Opposing Strategems On PoK; PLAGF High-Altitude Plateau Warfare Exercises in TAR; & ORBAT Of TMD

July 2018: China pledges US$2 billion in July last year to help Pakistan weather the economic crisis.

January 2019: China pledges to lend an additional $2 billion to Pakistan to increase the foreign exchange reserves of its South Asian ally.

December 2019: China and Pakistan agree in principle to implement a ‘Green Corridor’ inside PoK’s Gilgit-Baltistan region between the two countries. The ‘Green Corridor’ is to enable the quick clearance of perishable agricultural items via the Khunjerab Pass. The formal agreement, likely to be inked later in 2020, will permit Pakistani traders to export 313 items duty-free from the Sost Dry Port to Tashkurgan in China’s Xinjiang Autonomous Region. Additional Customs staff will be deployed by Pakistan at the ‘Green Corridor’ to ensure minimum intrusive examination and automated processing. The Sost Dry Port, spread over 21 acres of land, has a perimeter length of 1,400 metres. In addition, an SEZ is being built at Moqpondass over an area of 250 acres.

March 16 to 17, 2020: Pakistani President Arif Alvi visits China from March 16 to 17 at the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping. In Beijing, he is told that China will consider all debt-relief options for Pakistan if it speedily resolves the constitutional and legal status of Gilgit-Baltistan, following which it will become possible for China to acquire a 99-year lease on the ‘Green Corridor’, similar to the arrangements made between China and Sri Lanka regarding the status of Hambantota SEZ.

April 30, 2020: A seven-member larger bench of The Supreme Court headed by Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed accepts the plea of Prime Minister Imran Ahmed Khan Niazi’s PTI-led federal government to amend the Government of Gilgit Baltistan Order 2018 to conduct the general elections in September, as well as the setting up of a caretaker government during the interregnum period. The so-called Gilgit Baltistan government is presently headed by Chief Minister Hafiz Hafeezur Rehman of the PML (N) party. The PTI-led federal government intends to replace the PML (N)-led administratoive set-up in Gilgit-Baltistan with one led by the PTI so that it can push through the necessary necessary administrative and political legislation that legitimises the long-term leasing of Gilgit-Baltistan’s real estate to China under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) scheme.

May 5, 2020: Fearing a localised cross-LoC tactical offensive by India’s armed forces, the Pakistan Army (PA) and Pakistan Air Force (PAF) go on to a ‘high alert’ status, with increased operational combat air patrols (CAP) being mounted by the latter since then over northern Punjab and the whole of PoK.

May 6, 2020: Bombardier 5000A airborne standoff recce aircraft of the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) start flying out from the Indian Air Force’s Sarsawa AFS to monitor the PA’s ground force dispositions all along the LoC and WB on a daily basis.

May 8, 2020: Well aware of the China-Pakistan machinations, India’s Doordarshan and All India Radio begin broadcasting weather reports on Mirpur, Muzaffarabad and Gilgit in PoK in their prime-time news bulletins—this being a symbolic way of asserting India’s legal claims over PoK.

May 12, 2020: Prime Minister Imran Ahmed Khan Niazi orders the immediate commencement of work on the construction (with China’s technical and financial assistance) of the Diamer-Bhasha Dam in the Gilgit-Baltistan-Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) border. The main purpose of this dam is water storage and production of 4,500mW cheap and affordable electricity. The 6.4 million acres feet (MAF) water storage capacity of the dam will reduce the current water shortage in the country of 12 MAF to 6.1 MAF. It will also add 35 years to the life of Tarbela Dam by reducing sedimentation. An area of 1.23 million acres of land will be brought under agriculture in KPK.

May 12, 2020: China’s Ambassador to Pakistan Yao Jing calls on the PA’s Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa at GHQ in Rawalpindi to congratulate him on the commencement of construction of the Diamer-Bhasha Dam.

The physical brawl and stone-pelting between the patrolling parties of the Indian Army (IA) and PLA Ground Forces’ (PLAGF) Border Defence Regiment (BDR) at an altitude of more than 5,000 metres in the Naku La sector in north Sikkim on May 9, 2020 afternoon (which was triggered after IA soldiers blocked an “aggressive” PLA-BDR patrol party in the area ahead of Muguthang) is most likely attributable to a jittery PLA-BDR being over-anxious to find out whether or not the IA was monitoring a PLAGF mechanised infantry exercise that has been underway for the past one week at the Gamba Country further up north.

