Russia will fall, China will rise: India’s General Staff on world’s future

Russia’s geopolitical influence will gradually diminish in the coming years, while China’s position will strengthen, Lt. Gen. Anil Chauhan, India’s chief of staff, said in a public lecture to the military. In his speech, the general also discussed the challenges the modern world is experiencing and outlined the contours of the future new international order.

“The current geopolitical environment is in a state of flux. The old order is withering away and the shapes and contours of the new world order are yet to stabilise. The geopolitical importance of Russia will go down in times to come. It is in spite of being a nuclear power. The Wagner rebellion indicates the internal weakness and is indicative of what may lie in store for the future as far as Russia is concerned,” General Chauhan said.

China is currently strengthening itself in the geo-economic world order, continued the Chief of the General Staff of India. “It is the fastest growing economy and its economic heft is now visible in the political and diplomatic domains. This is also visible in their military prowess also. We will see a more assertive China in times to come,” he said.

Chauhan observed that countries are preparing for an uncertain future, and the national security strategies of states and rising defense spending only confirm this.

“If you have a look at national security strategies, countries such as Japan, France, Germany, (the) U.K., Poland, South Korea, Bangladesh and many others have revived their national security strategies. They actually revived at the time of the Ukraine conflict, but now bigger change is happening in the Middle East,” Chauhan said.

The Indo-Pacific region is fast becoming the center of future struggle. At the same time, the successful holding of the G20 summit shows that India is likely to become the leader of the Global South, the Chief of the General Staff of India is convinced.

“Technology is changing the domain of warfare. Space is one such domain. Information warfare is something we fight in the cognitive domain,” Chauhan said.