Having Painted Yourself Into A Corner….

“Hype of ‘new Quad’ reflects India’s guilty conscience as an accomplice to threaten peace” – By Long Xingchun – Published: Sep 02, 2021 for Global Times

Have you ever seen a better image of painting yourself into a corner?  

This shared GT post is Illustrated by: Liu Rui/GT – whose glowing work has produced some geopolitical cartoon masterpieces. This is one of them.

And so, it is India alone it seems that is spreading talk of a new ‘Quad’. A northern or Afghanistan quad if you like to oppose the US southern South China Sea quad, all eight nations comprising the two, in India’s thinking, belonging uniquely in only one of those quads.  Of course this is an Indian thought bubble at best.  The nations India names for the Afghan quad are not normally known for tying themselves hand-in-hand in alliances with other nations for other than economic reasons.  ‘Alliances’ are one of the West’s fortes.  A strange and ill-fitting game for India to be playing in the first place.

It is entirely down to the lack of foresight by India (or perhaps an attempt to play chess armed only with pawns) that it sees itself either unwanted or shunned by the one ‘group’ (let’s not use the word ‘quad’ any more, it leaves a nasty taste and throws up images of ‘squad’), and unsure if it really wants or considers, on reflection from the corner, whether it is beneficial to be part of the other.

It can be very lonely in that corner, until the paint dries and you can sneak away somewhere else for a rethink.