Well that's the thing. What is it that China wants? They are amassing large number of troops...for what, exactly?
Looks like they are trying 'fill up' the last remaining sections of the border right up to their claim line. But is that it?
Ladakh Flash Point
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Well that's the thing. What is it that China wants? They are amassing large number of troops...for what, exactly?
Looks like they are trying 'fill up' the last remaining sections of the border right up to their claim line. But is that it?
Lets not all get too excited about the possible consequences of this incident, because incident is precisely what is was. An incident which (as a result of policy observed by both sides) was little more than a vicious gang fight.
Yes incidents can lead to major conflict, but it tends to do it very quickly - as in a seamless continuation, by escalation, of the incident, and mostly in situations where you have two, large, heavily armed forces already in position and in direct face off.
This is not the case here. It is remote and the placements are sparse. An incident can be a spark, but there is no real tinder for it to catch in this instance.
What we had, has; imho. all the hallmarks of a local feud between two garrison commanders but boiled over and spun out of control, beyond the usual argy bargy and punch ups.
The only lesson of significance I can see, is that PLA Hand to Hand training is better than that of the IAF.
The lack of MSM coverage of "Plucky India standing up to Big Bully China" suggests that serious casualties and fatalities were indeed on the Indian side and not the Chinese. Instead it been "Chinese use nasty horrid primitive weapons...." etc etc
Have lessons been learned from any of this by the leadership on both sides? I doubt it, as it has simply confirmed what everyone and his dog already knew.
Yes incidents can lead to major conflict, but it tends to do it very quickly - as in a seamless continuation, by escalation, of the incident, and mostly in situations where you have two, large, heavily armed forces already in position and in direct face off.
This is not the case here. It is remote and the placements are sparse. An incident can be a spark, but there is no real tinder for it to catch in this instance.
What we had, has; imho. all the hallmarks of a local feud between two garrison commanders but boiled over and spun out of control, beyond the usual argy bargy and punch ups.
The only lesson of significance I can see, is that PLA Hand to Hand training is better than that of the IAF.
The lack of MSM coverage of "Plucky India standing up to Big Bully China" suggests that serious casualties and fatalities were indeed on the Indian side and not the Chinese. Instead it been "Chinese use nasty horrid primitive weapons...." etc etc
Have lessons been learned from any of this by the leadership on both sides? I doubt it, as it has simply confirmed what everyone and his dog already knew.
Just watched the headlines of CCTV1 7pm news and there where no mention of India at all. Can you reach the conclusion that this was not done for any internal reasons on the Chinese side as they don't even talk about it. The headlines was that Xi called the president of Uzbekistan and other boring news that no one cares about.
vesicles
Colonel
I know that everyone is trying to figure out the casualties of the PLA at this time. What is puzzling to me is that the easiest and the most convenient statistics is the captured. You can simply line up all the enemy troops and let a first grader count how many people are standing there. Why don't the Indians just do that? Why doesn't CIA suggest the Indians to do that? And we would have a confirmed number of the captured PLA. How easy is that? The PLA cannot refute it since the Indians will simply show a photo of the PLA soldiers lined up and tied up. So why no info on the captured PLA? Indians don't have any? Why?
In every conflict, we have statistics of killed, injured and captured. Assuming the Chinese and the Indians had an even fight, then the Indians should have captured similar amount of PLA troops as the PLA has captured the Indians. As I understand, the PLA captured ~50 Indian troops. So the Indians should have similar number of PLA soldiers in their hands at this time. Assuming the Chinese lost the fight, then the Indians should have a lot more PLA troops in their hands. This would be consistent with the Indian-claimed higher number of the killed PLA, either 35 or 43. Why hasn't the Indians captured any PLA? Was it because the fight was so lopsided and so no PLA troops was ever captured?
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The border incidents were never big news in China. Unlike during Doklam no one gave significant coverage to this, despite loss of life.
Just a random thoughts. Does China or India have special hand to hand combatants or is it regular soldiers? Would be funny if China drafted shaolin monks and have them fight Indias equivalent. I guess using special troops like Thor Björnsson (the mountain) could win a fist fight quite easily.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Are there wars in the Taiwan straits and SCS that we are unaware of? If not, nothing is bogged down and can be redeployed within hours. These are airforce assets, not bunkers for crying out loud.
As for limited airports in Tibet, well you do realise that for such a grand strategy to work Pakistan would need to be fully onboard right? If Pakistan is fully onboard, why on earth would the PLA and PLAAF be limited to operating from only Chinese territory? Did the USAF fight WWII exclusively from US home soil airfields?
That’s the big difference between western/Indian analysts and strategists and Chinese. Only the Chinese seem to think big and bold.
China’s National motto might as well be, ‘if something is worth doing, it’s worth doing like no-one else could even dream of’.
Just look at every major thing China has done: SCS, BRI, COVID19 response, 3 Gorges Dam, South North water diversion project, even going as far back as Reform and Opening up and even one Child policy. All of those were mould shatter, game changing moves, and China makes them time and time again.
That’s the whole point, China, by default, likes to maintain the status quo. It will only actively change the status quo if doing so would allow it to fundamentally change the situation to its own overwhelming advantage.
China has zero interests in petty, meaningless military pissing contests for nothing more than bragging rights that a limited boarder clash would be. Don’t get me wrong, it will push back and push back hard if the other side crosses China’s red line, as it has done here. But China will not actively launch a military campaign without a grand strategy that will not only allow it to win the war, but also the peace afterwards.
When Indian and western analysts try to draw conclusions, they deliberately limit the scope to a part of the board just big enough to give India the biggest comparative edge. When Chinese strategists look at the same problem, they not only consider the whole board, but how to change the board itself if that isn’t to China’s liking. That is what being a superpower means in its most brutal and distilled form. Only America has the raw power to affect change on that scale, but they have not have strategists and leaders with the vision and will to act on such a scale for many generations now. To be fair, it’s only once every few generations that China does a leader of that caliber. But China has such a leader now, so it is an especially bad time for India to be playing stupid games.
If the Chinese needed to defend like Maginot line then it would be risky to remove them. But unless RoC is planning on fufilling there dream of reconquering China they would never attack so assets can be redeployed safely.
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