Former US national security adviser John Bolton has said that if the Sino-India border tensions escalate, there is no guarantee that US President Donald Trump will back India against China.

China has been behaving in a belligerent fashion all around its periphery, certainly in the East and South China Sea, and its relations with Japan, India as well as others have declined, Bolton said in a TV interview.

On how far Trump was prepared to go to back India against China, he said, “I don't know which way he would go and I don’t think he knows either. I think he sees the geostrategic relationship with China, for example, exclusively through the prism of trade.”

“I don’t know what Trump will do after the November elections once the guard rail is removed... He’ll be back to the big China trade deal. If things were to develop between India and China in a more critical fashion, I’m not sure where he would come down,” the former US envoy to the UN said.

Asked if he believes that if things were to escalate between India and China, there is no guarantee that Trump will back India against China, Bolton said, “That is correct”.

Bolton also said he does not think Trump knows anything about the history of these clashes over the decades between India and China.

Trump may have been briefed on it, but history doesn’t really stick with him, said Bolton, who was the NSA from April 2018 to September 2019 under the Trump administration. “I think his gut instinct for the next four months is to take anything off the table that complicates what is already a difficult election campaign for him,” Bolton said.

“So what he (Trump) would want is quiet along with the border whether it benefits China or India. From his point of view — No news is good news,” he said.

The Indian and Chinese armies were locked in a bitter standoff in multiple locations in eastern Ladakh for the last eight weeks. The tension escalated after the Galwan Valley clashes in which 20 Indian Army personnel were killed.

Both sides have held several rounds of diplomatic and military talks in the last few weeks to ease tension in the region.

US citizens warned

The US state department warned American citizens on Saturday to “exercise increased caution” in China due to heightened risk of arbitrary law enforcement including detention and a ban from exiting the country.

“US citizens may be detained without access to U.S. consular services or information about their alleged crime,” the state department said in a security alert issued to its citizens in China, adding that US citizens may face “prolonged interrogations and extended detention” for reasons related to state security.

“Security personnel may detain and/or deport US citizens for sending private electronic messages critical of the Chinese government,” it added, without citing specific examples. The state department also did not say what prompted the security alert.

It comes as bilateral tensions intensify over issues ranging from the Covid-19 pandemic, trade, the new Hong Kong law and allegations of human rights violations against Uighurs.