India-China News and Discussion

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ramana
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by ramana »

One thing the PRC wont do is to have formal armed confrontation in NE for that will unite India like nothing else. So dont expect any 'hot' war but cold threats.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by NRao »

ramana wrote:One thing the PRC wont do is to have formal armed confrontation in NE for that will unite India like nothing else. So dont expect any 'hot' war but cold threats.
A non-nuclear deterrent?

But, a very, very interesting observation.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Atri »

ramana wrote:One thing the PRC wont do is to have formal armed confrontation in NE for that will unite India like nothing else. So dont expect any 'hot' war but cold threats.
Ramanaji, but there will be a threshold after which short-term goals of China will outweigh the risk of uniting India. China's major concern is access to IOR at all costs. I think the swift invasion on Myanmar OR ladakh will do China more good than Arunachal.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Prem »

NRao wrote:
ramana wrote:One thing the PRC wont do is to have formal armed confrontation in NE for that will unite India like nothing else. So dont expect any 'hot' war but cold threats.
A non-nuclear deterrent?

But, a very, very interesting observation.
I think similar message was conveyed when India asked China to take a long term view of the relation and amend the old habits. Chinese , if they are wise , would not like huge neighbour like India as an enemy sitting next door to them. Having strategic weapons ,If we do Pakistan on them ,all of their dreams of beinmg number 1 will be shattered. PRc must accord strategic space to india if it wants to emerge as true global player on US scale. Yes they can cut one of our limbs but we can alos make them half dead and no half dead has ever reocoverd fully.
ramana
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by ramana »

NRao wrote:
ramana wrote:One thing the PRC wont do is to have formal armed confrontation in NE for that will unite India like nothing else. So dont expect any 'hot' war but cold threats.
A non-nuclear deterrent?

But, a very, very interesting observation.
Right now from outsider prespective, the million mutinies have to be allowed to run full course but any abhorrent outside intervention like the past one in 1962 will subside the mutinies.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by D Roy »

yes , but in exchange for showing that 'wisdom' they will play India for something.

And that something is to get a part of your demand pie. they will yonlee ask you to "let the ancient civilisation of china participate in the ancient civilization of India's amazing growth story'. After we clocked 500 million cell phones the world has sat up and taken notice. maybe just maybe all the those pundits talking about the black economy of India are not so much of the mark after all. also the great civilisation of china has shown competence in building infrastructure. so they would want to capitalise on our impending infrastructure boom.

I will just give one figure. we produce 40 mt of steel. the chinese- 400 mt. the beijing olympics is over, america is in a quandry, china already has significant over capacity in roads etc. where the hell is all that steel going to go, if not to the giant next door which is expanding at 7-9 per cent and has built up only 20-30 per cent of the infrastructure it requires?

they need another big market. and they have identified us. they are probably looking seriously at overland trade somewhere as well. but at the same time doing that may mean marking signposts - i.e at least defacto settlement of the border at places.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by V_Raman »

personally i have always felt that the only way for the world to get out of this economic mess is to develop india. looks like that will indeed be the case.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Muppalla »

NRao wrote:Are the current roads "all weather" roads?

There are two major types of "roads" - civilian and military. For instance EVERY intestate highway (road) in the US is under the defense department - no exception.

What India NEEDS is such a system all along the border areas - a very high quality system of roads (4 lanes at a minimum). NOT for the regional population, but solely for teh armed forces. Civilians can use them in times of peace for sure.

This thinking is some 80 years old!!!!!!!
You are right from that perspective. The roads are pucca and there are stretches of patchy roads. It is at many places single lane shared between opposing traffic. But when the roads are nearing Tawang after Bomdila they are not in great shape. I don't think there are any modern multi-lane-freeway style roads. In case of Military situation they may stop all trafic except for Armed forces.

However, the tone of Outlook is that since we don't have roads build by sweatshops we should not claim AP or Tawang. If we go that route, we are still laying roads even in mainland India. Not such an extensive roads other than some shades of good roads in few states.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by harbans »

India kicked Chinese arse then in 87 ( a very personal thing deleted). So did they in 1967. Things which have been got under the 'diplomatic' scanner....' We must not tell how we hurt the Chinese'. India can do it and did it but, media would hype it and offend Chinese. I hate it when Admiral Mehta says we cannot fight. I would have sacked him on the spot if i was PM. We can beat the crap out of them. We can hit and hit very hard.Will is deterrence. Not 20 Kt or 1 Mt nukes. One cannot have an Army or Naval Chief declaring to media we are weak and cannot fight. If we are operationally inferior, we want the Army or Naval Chief to say we can and will fight at the minimum in public. We can and should take the fight into Tibet. We will vanquish the agressor. And will hit them hard. Very hard. Whatever means.
Last edited by harbans on 10 Nov 2009 05:35, edited 3 times in total.
ramana
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by ramana »

Sorry to hear about your friend.
On the other hand the good Adm.'s statement was also served its purposes. Don't be disheartened for there is a place and role for everything.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by svinayak »

harbans wrote: We will take the fight into Tibet. We will vanquish the agressor. And will hit them hard. Very hard. Whatever means.
Can we annex Tibet and Lhasa?
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by harbans »

Ranana ji there's a whole lot of difference between Mehta and Arun Prakash. If i was 20 men against 10,000..i'd still say the CO says we can fight and will do so hard. Thats what Ishar Singh did. In Saragarhi. 20 Jatt sikhs against 10000 Pathan tribals. They fought and died. But the 20 took with them around 500+ of the so called 'fierce; pathans. NWFP region, they hesitated to attack any post hence forth. Will is always the biggest deterrence. Our Chiefs are not coming out with that. Mehta is too soft to say in public that. He has lost my respect post that.
Can we annex Tibet and Lhasa?
Sure, short of a nuke war. We can. Chinese cannot sustain too many divisions as such in Tibet. Check out the geography. They have till date only a single route into Tibet from mainland.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by RoyG »

US defends Dalai Lama freedom of movement

(AFP) – 4 hours ago

WASHINGTON — The United States on Monday defended the Dalai Lama's right to free movement after China protested his visit to a region near India's border with Tibet.

The Dalai Lama "is primarily an internationally respected religious figure," State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters.

"He of course has the right to go wherever he wants and talk to people that he chooses to talk to. And we just don't see it in any other way than that," Kelly said.

More than 30,000 people, some of whom arrived days in advance, turned out on Monday to see the Tibetan spiritual leader in the remote Tawang monastery in India's Arunachal Pradesh state, which China claims as its own.

The region has close ties with Tibet. The Dalai Lama took refuge in the monastery 50 years ago as he fled Lhasa amid an abortive uprising against Chinese rule. He has lived in India ever since.

The Dalai Lama said his visit was "non-political," but China accused him of trying to stir up tensions between Beijing and New Delhi.

The world's two most populous nations have had uneven relations and fought a border war in 1962.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/ar ... r3jjoWYkWg
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by NRao »

This is total Jai Ho article. Besides the normal rant from ATimes, there are a few gems that must make the archives. A Marter's Voice article - pedigreed, distilled.

Sorry, but this a cut-paste article:
Dalai Lama at apex of Sino-Indian tensions
By Peter Lee

India has engaged in high-profile hand wringing over the Barack Obama administration's renewed focus on developing the United States' relationship with China, as New Delhi perceives a pattern of diplomatic, economic and military encirclement by Beijing.