This exercise, by all means a routine one, is being conducted to ensure the operational synchronisation of all elements of combined-arms manoeuvre warfare in various portions of the Tibetan Plateau. In Gamba, this involves the deployment for the very first time of the ZTQ-105/Type 15 main battle tanks (MBT) whose export designation is the VT-5, the PCL-181 (SH-15 being its export designation) 155mm/52-cal mounted gun system (MGS) and the Type 04A tracked ICV. Deliveries of all three type of weapon systems to the Tibet Military District (TMD) had commenced in late 2017 and their first combined-arms exercises were conducted since late December last year at the Seni-Nagqu Training Base.

The 35-tonne NORINCO ZTQ-105/Type 15 MBT, powered by a 780hp diesel engine (a clone of the USSR-era V46-6 engine), comes armed with a 105mm rifled-bore cannon. It was publicly unveilled at last year’s October 1 parade commemorating the 70^th anniversary of the PLA. In terms of vectronics, it incorporates almost all that is to be found on the heavier VT-4/MBT-3000 MBT.

The 25-tonne, air-mobile PCL-181 MGS started entering service in the Western Theatre Command’s TMD back in 2017 and has since also entered service with the artillery brigades of the PLAGF’s 71st, 72nd (9th Artillery Brigade, or Unit-73031) and 77th Group Armies. It uses a 6 x 6 wheeled Shaanxi truck chassis with an armoured cabin at the front (that also houses the digital ballistics computer and communications radios) and the AH-2 155mm/52-cal howitzer mounted at the rear. The howitzer has a powered traverse of 25 degrees left and right and powered elevation from 0-degree to 67.5 degrees. The howitzer is protected against firing of small arms and artillery shell splinters. The armoured cab also has two large bulletproof windows at the front and there are two doors on each side. The truck chassis is powered by a 400hp diesel engine with a 15.68hp/tonne power-to-weight ratio.

The PCL-181 can fire all NATO-standard 155mm ammunition and it uses a semi-automatic loading system. The barrel is fitted with a double-baffle muzzle-brake and when travelling, the barrel is held in position by a clamp, located to the immediate rear of the cab, which is operated by remote control. When the PCL-181 is deployed in the firing position, two large spades are lowered at the rear to provide a stable firing platform. For this, the truck chassis is fitted with a hydro-pneumatic suspension system. The PCL-181 has a minimum firing range of 20km and 53km with a rocket-assisted artillery projectiles. The entire MGS is operated by a crew of five. On each side of the truck chassis, there are storage boxes containing charges and ammunition, elevation and traverse are hydraulic with manual controls being provided as a back-up. Maximum rate of fire is up to six rounds per minute.

PLAGF ORBAT Of Tibet Military District

15 Engineer Brigade (located at Dazi, Lhasa) or Unit-77619, comprising the 308 Field Artillery Regiment, Lhasa; (Unit-77611), 16 Vehicle Regiment, Lhasa; Communications Battalion, Lhasa; and Special Operations Division, Lhasa (Unit-77606).

52 Mountain Brigade (located at Bayi village, Linzhi County) or Unit-77675, comprising an Artillery Regiment (located at Nixi, Bayi village, Linzhi County) or Unit-77678; 1^st Battalion (Bujiu village, Linzhi County); 2^nd Battalion (Yongjiu village, Linzhi County); 3^rd Battalion (Yongjiu village, Linzhi County); and the 4^th Battalion (Bujiu village, Linzhi County).

53 Mountain Brigade (Linzhi City, Milin County) or Unit-77680, comprising an Artillery Regiment (Jiage village, Linzhi City, Milin County) or Unit-77683; 1^st Battalion (Wolong village, Linzhi City, Milin County); 2^nd Battalion (Gangga village, Linzhi County); 3^rd Battalion (Linzhi County); and the 4^th Battalion (Wolong village, Linzhi City, Milin County).

54 Armoured Brigade (Lhasa City, Duilongdeqing County) or Unit-77625, comprising an Artillery Regiment operating PCL-09 22.5-ton 122mm motorised howitzers (now converted to the PCL-181 MGS), three Mechanised Infantry Battalions equipped with ZBD-04 tracked infantry combat vehicles (ICV); Medium Battle Tank Battalion using Type-96As (now converted to the VT-5 ZTQ-105 Type 15 MBT; and a Chemical Warfare Battalion.

