Bharat Rakshak

Love the way this scenario is progressing parallel to developments in real world -- I remember reading something in an article wherein the Chinese have let known indirectly that they will use nuclear weapons in the event of their conventional warfare capability being 'whooped'.

I remember reading in a scenario here (Singha's scenario? or some other's) wherein India responds to a Paki nuke attack by nuking the base from where the attack originated. Nuking military targets with 'small nukes' is a good idea and I think our nuclear philosophy is following similar lines. I strongly feel we must change the 'No-first-use' to 'No-first-use-on-civilian-targets'... this would instantly cause second thoughts on those trigger happy fingers on Nasrs and DF-21s.

Since this scenario started with Tibetan unrest, I would've expected it to end with the Tibetan cause. Likewise, I would have responded by asking the Tibetans all over India to pack their bags. Then detonate an EMP 'bum' over Tibet, shoot down chinese satellites, nuke military targets in TAR and basically cut off TAR from the rest of China as we did to East Pakistan in '71. Then when the smoke clears, we'll have Tibetans from India happily selling sweaters and what not in TAR while the Dalai Lama poses for pics in the Tibetan palace !!

I would rather have the uptime of a swank new p8 and boeing OEM support team. H6 works for Cheen because they probably make every nut and bolt inhouse by now.

DAY 8 + 2135 HRS (L)

AIRSPACE OVER NORTHERN BHUTAN

The arrival of a second airborne radar signal over the horizon from the north was detected by the sensors on board the CABS AEW aircraft as it patrolled over the Tsenda Kang. The signal was processed and revealed to be that of a KJ-2000 AWACS. The PLAAF were left with three active airframes of this type in their entire force following the IAF operations against these aircraft in southwestern Tibet. One of these was based out of Korla and flying patrols in rotation with a KJ-200 AEW in order to maintain a round-the-clock presence over southwestern China. The two other KJ-2000s were rotating in a similar manner out of Golmud and attempting to keep a continuous presence over southern and central Tibet. All remaining KJ-200s were to the east of Chengdu on purely defensive duties as part of an integrated air-ground defense line around Chengdu and south from there. As far as the war was concerned, unless the IAF ventured as far out as Chengdu, the KJ-200s operating in rotation there were of no consequence. The Korla and Golmud aircraft, though, were still a concern.

The current pair of KJ-2000s was currently exchanging patrols over the Nam Tso, east of the forward airstrip at Dangxiong, now used only by a solitary flight of J-8IIs on point-defense duties in case the IAF decided to go after the airborne radar aircraft yet again. Additionally, J-11s from the 19TH Fighter Division flying out of Urumqi were keeping a much stronger presence near these aircraft after past experience that led to the loss of one KJ-2000 northeast of Hotien two days ago. They now had a virtual wall of J-11s around these radar aircraft to ward off IAF attacks. But in doing so they were being strictly defensive. The days of sending flights after flights of aircraft south to engage the Indians under the direction of these airborne radars was now long past.

Both sides were sticking to their sides of the border for now. The IAF Eastern Air Command was still reeling from the loss of airbases at Tezpur and Jorhat. Su-30 force levels in the eastern skies had dropped to an all-time low since the start of this war and had pushed the IAF to defensive operations for now. There was no concentration of aircraft left to go on the offensive against these last vestiges of PLAAF power in Tibet. So for now both the Indian and Chinese airborne radar crews in the skies above Tibet had to content themselves with intelligence gathering operations…

As the second KJ-2000 took over and the first one shut down its radars and retreated back to Golmud, the radar crew on board the Indian aircraft noted the time and put down the tracking history for the radar aircraft rotating out of Golmud. The EW operator on board sent off the sit-rep to the operations center at Shillong, leaned back into his chair and rubbed his exhausted eyes as the flight crew up front brought the aircraft on a southerly heading out of Bhutanese airspace to refuel with a IL-78 tanker that had just lifted off from Kalaikunda. To him this process was as routine as having three meals a day, but somebody a lot senior to him at Shillong had probably decided that knowing the aircraft schedule for the Chinese 26TH Air Division out of Golmud was interesting.

Had he not been so physically exhausted after nine days of continuous combat operations, he might have had a chance to think this through. They were supposed to have been on rest right now as the second crew for this aircraft rotated for the next eight hours. But they had been caught on the ground when Tezpur had gone down. Unlike the Phalcons, the CABS aircraft were almost always deployed closer to the battlefields in a relative sense because of the lack of tankers to refuel so many aircraft flying out from long distances to the FEBA. And Tezpur had been secure for the last week and a half. But the surprise Chinese GLCM attack had done a lot of damage. For this crew and aircraft, it meant that a large portion of its replacement crew had been killed in action. So now there was little choice but to continue with one crew and grab whatever rest they could, when they could.

So as the aircraft headed south for an airborne refueling operation, the only thing the operators in the cabin could think of for now was the one hour of sleep in their seats and the hope that others in Shillong knew what they were doing...

DAY 8 + 2200 HRS (L)

SONEGAON AIR FORCE BASE
NAGPUR
INDIA

As the undercarriage of the large B-737 BBJ transport aircraft touched the concrete, the puff of smoke rolled off and traced out of the wing vortices behind while the aircraft ran down the runway. The vibrations inside subsided soon enough and the Defense-Minister removed his seatbelt and got up despite the disapproval of the IAF sergeant nearby. But there was no time for any of that, he told himself as he saw the other senior government officials doing the same and walking back to the conference room on board while the aircraft outside taxied to the tarmac for yet another refueling operation and change of flight-crews. From one of the few windows opened for a brief moment to get his bearings, he could see the five IAF Garud special-forces teams in their vehicles escorting the aircraft as it taxied. He closed them back down and took his seat at the table while the Prime-Minister walked in. The latter leaned forward and pressed a button on the teleconference system embedded into the table:

“You better listen to this,” the PM said irritably. “You there, Ravoof?”
“Yes sir,” the distant voice of the Foreign-Minister came through.

“I have the usual people on this side. You want to recap what you told me a few minutes ago?” the PM ordered politely.
“Very well. I have just given out our first official press-conference since the Chinese missile attacks on Tawang this afternoon. The press is livid. So are the people. The conference went as bad as can be expected. All they wanted to know was how we allowed this to happen and what and when our response was going to be,” Dr. Ravoof said impassively.

“And? What did you tell them,” the Defense-Minister asked.
“What do you think? I told them that the Chinese attack was a brutal murder of civilians and completely unwarranted. I also told them that India reserves the right to respond but that we cannot comment on ongoing military operations.”

The Defense-Minister sunk back into his chair. “Good. That’s all we need to tell them at the moment.”
“But that doesn’t cut it as far as I am concerned,” the PM said, visibly angered now. “I want to know what we intend to do about this? Where is our response? And when?”

The Defense-Minister rubbed his forehead and looked over to the NSA sitting next to him before he looked back to the Prime-Minister.

“So here’s how it works: We have the Chinese beat on the ground and in the air over Tibet. The Chumbi valley for the most part is under our control. The Chinese presence in Bhutan is becoming tenuous as General Potgam launches his counter-offensive to take back lost territory. The Chinese ground offensive in Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh has ground to a halt at heavy losses to both sides. And the Navy has begun operations to shut down the Chinese merchant shipping through the Indian Ocean region. There is still the issue of dealing with the Chinese fleet entering the southern Indian Ocean region but Admiral Surakshan has plans to deal with them. So the Chinese are reeling under all this and now intend to use the one advantage they have over us: missiles. They have a lot more conventional and nuclear armed missiles than us and they will use them if they have to. This attack on Tawang, savage and painful as it may be, is nothing more than the dying lashes of a snake. What they want now is for us to get into a missile war with them. And that’s a war we do not want to get into because unlike the ba$tards in Beijing, we don’t want to see a lot more of what happened in Tawang happening over the rest of the country.”