A Chinese threat is seen in the "string of pearls" - China's access to maritime facilities in Myanmar, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and the Maldives - and in the military buildup on India's eastern border that threatens to sever the "chicken's neck", the narrow Siliguri Corridor between Nepal and Bangladesh that connects India's landlocked eastern boondock to the national heartland.

In July 2009, one pundit predicted war with China "by 2012", in the article "'Nervous China may attack India by 2012'" [1], published by the Times of India: "China will launch an attack on



India before 2012. There are multiple reasons for a desperate Beijing to teach India the final lesson, thereby ensuring Chinese supremacy in Asia in this century," Bharat Verma, editor of the Indian Defense Review, wrote in the article.

But a look at prevailing trends in South Asia indicates that China's adventurism will be moderated by its own vulnerabilities. The fate of Tibet could emerge as Asia's defining security issue - to Beijing's detriment - if China and India can't manage their differences.

An adjustment of the special Indo-American relationship consummated under president George W Bush was inevitable once the Obama administration entered office in January 2009.

One of the most erratic and destabilizing initiatives of Bush's erratic and destabilizing presidency was his opening to India. Bush and his national security advisor, Condoleezza Rice, entered office determined to upgrade relations with Delhi. To do so, a key diplomatic and legal impediment to intimate security cooperation had to be swept aside: India's development of its civilian and military nuclear programs outside of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) structure. This initiative was not popular, even inside the Bush administration.

Robert Blackwill, the abrasive, arm-twisting (literally - he left government in 2004, shortly after he allegedly yanked the arm of a female embassy functionary in a rage over a missing airline reservation) US ambassador to India was a mentor to Rice and one of the most aggressive advocates of the new relationship.

He described his struggles with non-proliferation types and the pro-Pakistan former secretary of state, Colin Powell, and his deputy, Richard Armitage, in colorful terms in the article: "What are the origins of the transformation of US-Indian relations?" [2]
... [T]he non-proliferation "ayatollahs", as the Indians call them, who despite the fact that the White House was intent on redefining the relationship, sought to maintain without essential change all of the non-proliferation approaches toward India that had been pursued in the [Bill] Clinton administration. It was as if they had not digested the fact that George W Bush was now president. During the first year of the Bush presidency, I vividly recall receiving routine instructions in New Delhi from the State Department that contained all the counterproductive language from the Clinton administration's approach to India's nuclear weapons program. These nagging nannies were alive and well in that State Department labyrinth. I, of course, did not implement those instructions. It took me months and many calls to the White House to finally cut off the head of this snake back home.
Assisted by Blackwill's persistent insubordination and the determination of India's foreign secretary at the time, Shyam Saran, Bush cut the Gordian knot in a manner that suited his world view of the US and its allies unconstrained by the international system and its network of treaties and instead dispensing instruction to it.

The US unilaterally concluded a nuclear deal with India that made a mockery of the NPT and logic by exempting eight Indian reactors capable of generating fissile weapons material from inspection. Then the United States orchestrated acceptance of the deal by the International Atomic Energy Agency and, after considerable arm twisting, the Nuclear Suppliers' Group. The deal was ratified and signed by the US and Indian governments in late 2008, in one of the last acts of the Bush presidency.

The deal, enshrined in US law as the United States-India Nuclear Cooperation Approval and Non-proliferation Enhancement Act, was sold as a reward for India's good record as a democracy and as a non-proliferator as it developed its nuclear program outside the NPT. India's less-than-stellar record as contributor to nuclear tensions in South Asia - it had danced to the brink of a nuclear exchange with Pakistan as recently as 2002 over Kashmir - was pointedly ignored.

India was overjoyed at its good fortune, having gained an undeserved pass for its nuclear program and recognition of a privileged role as an American security partner at the expense of its detested rival, Pakistan.

Bush remains a popular figure to the Indian establishment. Tellingly, after he emerged from the traditional one-year hiatus of presidents who have left office, one of his first stops was the hospitable venue of the Hindustan Times-sponsored Leadership Initiative Conference in New Delhi.

The Hindustan Times concluded its interview with Bush, "India's voice on the global stage very important: Bush" [3] with the following question/statement: There are some who believe you have been the best US president for India.

In his reply to the newspaper, Bush - while modestly stating that he would await history's verdict - did not presume to disagree.

When asked what the United States got out of the nuclear deal, Bush jocularly cited reduced import barriers for India's luscious mangoes in the US market as justification.

A more realistic case was made that US suppliers of nuclear gear would benefit from India's entry into the global market for plants and equipment, though Russian and French suppliers, with their proven export records, would be expected to fare better selling to India than America's civilian nuclear plant builders.

Beyond its shortage of unambiguous benefits, the deal brought a number of negatives with it.

The Indian transaction - and the inescapable conclusion that the United States had institutionalized a double standard of forgiveness for its allies and selective enforcement against its enemies - has created inevitable problems for the United States in its attempts to create a united front against Iran.

When the Bush administration declined to extend similar nuclear privileges to the (admittedly, undemocratic, serial-proliferating) government of Pakistan, it contributed to the sense of anxiety and suspicion of the US within the Pakistani military that dogs American efforts to gain Islamabad's wholehearted participation in its bloody AfPak strategy to this day.

It also brought the security tensions implicit in the Sino-Indian relationship to the surface. China vigorously if fruitlessly opposed the Nuclear Suppliers' Group waiver to India, earning considerable resentment from India in the process.

The primary significance of the Sino-American relationship was, apparently, geostrategic. In its official statements, the Bush administration never alluded to a significant rationale for the Indo-American alliance: China.

After he left government, Blackwill was considerably less circumspect. While he acknowledged that there was no sense of immediate existential threat underlying from Beijing underpinning the relationship between Washington and New Delhi, he went on to say:

Like some in Washington, India is enormously attentive to the rise of Chinese power ... as the Indian military thinks strategically, its contingency planning concentrates on China. It is partially in this context (as well as energy security) that India plans a blue-water navy with as many as four aircraft carriers. India will also eventually have longer-range combat aircraft and is working on extending the range of its missile forces. What other US ally, except Japan, thinks about China in this prudent way? On the contrary, witness the current widespread eagerness within the European Union to lift its arms embargo against China. As a Chinese general said to me a few years ago, European policy toward China can be summed up in a six-letter word: Airbus.

The American conservative's platonic ideal of confrontational Sino-Indian relations driven by border disputes (and a unique interpretation of the phrase "honest broker") was supplied in a Wall Street Journal op-ed: "The China-India Border Brawl" [4] by Jeff Smith of the right-wing American Foreign Policy Council in June 2009:
What is Washington's role in this Asian rivalry? ... Washington should leverage its friendly relations with both capitals to promote bilateral dialogue and act as an honest broker where invited. But it should also continue to build upon the strategic partnership with India initiated by former president George W Bush, and support its ally, as it did at the Nuclear Suppliers' group and the ADB [Asian Development Bank], where necessary. Washington must also make clear that it considers the established, decades-old border between the two to be permanent.
Most importantly, though, the Sino-Indian border dispute should be viewed as a test for proponents of China's "peaceful rise" theory. If China becomes adventurous enough to challenge India's sovereignty or cross well-defined red lines, Washington must be willing to recognize the signal and respond appropriately.

Alas for India, its privileged position near the heart of American security calculations did not survive the global financial crisis, the deterioration of the situation in Afghanistan, and the Obama administration.