The 308th Independent Artillery Brigade, armed with PCL-181 155mm 52-cal motorised howitzers, which was raised in the latter half of 2017 at Linzhi.

The 651 Independent Anti-Aircraft Artillery Brigade at Bayi Nyingchi. Since late 2012, this Brigade began taking over responsibilities from the HQ-12 ADK-12 KS-1D medium-range surface-to-air missiles of the PLA Air Force’s (PLAAF) 11th Anti-Air Artillery Brigade’s 22nd Regiment. The 651st today comprises a regiment of LY-80E 70km-range MR-SAMs (containing 16 TELs each loaded with six MR-SAM vertical launch-cells), a Regiment of 18 tracked PGZ-04As (each armed with four FN-6 VSHORADS launchers missiles and four 25mm cannons), a Regiment of FM-90 SHORADS, and a composite Battalion that has 108 FN-6 VSHORADS/MANPADS launchers, 24 Type 73 towed 37mm anti-aircraft guns and 18 towed twin 35mm PG-99 ‘Giant Bow’ anti-aircraft guns. Also included are LIMAN ground-based jammers, JY-27A VHF-band anti-PGM volume-search radars as part of the LY-80E MR-SAM regiment, YLC-18 S-band 3-D acquisition radars for the FM-90s (now replacing the older LSS-1/Type 120 L-band 2-D low-altitude acquisition radars), and YLC-6 S-band 2-D low-level air-defence radars for the FN-6s, Type 73s and PG-99s. For airspace surveillance, there are three Army-operated YLC-2V 3-D S-band acquisition radars. This Brigade stayed put at its peacetime location throughout the standoff period.

Supplementing the above-mentioned formations were the following Border Defence Regiments of Military Sub-Districts under TMD:

* 1^st Border Defence Regiment (Shannan City, Longzi County) Unit-77629: China-India LAC and China-Bhutan Border.

* 2^nd Border Defence Regiment (Shannan City, Cuona County) Unit-77635: China-India LAC and China-Bhutan Border.

* 3^rd Border Defence Regiment (Shigatse City, Tingri County) Unit-77639: China-India LAC and China Nepal Border.

* 4^th Border Defence Regiment (Chayu, Linzhi), Unit-77643: China-India LAC.

* 5^th Border Defence Regiment (Shigatse City, Saga County) Unit 77646: China -Nepal Border.

* 6^th Border Defence Regiment (Shigatse City, Yadong County) Unit-77649: China-India LAC and China Bhutan Border. (Nathu La outpost is the first outpost of South West, Zhangniangshe Outpost of the 6th Border Defense Regiment is the Yunzhong Outpost).

*1^st Independent Battalion (Shigatse City, Gyantse County) Unit-77655: China-India LAC and China-Bhutan Border.

* 2^nd Independent Battalion (Shigatse City, Gangba County) Unit-77656: China-India LAC. (Chaguola Outpost). Khamba Dzong (Gamba County for the Chinese) is not located close to Arunachal Pradesh, which is bordered by the Prefectures of Shannan and Nyingchi, but near the strategic Chumbi Valley—and the Siliguri Corridor.

* 3^rd Independent Battalion (Beibeng village, Linzhi City, Medog County); Medog Garrison, Mofan.

* 4^th Independent Battalion (Nanyi Township, Linzhi City, Milin County): China-India LAC.

* 5^th Independent Battalion (Shannan City, Luoza County): China-Bhutan Border.

* 6^th Independent Battalion Unit-77659: China-India LAC.

Nett Assessment Of PLAGF Activities & Deployments

Since the acclimatised formations the IA far outnumbers those of the PLA Army all along the LAC, and given the latter’s inability/unwillingness to maintain a large numbers of forward-deployed and fully acclimatised manpower along the LAC, the PLAGF clearly, just like the PLAAF, has adopted a strictly defensive force posture along the LAC in both Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh, as well as around Ladakh. This is most probably due to the lessons learnt by the PLAGF in 1986 when, during the Wangdung/Sumdorong Chu standoff and the IA’s resultant launching of Op Falcon, the PLA Army had mobilised six of its Infantry Divisions (from the 13^th and 14^th GAs of the erstwhile Chengdu Military Region), which had taken more than two weeks to travel from locations in Yunnan and Sichuan provinces to their destinations opposite Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh. And since these reinforcements were not acclimatised, more than a thousand soldiers had then lost their lives to various diseases like malaria, typhoid, dysentry, etc.

