Book Reviews

471

Thant Myint-U, Where China Meets India: Burma and the New Crossroads of Asia
(New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011), pp. 361, US$27.00, ISBN: 978-0374-29907.
DOI: 10.1177/0009445512466623
Located between two Asian giantsIndia and ChinaMyanmar has had immense
geostrategic significance since ancient times. Often, Myanmar was seen as a buffer
zone while at other times, it served as a strategic outlet; but at all times it has been
a back door to its two larger neighbours. These concepts may soon give way to new
ones as a new kind of frontier emerges. If one looks at the map, is it not hard to see
such a possibility and given the huge potential for trade, it makes one wonder why
India and China have not taken advantage of the overland connection that Myanmar
offers. The book under review attempts to answer this key question.
The basic argument of the book is that the frontier of both China and India is
undergoing dramatic changes as a result of their rise and, as their economies grow
further, the potential of the back door transforming itself into main gateway, connecting three major economies of South, Southeast and East Asia in the coming years
cannot be ruled out. Given its geostrategic position, Myanmar will find itself to be a
bridge connecting India and China. This is an idea that has gained increasing currency
in the recent years. As a historian of Myanmar, Thant Myint-U uses Burmese, Indian
and Chinese literature to deconstruct the histories of the most far-flung regions of
(India and China), regions of unparalleled ethnic and linguistic diversity, of forgotten
kingdoms and isolated upland societies, that were, until recently beyond the control
of Delhi and Beijing (pp. 56).
The book is a travelogue that revolves around the smaller kingdoms, small towns and
new cities, hills and valleys, dirt roads and new highways on the fringes of Myanmar,
China and India, namely Northern Myanmar, Chinas Yunnan Province and Indias
Northeast, that sit between the great populations centres of India and China (p.275).
The author narrates the histories of the places visited and the changing lifestyles of
the peoples encountered to demonstrate the development of a new countryside. What
had been remote is now closer to the new centre (p. 107). The book attempts to
understand IndiaChina interactions not from the perspectives of Delhi and Beijing,
but from the standpoints of their border regions, making it different from most of
the contemporary works on IndiaChina relations that often overlook the places and
peoples that lie in-between and separate the two countries.
The dream of having a direct route between India and China is not new. Ancient
rulers had dreamed about it, and the British had dreamed about it during the colonial
period. But it is only in the twenty-first century that (f )rontiers are being pushed up
against one another like never before and new countries are finding new neighbours
(p. 6). A dimension that has never received much attention in IndiaChina relations
so far has been to understand the frontiers themselves. There is a tendency to assume
that Myanmar is the only missing link. But, as the book rightly argues, it is not only
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China Report 48, 4 (2012): 469473

the geography and the fears and desires of the Burmese, but also a much greater ethnic
mix, with other local people, shaping and adapting to the changing environment in
their own ways and with relative peace and border trade, a very strange landscape
was developing, of overlapping ethnicities, new politics, new warlords, and perhaps
clues to Asias future (p. 94).
Thant Myint-U brings to life histories of forgotten kingdoms such as of Ava,
Manipur, Ahom and Dali and of the various ethnic groups such as the Wa, the Kokang,
the Naga, the Shan, the Kachin and others to establish the role they played in the
past, the role they play today and the role they might play in future in ChinaIndia
relations. The book argues that in the border regions of India, China and Myanmar
there were always some forms of linkages that had existed since ancient times. This
is evident from the various ethnic groups inhabiting the region sharing the same or
similar cultures. However, for centuries these smaller kingdoms, ethnic groups and
the difficult topography of the region have kept India and China separated. A direct
route between India and China through the region could not be established because
the smaller kingdoms and the ethnic groups have fought back several invasions, and
efforts to bring them under the control of Delhi, Naypyidaw and Beijing continue
even today.
This does not mean that the region was never in the limelight of international
geopolitics. In the ancient and medieval times, Yunnan had been a crossroads of sorts,
linking the Chinese empires to the north with Tibet, India, Burma and other places to
the southwest (p. 161). Not too far in the distant past, the region was the centre of the
world when the Allied and the Japanese forces fought the last battle of the World War
II in the hills and valleys of the region and where a new road linking Ledo in Assam to
Kunming in Yunnan via northern Myanmar was built called the Burma Road (and
now more commonly known as the Stilwell Road, after Gen. Joseph Stilwell of the
US Army). A line that captures the essence of the book reads: The old frontiers that
had long separated India and China were coming to an end and, in their place, a new
crossroads was being made (p. 315).
The book also provides interesting insights on Chinas Myanmar policy. Apart
from other economic and strategic interests, the book examines in detail how Beijing
acknowledges the Yunnan factor in its policy towards Myanmar. For instance, the book
argues that (f )or Beijings leaders, securing markets near and far has been of crucial
importance. But of even greater importance has been ensuring internal stability, including and especially in ethnic minority areas (p. 134). In India too, the author rightly
observes that Indias influence in Myanmar would depend not only on Delhi, but also
on people and events in Indias melancholy Northeast (p. 271). Can the Northeast
become the springboard for India to Myanmar and beyond as Yunnan has for China?
At a time when there is a growing interest on what direction the relationship between
the two emerging Asian powers will take in the next several years to come, this book
provides a dimension to understand ChinaIndia relations that will pre-occupy Delhi
and Beijing for decades to come.

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Book Reviews

473

Even as efforts continue by national governments to bring their respective parts

of this vast region under full control, changes have been taking place in the remote
hills and valleys. The book vividly captures the changing lifestyles of the people in the
Chinese border towns of Lijiang and Ruili. The culture of consumerism is fast growing
in this region as is true also in the case of the people of Indias Northeast and Northern
Myanmar, if at a slower pace than that on the Chinese side. The author travelled on
both sides of the ChinaMyanmar border by road and provides detailed accounts of
the two journeys from Mandalay to Lashio on the Myanmar side and from Kumning
to Ruili on the Chinese side. To reach the frontier of India and Myanmar, the author
had to take a flight. Perhaps, a road trip from Mandalay to Guwahati via Nagaland
or lower Assam would have given a slightly different impression of the region to the
author and possibly given him a closer assessment of the changing life-styles of the
peoples and the inter- and intra-ethnic tensions and conflicts that will also have their
own implications on the overall peace and stability of the border regions.
The book is an effort to construct a new paradigm in understanding ChinaIndia
relations. The author raises several critical questions that both policymakers and
scholars in India, China and Myanmar will increasingly be confronted with in the
coming years. As policymakers seek to find answers to the many issues that confront
the region, the future of the ethnic groups of the region and their potential role in
IndiaChina relations will be crucial. This book should be of great interest to anyone
who wants to understand the changing nature of border regions and how they are
redefining the relationship between India and China.
K. Yhome
Research Fellow
Observer Research Foundation
New Delhi

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