Obama, who won his Nobel Peace Prize in part for his efforts towards world nuclear disarmament, not the granting of deals to ostensibly right-minded and responsible nuclear democracies, pledged during his presidential campaign to obtain ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

Indian experts promptly announced that India's first hydrogen bomb test had been a dud, implying that enmeshing India in international nuclear agreements would be an unacceptable compromise of India's ability to perfect its weapons and ensure its security. (See India reels under explosive nuclear charge, Asia Times Online)

More significantly, the Obama administration has embarked on a policy of "strategic reassurance" towards China, intended to obtain China's active assistance in resuscitating the global economy and to ensure it will not dump its massive holdings of US public debt.

The US-India relationship remains, but for the time being it is stripped of the China-pushback elements that imbued the Bush administration's initiative with its appeal, sense of urgency, and bilateral recklessness.

In South Asia, the US no longer has the Bush administration's luxury of cultivating relations with India while a medium-intensity conflict festers in Afghanistan. Instead, the US has found itself desperate for effective cooperation from Pakistan as it attempts to forestall a political and military collapse in Afghanistan that, aside from its strategic implications, would be a considerable embarrassment for the current US president.

The Obama administration made an effort in good faith to square the US/Afghanistan/Pakistan/India circle by promoting a grand bargain involving the disputed region of Kashmir. In an attempt to win the support and gratitude of the Pakistan military - and enable the shift of resources to the Afghanistan border - the US tried to put negotiation of Kashmir on the regional agenda and revealed the first conspicuous fissures in the Sino-American relationship.

The Indian government is resolutely opposed to internationalization of the Kashmir issue, since the demographics are against it. The area is overwhelmingly Muslim - even more so now that a terror campaign has uprooted almost 300,000 Hindu residents and turned them into internally displaced persons - and the inevitable destination of a good faith negotiation would appear to be the alienation of a large part of India's current holding of Jammu and Kashmir.

At New Delhi's vociferous insistence, Kashmir was deleted from US special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan (AfPak), Richard Holbrooke's portfolio, and the US State Department sent him off to try to solve the AfPak mess without explicit reference to the central preoccupation of Pakistan's army.

Beyond assuring that the desperately distracted Pakistan government would be deprived of the good offices of any third party to overcome the entrenched Indian position on Kashmir, the decoupling of Pakistan from India's geopolitical concerns also confirmed a more subtle shift: the near-total marginalization of Pakistan as a Chinese asset in South Asian affairs.

Although the Pakistan security establishment retains its loyalty and appreciation of China as a genuine ally, it is enmeshed in a bloody, distracting struggle with the Taliban while its civilian leadership finds itself desperately reliant on US arms, aid, and diplomatic good offices.

The Obama administration has also provided signal assistance to India in dealing with another nettlesome ally of Beijing on its border: Myanmar.

Myanmar has been courted by India for years, even as persistent US advocacy of democracy in Myanmar and the cause of Aung San Suu Kyi pushed the junta deeper into Beijing's embrace. Now, the United States has adopted a policy of engagement.

Although the Pakistan security establishment retains its loyalty and appreciation of China as a genuine ally, it is enmeshed in a bloody, distracting struggle with the Taliban while its civilian leadership finds itself desperately reliant on US arms, aid, and diplomatic good offices.

The Obama administration has also provided signal assistance to India in dealing with another nettlesome ally of Beijing on its border: Myanmar.

Myanmar has been courted by India for years, even as persistent US advocacy of democracy in Myanmar and the cause of Aung San Suu Kyi pushed the junta deeper into Beijing's embrace. Now, the United States has adopted a policy of engagement marked this week by the visit of US Undersecretary of State Kurt Campbell - whose primary objective appears to be to help India wean Myanmar away from China.

It is perhaps not a coincidence that India now finds - with its western and eastern headaches reduced if not eliminated - that it has the leisure to involve itself in a border spat with China on the matter of Beijing's claim on a remote ethnic-Tibetan enclave in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh and, specifically, the little town of Tawang, the town that the Dalai Lama - to considerable Chinese tooth-gnashing and with the full-throated support of the Indian government - arrived in on Sunday for a five-day visit.

Although Western observers tend to dismiss the Sino-Indian border dispute as a matter of juvenile posturing by two aspiring superpowers who ought to know better, there is a deadly serious element to the dispute over these remote areas - the destabilizing and, to Beijing, profoundly threatening problem of the hostile Tibetan diaspora on the People's Republic of China's (PRC) borders with India, Nepal and Bhutan.

Beijing's top Indian affairs boffin, Ma Jiali, has identified the border dispute, not economic competition or maritime security, as the central problem of Sino-Indian relations.

As demonstrated by the unrest in 2008 throughout the vast ethnic-Tibetan areas of China and South Asia, the PRC has been unable to get a grip on its Tibetan problem, despite 60 years of assiduously working the military, security, political, economic and diplomatic levers at its disposal.

Over the past four decades, China has profited in its clumsy grappling with the Tibetan issue from forbearance by the international community, especially its neighbor to the south, India.

Despite hosting the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, since his flight from Lhasa in 1959, the Indian government has refused to allow the Tibetan diaspora to engage in activities that directly attack PRC rule in the Tibetan Autonomous Region and the Tibetan areas of Qinghai, Gansu and Sichuan.

China has exploited the Dalai Lama's commitment to a "Middle Way" of negotiated autonomy, to entangle the Tibetan government-in-exile in endless, fruitless and seemingly insincere negotiations.

However, it appears that generational changes within the Tibetan movement, the evolving geopolitical and economic stature of India, and Washington's willingness to partner with New Delhi are converging to introduce elements of instability and dangerous unpredictability into China's relationship with India.

To forestall Chinese interference in the selection process, the Dalai Lama has indicated that his successor may be found outside of China, and may even be selected before his death.

Whoever succeeds the Dalai Lama, and however he is chosen, increased militancy by proponents of Tibetan independence within the diaspora is virtually assured. Explicit independence activists like the Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC) have historically respected the desires of the Dalai Lama and moderated their activities. They are unlikely to show the same deference to the young man who is rumored to be the Dalai Lama's preferred successor, Ugyen Thinley Dorjee, the 17th Karmapa.

The Karmapa, a charismatic 22-year-old who escaped Tibet dramatically in 1999, may serve his people well as as telegenic, intelligent and pious face of Tibetan Buddhism to the West, but he is unlikely to command authority within the movement. He comes from the competing Black Hat sect and has been locked into an embarrassing struggle with a powerful leader within his own sect who has recognized a competing Karmapa. He has been locked out of the sect's monastery and denied access to his customary regalia. Instead, he resides at Dharamsala in India with the Dalai Lama and is seen as little more than his protege.

In the context of the South Asian status quo, in which all nations subscribe to the "One China" policy, as well as discourage Tibetan political activity and monitor and suppress Tibetan militancy with various degrees of enthusiasm, the loss of the Dalai Lama's moderating influence and an uptick in rhetoric and violence by angry Tibetan emigres would not concern Beijing overmuch.

What concerns the PRC is the possibility that India, flush with economic development and US backing, would be willing to confront China and roll back its influence in South Asia by choosing to play "the Tibet card" with the help of Tibetan militants operating from havens located in the cross-border territories of India and its allies.

The Christian Science Monitor in "Rivals China, India in escalating war of words" [5], sought out Chinese and Indian pundits in the context of the Dalai Lama's visit this week to Tawang:

The fierce People's Daily editorial was "a message showing Beijing's intention", says Han. "They don't want the Indian side to do anything to play the Tibet card."

