This analyst writes that China is foolish to provoke India along their disputed border because that might lead China to split defense investments between being a sea power and being a land power:
One hopes China has genuinely reconsidered picking a fight with India, a great power with which it shares a long land frontier. Beijing has created headaches aplenty for itself through its conduct in the South China Sea and East China Sea. The last thing it should do is open another axis along which to disperse energy and resources. Why am I venting my spleen? ...
Strategic theorists were probably turning over in their graves during the impasse. Given the rock-star status Alfred Thayer Mahan enjoys in China, decision-makers there should understand the perils of waging simultaneous strategic competitions on land and at sea. Mahan concedes that a nation can be a great sea power and a great continental power for awhile, but he also warns that the good times won't roll for long. China has mounted an impressive naval buildup precisely because it quieted disputes along its distended continental periphery. By reopening its territorial quarrel with India, Beijing risks having to redirect resources from sea power back to land defense. Needlessly draining your national treasury is self-defeating behavior.
Um, yes, why is he venting his spleen on this? I've long wanted China to turn inland for exactly the reason the analyst says is needlessly draining China's treasure:
We need to get China focused on the Asian interior so that we are not on the verge of war with China over Taiwan.
Our pivot to Asia and the Pacific may strengthen our alliances and forces to deter China or defeat China if it comes to war, but this isn't exactly ideal grand strategy, is it?
[Defeating] China makes the best of the worst case and deterring China makes the best of the second worst case. We need to shovel the Snow back north. We need to play the Great Game in Asia to achieve our best case--a China pointed away from the south--Taiwan and the United States and our other allies--and pointed toward the north and the interior of Asia.
"Shoveling the snow" was a reference to the possibility that Russia has been actively pointing China at America through weapon sales (and tolerated theft) to avoid China's attention. Russia did that with Japan prior to Pearl Harbor, without a doubt.
Fortunately, we may not need to do much to keep China pursuing self-defeating aggressive policies. China's growing power, growing nationalism, and a long memory for the glory days when China was the Middle Kingdom between heaven and earth rather than a weak state exploited by foreign powers may combine to push Chinese leaders to lean forward wherever their capabilities allow them to do so.
China props up their aggressive attack dog, North Korea; demands Japanese islands in the South China Sea; demands (quietly for now) Taiwan; demands everyone's property in the South China Sea (and their little dog, too); and claims territory in India. And everyone, everywhere has to talk nicely about China. How long can Russia avoid China's demands? Those claims do seem to multiply, don't they?
For a lot of countries, China's rise is making America look a lot better. Big, powerful, and far away seem pretty good compared to big, powerful, close by, and holding a list of your stuff that China wants. China may not be able to help pissing off everyone around them. So we might not need to be very good at the Great Game at all.