“This doesn’t help me any,” the PM shouted out. “If we don’t respond then the people of this country are going to hang us up to dry. China cannot be allowed to get away with this!”

“And they won’t! But acting rashly is exactly what they want us to do!” the Defense-Minister shouted back. The NSA decided to enter this argument:
“Besides, what are we going to strike back with? The Chinese attacked us with long range cruise missiles. We don’t have any in our service. I spoke to Air-Marshal Iyer a little while ago and he assured me that he can deploy some Agni-II missiles for a counter-strike against Chinese targets. But the Agni-II is a ballistic missile. We launch those, and the Chinese will get the pretense to fire more than two hundred of their DF-11s and DF-15s based in Tibet at targets across northern India. Our ability to wage conventional war will be completely devastated.”

“But they are anyway going to use those missiles soon enough! That was what Iyer told us in our last meeting with him! So why does it matter whether we strike now or not!” the PM said as he turned his gaze to his NSA.
“That may be true. But it is better to fight a coordinated war than a precipitous one, is it not?” the NSA asked in his schoolmasterly voice. The PM was not convinced. The Defense-Minister leaned forward:

“The SFC is putting together a coordinated action plan for us. But here’s the bottom-line: we know the Chinese have missiles in Tibet. We know where they are for the most part. We have long endurance UAVs that entered Tibetan airspace a few hours ago and are monitoring these launchers continuously. And we have our own missiles and aircraft at our disposal. Give Iyer and the IAF commanders the time to set their plans in motion. When the time comes, we will unleash the wrath of hell on the Chinese. But for now, we must not act out of turn. Bite the pain! Our time has not yet come.

“But remember this: when this is all done, the escalation to Nuclear weapons will be inevitable. What we need to do is to draw a line in the sand to ensure that China knows the consequences of any action with nuclear weapons. Perhaps the Russians can be asked to open a discreet line of conversation with Beijing. The main danger here is that we are not seeing an end to this war from a military perspective. Neither side will give up the war in defeat. So we have to find out what is the real cost of peace, else we will all find out the real cost of war…”

DAY 8 + 2300 HRS (L)

TASHICHHO DZONG
THIMPU
BHUTAN

Colonel Misra walked through the door leading to the top most terrace of the building and was instantly met with a wall of cold winds. The two paratroopers manning the observation-post here looked back from their positions to see him and then turned back to their tripod mounted optics pointed towards the northern outskirts of Thimpu and beyond. Misra walked out on to the terrace and could barely make out anything of Thimpu in the darkness until he strapped on his night-vision goggles and activated them on. The slight hum on activation and Thimpu appeared to him, awash in green. He immediately saw the outlines of the two Mi-26s as they hovered near the northern outskirts, near the clearings created for them to bring in the rest of his battalion. As a large rumbling noise overtook the noise of the howling winds, the building walls vibrated somewhat. Misra walked over to the edge of the terrace and looked over to see a line of BMP-IIs that were making their way in a convoy through the narrow streets of Thimpu on their way to join the offensive against the Chinese light-infantry brigade at Dotanang. As the vehicles made their way along the road, their auto-cannon turrets kept sweeping left and right for targets. General Potgam had pulled all the strings he could with General Suman to get these Mechanized forces airlifted to Paro airfield and then driven up from there to Thimpu. Now they were here along with the rest of his paratrooper force. Spear team had also been inserted. He smiled as he walked back into the building to rejoin his staff at the makeshift command center on the ground floor. It was time to play…

DAY 9

DAY 9 + 0000 HRS (L)

NEW CHINA NEWS AGENCY RADIO BROADCAST INTERCEPT
BEIJING, CHINA

“The operations by the courageous men and women of the People’s Liberation Army against the Indian aggression go well on its ninth day. The people of Bhutan celebrated the arrival of our soldiers and thanked the soldiers for freeing them of Indian hegemony. The Indian attack on our innocent comrades in Kashgar were avenged yesterday when the People’s Liberation Army Air Force launched a devastating series of blows on the Indian forces in the eastern frontier city of Tawang. It was an action that weighed heavily on our leaders but the enemy has been shown that they would be better not to underestimate our will to ensure our people’s safety. If the enemy continues to push us further, they will find themselves engulfed in an ocean of fire the likes of which the world has never seen…”

Bravo Vivekji!

So any conventional Indio-China war will boil down to this, besides the direct conflict between two armies, which can be made a tie, unless one side has a weak/peacenik leadership.

Indian advantage is its Air Force's ability to take off from near sea-altitude bases. Given MKI's range of ~1100 miles, it can dominate the skies of entire Western China. Augmented by Brahmos MKIs can slowly but surely remove the LRSAM bubbles and achieve superiority.

The problem with MKI-centric strategy is that
1. Any forward air-bases can be made un-usable by a few missiles or a single successful air-attack originated from safe regions of China.
2. Once MKIs reache the limits of its range, they can face a survival threat from the east-china based air-forces; hence untenable to execute a sustained deep attacks

India's weakness is in its inability to reach out to the soft & influential belly of China. Without hurting this region, India cannot force China to behave.

Unless India acquires a 1000-1500 mile range cruise missiles that can be made operational in the Assam region, it cannot bring the real China under threat of conventional attacks. Perhaps Nirbhay fills this gap. But we need them in good numbers (at least 200+).

If India plays its cards well, any future Indo-China war can end up in liberation of Tibet.

I think Chinese realised that when their ground offensive was not going as per plan and sky was dominated by IAF. That is why strike against Jorhat, Tezpur and Tawang. We should have more airbases .

The moment Lahsa is occupied Tibet would be difficult to repossess by PLA. But they have many Missile bases scattered around Tibet. They need to be neutralised. But then how to neutralise those which are deeper in China and have ability to strike deep in India.

Russian line of communication is a good idea. I suspect that would be open long back.

Our weak link seems to be less missiles and lesser options available in what little we have. Need to remedy that and fast. GOI??

How to counter surprise Missile attack..... not to have surprise in war. The moment missile launch is detected counter launch at predesignated target even before their missile penetrates our air. If Chengdu was also burning near simultaneously, the effect would have been different. Chengdu is a military target and must be designated and announced well in advance to give civilians an opportunity to leave. But there could be smaller cities within our reach.

What other alternatives are available? Waiting with bated breath.

from purely military and tactical objectives - striking at military and logistical targets in tibet and sinkiang is the logical course and thats what IAF was doing in the scenario.

however there will surely be a media blackout in both these areas and even devastating indian successes will be hidden or moderated down for public consumption in the mainland. nobody in peking gives a rats arse for any civilian hardship in these areas - they will be roughly booted aside and asked to keep out of the way of the military ops.

on other hand due to open media and our heartlands being next to himalayas any chinese successes will be magnified N times by our shrill TV media as "breaking news" on a 24hr basis. our indian govt also cannot enjoy civilian hardship like the situation in tawang.

this game is loaded dice in favour of Cheen. but there are ways to change the rules and turn the tables. one of these I have already mentioned - submarine launched LACMs in the east and south china sea to take out vital coastal power plants, electric distribution stations, oil refineries and sink a few large ships before making good their escape to the west pacific to strike again later. this will cause a huge hue and cry in the mainland and also tie down ASW forces hunting shadows of indian subs.

the other method is long range GLCM/ALCM attacks taking out similar targets in the big cities of the interior provinces.
distances to chengdu and chonqqing the two fattest cities nearest are 950km and 1250km from dibrugarh. Hainan island is 1750km...doable by shourya with a very light payload though - more of psyops than a real hit. so GLCM will work but obviously better if you have a small troop of bombers flying in from Deccan to release missiles over eastern assam...this will also force cheen to redeploy fighters on that front heavily....due to mountainous terrain of yunnan will be hard to pick up lo-lo-lo objects.

that's what i also suggest, may be SFC will do the same thing in this scenario .chengdu and chongging can be hitten by shourya with decent amount of payload.