New Delhi, however, "has no bargaining leverage with China except the Dalai Lama", says Dr Pant. "He is the last thing they can use against China ..."

The Times of India, in the article "India and the Tibet card" [6] provided some additional background information by recounting the result of China's continual fishing in the troubled waters of India's increasingly disgruntled and independent-minded satellite state on the Tibet border, Nepal:

India has also played the Tibet card, at least twice in recent times. Kondapalli [of Jawaharlal Nehru University] points out that "in 1987 and 2003, when China began supplying arms to the Royal Nepalese Army, India did play the Tibet card. In 2003, foreign secretary Shyam Sharan went to Dharamsala to meet the Dalai Lama. It was a message to China: Don't interfere in our backyard."

The desire to display and deter on their contested border in the area of Tibet has led both China and India to develop and militarize the remote communities there even beyond the expected investments of two burgeoning regional powers that wish to secure and integrate their most remote territories.

The Sino-Indian border has never been fixed by mutual agreement between the two nations. In the 1950s, China proposed a swap in which China would keep a desolate stretch in western India called the Aksai Chin, claimed by India, over which the Chinese had constructed a strategic road linking Xinjiang and Tibet. In return, China would recognize Indian control of a piece of land in what was then known as India's North East Frontier Agency (NEFA) nestled against the Myanmar border and China.

Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, miscalculating China's willingness to go to war, refused the deal and instead sent troops into Aksai Chin to expel the Chinese.

Disagreement escalated into a full-scale war in 1962. China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) administered a thorough drubbing to the unprepared Indian army, expelling Indian units from Aksai Chin, and occupying contested areas in the NEFA.

The Chinese leadership, wary of becoming embroiled in a prolonged war with India on top of problems with the Soviet Union, the US and Kuomintang leader Chiang Kai-shek, fatefully decided to withdraw unilaterally from the territory it had taken in NEFA, instead of continuing military operations and occupation to bargain the border dispute towards a final conclusion.

Today, the swap - actually, the acknowledgement of de facto control of territories each side already occupies - is still on the table. The PRC has the (virtually) uninhabited Aksai Chin tightly in its grasp, while India has reorganized the NEFA and created the state of Arunachal Pradesh on the land China claimed.

There's one wrinkle. For several years, China has indicated that it would surrender its claims over all of Arunachal Pradesh except Tawang - the same Tawang that the Dalai Lama visited on November 8. That is the same Tawang that the Dalai Lama - in 2008, in a statement that possibly reflected frustration at serving as a punching bag for duplicitous Chinese negotiators and aggrieved Tibetan militants in the aftermath of the bloody unrest inside China - stepped into the political arena and identified not as "Tibetan" (as he had done previously in an acknowledgment of its cultural character while sidestepping the political issue of whose territory it should belong to) but as "part of India".

To be fair to the Chinese, Tawang is indisputably Tibetan.

In a twist that probably accounts for Tawang's existence as a Chinese negotiating point, in 1947, the Tibetan government asked for only one modification to the border arrangements that the British had made (and China has consistently refused to recognize): it explicitly asked that India acknowledge Tibetan authority in Tawang. That is a persuasive indication that the district - which protrudes into the president-day Tibetan Autonomous Region like an inconveniently extended thumb - falls outside what India might construe as its natural Himalayan boundary.

Nevertheless, it is difficult to believe that the Chinese are serious about recovering Tawang. Tawang is the site of the Tawang Monastery, known as Galden Namgyal Lhatse, founded in the 17th century. It calls itself the "second-oldest Buddhist monastery in the world after Lhasa", hosted the Dalai Lama when he fled the Chinese occupation in 1959, and the Tibetan spiritual leader has visited it four times since then. The Dalai Lama has chosen at least one of Tawang's abbots and provides financial support to the monastery, which provides political as well as religious leadership for a community of 20,000 Monpa tribespeople of Tibetan extraction.

Turning Tawang over to the tender mercies of the PRC in the face of the horror, outrage and resistance of a large, powerful Buddhist monastery, an aggrieved population, the global Tibetan community, and a large swath of Indian and world opinion would appear to be a political impossibility for New Delhi and utter folly for Beijing.

Given Beijing's current anxieties over the future direction of the Tibetan independence movement and India's increased assertiveness, it will probably persist in its claim to Tawang simply to have a convenient casus belli at hand if and when it wants to escalate tensions in a relatively controlled manner and lay claim to the Indian government's attention.

In an indication to Chinese, Tibetan and world opinion that the contested border is not a place where China can provoke India at little diplomatic and military cost, the Indian government announced in June the stationing of a squadron of nuclear-capable Sukhoi 30 MKI fighters within striking distance of Arunachal Pradesh, and has mooted raising another two divisions of mountain troops to serve there.

To emphasize the state's status as an integrated and inalienable part of India, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made a campaign visit to Arunachal Pradesh in October 2008 during the run-up to the parliamentary elections. The Chinese retaliated with an unsuccessful attempt to block an Asian Development Bank loan to India that included flood control in the state.

The Tawang situation benefits from the fact that each side has occupied and fortified its positions for decades and not too much can happen there that can surprise and threaten. More importantly, as India's ability to project power into its border areas improves, the situation has benefited from the discrete restraint of the Congress Party's Manmohan and Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao.

Manmohan characterized the Dalai Lama's trip as a response to a local invitation extended to the Dalai Lama that he wasn't involved in, an absurdity considering the close attention New Delhi pays to every issue surrounding the Tibetans.

In an apparent attempt to diffuse or redirect tensions as the date of the trip approached, the Chinese government cannily noted Manmohan's bland statement, and decided to construe and condemn the trip as the Dalai Lama's affront to Sino-Indian ties instead of an insult to Beijing by New Delhi.

For India's part, in order to lower the temperature for the Dalai Lama's visit to Tawang - which had already received in-depth coverage in the New York Times, Time magazine, the Christian Science Monitor and a host of other media outlets, its Foreign Ministry canceled visas for foreign journalists looking to cover the trip.

Disappointed foreign journalists - deprived of the opportunity to observe the Dalai Lama sipping butter tea in calm defiance of the Chinese dragon - might as well instead journey a mere 640 kilometers westward to find the true epicenter of Sino-Indian tension: Kathmandu.

The burgeoning crisis in Nepal - and the frantic competition between New Delhi and Beijing for influence in this volatile, nascent democracy cum impending failed state - has attracted remarkably little international attention.

Nepal is an independent country stretching across the Himalayas between India and China. Predominantly Hindu, it is a major destination for Tibetans fleeing China. How many Tibetans reside



in Nepal is unknown. While 30,000 are officially registered, thousands more entered the country after 1989 illegally. At the same time, the Nepalese government has bowed to Chinese pressure and began to refuse asylum to Tibetan refugees.

The Tibetans - and the Nepalese government - aroused China's displeasure in 2008 when Nepal's capital of Kathmandu was rocked by angry anti-Chinese demonstrations in the aftermath of the June unrest. An unexpected turn of political events provided China with a much more enthusiastic Nepalese partner just in time to harass Tibetan anti-Olympic demonstrators in August of the same year.

India's Foreign Minister, Shyam Saran - the same Saran who was architect of India's alliance with the Bush administration - decided to do something about Nepal's independent-minded but ineffective monarchy, which was not only floundering in its attempts to suppress an extensive Maoist insurgency but also buying arms from China in the process. Saran midwifed an alliance of the Maoist insurgents and disaffected Kathmandu insiders that toppled the king and brought Nepal's 240-year old monarchy to an end.

