China is tweaking the Indians as part of a campaign to negotiate a treaty to settle, once and for all, these many border disputes. India has been reluctant to give in much to the Chinese, and the issue is not seen, by either nation, as worth another war. So non-military pressure is being applied.
I'm not that comforted. How many wars have been fought over issues that few would consider worth a war--or even the bones of a single Pomeranian grenadier?
As long as India and china fear each other and see each other as a potential enemy, any nominal dispute could be leveraged into a war by design or accident. What if China decided that it needed a foreign distraction from economic, political, and social disorder inside China and that it was too risky for the moment to go after Taiwan? Disputes over what seem to be small issues easily contained might be too tempting for Peking to pass by if the perceived alternative to provoking a border crisis with India was revolution.
China and India are at least lucky that mountains keep them from being able to go at each other in full-scale ground warfare. That at least should take them off hair trigger responses in any crisis.