@Singha I agree with your line of Thinking. Civilan population centres in Tibet should be no no while military targets would continue to be neutralised or confronted by Indian Armed forces. Targets deep in China , which have military potential and civilian population would cause Chinese to rethink their Plans. But it has to be a three pronged attack.

1. Attack their Missile bases to reduce their capabilities to strike deep in India. Still some may pass through and that needs to be taken into account.
2. Attack infrastructure facilities and supply line to Tibet. That could be easier I suppose.Rail and roads are marked and few choke points could easily be created.
3. Tell russians to inform China if they escalate further Beijing and Sanghai and Hainan etc would be hit and also inform them that Chngdu is our reply to TTJ so back down or face preemptive strike since we cant match their missile capabilities.

ONCE first step is taken , Rapid Advance Forces could lodge themselves in Tibet and SF could be inserted into Lasha and Tebetan Govt in Exile could be asked to declare independence from the Palace and then fly more troops into Lasha . Grant recognition.

What is surprising is that it is 9th day of war and supplies.force levels are running low. We need to prepare for a long haul.

Military objective is achieved if China is repulsed beyond IBL claimed by India and then take few more preferably Mansarover, finger area i sikkim. Then call for ceasefire( Lasha is optional??) and political solution.

Role of Nepal and its border with Tibet needs to be looked into and secured. How?

I presume that Ari might be operational and lurking somewhere near east or South China Sea.

Mere hitting Military installations would not bring them to halt.

btw what happened to areas leased by Pakis to China. Could we take them back ?? Does it insert pakis overtly in the war?

What about hitting 3 Gorges with Agni II with conventional war head. It wont destroy the dame but will send a message strong enough to stop further escalations. You hit me again, I will take out the dam and a dozen of your cities will be washed away.

Taking out Three Gorges Dam will be akin to megaton nuke attack. I am all for it. Nuke devastation without using nukes

Immediate need is "enough numbers" of "operational Nirbhay" and "S-300/400" type Air defense systems.
This alone will increase retribution fear factor.

As much as I am tempted by the quality of the discussion here to jump in, I am going to resist and continue in my BRF designated role of agent provocateur writing the fictional scenario. So you will have to forgive me if I am unable to answer some of your queries/thoughts as much as I would like to.

But on some very scenario specific comments:



Indeed. This is a result of continuous operations with modern weaponry against a much larger country that what we have been exposed to in the past. We have never fought a truly modern war with any nation before (Kargil could be argued as modern but it was a mere skirmish compared to the scale of a full up ground and air war with China). With Pakistan, the wars of the past (1948, 1965 and 1971), especially the air wars, were very gentlemanly compared with what the simulations show will take place today. Weapons needed are costly and fewer in number. Targets against a country the size of China are very high. Nighttime no longer restricts operations (think about it this way: if 12 hours per day restrict your operations because of low-light, 9 days of war are essentially 18 days from before just by direct scaling). Weapon damage is significantly higher. Terrain to cover is much larger. And then there are the attrition characteristics: Attrition in the air and ground, attrition due to overuse of the same machines on a 24/7 basis. Weapons and platforms malfunction. Crew fatigue and insufficient backup reserves (IAF case especially given the squadron numbers and pilot deficiencies) add to the above. Bottom line is that it is my firm opinion that the IAF is not geared for long duration, high-intensity war at this present time. We need a lot more airborne radars, dual ground and flight crews to allow rotations and rapid turn-around times (similar to the other IAF: Israel), larger stocks of weapons rather than the piddly amounts we seem to purchase in every deal. The wish list goes on.

You can attempt to replicate the differential equations of combat that I used in simulating this scenario by reversing the numbers you have seen so far. Take any one platform type (say, the Su-30) and go back through the scenario to look up where and how they were used, numbers involved, time taken and losses incurred. These will give you the time-variable coefficients for a integration to show you how many days of sustained combat will force the strength to fall below the minimum threshold. Same can be done for the Chinese.

Maybe after I conclude this scenario I will post the mathematics that I use for this kind of stuff.



I think this was discussed before in the scenario. The Arihant has deployed two days ago into the Bay of Bengal.



Question that follows is what you mean by halting them. If the PLAAF loses all airbases within striking range of Indian targets, will that not stop them, for example? If you meant stopping the war, then yes, there are other considerations.

<Poster hat on>

There is also another thing to consider as far as the conventional warhead ballistic missile attack option is concerned.

So the idea (based on scenario and above posts by folks) is that the war is being hidden from the Chinese public and hence we need to strike at very public targets within China in response to the attack on Tawang. This will allow Beijing to feel the pressure of public discord and resentment. Perhaps force them to the negotiating table.

But what if it inadvertently reverses the desired result?

The Chinese culture values maintaining face more than they value the life of an individual. So, if Beijing is forced into a very visible and humiliating corner by Indian attacks, will they see it as a sign to back down or to up the stakes even more into an area they know the Indians are reluctant to go?

Put it another way, if it remains in India's interest to end the war early and without catastrophic losses in lives, is it better or worse to allow Beijing to maintain the illusion for its citizens that the war is going well? Should we care about what their public knows or doesn't know? Does it matter?

China will never leave Tibet to the Indians. Despite our fondest hopes and wishes, the military logistics do not support this idea. Nor does the strategic side of things. Unless India builds up a much larger military presence and substantially improves its capabilities, advances into Tibet are restricted for short term tactical uses, not long term holding.

If the idea is to topple the government in Beijing, will their use of nuclear weapons as a last, desperate thrust of force on Indian cities be acceptable to India as a price?

We are not talking about toppling a crackpot dictatorship like Saddam in Iraq. These guys have very potent weapons and the ruthlessness to use them to save their skins. These should be factored into the analysis as well.

Just a few discussion points to think about.

<Poster hat off>

<Writer hat on>

Love that..

Do not wear you poster hat in the first place from now onwards. No need to explain unless absolutely need. you are providing great level of free entertinement for us. As I person who ready most of the militory fiction writers of the resent past your writing are of the same quality. Informed BR abduls do not ask for anything more and others you can ignore.

A teaser trailer cover from Amazon for the upcoming novel in January 2013



More details as I hear them from the folks at Amazon on the publishing cycle etc.

Some details for now:

1) It will be coming out in January 2013
2) It is now in its final editing cycles
3) It will be available from Amazon.com for now, and perhaps if I can get some concrete help from Indian publishers then from local bookstores as well.
4) The book will be about 400 pages in 6x9 inches format.
5) I will let you exactly when the book is out for sales
6) A second novel is in the works for the May 2013 timeline as well.

-Vivek

I will agree to disagree strongly with Vivek's statement that we must not push and humiliate peking or islamabad too badly lest they go nuclear etc etc.

