China urges India to restrain
▶ Indian troops ‘intentionally staged fatal provocation’
In an event that Chinese experts call the most severe situation China and India have experienced along their border in decades, a fatal physical clash broke out on Monday between the two countries’ border defense troops in the Galwan Valley.
The clash took place after Indian troops crossed the border to conduct illegal activities and launched provocative attacks against Chinese personnel, leading to physical self-defense measures from Chinese troops that reportedly caused the deaths of one Indian Army colonel and two soldiers.
Breaking their promises, Indian troops had again crossed the line of actual control in the Galwan Valley region on Monday evening and purposefully launched provocative attacks, leading to severe physical clashes, causing casualties, Senior Colonel Zhang Shuili, spokesperson of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Western Theater Command, said on Tuesday.
China has always maintained sover
eignty over the Galwan Valley region, and Indian border defense troops are inconsistent in their actions and seriously violate the agreements both countries have reached, seriously infringe upon the consensus made in the army commander-level talks and seriously harm the relations of the two militaries and the sentiment of the people in both nations, he said.
Despite China and India’s close communication via diplomatic and military channels aimed at easing border tensions, Indian troops on Monday severely violated the consensus reached in the two countries’ commander-level talks on June 6. They crossed the border twice to conduct illegal activities and launched provocative attacks against Chinese personnel, leading to a serious physical conflict between troops from both sides, said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian at a routine press conference on Tuesday.
The Chinese side has lodged strong protest and solemn representation to the Indian side, urging it to strictly restrain its frontline troops according to the consensus, and not to cross the border and make any unilateral movement that could complicate the border situation further, Zhao said.
The statements made by both Zhao and Zhang came after Indian media reported on Tuesday that an Indian Army colonel and two soldiers were killed in the clash. Indian reports also claimed there were Chinese casualties.
A further 34 Indian soldiers are also missing, believed to have died or been captured, the Telegraph reported on Tuesday, citing senior Indian Army sources.
This is the first time that military personnel have died in border clashes between China and India since 1975, Indian media said.
The world has always focused its attention toward how China and India as major global powers solve their border conflicts. The two countries have only just walked out from the 72-day Doklam standoff in 2017 after meetings by the two countries’ leaders brought the serious border crisis out of harm’s way. Despite of this, a new conflict broke out again three years later, even causing the first deaths in four decades.
The incident happened during a patrol and both sides suffered injuries and casualties, with this being the most severe situation that China and India have experienced along their border in more than four decades and may render previous efforts to defuse border disputes fruitless, Qian Feng, a senior fellow at the Taihe Institute and director of the research department of the National Strategy Institute at Tsinghua University in Beijing, told the Global Times on Tuesday.
Hu Zhiyong, a research fellow at the Institute of International Relations of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Tuesday that plagued by the worsening COVID-19 epidemic domestically and a slumped economy, the Indian government has been provocative regarding border issues in recent months, trying to divert public attention. India has also had disputes along its borders with Pakistan and Nepal in recent months.
The statements from China urged the Indian side to restrain its frontline troops and return to the avenue of talks. This shows the Chinese side treats the incident as an on-site conflict conducted only by frontline troops, and still see that dialogue is the ultimate approach to solving such issues.
Chinese preparations
India may further increase provocations and make more troubles in border regions in order to achieve their goals. And while the likelihood of a larger military confrontation remains low, the possibility does exist if military tensions keep rising, fueled by aggressive public opinion in India, analysts said. China needs to prepare for this, and only when China is well prepared militarily can it secure an advantage at the negotiating table, they said.
Since border tensions flared up in May, the PLA has conducted several military exercises in China’s Northwest and Southwest plateau regions, a move that observers believe was related to the border situation.
This includes night time behindenemy-line infiltration drills by the PLA Tibet Military Command, a large-scale maneuver operation featuring thousands of paratroopers plus armored vehicles coming from Central China to the high-altitude northwestern region, and the deployment of advanced weapons like PCL181 howitzers and Type 15 tanks to the region.
The PLA is fully capable of thwarting foreign provocations that threaten China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and the Chinese troops’ restraint should not be taken as a sign of weakness, analysts said.