On the
night of 15th
April 2013. about 40 Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops
stealthily intruded 19 km inside Indian territory across the line of
actual control (LAC) and set up 4 tents in the Daulat Beg Oldi sector
of the Northeast Ladakh. Another tent was added after two weeks. I
have already dealt with all the background information about this
Chinese action in my article, Trouble brewing on
India's northeast Ladakh border with China
and I do not intend to repeat it here.
Most
of the people in India were completely puzzled by this Chinese
intrigue. The netizens and media Pandits rushed to offer explanations
for this strange Chinese action. Most of the people including
bloggers, retired generals, the opposition spokespersons, television
commentators and newspaper columnists rightly blamed China for this
provocative action. Most of the commentators thought of this Chinese
provocation as a way of putting pressure on militarily weaker India,
presumably to extract concessions like freezing the number of troops
that can be deployed along the border, or some way restrict the
Infrastructure development being done by India on the borders.
Chinese have already set up such infrastructure and by limiting
India, they would always retain their stronger position. Some people
also thought that this adventurous incursion was carried out by some
lower order military authorities at the behest of some pressure group
trying to pressurize, China's new political leadership. Some others
gave the reasons of this incursion as Indian Government's apparent
weakness and feebleness, which was being probed or tested by Chinese.
There
could be some elements of truth, in all these lines of thinking, but
they do not appear to me as completely satisfying answers to the
vexing questions; why did the Chinese do it? Why in godforsaken,
desolate and forlorn place like Depsang plateau? and why now?
Let us
look at this situation in a broader perspective. At this point of
time, Chinese have picked up territorial disputes with Japan,
Philipines and Vietnam, why add another dispute to this list? There
is simmering tension across the Ladkah border in Xinjiang.
Historically speaking, China did win the 1962 war with India and
managed to grab a large land area in Ladakh and control over almost
complete Aksaichin region, but it also converted overnight, a perfectly passive and placid neighbour to a foe. This latest
Chinese action was surely going a raise a stink in India and a
stronger call for more spending on military capacity, along the
border. India’s reliance on a nuclear deterrent alone no longer
looked sufficient.
China
-India trade, which was nothing in 1962, has now grown to US$ 66
Billions and is almost one way in favour of China. China and India
have agreed to co-operate as members of the BRICS group of
countries. Even for solving border disputes, both countries had
established limited mechanisms for managing their disagreements
peacefully. No country would like to jeopardise all this. Yet Chinese
appeared to have done it.
Ever
since the day of incursion or 16th
of April, local commanders of two armies in Ladakh, have been holding
a series of flag meetings to sort out the incursion issue. To start
with Chinese simple refused to accept that they have disturbed the
status quo and kept claiming that they were well within their areas
of control. At the diplomatic level, India's foreign office was in
touch with Chinese. The international press almost carried the story
as told by India's media, which was leaked to them in the first place
by Indian Army. In south east and east Asia it was picked up by all
news agencies. It was obvious that there were not very few takers for
the Chinese version of it and in already strained scenario in south
east and east Asia, this was another arrogant act by Chinese. Indian
army highlighted in a series of tweets, visit of Gen Eiji Kimizuka,
Chief of Staff, Japan's official visit to India.
For
whatever reasons, a flag meeting held on Sunday 5th
May 2013,which took place at 4 p.m., and a deal was struck, which
suddenly and mysteriously ended the row with commanders from both
sides shaking hands and ordering their troops, facing each other 300
meters away, to dismantle their tents. By 7.30 PM, Chinese were gone.
Some newspapers have reported that India has agreed as part of the deal, to dismantle a tin shed erected 5 Km inside of what Chinese call LOC, on a small disputed part of the
boundary, near 'Chumar' monastery in south Ladakh, more than 300 Km
away from the Depsang plains point of incursion. This shed was apparently erected on 18th April as a tactical response to Chinese incursion of 15th April and India immediately agreed to dismantle it in the deal as it was only meant as a tactical move to pressurize Chinese.
Well!
How do you explain this strange course of action by the Chinese? To
start with, we need to have some historical perspective. I have
written a number of blog posts about historical and Geographical
perspectives of Ladakh and also a detailed account of 1962 war in
Ladakh. Those readers, who are interested, can go through these
articles to acquaint themselves with the actual situation and future
perspectives. Here is a list.
Coming
back to our story, immediately after annexation of Tibet in 1950's,
Chinese started working on a highway (shown in yellow line) that
would connect Tibet with other western region of Xinjiang. The
problem with this road was that it passed through Aksaichin region,
belonging to India. So important was this road strategically to
Chinese, that they decided to build it without bothering about India.
Though this region politically belonged to India, the only
monitoring that was done historically, was by occasional police
patrols, that too only in the summer. After India started objecting
to this road, a decision must have been taken by the Chinese
leadership at top to secure this road, at any cost, by putting all
such passes and river valleys that lead to this road from any
expeditionary forces of the Indian Army. This was the sole and
basic reason for 1962 war in Ladakh and after the humiliating defeat,
India was forced to accept a new LOC, as decided by Chinese, that
served this function well. This fact could be ascertained by going
through history of 1962 war. Effectively, starting from Demchowk in
south, Chinese managed to seal all gateways to Aksaichin and Tibet at
Hotsprings, Rezang La, Spanggur Gap, Kongka La, Galavan river and
Chipchap river in north (near the famous Karakoram pass), totally to
any future Indian expeditionary forces.
Was
this sealing of the Aksaichin region from India,really complete and
total or there were still some gaping holes that were strategically
still dangerous? To find an answer to this question, we should really
go back to beginning of twentieth century in 1907, when a German
explorer, Sven Hedin, was leading a trekking expedition across
southern Tibet.
(To be
continued)
8 May
2013
You have written a very interesting article here.
ReplyDeleteSunil
DeleteThanks for your comment