Imo the best way to deal with wanton aggression is to expose and slap them around, making the lose face. This will no doubt trigger a palace coup where the die hards who started the fire will get slapped in irons and two sets of people could take over. The first set would be more realists who will talk peace and end the war , the second set could be wild eyed 2nd arty types to whom every problem can be solved with a 500kt nuke.

If its the first set, the war will end on status quo borders with cheen deeply shamed and shown up in east asia. Our stock will hugely rise as someone who took the first heavy blows but landed the last bloody kicks on the dragons belly.
If its the nuclear jihadis we need to ensure we retain the ability to flatten the top30 cheen cities after absorbing a surprise and uncalled for cheen first strike. If we can do that we should be at peace. If not, we must spare no effort to teach that state asap.

I am afraid playing by rules is just a invitation to more atrocity. Disrupt the rules and watch people squirm in discomfort....

Singha ji , very noble thoughts indeed. We need to up the ante . The Chinese and the pakis need to know that India is ready to be nuked and nuke them in oblivion in return too. This is the message and impression that India needs to imprint in those minds. Once it's done, peace will ensue.

It's not that only India has to worry about getting nuked , the same needs to be aroused in the counter party too. The Chinese should be thinking among themselves whether they are willing to lose their megacities and entire infrastructure for aksai chin or arunachal pradesh . Is China willing to pay the price for that ? When the Chinese start thinking like this , we will know India has arrived.

Seems like when usa as behind in space and nuclear race, they considered striking the moon with a apollo rocket tipped with a nuclear bomb in a show of force. Cam in news recently.

JMT

If I were part of chinese power circles.... than my objective for attacking India would be exactly "Teaching a lesson*" and nothing more. In case my plans are not working out I would secretly back out of war with a concomitant threat about nuking Indian metropolitan cities with mega ton nukes if retreating (or cease firing) chinese forces are attacked (i.e. Indian forces keep attacking chinese "pre war controlled" territory.

Local image of Chicom would be handled by usual blanket ban on media / propaganda machinery.

My backing out (coupled with threat of massive escalation) would ensure GOI would also scale down the offensive posture.

Purpose solved...
My population would accept (pseudo)victory (ala vietnam)

*Teaching a lesson would be to unite the nation and to divert the attention of local populace from omnipresent corruption and my grip on power circles would be saved for next few years.... after which yet another weak neighborly nation would be "Taught a lesson"....

Is it possible for us to purchase this book from Amezon or any Indian book stores.

Please try to get it for flipkart also so that we can purchase it. Good to know one more thing is under way.

We have to understand that Paki Army is not an nation with a army but army with a nation - Just like Germany under W Kaizar. So do not expect to them t care for their people. Just like that Princelings ruling Pandaland also afraid of changing the status quo. When you are afraid that you lose power and publicly follow the fate of Gadaffi fellow then you will not hesitate to use nukes. But they really gives Rats a** for Arunachal Pradesh or Meckmohan line which they have agreed as borower. They got sound beating from Viathnam and called it Vicotry for their people. Nothing prevents them calling Victory against India if they can get away with it in their people eyes. But loss of face in the world eyes is serious and India will grow like anything. Do they care for face in the world or power. I am of the view they want power and as long as they can con their people they do not escalate. best way would be continue crushing their B*lls and send a messages that we can settle for so and so and will agree to stop the war.

Just like what was porposed against Maoist in India continue killing them and talk to them at the same time.

when the chinese entered the korean war , they deterred the US/UN from rolling them back north again using massive resources (naval and air bombardment) simply by their willingness to sacrifice as much blood as was necessary to make the americans lose their taste. this was when their mil ind capacity was a fraction of the US and tech disparity was huge. and this was right next to their heartland.

they are ambitious lot and thrive on one upmanship and daring people to escalate. so far they have mostly won at this game and each little win has emboldened them. the vietnamese were the only ones to stand up and let them know they wouldnt be rolled over. we need to be the next set of guys who raise their hand in the classroom.

I blame japan more than anyone in east asia for pussyfooting around and being a US pet rather than use their vast financial and technology resources to become a full fledged nuclear power and evolve a muscular posture. japan's pacifism has given Cheen a lot of confidence that they can slap anyone around in that part of the world. the only country to have civilian cities nuked surely has a right to nuclear weapons to defend itself. and japan of all people has enough money to fund the JDF properly and not depend on US protection. they should have built a world class arsenal of IRBM and GLCMs by now...even Soko and Taiwan are moving ahead on that...countries which became advanced decades after Japan.

Vivek, , your scenario was referred to in some newspaper and that's how I found about brf. I think much research has gone into your scenario and you deserve all the credit for forcing us into thinking.

How do we prepare ourselves for long haul. It is not simply a question of purchasing more and more hardwares or raising more squadrons or divisions. There are other hidden facts of life in India , like , a radar purchased in 2005 is not yet deployed as I recently discovered and people responsible for that were not even aware of its seriousness. We are quite inefficient in many ways.We cant become efficient overnight only because chinese attacked us.

How we are going to force chinese to negotiating tables (they have started the war in the first place). War is like a game of chess. What losses are or they prepared to take. Military losses might be acceptable to both , but , are we prepared to see civilian losses, economic infrastructure losses etc? Are they prepared to take that kind of losses? We have taken defeat in 62 and lived with it for 62 years so does that mean we should take another defeat just because chinese would like to tave their H&D before coming to negotiating table?

What will force them to halt the war?

Korean venture was out of fear from anti communist tirade of west. Hence Chinese acted out of fear to preempt the attack on chinese.

The mil-Ind complex of chinese was in shambles after wwII and was no match for US but here they were supported by Soviet and without which perhaps history would have been different...

Chinese political leaders are ambitious but only to mint money (as anywhere the political class is parasitic)

National ambitions are only different masks behind which they try and hide there greed.

Now the chinese ruling elite is confident that they will not be attacked and removed by external power. The are clearly aware that grip on power can be lost by
1. free flow of information by media (and so google was banned)
2. act of external power that is impossibleto hide (nuke attack)

This will surely lead to
Mega tiananmen square type protests and as a consequence the elite would be replaced. Now who in chinese elite would want that... Therefore they would only perform sabre rattling or "Nura Kushti" and will push only to a point. Unlike irrationally rational pakistan, chicom are rationally irrational ... or is it the other way out.. perhaps Doc Shiv ji could phrase it better.

Enough of chitchat...

@Vivek:
Tell us the story ...
Tell us the story ...
Tell us the story ...
Tell us the story ...



--Ashish

++1.

One must play by rules, if the idea is to be a follower or a mid-level player. But, if one wants to reach the top, then eventually the rules will have to be tweaked, pushed, redefined or even invalidated(in short, argue that the rules in their present form do not or cannot apply to you, so breaking them is not really 'breaking' them).

I think the Chinese try to fight in their periphery or in others' field. The one greatest deterrent for them is to take the war/battle into their heartland(where even if they win, they lose because of the various factors). They fight in India or Tibet, so that war/battle will not come to the heart of mainland China.

