Bharat Rakshak

Y I Patel

Demchok - arguably India's most vulnerable outpost If you look at the 3D map, "New" Demchok is the southern end of a wide and flat valley, ideal for tank warfare. Looks like a good place for India to go on an offensive? Wrong. It is ideal terrain for armoured ops, but in this case India i...

Y I Patel

^^^ possible that Spice might have been used?

Y I Patel

What this does is put the onus squarely on the PLA to escalate, if it wants to. He has signaled to them that he is confident of handling any internal political dissent about the incursions in Fingers 4-8 and he is under no pressure to fire the first shot. Essentially telling Xi Jinping, "Your ...

Y I Patel

Might I suggest that some really high quality posts should be deleted because they are too informative?

Y I Patel

Some of you are extremely good at picking up innocuous looking details, and you probably take it for granted that some things are obvious. In this example, an operational detail is involved... At a sensitive time like this, it might be better to rejoice quietly.

Y I Patel

I thought the game changing bridge was named after Col Chewang Rinchen (MVC with Bar) because of his exploits in 1971 that led to the capture of Turtuk... but there is so much more to this legend... would not be an understatement to call him the savior of Ladakh Read about the exploits of the Tiger ...

Y I Patel

This is Chandrashekhar Athwale, an amateur historian who maintains a fantastic website of historical and contemporary articles, including several fantastic ones on the 1962 war: https://chandrashekharasandprints.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/new-avatar-photo.jpg The front page to his website Akshardho...

Y I Patel

PankajS your OTOH is right on the money. Direct access to Khurnak fort Ldev follow the tracery of roads southwards from Marsimik La. Piu La is the next pass to the south. If that doesn’t help try road from Chinese side that ends south of Marsimik La; Piu La is west and uphill of that Chinese road he...

Y I Patel

Your OTOH is right on the money. Direct access to Khurnak fort Ldev follow the tracery of roads southwards from Marsimik La. Piu La is the next pass to the south. If that doesn’t help try road from Chinese side that ends south of Marsimik La; Piu La is west and uphill of that Chinese road head. ITBP...

Y I Patel

Please study these three passes: Marsimik La, Piu La, and Ane La. Zoom in , zoom out, rotate, note relationship to each other and to (Google) LAC. Also zoom in close to western side of Piu La noting that the imagery will not be current.

Y I Patel

ALGs like DBO and Fukche are too close to the enemy to be of much use as an Airbase. Easily threatened during war time by placing SAMs along the Chinese controlled areas. For DBO we need a all weather road and a backup. The DSDBO road is already complete and work on the backup via Saser pass is in ...

Y I Patel

I tried using Baidu maps today, but not very impressed. Resolution of satellite imageries much lower than google, and boundaries switch off at high resolution just when you can start making out features. So I gave up after a while.

Y I Patel

nachiket, You are looking at Track Junction, Burtse is as nrao points out. Much as I hate to say so, the more I read the more it becomes apparent that in this case and others the Chinese LAC *is* the LAC. Look at the map of patrol points from Quint and try to superimpose on google maps. The whole ar...

Y I Patel

Ok so someone has been briefing journalists on all these vital petrol points. Best map so far, in Quint:

Quint: Patrolling beyond Bottleneck limited since March

Y I Patel

Okay, a couple of very good articles in Swarajya Mag and Indian Express (IE was the one I mentioned earlier, now with link in this post). Swarajya Mag article (Must read) https://swarajyamag.com/defence/explained-how-china-is-opening-a-new-front-near-ladakhs-depsang-plains-and-daulat-beg-oldi-sector...

Y I Patel

A lot of puzzle pieces fall in place if you read above IE article posted by NATO with Shiv Aroor map I posted last night. Will post more tonight but big picture - Bottleneck is confirmed as apex of Shiv Aroor triangle that shows location of Chinese camps. Bottle neck is to its west. Big confirmation...

Y I Patel

Regarding DBO and Depsang Plains, a very useful map in this article by Shiv Aroor on the developing situation in SSN: https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/china-attempts-to-open-new-front-in-ladakh-s-depsang-inputs-confirm-movement-on-ground-1692289-2020-06-24 In particular, this map: https://akm-i...

Y I Patel

Thank you RaviB for your highly educative posts!

Y I Patel

New Bridge in Galwan valley .. https://twitter.com/MarkKumar3/status/1274402486888001536/photo/1 https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ea-WSvBUYAAincD?format=jpg&name=900x900 This is the recently built Major Chewang Rinchen bridge over the Shyok, not the new Bailey Bridge over the Galwan. It enables all-...

Y I Patel

The above article mentions that the more serious incursion is near the Gogra post. It also talks about some patrol points whose geographic location is obscure, but very likely to be in Shamal Lungpa. Refer to my posts and geographic coordinates for context

Y I Patel

Equipment aside IA should start acclimatizing large number of soldiers at some other place with same altitude for large scale lift and shift. Apart from 3rd Infantry division at Leh, we have 8 Mountain division at Dras and 17 Mountain handling North Sikkim, both of which are at altitudes above 10,0...