But then, in a shocking development that neither Saran nor Nepal's self-styled revolutionary vanguard likely expected, the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) - instead of becoming a marginalized junior partner destined for disarmament and irrelevance in a pro-Indian regime of cooperative Kathmandu fat cats - carried the day in the parliamentary elections and won enough seats to form the government with its chairman, Prachanda as prime minister.

The Nepalese Maoists, despite their name, are not allies of the CCP. They are ideologically closer to US Marxist Robert Avakian and Peru's Shining Path than Hu Jintao and the CCP (which had been supplying Nepal's King Gyanendra with weapons to fight them and which they describe as "revisionist").

Nevertheless, the Maoists recognized India's fundamental hostility toward their movement and extended a hand of friendship to China. Prachanda rejected the traditional pilgrimage to New Delhi for his first overseas trip and went to Beijing instead to attend the closing of the Beijing Summer Olympics. He also announced that his government intended to renegotiate the friendship treaty between Nepal and India, which he termed unequal.

China accepted with alacrity. During Prachanda's one-year tenure as prime minister, China dispatched a dozen delegations to Kathmandu, including two PLA delegations bringing security assistance and a visit by China's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Yang Jiechi.

A think-tank funded by the Indian Ministry of Defense, the Institute for Defense Studies and Analysis, highlighted in "Nepal: New 'Strategic Partner' of China?" [7] a series of Chinese statements that were qualitatively different from the usual barrage of flattery and economic aid that China concentrates on impoverished potential junior allies, and which undoubtedly set alarm bells ringing in New Delhi - Beijing seems to have provided something that sounds very much like a security guarantee to Nepal.

The increasing level of bilateral engagement also indicates that China is wooing Nepal as a new strategic partner. This has been confirmed by the statements made by various Chinese officials. For example, on 16 February 2009, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said in Beijing that China would prefer to work with Nepal on the basis of a strategic partnership. In fact, Vice Minister of International Department of the Central Committee of Communist Party of China, Liu Hongcai said in Kathmandu in February 2009 that 'we oppose any move to interfere in the internal affairs of Nepal by any force.' Similarly, on November 4, 2008, Liu Hong Chai, International Bureau Chief of the Chinese Communist Party, stated that 'China will not tolerate any meddling from any other country in the internal affairs of Nepal- our traditional and ancient neighbor.

Prachanda reaffirmed Nepal's One China policy, declared his government would not permit Nepal to be used as a base for anti-China activity, vigorously suppressed Tibetan demonstrations, harassed Tibetan residents, and apparently turned a blind eye when ten Chinese security personnel crossed the border into Nepal to demand that a photographer from the Agence France Presse news agency erase his camera's memory chip.

It was too good to last.

Through an unknown combination of domestic incompatibility and foreign interference, the Maoists were frozen out of the Nepalese government in May 2009 as the result of a scuffle over removal of the pro-Indian army chief of staff, and an unpopular but pro-Indian moderate communist took over. (See Maoists isolated over army chief, Asia Times Online, April 28)

The Maoists went into opposition and have carried out their threat to gridlock all government business - through a parliamentary boycott - until matters are ordered to their satisfaction.

The small and incestuous world of Kathmandu politics has been diverted by the non-stop bustle of Nepalese politicians to New Delhi and Beijing to consult with their patrons.

The Maoist leadership visited China for an eight-day visit in October 2009, obtaining a statement from Beijing stating that the Maoists should not be frozen out of the constitution-writing and peace process activities that the Nepalese Constituent Assembly is supposed to be pursuing, despite their absence from the ruling coalition.

At the beginning of November, the Maoists announced their push for power, albeit within the context of Nepal's murky combination of post-insurgency power-sharing and democracy.

They have promised to bring the current government to its knees and return to power through a program of mass action conducted over the next two weeks, ostensibly non-violent but undoubtedly accompanied by intimidation and harassment courtesy of the bullyboys of the Maoists' Young Communists League.

Signs are that they will succeed.

The Nepalese government, which unwisely exhausted its budget several months ahead of schedule despite the knowledge that the Maoists had gridlocked the budgetary process, rather abjectly requested the Maoists not to engage in their mass action. Prachanda also rather magnanimously agreed not to shut down Kathmandu's international airport at the urging of the Western embassies, and predicted he would shortly be back in power.

As Nepal threatened to descend into chaos, the Chinese government threw another $200 million dollars at the mess, in the form of a credit from its Export Import Bank for hydropower and infrastructure projects at a concessionary interest rate of 1.75%.

The Maoists are keenly aware that they cannot push things too far and Nepal will not become a Chinese satrapy or a communist paradise.

The implicit shadow over all Nepalese actions that displease New Delhi is the memory of what India did to Sikkim in the 1970s: destabilization of the regime of an inconvenient monarch, followed by riots, request for assistance by pro-Indian local politicians, the arrival of Indian troops in the capital, and a plebiscite in which, by a margin of 97.5% to 2.5%, voters chose to join the Indian Union.

In a tribute to the instincts of moderation and business as usual, India's Congress Party, China, and the US administration appear jointly determined to keep a lid on things in Nepal - and in South Asia.

In an exercise in political triage that provided hostile advocates with opportunities for outraged posturing but reflected a sober understanding of geopolitical realities and US interests, President Obama postponed his meeting with the Dalai Lama until after his visit to Beijing, and allocated the first state visit by a foreign leader to Washington to Indian Prime Minister Manmohan.

For its part, China knows that India holds the cards - especially the Tibet card - in South Asia. It is looking for a modus vivendi that keeps the focus on economic growth instead of military adventurism. The successful continuation of the current regional security regime in South Asia - based on denial of Tibetan aspirations avoiding destabilizing actions at the Sino-Indian border - relies to a significant extent on New Delhi.

The current system will be put to a more stringent test if the bellicosely nationalistic Bharatiya Janata Party were to replace the relatively lamblike Congress party as the majority party in India's parliament. By entering into an equal alliance with the US and obtaining international validation of India's treasured nuclear program, the Congress party effectively stole the BJP's national security thunder and trounced it in the most recent elections.

Unable to score political points against the Congress party at this date for its closeness to the US, the aggrieved BJP has directed its fire at the ruling party's sensible and moderate China policy as insufficiently protective of India's security and honor.

The Chinese ambassador paid a formal call on the head of the BJP, no doubt hoping for reassurance that the BJP's outbursts were mere cynical posturing and Beijing could expect the usual pragmatism if and when the BJP regained power. What he received instead was a detailed rehashing of India's security grievances against China.

If the BJP takes power and decides to exploit China's vulnerabilities in South Asia, the world might indeed get that 2012 war that Bharat Verma was talking about.

Notes
1. China may attack India by 2012, Times of India, July 12, 2009
2. What are the origins of the transformation of U.S.-Indian relations?, Article in "The National Interest" by former United States ambassador to India Robert D Blackwill, Summer 2005
3. India's voice on the global stage very important: Bush Hindustan Times, October 30, 2009
4. The China-India Border Brawl, Wall Street Journal Asia, June 24, 2009
5. Rivals China, India in escalating war of words, Christian Science Monitor, October 20, 2009
6. India and the Tibet card, Times of India, November 23 2008
7. Nepal: New 'Strategic Partner' of China?, Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, March 30, 2009
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Pranav »

D Roy wrote: And that something is to get a part of your demand pie. they will yonlee ask you to "let the ancient civilisation of china participate in the ancient civilization of India's amazing growth story'. After we clocked 500 million cell phones the world has sat up and taken notice. maybe just maybe all the those pundits talking about the black economy of India are not so much of the mark after all. also the great civilisation of china has shown competence in building infrastructure. so they would want to capitalise on our impending infrastructure boom.