I view china's claim on Tawang in similar fashion. Not just Tawang, but also other territorial claims made by China which has annoyed many countries(including India). The logic, as far as I understand, is that the new claims are meant to hide the already vast territorial aggressions made by china. For example, by keeping Tawang in focus, Tibet is protected. As long as, India is kept occupied by Tawang, India will not think about Tibet. The ploy is to keep others in defensive mode, so that they so not think of going on offensive on China. The bluster and aggressive posture is meant to stop others from making any moves on China because the others are too busy in defending their own space. But, this doctrine required that the opponents must not be pushed to the wall lest they become desperate. And chinese follow this. They never push the opponents to the wall. They take what they get and declare victory, even while keeping the threat of future action/claims alive. As far as they are concerned, any gain is a bonus. The real aim is to protect the mainland(the aim is to stop anyone from even thinking of chinese mainland by keeping them embroiled in the periphery, preferably in the opponents territory). Both their diplomatic and geo-political moves can be explained by this theory, IMHO.

In essence, the chinese are trying to create buffer zone between their mainland and others through aggressive occupation and claims. So, Tibet is a buffer zone between India and China. Tawang and Nepal are buffer zones between India and Tibet. If India concedes Tawang, then a newer buffer zone between Tawang and India will have to be found... When India acknowledged Tibet as part of China, then China had to create a newer 'dispute' in Tawang so that India can be kept on defensive. The doctrine is to keep the others on defensive, so that they don't become offensive. To keep others on defensive, china has to be on offensive... When others concede to China(hoping that China will not be on offensive anymore), then they force China to become more offensive(because China has to create a newer dispute to keep others on offensive).

The strategy to handle such a doctrine is to try to dismantle/weaken the mainland. Because, when the mainland collapses, the peripheries automatically collapse(from the grip of china). The general wisdom is to first win the periphery and then go to mainland. China is trying to use this 'general wisdom' in its favor by pushing the periphery deep into others territory and by keeping periphery as large as possible to protect the mainland. So, the opponents neutralize this concept by stop trying to gain full control/victory in periphery and instead any marginal control/victory in the periphery must be used to mount attack on the mainland. The opponent will have to use China's doctrine on china by keeping china on defensive through aggressive action(diplomatically, geo-politically and militarily).

This doctrine also indicated that the chinese will give up their periphery when the mainland is threatened. So, there is ample chance for Tibet to be taken out of China's grip. China will be ready to take huge loses in periphery rather than tiny loses in thew mainland.



++1.

---
Since, the Chinese are claiming the Tawang, I don't think Chinese will bomb Tawang. They will, if they have to, bomb someother nearby place to send a message/threat that Tawang should not side with India(and at least remain neutral). They will try to drive a wedge between Tawang and Delhi by suitable carrot and stick.

If they bomb the area that they are claiming, then their claim will become invalidated and they will also lose face.

---
Vivek saar,
+108...

good points johneeG. we need to go in and set fire to some part of their main house and watch the fun.

they are ok with fires in the periphery because its just the game they want to play. the periphery never belonged to them and was captured through military action to protect the heartland.

in that context, we should stop obsessing on tibet or aksai chin which is how they have rigged the game and consider the fact that their rich and fat southern provinces are at a distance of only around 1000-2000km from our missiles and strike fighters. even manned su30 and rafale could reach that far. the starting point is chengdu and chonqing in sichuan province, and then a range of large cities ending in hainan, shenzhen, shanghai in the eastern seaboard. cause loss of face in any of these and it cannot be hidden - china simply has too many cellphones, internet connections and angry bloggers now. there are also lots of steel plants, high speed rail, expressways and power plants to launch attacks at.

a good chess player will sometimes not fight attritional battle with pawns and horses, he will not waste time in going for jaguar vein and the kings fortress.

Khan will likely be happy to see us take Cheen down a few notches....makes its security management in east asia easier, emboldens its allies and gets the job done with no risk to Khan itself. so he will observe our subs moving in between the blue and green water belt to launch attacks but quietly sit by and take no hostile action against us.

Sounds more like a Chinese variant of the scam called Ponzi scheme applied to territory similar to muslim invasions of yore where they used to convert the conquered ones so that they can be co-opted in the follow on conquests in an ever expanding empire, in so much the Caliphate idea has its believers on our western border even today and defending it for the Ummah brotherhood or Jihad

Johneeg post was a master class in clearly explaining in layman terms the crux of cheen strategy on land. People should save it and share it in other threads.

Excellent post Johnjee. Beautifully explained chinese (National strategy).

Well articulated comments and excellent discussion from all posters here. You seem to have extracted that thread of strategic theory around which the scenario was built on.



Continue this thought. Take the theory you have excellently extracted to its logical conclusion.

I described in the scenario where the Chinese DO go ahead and strike Tawang. And it ends up giving them tactical successes by delaying the Indian ground offensive in the sector about to be launched north of Bum-La and into Tibet while also extracting heavy casualties on the citizens of Tawang. If Tawang were removed completely from the strategic analysis, this attack would be seen an effective, albeit brutal, military strike.

Now ask yourself this on the basis of the above: Why would the Chinese do that? if the long term strategic theory for the Chinese when it comes to AP has always been to keep the Indians on the defensive by putting forth a fictitious claim on it, under what conditions would Tawang (and perhaps other tracts of AP) lose their strategic use to them? In other words, if AP was used as a buffer to push the arguments over land south and away from their annexation of Tibet, at what point and under what conditions would these areas lose that usability as a buffer?

Just a thought experiment, if you will.

-Vivek

Fits perfectly well, with the middle kingdom centric thought process of the Han, for centuries now. It has always perturbed me that our arguments with China are around the mcMahon line, where we are the one clamoring for its recoginition and China is the one seen as asking for more. For a change, we should agree with the Chinese the McMahon line is not the border and India's borders lie with "historical" India's cultural borders. Watch the Chinese squirm at this. Meanwhile do ensure we have a couple of additional strike corps available in the area to take the battle to Tibet. But, until this capacity is not built, it really does not matter what we say or do, the CPC will sit pretty, knowing fully well that they are in control of Tibet already.

DAY 9 + 0220 HRS (L)

THE BATTLE OF DOTANANG-BARSHONG
FIVE KILOMETERS NORTH OF DOTANANG VILLAGE
NORTHERN BHUTAN

The valley was lit by the moonlight broken up with a few clouds. But it was quieter tonight that in the entire last week. The damped man-made thunder coming from the Chumbi valley had died away in the last several hours as the battered Chinese 149TH Infantry Division had disengaged and withdrawn along the S-204 route to the north of the Dochen Tso, effectively yielding the Chumbi valley vegetated regions to the Indian Army units that had led the 33 Corps offensive several days ago. The Indian forces were now consolidating their hold in those sectors while the Chinese 13TH Group Army did the same around the Dochen Tso as well as their left flank elements that were now entrenched in northwestern Bhutan. In the latter sector, the Indian forces under General Potgam were leading an independent offensive with a collection of Special Forces units, airborne units and surviving Bhutanese forces. But time was of the essence as the 15TH Airborne Corps had begun sending elements of its three Divisions via the ground route into southern Tibet. The three organic Divisions of this elite Corps were to replace three battered Divisions of the 13TH Group Army as they conducted a passage of lines around Gyantse in southern Tibet. Once there, one of the three fresh Divisions now entering combat, the 43RD Airborne was preparing to enter Bhutan while the 44TH and 45TH Airborne Divisions were to head south and engage the Indian forces inside the Chumbi valley while the 149TH Infantry Division was withdrawn from combat altogether.

The arrival of the 43RD Airborne as reinforcements for the single Highland Brigade in northern Bhutan could not be tolerated. And while the IAF was doing its best to ensure that the 15TH Airborne Corps would endure heavy casualties during its transit to the south, the 33 Corps of the Indian Army was preparing for a heavy fight as the Chinese attempted to take back what they had lost in the Chumbi valley sector.

