The Sino-Indian conflict of 1962

The Sino-Indian war of 1962 cannot be analysed purely in terms of the frontier dispute between the two countries. The stakes of this conflict between two neighbours who attach great importance to maintaining their friendly relations, even though they offer two different social, political and economic models to the Afro-Asian Movement, go beyond the bilateral framework. They are as much connected with the Sino-Indian rivalry as is proved by the Soviet archives. In fact, the relations between the two giants of the communist bloc deteriorate whereas Indo-Soviet relations improve considerably during the second half of the 1950s. The 1962 war therefor has to be situated in the framework of the triangular relationship between India, China and the Soviet Union. It heralds the restructuring of the international system, the forthcoming Sino-American alliance and results, on the regional level, in the rapid militarisation of the Indian subcontinent.