I will just give one figure. we produce 40 mt of steel. the chinese- 400 mt. the beijing olympics is over, america is in a quandry, china already has significant over capacity in roads etc. where the hell is all that steel going to go, if not to the giant next door which is expanding at 7-9 per cent and has built up only 20-30 per cent of the infrastructure it requires?

they need another big market. and they have identified us. they are probably looking seriously at overland trade somewhere as well. but at the same time doing that may mean marking signposts - i.e at least defacto settlement of the border at places.
Chinese goods are undervalued as a result of currency manipulation. Getting something cheap is good but it's bad for Indian industry. We cannot afford to have a hollowing out of manufacturing due to imports, as has happened in the US. One needs to take a calibrated approach.

Another point is that it is better to ask the Chinese to invest in infrastructure rather than just sell stuff (subject to security clearances). With returns from investment to be realized over the next twenty years say. Then they have a stake in the continued growth of the Indian economy.

The main Q is what will convince CPC kleptocrats that supporting Paks will be more trouble than it's worth. Use whatever tools available - Saama, Daama, Bheda, Danda. The Danda aspect should include rapid technological upgradation of defense capability and continued close relations with both the US and the Russians.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by ramana »

RoyG wrote:US defends Dalai Lama freedom of movement

(AFP) – 4 hours ago

WASHINGTON — The United States on Monday defended the Dalai Lama's right to free movement after China protested his visit to a region near India's border with Tibet.

The Dalai Lama "is primarily an internationally respected religious figure," State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters.

"He of course has the right to go wherever he wants and talk to people that he chooses to talk to. And we just don't see it in any other way than that," Kelly said.

More than 30,000 people, some of whom arrived days in advance, turned out on Monday to see the Tibetan spiritual leader in the remote Tawang monastery in India's Arunachal Pradesh state, which China claims as its own.

The region has close ties with Tibet. The Dalai Lama took refuge in the monastery 50 years ago as he fled Lhasa amid an abortive uprising against Chinese rule. He has lived in India ever since.

The Dalai Lama said his visit was "non-political," but China accused him of trying to stir up tensions between Beijing and New Delhi.

The world's two most populous nations have had uneven relations and fought a border war in 1962.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/ar ... r3jjoWYkWg
What the US needs to do is defend their leaders' right to meet the Dalai Lama in Washington DC! :mrgreen:
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by ManuT »

1. In this day and age, the video of Dalai Lama's Arunachal visit (and the crowds) will soon start surfacing in Tibet. So much support so close to the border, will be a concern to the Chinese govt, this time for real, and of its own making. The Chinese have made a policy mistake.

2. I view India vs Chinese preparations as kind of China's successful completion of the Olympics vs India’s ongoing preparations for the Commonwealth Games. Chinese advantages are well known, opening Tibet with rail route, all TAR forces under one command, a lot else has been mentioned at BR. Compared to that, We have trouble moving Eastern Command to Gawahati.

3. I agree with the folks that is NO place for Uighirs in India.

4. Higher visibility and protocol needs to be accorded to the Tibetan Govt in exile.

5. Someone (other than the Chinese) needs to remind GoI that a war was fought in 1962.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by rohitvats »

D Roy wrote:@rohitvats

during stride 2009 there were instances where chinese troops reached a spot via commercial carriers while there equipment was nowhere in sight! this exercise rather than demonstrate 'awesome' power projection capabilities as touted in the Indian media only served to show that they are novices in this game.

whereas india demonstrated its airlift capabilities during the sumdurung chu incident itself in 1987.As always people give weight to what the chinese parade rather than india's demonstrated capability. Any large scale movement on the train line and elsewhere will be monitored through various intel assets including space based SAR.
My dear good freind, there is a difference between ability to undertake stratgic airlift across the length of your country and and ability to induct formations and sustain them in an area you know will be centre of hostilities and from where I (PLA) want to thrust into Indian territory.

The Stride 2009 was a dog and pony show to demonstrate how great the PLA strategic airlift capability is and that PLA can, in true fashion of US Army, trasnport men and material to hotspots. PLA is trying to play the Regional Cop and such airlift capability is critical to do so. What they do not understand is that all the equipment in the world will not make them proficient at using them. The US Army will usually go through series of studies and raising of dedicated experimental formation (Air Assualt Brigades for example) to evalaute a concept, learn the lessons and fine tune that into SOP and strategy. Our northern freinds do not seem to have learnt this lesson. Well, there is only that much you can steal. :P

As for the sustaining the formations in sector opposite Tawang is concerned, given the way PLA has modified the infrastructure, provided for road, rail and air transport facilities, I'm sure they would have provided for logistics/material for formations to be inducted to the sector in advance. The ability to monitor troop movement is not relavent to our discussion as is our ability to induct troops into the area. The question is about sustaining them.

Let assume that the situation hots up. What the infrastructure will allow the PLA to do is smoothly induct troops into the area. Even if IA knows about it, what can we do? Will we pre-empt the deployment and take out the major nodes/bottlenecks? Take out the railway line, major mountain roads and bomb the airfields? No. All this will happen after the shooting match starts. By that time, the infra would have served its purpose: Induct large mass of troops into the sector. Please remember, that troops required for fighting in the area will be inducted from outside Tibetan Military District.

The biggest limiting factor that I see is the terrain. How much troop density can it allow for, something I cannot comment on.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Philip »

Tx Rao for that insightful viewpoint of the whole Indo-Sino imbroglio.However,Lee is being flippant when he says that "we might get that war in 2012 if the BJP is in power...".If the BJP is in power,to me it might actually be less likely,as security matters traditionally (in recent times at least) are generally higher in the list of priorities of that party as that of the Congress.Though the GOI is now seized of the issue,better late than never,a consistent thrust to plugging the gaps in our security against China and ita all=weather allies neds to be done on every front.A holistic approach is required as China is trying to usurp Africa for its future raw material requirements.Raising extra divisions using a large percentage of locals is one way to stymie the Chinese.You fight better when you are fighting for your homeland and the Han Chinese despite 60 yrs. of opression,haven't been able to defeat the Tibetan spirit despite the liberal use of the Chinese jackboot.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by D Roy »

Let assume that the situation hots up. What the infrastructure will allow the PLA to do is smoothly induct troops into the area. Even if IA knows about it, what can we do? Will we pre-empt the deployment and take out the major nodes/bottlenecks? Take out the railway line, major mountain roads and bomb the airfields? No. All this will happen after the shooting match starts. By that time, the infra would have served its purpose: Induct large mass of troops into the sector. Please remember, that troops required for fighting in the area will be inducted from outside Tibetan Military District.
Hi Rohit,


Yes the question is about ' sustain' isn't it? Even suppose the infrastructure serves its purpose ( which by the way i don't believe it will to the extent some people think it will) they still have to maintain men and material in that area . After the IAF interdicts all their supply lines, as detailed by you above, how long do you think this great PLA campaign will last? not more than a couple of weeks i would say.
Moreover whatever stuff the PLA is probably stocking up in underground installations near the border a.k.a north korean strategy are vulnerable as well. this is where training with the amrikis comes in. And this why the development of the IAf must be accorded top priority by the government especially on the indigenous development of air launched precision guided munitions and space based sensor capability.
The PLA just has that one high altitude railway line into Tibet and traffic is slow on that. there are maintenance issues.
as far as their strategic airlift capability is concerned - given the high altitude and PLAAF inexperience, I would say nothing great. any buildup will take time and there will be no 'strategic surprise".

in my opinion the PLA built up this infrastructure for three reasons:

1. Foster economic development in these areas . show the tibetans "public investment" is being made.

2. Have the ability to bring in light infantry to quell tibetan uprisings in far flung places.

3. Look, without these things the PLA would be rather naked in Tibet. This is the least it can do to make up for their handicaps against the superior force position India can project and has projected in the past. ( 11 divisions high mountain defence force etc.) We winded down in the 90's after that jiang zemin visit. Now we are turning the screws again and the PLA bitches are squealing.