In Bhutan, this meant that the lone Highland Brigade and its two surviving Battalions, one north of Dotanang and the other at Barshong, had to be destroyed before their reinforcements arrived and seized the initiative from Indian forces. But the advance was not going to be easy, as Colonel Misra was finding out. The Chinese had started fighting more rigorously for some reason. Perhaps they had been told that there was to be no retreat. Either way, his forces including the 11TH Para-SF Battalion and light mechanized infantry platoons had fought their way to Dotanang and seized the village without much of a fight: the PLA infantry units had simply withdrawn to the north just as his forces had reached the southern end of the village. A tactical withdrawal that had been conducted professionally, as Misra had noted after reviewing his company commander reports. So now the Dotanang was in Indian hands. But anything north from there was not. That was to be changed tonight…


*****

…the valley became abuzz with noise as a single Nishant unmanned drone flew over the moonlit village of Dotanang. The moonlight reflected somewhat from the handful of BMP-IIs parked on the narrow muddy roads of the village. As it flew north, it followed the path of the snow-covered road along the small river that went north to south along the bottom of the Dotanang valley. It had advanced a good five kilometers north of the village when flashes of light suddenly erupted all around the drone and lines of tracers flew by. The valley suddenly reverberated with rapid succession thud-thud-thud noises as the airspace around the drone was lit up with shrapnel. The drone crew at Haa Dzong to the south initiated evasive maneuvers and the drone banked to the side and began to turn south while climbing higher; To no avail: the skies around it were rippled with shrapnel. Several of these ripped through the wings and perforated the fuselage section and the undercarriage. The drone broke up under the impacts and disappeared inside a small fireball before a trailing smoke on its way down into the mountain side…

*****

… “Oops! There goes our eye in the sky!” Vikram noted from his position, two kilometers from the north of where the drone went down. The tracers and explosions from the anti-air artillery fire stopped as the wreckage from the Nishant drone slammed into the trees a few kilometers north of the village and a column of smoke rose into the starlit sky. The valley went quiet once again.

“So now we know the Chinese have some radar-directed anti-air weapons north of here,” Ravi noted dryly over the team’s comms as he tucked in his INSAS rifle tighter into his chest. He heard a grunted agreement over the comms.

“Yeah, no shit! We could have used that information five minutes ago,” Captain Pathanya said while he lowered his binoculars and keyed his comms: “Vik, get the IMFS out and see if you can spot the location of the Chinese guns that fired on our bird. Their tracer rounds gave us a pretty clear idea where they were on the road about two clicks northerly. Let’s confirm it.”

“Roger that, boss. Deploying IMFS now,” Vikram said and pulled back from the set of boulders he was using as a cover. He put his rifle on the ground and motioned to Sarvanan to cover his zone while pulled down his backpack and removed the Integrated-Multi-Function-Sight or IMFS from it. The second generation of the new IMFS allowed them a combination of IR, Low-Light and standard optical modes with magnification and laser designation built in. It looked like a high-tech binoculars because it was exactly that. But it was also substantially heavier than the standard military binoculars that Pathanya preferred for most operations. Here and now, they needed intelligence that they could not get from a UAV flying overhead anymore.

“Okay commies, let’s see what you have down there,” Vikram said to himself as he crawled over the cold snow covered boulders on his stomach and set up the IMFS. As expected, the optical and low-light did not help much over the forested areas. He switched to IR and the depressed the button for W-Hot so that all high temperature sources were shaded down from white on the sights. As a result, the background valley became black with shades of dark gray. The 4x4 wheeled anti-air vehicles now being used by the Highland Brigade against the Indian UAV threat were lit up immediately as white and very-light gray shades. The brightest white coloration showed the engine areas of the vehicles and the blazing hot barrels of the 35mm guns on the back of the chassis that had ripped the Nishant UAV into shreds. Vikram let out a slight whistle as he watched the view…

“Boss, the commies have brought in some vehicle based support for their light-infantry units. I count two light-armor 4x4s with anti-aircraft guns on the back, still glowing hot from the fire we saw. I also see several other light-utility vehicles and what looks like a single 6x6 armored vehicle with a strange turret on top. Can’t make out the make but it is not a gun turret. Possibly anti-air vehicle as well,”

Pathanya looked over to Ravi with a raised eyebrow as they heard Vikram’s IMFS observations.
“Looks like our friends have been busy to the north,” Ravi noted quietly.

“Well, we did the same back in Thimpu. Didn’t expect them to sit around while we built up our strengths, did you?” Pathanya replied back calmly. It was true. While General Potgam and Colonel Misra had used their hold on Thimpu to bring in reinforcements and supplies for the offensive to retake northern Bhutan, the Chinese had done as much as they could to ensure that the Indians could not retake territories under their control. So now they had some very effective short-range-air-defense or SHORAD battery deployed against Indian UAVs.

“God knows what else has been brought in,” Ravi said out just before the SATCOM R/T squawked.
“Spear, this is Warlord-Central. Do you read?”

Pathanya removed his chest mounted speaker set for the SATCOM and pushed it through his woolen cap and to his ears before pressing the send button:
“Roger that, Warlord-Central. Spear-One reading you five-by-five, send traffic. Over”
“Spear-One, we lost an aerial drone near your location. Can you confirm?”

“Roger, Warlord. Spear has eyeballs on the crash site. We also confirm presence of what appears to be a SHORAD battery deployed with the Highland Brigade positions two click north of us. Over”

There was silence for several seconds on the other line. Pathanya looked over to Ravi and shook his head.
This was not good…

“Roger, Spear-One. Can you engage and eliminate threat at this time?”

“Uh…negative, Warlord. I repeat: we are two clicks away from target and do not have Intel on surrounding enemy defensive lines. Suggest we move close for recon,” Pathanya suggested. There was some confusion on the other side until the voice was much clearer and far more authoritative:

“Spear-One, this is Warlord-Actual. Be advised, we have reason to believe further reinforcements from Chinese airborne units underway to reinforce Chinese Bhutan presence. We are out of time. We cannot wait for further intel-gathering operations. The Paras will advance on schedule. I will not deploy any more RPVs to your area until that anti-air battery is dead. Hotel-Six will provide indirect fire support for the Paras and is not available. And all available friendly air is being directed north to prevent the arrival of these reinforcements to the battle-zone. So no chance to finesse this one: you are authorized to advance to contact and eliminate the commie anti-air battery immediately. I have a replacement RPV on standby once you send the all-clear. Get it done, son. Warlord out,” Lt-General Potgam’s voice was like a breath of fresh air for Pathanya and his men. He may have been sending them into combat but he was unhesitant about it and had a sense of confidence in their abilities. It gave his men the jolt of electricity they needed…

Pathanya looked around after stowing away the comms and keyed his team:
“Vik, get us a good fix on the red battery vehicles. The rest of you, form up on me and let’s figure how we are going to take this down...”

*****

….An hour later and three kilometers down south, the village at Dotanang was abuzz with activity as the Indian Paratroopers moved. The three BMP-II engines roared to life and spewed out bursts of engine smoke as they did so. The auto-cannon turrets moved left and right as the gunners checked their optics and targeting systems. As the Paras moved out of the northern outskirts, advancing along the eastern edge of the river and moved north, the three BMP-IIs splashed on the mud-snow slush and began advancing up the road.