Y I Patel

Thanks for posting the lat lon and providing linked images from Nathan Ruser's tweet. Here are some other location lat lons that are of interest, in that area: Samzungling - PLA base: 34.7142425N 78.7475967E this is close to the headwaters of Galwan Lungpa. Note how upper lungpa is easier to negotia...

Y I Patel

Manjgu thanks for the Nathan Ruser tweet. Very revealing of Chinese intentions: https://twitter.com/Nrg8000/status/1264042209130627072/photo/1 Notice how the Chinese tents are deployed in a line along a very narrow river gorge (Galwan Lungpa). What this imagery seems to convey is that their intent i...

Y I Patel

* The Chinese have pitched close to a hundred tents at four points on the Galwan River between Patrolling Point 14 (PP 14) and Gogra * There is a serious stand off in the finger 4 area on the north shore of Pangur Tso Some historical and geographic perspective to these two locations of standoff and ...

Y I Patel

^^
This is the strongest confirmation so far on how IAF views the worth of Tejas. Words are easy but entrusting the defense of vital sectors to Tejas sends a message no amount of press releases can

Y I Patel

^^ MiG-29s were previously based in Jamnagar and are now based in Adampur, two of the most important air bases for operating air defense fighters. Jamnagar protects refineries and the overland air approaches towards Mumbai. Adampur provides the same for industries in Punjab and air approaches to New...

Y I Patel

After posting yesterday I recollected Rohit's blog post which talks about dual tasked divisions for 9 Corps and 17 corps... so the IBGs are not a replacement, but an augmentation of 17, 9, 11 and maybe some other corps. The other facet of the reorg seems to be increased dual tasking of division leve...

Y I Patel

The article above has some significant pieces of information regarding Army reorg: (1) We have the first confirmation that 17 MSC is now operational. There were previous reports of two Divisions in the process of being raised, but this is the first unequivocal confirmation that the component units a...

Y I Patel

Regarding the recent posts on Neelum (Kishen Ganga Valley) I had post on this following Pulwama attack when we were discussing different retaliation options. This is a useful supplement to what you mention above with your maps. Hope those that are already familiar with this do not mind the recycling...

Y I Patel

Rohit You had mentioned the road from Pathankot to Jammu and thence northwards in one of your posts, in the context of it being a vital artery that needs to be protected. I am happy to draw your attention to a road slowly coming up farther to the east of it: follow north from Pathankot to Dunera to ...

Y I Patel

Thanks for the link Rohit, and for your excellent compilation. I made a comment on your blog but it’s not visible yet probably because you need to review it. If you don’t see it either and it’s lost in the ether then I will resubmit by logging in

Y I Patel

To get the full picture on IBGs it will be necessary to look at the units used to raise them. Apparently they will be raised out of existing formations. One indicator so far is that 14 RAPIDS lost its armoured brigade to an IBG, and will now be deployed in Uttarakhand/HP. 14 RAPIDS is from 2 Corps i...

Y I Patel

S&P BSE SENSEX Index Current : 39,592.08 - Pt. Change : +157.14 - % Change : +0.40 Market Capitalization of BSE Listed Co. (Rs.Cr.) : 1,51,99,410.35 - $ 1 / I N R 69.3025 Market Capitalization of BSE Listed Co. (U S $.) : 2,194.20 Billion P S E Current Index : 34,088.56 – Change : -102.06 – Cha...

Y I Patel

My hunch is that Jaishankar will get defense, not EA

Y I Patel

Up to early 60s Congress was a genuine political organization with a solid second tier of potential successors to Bandit. Then, when he was at his most vulnerable in 63, he unleashed the Kamaraj plan to kneecap potential replacement PMs - the biggest victims were social and financial conservatives l...

Y I Patel

Babaji posted a beautiful picture of a snow-covered mountain range and accompanied it with an ode where he describes Kashmir as "mere desh ka dipt lalat". That is Mahakavi Tulsidas level vocab right there - he called Kashmir the luminous forehead of his country. The poem goes on to state t...

Y I Patel

CNN now reporting via scroll bar that India obtained information on the attacks through interrogation of an arrested ISIS terrorist. Information was passed to SL authorities. This is on near-prime time news in US

Y I Patel

On Gujarat turnout: (1) Overall it looks like on par with last time, which is great news particularly with (2) below (2) Turnout looks pretty good in urban areas and particularly in South Gujarat. These are the areas that helped BJP retain majority in the last state legislature elections So I have i...

Y I Patel

^ not a good idea to make the rebuttal so personal.

Anujan is entitled to an opinion and if every thoughtful poster is going to be shouted down it won’t help the quality of discourse here

Y I Patel

... I have seen the corruption Madhavsinh Solanki indulged in with my very own eyes. Tankers of petrol were pilfered and adulterated with kerosene. All the funds going to divide Indians and killing them in communal clashes. ... I would prefer anybody outside of the CONgoon familia, right from bandi...

Search found 774 matches