It is typical in India and America to portray any move by the enemy as conferring a significant advantage on it. Instead I would say that if I were the PLA , it would be very foolish on my part not to build up all this in Tibet. I remember the Pentagon's 'soviet military power' from 1987 which talked about a "soviet lead in liquid fuel missile technology" .

The PLA will increasing rely on nukes as they did in the post 1967 period. If they are stupid enough to try a major incursion, which will not only fail but end in disaster, the PLA will start making tactical nuke warnings. it is then that all the dhoti masters and topiwallahs better show that fabled indian stoic and stare the commies down.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by svinayak »

Philip wrote:T However,Lee is being flippant when he says that "we might get that war in 2012 if the BJP is in power...".If the BJP is in power,to me it might actually be less likely,as security matters traditionally (in recent times at least) are generally higher in the list of priorities of that party as that of the Congress.
BJP is not in power but talk about BJP as a factor in the events to unfold
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by vera_k »

That author lost all credibility by dragging BJP into the argument. Pray how is the BJP supposed to start an India-China war when national elections are not due until May 2014? Complete moron that author is.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Sanku »

D Roy wrote: The PLA will increasing rely on nukes as they did in the post 1967 period. If they are stupid enough to try a major incursion, which will not only fail but end in disaster, the PLA will start making tactical nuke warnings. it is then that all the dhoti masters and topiwallahs better show that fabled indian stoic and stare the commies down.
Bingo and thats why we want to put some steel in their spine so that they find the staring down easy to do rather than wondering if A II has enough range with FBF to hit one town and the half ready A III may hit two etc etc...

Lots of A 5 with tons of 200+ KTs, shown to be working to even the avg moron (since we can expect more than a few in Chinese leadership), and even Raj T will be able to stare down the Chinese (an vast improvement over his petty bullying tactic of going after the weakest Indians)
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by D Roy »

hi Sanku,

i am pretty much in favour of rail mobile MIRVs with TN.

Only thing is we also need the unhindered import of important industrial tech from the west ( hitherto denied to us) for a while, as we take indian industry to the next level. this will secure us for the game that begins post absolute nuke stalemate.

In fact that is the whole thing. India is pretty cognizant of the state of affairs . but also needs tech imports from west and allies to continue so that we can experience what panda economy experienced in the nineties.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Sanku »

D Roy wrote: In fact that is the whole thing. India is pretty cognizant of the state of affairs . but also needs tech imports from west and allies to continue so that we can experience what panda economy experienced in the nineties.
But the west will not give us any such tech anyway, whatever we do or we do not in terms of acceding to their wishes.

OTOH if we do some Indian developments and send some Reliance etc to buy out the now dying western ones, we will get those anyway.

So we will have to take from the west, we wont get anything (take means buying, in house development followed by clever use of non dual use items etc..)
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by D Roy »

Hi,

Whatever we get we take.

Whatever we don't get we also take.

But there's a time period consideration involved here. there are some items that just get cleared and will help obviate the need to re-invent the wheel as it were. so we get those without the state department's approval if there are no sanctions etc.

It is a tradeoff scenario. which event is given precedence depends on what the national planners in consultation with industry decide.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by rohitvats »

D Roy wrote:
Yes the question is about ' sustain' isn't it? Even suppose the infrastructure serves its purpose ( which by the way i don't believe it will to the extent some people think it will) they still have to maintain men and material in that area . After the IAF interdicts all their supply lines, as detailed by you above, how long do you think this great PLA campaign will last? not more than a couple of weeks i would say.
Good Sir, you're over simplifying the situation here. Whatever draw backs you've pointed out wrt the infrastructure and it's vulnerability to intrediction, applies equally well for the India also. What is sauce for the goose, is sauce for gander.

Consider for example the accessibility in the Western LAC sector. There are two main lines of communications. These are:

1. Manali-Leh Road: This road will become part of NH-21 (Chandigarh-Manali) and connects the Leh with rest of India through Kullu-Manali in Himanchal Pradesh. Before you can reach Chang-thang Plateau (western periphery of Tibetan Plateau) in Ladakh, you need to cross 4 passes - Rohtang/Baralacha La/Lachulung La/Tanglang La with minimum elevation being 13,000 feet. If we are to have any defensive and offensive capability in the Southern and Central Ladakh Sector ( Dhemchok-Chusul and Chang-Chenmo Valley respectively), we'll need to induct and maintain a Corps+ size formation over such a terrain. Now it is obvious that PLA/PLAAF will try to take out these choke points (passes). And I'm sure military planners in AHQ would have planned for such a contigency. Because if they have not, then as per your assertion, IA cannot sustain operations in these areas. If IA can/will need to dump equipment/FOL/supplies/ammunition to sustain operations, then why do you think PLA will not be able to do so? And mind you, the ALG in Nyoma and ****** can at best provide some relief to the formations. They sure cannot sustain a large size formation.

2. Srinagar - Leh: NH-1D. Equally prone to interdiction.

As for the airlift capability, how long do you think PLA will alow the Leh and Thoise AB to remain?

If I'm a IA Commander, I'll factor all these scenarios and then plan my logistics. Anything less than that, is wishful thinking.

I expect PLA to keep the same in mind for their operations as well.

And as for the Tawang Sector, there is one road connecting Tezpur, the nearest air head in plains and from there its up the hills to Tawang. The best options to isolate troops in this area (5th Mountain Division+re-inforcements) is blow up this very road. And what do we do then?
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by D Roy »

-self deleted-
Last edited by D Roy on 10 Nov 2009 18:06, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by D Roy »

Hi friend,

Your detailing of the vulnerabilities in the western sector is of course valid. however the IA will also have pre-positioned stuff in all of these places inside shelters. And The PLAAF is certainly not anywhere close to the IAF in terms of operational capability. Despite all the shiny new flankers. most of those flankers ( i.e the Su-27 sks) in any case do not have a credible ground attack capability. The PLAAF's ability to interdict our supply lines is nothing great.


therefore the PLA's ability to hit us behind the lines is dependent on the second artillery division. But to permanently put out airbases you need persistence which no BMs can provide. whether the gulf war or russia's georgian adventure show that conventional BMs are nowhere near as effective as they are touted to be. the chinese are cognizant of this fact and that is why they are developing a DF-15 version armed with a penetrator warhead similar to what the Pershing once carried.

The entire analysis seems oversimplistic because we tend to only think of this in terms of being an IA vs PLA battle. People underestimate the capabilities that the IAF has accrued ever since operation safed sagar and that the PLAAF conitnues to be a third rate force which is not even permanently based in Tibet, is much more prone to accidents than the IAF and has no real exposure to modern air operations.