Further south, near a clearing around the northern outskirts of Thimpu that was being used as an advanced helipad by the Paras, two Rudra helicopters remained parked on the snow-covered grass, their engines switched off and their flight crews standing around with open cockpit doors. There was no way in hell they would be given the go ahead to advance up the valley in support of the offensive until that Chinese Yitian SHORAD battery remained active. As the army-aviation major commanding these two helicopters stood around with frustration, the skies above rippled with rocket fire as Hotel-Six battery got into action. The Paras had run into contact with Chinese defenses…

*****


…The valley behind the Chinese lines was being continually lit up as each rocket explosion hit the slopes on either side of the road in the center of the valley. Pathanya advanced down the slope and through the bushes with deliberate slow movements. He pushed aside branches of trees that got in his way with one hand while holding the rifle in the other. His low-light goggles remained strapped to his eyes and he was experiencing regular flare-out as explosions far to the south at the battle being waged ruined his night-vision.

He and six others of Spear-One were moving down the slope and towards the road that lay below at the base of the valley. They were now close enough that they could hear the PLA officers shouting in Chinese to their men as they ran south to join the battle with the Indian paratroopers. He could also see the squad sized patrols on either side of him that were trying to climb up the same slope that he was descending on. But Spear ensured that they bypassed these men with a good margin. Surprise was the key here, especially when there were hundreds of Chinese soldiers in this valley and under a dozen men inside Spear Team.

They simply could not afford to get into a firefight.

Of course, there was a danger of being spotted by Chinese optics as well. They had deployed several observation posts with men equipped with tripod mounted high-frequency radars and IR scopes. Vikram had spent quite some time locating these positions and Pathanya had come up with an ingress path that would allow them to move within the blind-spots in the views of these teams. There was only one such position that they could not bypass on their way out. So Vikram and Ravi had branched off during the descent from the top of the valley and had headed around the back of the three man Chinese observation post that had its orientation to the south, towards the raging battle. Vikram pulled out his combat knife and nodded to Ravi. The latter lowered his rifle and pulled out his knife as well. As he handled it into position, it glistened in the moonlight. Ravi smiled at that and nodded back to Vikram.

By the time the PLA Lieutenant commanding the observation team heard the slight rustle of branches in the snow behind, Vikram leaped over and grabbed the man by his head, covered his mouth with his hand and shoved the large blade into his back and twisted it. The man’s eyes grew large with the pain and Vikram pushed the knife in again, this time draining the life out of the Chinese officer. It happened in under a second, during which time Ravi had done the same with the Chinese Signals NCO attempting to set up a tripod stand for a communications antennae. The third soldier had been looking through a binoculars at the battle to the south and by the time he heard the muffled thuds around him and turned to look, he saw the body of his commanding officer being pushed aside by a dark faced Indian soldier wielding a blood soaked combat knife. The Chinese soldier panicked at the sight and fell back on his hands, struggling to find his weapon and his face a mask of pure horror. Vikram gathered his strength and dove into his opponent, stabbing him in the gut while reaching for his mouth with his hand. He got there just a split-second later than he had planned, allowed a half-muttered shriek to go out into the valley around…

The Chinese soldiers and the Yitian vehicle crews standing around the on the valley floor below suddenly jerked at the distant shriek, and the battery commander, a Lt-Colonel, came running out from around the Yitian vehicle to look at the observation post on the hill side with his binoculars. He spotted the two Indian soldiers as they finished off the remainder of the team up there and then turned around to shout orders for his men...

A three round burst of INSAS fire ripped through his chest and he fell back on the muddy road, still clasping the binoculars and his other arm still pointed to the men he was ordering. His orders died mid-sentence.

The suddenness of it all seemed to halt the passage of time as all of the stunned Chinese soldiers looked around at the body of the Lt-Colonel now lying on the road and with blood pouring from his chest.

Then there was a series of continuous rifle bursts from the nearby bushes and boulders a few dozen meters away up the slope on the side of the road. Several Chinese soldiers fell to the ground as bullets ripped through their winter uniforms. Then they scrambled in all directions to find cover and return fire. The vehicle crew of armored Yitian began clambering to the top of their vehicle and into the hatches so that they could move the vehicle out of danger. Pathanya spotted the gunner and the driver attempting to get inside their vehicle and turned his INSAS slightly and fired a continuous burst. Bullets ricocheted off the metallic hull of the vehicle with distinct pings and sparks went flying in all directions. The gunner shouted in agony and his lifeless body fell on top of the vehicle, just a few inches away from the opening of the turret. The driver, however, managed to get inside and close the hatch above him before Pathanya could reload another magazine…

Damn! Damn! Damn!

Pathanya thought to himself as he dropped the empty magazine of his rifle and slapped a new one in there just as the boulders all around him began to get hit with Chinese rifle fire. His team was returning fire a well and dropping Chinese soldiers quickly, but there were a lot of them to the north and south and it wouldn’t take them long to get here. This had to be taken care of quickly. He looked over the top of the boulder he was on and keyed his comms:

“Vik, Ravi: Driver of armor vehicle inside turret. Engage! Engage!”

“Roger that! Engaging!”

Further up the slope, Vikram and Ravi had finished disabling all of the Chinese optics on the observation post and put their knives away. Ravi had taken out his rifle and got behind the rocks to take aim from above the Chinese forces engaging the rest of Spear Team below. Vikram grabbed Ravi’s backpack and grabbed the RPG-22 shoulder fired anti-armor weapon. He flipped the safety and extended the telescopic tube to full length, locked it and set it up on his shoulder. From this range, he could aim manually. He took a couple of seconds during which he noted that the Yitian driver had started the diesel engines and the vehicle was spewing out engine smoke. As the vehicle rumbled forward, the Chinese soldiers fell behind to take cover behind its armor. The vehicle pulled out of its parking and turned towards Pathanya’s men just as the rocket fired by Vikram slammed into its frontal armor and exploded amidst a smoke filled fireball that rose above and vanished, leaving large licks of flame rising into the sky, illuminating the valley for several hundred meters in all directions with a yellow-orange hew…

Vikram keyed his comms for the team:
“Target destroyed!”

Ravi was now cleared to open fire just as Vikram threw away the disposable launcher and grabbed his own rifle. Both men opened up with short bursts of fire that caught the exposed Chinese soldiers in a cross-fire from the front and top. They retreated behind the cover of the remained two 4x4 trucks while one of the remaining crews clambered on top of the 35mm gun turrets, attempting to turn them on the attackers. Pathanya noted the elevation of the gun turret and keyed his comms instantly:

“Vik! Ravi! Get out now! Incoming fire!”

The Chinese gunner opened up a moment later and the large caliber weapon fire ripped through the trees and branches in between and slammed into the boulders formerly occupied by their own observation team. The explosions were powerful enough to shred the rocky cover, filling the air with flying rocks and gravel as Vikram and Ravi scrambled out of the post and into the trees on either side. The 35mm cannon fire decimated what remained of the Chinese optics at the post in a matter of seconds. But the large muzzle flashes of the guns prevented the gunner from observing the effect of his fire and so he treated it as an area fire weapon: shredding tree trunks all around causing a lot of branches and snow to come crashing down the slope. The thunderous noise of the gunfire removed all coherence from both the Indian and Chinese sides.

