Afghanistan could become a backdoor entry for China.

President Obama has left India. Safely, thank God. There is a cacophony of analysis from our intellectuals. Most attention is focused on a joint declaration in which both India and the US seem to have expressed reservations about Chinese intentions in its neighborhood. " Regional prosperity depends on security. We affirm the importance of safeguarding maritime security and ensuring freedom of navigation and flight throughout the region, especially in the South China Sea," reads a paragraph in the declaration. This has been taken as an attempt to contain Chinese hegemony. China is too rich and powerful to be contained like the Soviet Union was. The Soviet Union was economically isolated and most of its trade was with Comecon countries while about 14% of US trade is with China and China has $4 trillion in foreign exchange reserves, of which about 70% is in US dollars. With its wealth China could have inspired the whole of Asia towards economic prosperity and ensured peace by maintaining military balance but, sadly, Chinese leaders were children during Mao's Cultural Revolution and brutality is all they know. President Xi Jinping was 15 years old when his father was jailed. If this brutality is contained within China it will destroy itself from within. It has to be done in regular increments, small enough not to provoke a muscular response from China but significant enough to be noticed by the cockroach-eaters. Japan has amended its constitution so that its Self Defence Forces can now cooperate with armed forces of other nations for ' collective self-defence '. India is to sell weapons and patrol boats to Vietnam. As usual China reacted savagely to the joint declaration calling the trip symbolic and advising India not to fall into a trap set by the US. But while our Prime Minister is right to try and build strategic relationships with the US, Japan, Vietnam and Australia he should not forget a near neighbor, Afghanistan. After the withdrawal of foreign forces economic growth has fallen from 14% to 1.4% and the central bank is spending $40-50 million twice a week to support the Afghani. Afghanistan is a treasure trove of minerals worth between $1 and $3 trillion. And this is where China comes in. The China Metallurgical Group, a state owned company, has already signed an agreement with the Afghan government and could ask for permission to send  the People's Liberation Army to guard the mines. China is already a friend of Pakistan so the ISI would be defanged. When the Soviet forces withdrew in 1989 it eventually led to the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, leading to 9/11. China is infinitely more dangerous.