In tawang we already have the equivalent of a division acclimatized and stationed ( as well as stocked). there is a watch tower/ mini base every 500 metres. the Chinese are getting nowhere. we are also inducting 40 more Mi-17s. an airbridge is possible as long as the skies are clear. which they will be thanks to the IAF. air superiority over TAR can be achieved in 72 hours.
Last edited by D Roy on 10 Nov 2009 18:11, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Rahul M »

guys, won't this be more topical in the china military thread, where it will receive due attention who want to know the mil side of things ?
this thread is not really meant for military stuff.

Please continue in the china mil thread.
TIA.

p.s. I'll move the above posts there.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Philip »

Perhaps better in the Piracy thread,but I'm cross posting this to show the intended reach of the PRC,to make the IOR the COR!

http://in.reuters.com/article/worldNews ... 9720091110

China eyes lead naval role against Somalia pirates - report
Tue Nov 10, 2009
HONG KONG (Reuters) - China wants to take a lead role in spearheading naval anti-piracy operations off the Somalia coast, underscoring its spreading military ambitions beyond Chinese waters, the South China Morning Post reported on Tuesday.

The request was made during a closed door multilateral meeting over the weekend, involving representatives of major international navies deployed in the pirate-infested waters off the Gulf of Aden and around the Horn of Africa, an important maritime route linking Asia and Europe.

"It's unprecedented, but Beijing's request was welcomed in a very cooperative atmosphere ... there is a recognition that a great deal more work is needed to get on top of piracy," one official at the meeting was quoted as saying.

"China is very keen but more discussion will be needed before a final agreement is reached," the official added.

The meeting comes after a Chinese coal ship was seized last month by pirates off the Somali coast. Some Chinese media outlets urged a direct military response, but the Post reported that Beijing and the ship's owners have instead been involved in "secret talks over a ransom to free the 25 Chinese crew".

While NATO and the EU have so far played a lead role in the anti-piracy operations, naval vessels from China, Russia, Japan, and other nations are also involved with the coalition of naval forces seen to be stretched very thin over the vast expanses of sea, including the Indian Ocean.

The move, while still not confirmed, comes as many governments worry about China's rising military spending, especially the United States, which has said Beijing is not open enough about its intentions.

"(China is) showing the world they are serious ... that they have the potential to be one of the big boys on the block and are prepared to risk furthering their military diplomacy. We haven't seen anything like this before," Sam Bateman, a senior fellow at Singapore's Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, was quoted by the Post as saying.

(Reporting by James Pomfret; Editing by Ken Wills and Dean Yates)
Manny
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Manny »

Is China headed toward collapse?

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29330.html

Chanos, a billionaire, is the founder of the investment firm Kynikos Associates and a famous short seller — an investor who scrutinizes companies looking for hidden flaws and then bets against those firms in the market.

His most famous call came in 2001, when Chanos was one of the first to figure out that the accounting numbers presented to the public by Enron were pure fiction. Chanos began contacting Wall Street investment houses that were touting Enron’s stock. “We were struck by how many of them conceded that there was no way to analyze Enron but that investing in Enron was, instead, a ‘trust me’ story,” Chanos told a congressional committee in 2002.

Now, Chanos says he has found another “trust me” story: China. And he is moving to short the entire nation’s economy. Washington policymakers would do well to understand his argument, because if he’s right, the consequences will be felt here.

Chanos and the other bears point to several key pieces of evidence that China is heading for a crash.

First, they point to the enormous Chinese economic stimulus effort — with the government spending $900 billion to prop up a $4.3 trillion economy. “Yet China’s economy, for all the stimulus it has received in 11 months, is underperforming,” Gordon Chang, author of “The Coming Collapse of China,” wrote in Forbes at the end of October. “More important, it is unlikely that [third-quarter] expansion was anywhere near the claimed 8.9 percent.”

Chang argues that inconsistencies in Chinese official statistics — like the surging numbers for car sales but flat statistics for gasoline consumption — indicate that the Chinese are simply cooking their books. He speculates that Chinese state-run companies are buying fleets of cars and simply storing them in giant parking lots in order to generate apparent growth.

Another data point cited by the bears: overcapacity. For example, the Chinese already consume more cement than the rest of the world combined, at 1.4 billion tons per year. But they have dramatically ramped up their ability to produce even more in recent years, leading to an estimated spare capacity of about 340 million tons, which, according to a report prepared earlier this year by Pivot Capital Management, is more than the consumption in the U.S., India and Japan combined.

This, Chanos and others argue, is happening in sector after sector in the Chinese economy. And that means the Chinese are in danger of producing huge quantities of goods and products that they will be unable to sell.

The Pivot Capital report was extremely popular in Chanos’s office and concluded, “We believe the coming slowdown in China has the potential to be a similar watershed event for world markets as the reversal of the U.S. subprime and housing boom.”

And the bears also keep a close eye on anecdotal reports from the ground level in China, like a recent posting on a blog called The Peking Duck about shopping at Beijing’s “stunningly dysfunctional, catastrophic mall, called The Place.”

“I was shocked at what I saw,” the blogger wrote. “Fifty percent of the eateries in the basement were boarded up. The cheap food court, too, was gone, covered up with ugly blue boarding, making the basement especially grim and dreary. ... There is simply too much stuff, too many stores and no buyers.”
V_Raman
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by V_Raman »

it is becoming more clear that the only way out for china is to develop india.
Prem
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Prem »

V_Raman wrote:it is becoming more clear that the only way out for china is to develop india.
Trade between them must be in local currency.
SSridhar
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by SSridhar »

Nostalgia and Relief Sweep over Tawang
What caught my eye was the following:
Mindful of the recent upsurge of jittery sounding media bytes and ultrapatriotic visuals, New Delhi has ordered the removal of all Indian flags lining the route to monasteries to be visited by the Dalai Lama in the coming days. Replacing the Indian flags generously supplied by the state authorities with mantra-inscribed Tibetan flags, Lama Phungtso, a national award winner for working with orphaned children, said the government had ordered the removal of the buntings in the Indian national colour because the Dalai Lama’s visit was purely religious in nature.
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Jarita »

The above article is typical Chindu reporting. Ascribing motives to straightforward actions.

Also Gurus, seems like unkil is cheering both parties on. There is a lot to gain for unkil from a skirmish between both, right?
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by Akshut »

There is something seriously wrong with Chindu. On the first day of visit the only space it could manage for Dalai Lama was the low left corner of an inner page with just a photo and no article at all. And as usual half of the national news were about CPI. :roll:
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Re: India-China News and Discussions

Post by santoshriyer »

Chinese, Indian Internet users to have lively debate Source: Global Times [17:08 November 10 2009] Comments A Sino-Indo Internet Users Debate Contest, launched by huanqiu.com's Sino-Indo Special Column, will hold its first debate on the Global Times Forum ( http://forum.globaltimes.cn) on December 1, 2009.
China and India, two Eastern giants each with thousands of years of civilization, are playing increasingly important roles in international affairs. However, in recent years, the increasing trade conflicts and tensions generated by border disputes have made this Asian region a hotspot in the world.
To reinforce civil communication and mutual understanding between China and India, the Global Times website is initiating a debate contest between Sino-Indo Internet users. Debaters from China and India can have hot discussions on key issues of mutual concern.
China's online users are ready to talk and we sincerely invite Indian web users to take part in the debate contest. Further details will be posted in Global Times Forum in the thread for "Debates".
http://forum.globaltimes.cn/forum/showt ... ina&page=2
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