Pathanya crouched back behind the boulder and removed a grenade from his belt-holster and hoisted it inside the tube of his rifle barrel mounted grenade launcher. He nodded to Sergeant Sarvanan and both men raised their heads over the boulder with their weapons. Sarvanan put the tripod of his INSAS LMG on the rocks and let loose a full barrage of covering fire that sent the Chinese soldiers diving for cover. An instant later Pathanya elevated his rifle upwards and pulled the trigger of his UBGL, firing the grenade on a depressed trajectory to its target. The grenade hit the base of the 35mm gun turret and exploded in a metal-on-metal explosion that sent splinters flying in all directions and left the Chinese gunner riddled with bleeding wounds on his seat. The anti-air gun turret was thoroughly disabled…

“Spear-One to Warlord-Actual! Anti-air threat destroyed! I say again: Red anti-air guns are dead in the water! My team is taking heavy fire from multiple azimuths! I need help over here! Send in the cavalry on my location right freaking now!” Pathanya shouted over the R/T as he lowered himself back behind the rocks. Sarvanan continued to blaze away with his LMG in a standing position next to him.

“Roger that! Hang in there! Cavalry on way! Warlord-Central out!”

*****

…The army-aviation Major nodded as heard the R/T call from Colonel Misra and then waved at the three other pilots standing by their helicopters and all of them ran over and started climbing into their cockpits at the advanced helipad in the northern outskirts of Thimpu. A few moments later the turbine engines spooled up and the main rotor blades began rotating and gathering speed…

*****

…Bullets smacked into the rocks and Sarvanan dived back behind rocks where Pathanya was slapping in another full magazine round for his rifle. Pathanya chambered the round and then looked around before facing Sarvanan:

“Okay, our jobs are done. We need to get out of here right away. We can’t go up the slope under this murderous fire or we will be shredded to pieces. Command is sending in the cavalry. We definitely don’t want to be here when they arrive. So that gives us a few minutes. Ideas?”

“Few, if any,” Sarvanan noted neutrally. He and Pathanya shared a look and then he smiled as he got into standing pose behind the boulder. He got his LMG tripod placed and got back into action, releasing bursts of fire in quick succession. Pathanya rolled around the side of the rocks and in prone position began picking off Chinese soldiers coming down the road from Barshong in response to the fighting. He saw three soldiers drop under his well-aimed bursts before a light-utility vehicle pulled up and the Chinese soldiers took up positions behind and started returning fire, churning up the ground around Pathanya with bullet impacts. He could not return fire after a few moments on account of the massive volume of fire pinning him behind the rocks.

And then he heard a new sound as a line of tracers whipped overhead and slammed into the Chinese utility vehicle, shredding its chassis into fragments and raising a dust cloud all around as the tracers bounced off the road and the side of the hills into arbitrary directions. The gunfire pinning Pathanya down instantly stopped. He jerked back to crouched position and dared to poke his head above the rocks and saw the smoke and dust clearing where the Chinese utility vehicle had been and saw a wrecked vehicle, spewing black smoke and half a dozen dead bodies nearby. Other Chinese troopers were taking cover behind the trees and rocks and returning fire into the sky…

One of the Rudra helicopters suddenly flew overhead as it fired its chin-mounted 20mm cannon and released a quartet of fin-stabilized rockets before pulling up aggressively. The latter smashed into the rocks and trees on either side of the road and several tree trunks collapsed on the road, throwing snow and dust in the air. Pathanya had just enough time to mutter an “Oh shit!” before the other helicopter riddled the remaining parked vehicles of the Chinese Yitian battery with a barrage of rockets. The trees above the road on the other side of the valley opened up with over a hundred flashes as a Chinese infantry company reinforcing the battered Chinese Battalion here came over the ridge. The air filled with rifle bullets and the second Rudra helicopter took multiple hits with Pathanya and the rest of Spear team hearing the definitive snags and thumps on the fuselage of the helicopter…

“This is Sierra-Two taking heavy Chinese small arms fire on peaks east of the river! We are hit and are hit and I have dead co-pilot in here. I am bringing this bird out of the fight. Sorry Spear-One, but I am RTB on emergency! Good luck down there!”

Pathanya grabbed his R/T as quickly as he could: “Roger Sierra-Two! Thanks for the assist! We will take it from here! Spear out!”
He saw the helicopter fly over the top of the peaks behind him at high speed and withdraw from the fight. He then turned to Sarvanan who had his binoculars out and observing the ridgeline on the opposite side of the river…

“What do you see?”
“Reinforced Company sized force making its way down to the road. Guess they must be from the Battalion at Barshong,” Sarvanan said as he squinted his eyes to make out the enemy force.

“We cannot stay here,” Pathanya said and was about to grab his team comms when the R/T squawked again:
“Warlord-Central to Spear, do you copy?” Pathanya fumbled with his comms but managed to sort it out:
“Roger, Warlord. Spear-One here”
“Spear-One, expect retreating Chinese infantry force to the south moving up to your position. Para commander confirms his force is seeing a break in the Chinese lines. You will be bumping into these forces imminently. Get out of there now,” the R/T voice said. Pathanya instantly motioned for Sarvanan to get the rest of the men together and to move out up the slope before they were faced with enemy forces from the west, north and south…
“Roger that, Warlord! Spear is disengaging! We are out of here!”

*****

…Further south, the surviving pair of BMP-IIs rushed down the road as they advanced north, cutting across the trees and vegetation with their auto-cannons while the Paras ran alongside to keep up and provide infantry cover. Hotel-Six battery fire now turned its attention to the HQ of the Highland Brigade at Barshong. The Chinese Battalion line between Dotanang and Barshong had been broken, and what had emerged was a bitter running fight between the last surviving reinforced Battalion of the Chinese Highland Brigade and the 11TH Indian Para-SF Battalion for control of the peaks of Northern Bhutan…

I think this song fits the mood



Also

I think india needs to keep a close eye on the versions and production rates of the cj10 long sword family. It gives them a very convenient long range strike option without using ballistic missiles. Hence very tempting to use. Yunnan is one continuous mesh of north south mountains and hills ( see articles on the tea horse road) ... Telars will be nearly impossible to track in that maze..as also low flying glcm which mask their approach by flying low....first warning ground based radar or aerostats will get is when they crest the last of these ranges and slide down into eastern assam....20-30 mins away from vital targets.

In scenario case, rather than flying all the way into tibet they could have struck same targets by just flying into someplace in yunnan for a launch area.

Dumb thoughts (No smileies/ridicules are allowed )

Assuming Chinese military has a more efficient MIC, they would/should buildup LRCMs like long-sword. Also assuming that ONLY THEN can make unprovoked and unexpected military escalations, they should sanitize all major air-fields at-least 1000km within Indian Territory in the first day of any future Indo-China war using these LRCMs and then throw a missile or two every day. Assuming India has 10-15 bases in this area, we are talking about 60 LRCMs on day1 and 10-20 missiles per day after that.

This alone will ensure that IAF cannot operate their superior airforce from these bases. This will take out any qualitative/quantitative/geographical superiority IAF has in this area. Without strong IAF presence, PLA can achieve its goals.

Assuming IAF pulls back into more secured bases in heart land uses a combination of mid-air refueling etc., this means lesser range for IAF into China's logistic centers in Tibet.

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This also explains why Pakistan is a dead animal as far as Indo-Pak wars are concerned.

All India has to do is identify known military targets (Air Fields, MIC, Air-defense radars, radar/missile sites, concentrated military clusters etc.,) in the range of 100-200

1. dispatch 3 brahmos per site on Day 1- 600 units
2. dispatch 1 brahmos per day on major air-fields and TSPA clusters - 100 items per day

By day 5 India can enforce a no-fly-zone all over Pakistan.