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India's appeasement only encouraged the Chinese to go further. China is plainly working to put India into the jaws of a giant Himalayan nutcracker. Recently China concluded a road-building treaty with Nepal, is offering economic aid to the Himalayan kingdoms of Sikkim and Bhutan. The significance of the Chinese pincers movement finally occurred even to Menon. "A stab in the back," he com plained last month. "When did you realize this?" gibed Election Rival J. B. Kripalani in Parliament. "The day before yesterday?" But Menon still urged caution against "adventurism," said that the Chinese Communists should withdraw from Indian territory "in the interests of peace and socialism."
Menon claims with some justice that India could not win a war with Red China, though it is a curious stance for a vain Defense Minister. But Menon's critics counter that defending Indian territory against further Red conquests need not lead to war. Trouble is that Menon has neglected to build up India's border defenses. While he and Nehru refuse to give details to Parliament, on the ground that such information would be useful to the Chinese, one fact is clear: north India's population centers are far closer to the frontier than Red China's big cities, but the Chinese have built more roads to the Himalayan passes than the Indians. Most frontier areas can be reached from the Indian side only by muleback or helicopter. India's defensive position would be far better if it were to make common cause with Pakistan, but Menon sneers at the suggestion. Because Pakistan is allied with the West, he argues, Indian-Pakistani cooperation "would plunge us right in the middle of the cold war." Partly because of Menon's attitude, the Pakistanis have lately begun talking about a deal with Red China.
The Economic Issue. Menon has no direct responsibility for India's economy, but his political opponents in the campaign point out accurately that his ideas strongly influence Nehru. They are both old-school, doctrinaire socialists of the 1930s variety, and both insist, against considerable evidence, that all the world is inevitably turning to socialism. They refuse to recognize that all the older socialist parties of the free world have abandoned the rigid formulas since World War II, and that the greatest progress has been achieved (in Germany, Western Europe, Japan) by relatively free enterprise. Of that progress Menon says scornfully, "The last word has not been said," suggesting that collapse is just around the corner. Both Nehru and Menon regard Indian private enterprise as some thing of a monster that must be kept in check. Certainly the older Indian capitalists are often rapacious, but Nehru and Menon are overlooking a younger breed with progressive ideas that is drawn to the Swatantra.