With global attention focused on Russia’s war in Ukraine, China’s territorial expansionism in Asia — especially its expanding border conflict with India — has largely fallen off the international community’s radar.
Yet, in the vast glaciated heights of the Himalayas, the world’s demographic titans have been on a war footing for over two years and the chances of violent clashes rise almost by the day.
The confrontation began in May 2020. When thawing ice reopened access routes after a brutal winter, India was shocked to discover that the People’s Liberation Army had stealthily occupied hundreds of square miles of the borderlands in its Ladakh region. This triggered a series of military clashes, which resulted in China’s first combat deaths in over four decades, and triggered the fastest-ever rival troop buildup in the Himalayan region.