Your post has contradictions.
They were building ports around India, one they have in Pak other in Maldives and there are many more commercial ports operated by the Chinese all over the globe. So I guess they are good in diplomacy.
Other thing is the industrial power. oh well without diplomatic efforts they would have not been able to spread made in china around the world.
They are very well diplomatically placed. When you say India stands alone. And Pakistan and NoKo being proxy of China. Does India have any proxy of it's nearby China?
This is not just diplomacy. Chinese have money, there are poor countries around the world who need money. Chinese smell an opportunity and move in and once they have a foot in the door they push in. This is no different from how colonial powers expanded in the past.
This is statecraft, call it imperialism, call it China's version of Monroe doctrine if you will. Diplomacy is a part of it. This is how imperial and colonial powers expanded in the past. This is how US expanded it's reach and influence around the world in the 20th century.
I am not saying India stands alone. I am saying that we should we prepared for the fact that though, countries around the world are favourable to our point of view, when it comes down to an actual conflict, we will have to go it alone. No one will formally come to our aid. If someone does, it's not because they like us, but it's because they have their own interests to look after and aiding us maybe in their interests.
We do not have a proxy anywhere because,
1. We have never played that game. AT least not at the nation state level. Sure we've had proxies in terms of leaderships in many countries, but never a country as a whole. Sure, Bhutan, Mauritius etc have deep links with India, but they are not our proxies.
2. We do not have the resources to match China and cultivate proxies. Proxies are like mistresses, do not kepe them if you cannot afford them. A self-insufficient proxy is a drain on resources, nothing more.
3. Proxies have a brains of their own...
Regarding the proxies, NoKo and Cuba were nurtured by Soviet Union more than China and when USSR imploded, so did the funds. China in contrast has done nothing to economically shore up NoKo to the same level as USSR did.
In fact China fears a collapse of NoKo as much as SoKo, Japan and the West do. A NoKo collapse will lead to 30 million hungry, desperate NoKo residents flooding across the borders and at least half if not more of them will run to China, where the borders are more relaxed, fewer mines, less soldiers and a large ethnic Korean population. Koreans of all hues strongly believe that North Eastern China is Korean territory of the great Goryo and Jeolla kingdoms that has been illegally occupied by China.
Pakistan is not just a
Cheeni proxy,
Napakis are rentiers who rent out to the highest bidder. Despite all the "proxiness", they still take money from US and KSA and from time to time do what is not always in
Cheeni interests. Because all their actions are guided by their irrational hatred and a schizophrenic inferiority complex when it comes to India.