodged strong protests with the Chinese authorities in Beijing and New Delhi over the matter.
However, a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman, Mao Ning, defended the action, saying, “Zangnan is Chinese territory. China has never recognised the so-called Arunachal Pradesh, illegally established by India.”
Similarly, earlier this week, an Indian vlogger claimed he was detained at an airport in China for 15 hours over a video he made about a month earlier in response to the harassment faced by Thongdok at Shanghai airport.
In India, these actions by the Chinese authorities looked bizarre as they were coming just months after relations were finally stabilizing between the two neighbours, following years of tensions and military stand-off in the aftermath of the June 2020 Galwan clash in Laddakh, the deadliest India-China border clash in decades.
In September, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi travelled to China to attend the 25th Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit held in Tianjin, his first visit to the country in seven years.
In retrospect, these actions seem like calculated moves by Beijing to convey a strategic message to New Delhi: that China’s stance on Arunachal Pradesh will become more rigid in the future.
China’s hardening stance on Arunachal Pradesh, effectively making its claims on this territory ‘non-negotiable,’ is shocking to India for one more reason.
Historically, China has been open to relinquishing its territorial claims in the Eastern sector (Arunachal Pradesh), if India recognizes China’s claims in the Western sector, specifically recognizing Beijing’s illegal annexation of Aksai Chin.
In fact, according to some analysts, had India accepted China’s offer in the 1950s, not only would Beijing have relinquished its claim to Arunachal Pradesh, but the two countries could also have avoided the 1962 India-China War.
When China Offered To Relenquish Its Claims To Arunachal Pradesh
After independence, India and China inherited over 4,000 km of an unsettled border. Beijing rejected the McMahon Line, the de facto border between the British Indian Empire and China, as a colonial legacy and refused to recognize it as the boundary between the two independent countries.
As Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai wrote to Indian Prime Minister Nehru in a 1958 letter, “historically no treaty or agreement on the Sino-Indian boundary has ever been concluded.”
The McMahon Line, Zhou wrote, was a “product of the British policy of aggression against the Tibet region of China. It can not be considered legal.”
There were several rounds of border talks between Beijing and New Delhi in the 1950s.
During these border negotiations, Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai proposed a “package deal” or swap arrangement: China would recognize India’s control over the eastern sector (Arunachal Pradesh, then known as the North East Frontier Agency or NEFA), if India conceded the western sector (Aksai Chin) to China.
The offer reflected a “give-and-take” approach, with China willing to accept the McMahon Line in the east in exchange for recognition of its claims in the west, where Aksai Chin was strategically important for linking Xinjiang and Tibet, two of China’s provinces where Beijing’s territorial claims were disputed.
Shri Avtar Singh Bhasin, who had served for 30 years in the History Wing of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) of India, and retired as its Director, wrote in his book titled ‘Nehru, Tibet and China‘ that in April 1960, a summit was held in Delhi between Nehru and Chinese Prime Minister Zhou Enlai to find a permanent solution.
Zhou agreed to “reconsider India’s claim on the McMahon Line and come to an agreement” with a spirit of give-and-take to resolve the issue amicably. In lieu, he urged India to recognise its claims on the western sector, Aksai Chin.
“Survey maps show that the border here was not defined until 1954,” the Chinese team pointed out. Aksai Chin is essential to China because it connects western Tibet with the Province of Xinjiang.
Again, during bilateral talks with Nehru in New Delhi in 1959, Zhou suggested that for a resolution, “neither side should put forward claims to an area which is no longer under its administrative control.”
Essentially, it meant that in the East, Beijing could recognize Delhi’s claim to Arunachal Pradesh, as it is under India’s administrative control; similarly, in the West, Delhi should recognize Beijing’s claim to Aksai Chin, as it is under China’s administrative control.
Bereft of diplomatic language, what China was suggesting was that in the East, Beijing has a much stronger claim to Arunachal Pradesh, as it was historically part of Southern Tibet. Still, China can recognize it as Indian territory because it is under Delhi’s administrative control and is valuable to India.
Similarly, in the West, India might have a stronger claim to Aksai Chin, but the area is under Beijing’s administrative control and is more valuable to China than India.
Thus, India and China can swap these territories based on the situation on the ground.
However, Nehru rejected this offer, saying that this would amount to recognizing China’s illegal land grab in Aksai Chin.
Eventually, India-China border talks failed, and the two countries fought a bloody war in 1962.
However, this raises the question of why China is hardening its stance on Arunachal Pradesh, a territory it was willing to swap with India in the 1950s.
There could be two possibilities.
One, this is a classic Chinese tactic to keep pressure on India through the LAC to dissuade New Delhi from getting too close to the US.
Otherwise, this could reflect China’s growing confidence in its military capabilities, in which Beijing believes it is in a position to pressure India in both the western sector in Ladakh and the eastern sector in Arunachal Pradesh.
China remains, as it was in the 1960s, a revisionist power, intent on realizing its territorial claims, inspired by imperial China in the Middle Ages.
- Sumit Ahlawat has over a decade of experience in news media. He has worked with Press Trust of India, Times Now, Zee News, Economic Times, and Microsoft News. He holds a Master’s Degree in International Media and Modern History from the University of Sheffield, UK.
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- He can be reached at ahlawat.sumit85 (at) gmail.com