In the western sector facing Ladakh, the PLAGF did not mobilise any reinforcements from either the TMD or neighbouring XMD during the Doklam standoff of 2017. Here too, once again, the biggest impediment of the PLAGF seems to be the lack of previous high-altitude plateau war-fighting experience at the Divisional and Corps levels. This was admitted to as much by the PLAGF’s Gen He Lei, one of the more hawkish voices asserting Beijing’s absolute rights to the South China Sea and elsewhere, when he made a telling observation at a Shangri La Dialogue-2018 in Singapore that reveals the PLA’s biggest weakness: China can’t match India where it counts. “I am retiring soon. My one big regret is that I never had a chance to fight in a war,” Gen. He remarked. He correctly identified what the Academy of Military Science of the PLA had previously admitted was the biggest weakness of China’s armed forces: inexperience. The PLAGF, PLAAF and PLA Navy, all owned by China’s Communist Party, has never fought a real all-out war after 1949. Its missions since then have centred around humanitarian relief and policing its own borders. Besides a brief fight with India in 1962 and Vietnam in 1979, the entire post-World War-II period for China has been peaceful. Meanwhile, the armed forces of India have engaged in regular battles. While much of China’s emerging new military doctrine seems sound in theory, it is yet to be tested. While the armies and air forces of India and China may both appear combat-ready, one of them will not be able to fight their way out of a wet paper-bag and the other one will rock anything that it comes up against. If that is just in the air, then ground combat with its toll on individual soldiers is a whole different beast. When PLAGF soldiers, many of them conscripts, are tested in battle, it is unclear if they will soldier on with the same grit as India’s all-volunteer Army. While the world can appreciate peace and a lack of fighting, as China looks to displace India as the dominant military power in South Asia, it will remain untested and doubt-ridden until it faces real combat.

At the tactical unit-level, the PLAGF has since 2017 accelerated service-induction of direct fire-support weapons like shoulder-carried LP D-50 flamethrowers and shoulder-launched ‘Hidden Blade’ thermobaric missiles, indicating that such weapons will be used in conjunction with armed VTOL–UAS platforms like the AV -500W and CR-500 ‘Golden Eagle’ that will provide indirect fire-support for assault operations along mountain ridgelines.

The PLARF’s increasing reliance on conventionally armed TBMs for use as counter-intervention or anti-access/area denial weapons against targets inside India like air bases and advance landing grounds (ALG) is indicative of the PLAAF’s reluctance to use manned offensive airpower platforms for either tactical or deep strikes beyond the LAC in the foreseeable future.

The raising of air-mobile ‘Modular Combined-Arms Battalions’ (starting with those of the WTC’s 149 Brigade based at at Liqiao, Ningxia) and the 308th Independent Artillery Brigade within the TMD since 2017, coupled with the on-going expansion of heli-base infrastructure at Lhasa-Gonggar, Ngari, Shigatse and Shiquanhe, are designed for conferring the PLAGF with Brigade-level rapid reaction capabilities in areas like Doklam and eastern Ladakh. To attain the required heli-borne air-assault capabilities, the PLAGF has initiated a large-scale programme for procuring in very large numbers a range of homegrown medium-lift and heavy-lift utility helicopters over the next 10 years. The new-generation variants of the Z-8 (the Z-8G and Z-8L) have a total takeoff weight of 13 tonnes, while the joint Sino-Russian project to develop and build a 40-tonne new-generation heavylift helicopter (AHL), which will be lighter than the 56-tonne Mi-26, is expected to be available for deliveries in 2032. Powerplant for the AHL is still under development in Russia. Previously, it had been stated that the AHL was to be powered by Ukrainian Motor Sich JSC/Ivchenko-Progress AI-136T turboshaft engines.

Changhe Aircraft Industry Group’s (CAIG) Z-8L ‘Gaoyuan’ (Plateau) heavylift helicopter, earlier designated as the Z-18, is a heavily modified version of the Harbin Z-8, CAIG’s derivative of the Aérospatiale SA.321 Super Frelon. The Z-8L flew for the first time in 2014. Powered by three domestic WZ-6C turboshaft engines, it has a maximum takeoff weight of 13.8 tonnes and can carry 30 troops, or five tonnes of cargo for up to 1,000km. The Z-8L’s design has replaced the Super Frelon’s distinctive boat-hull lower fuselage with a tail ramp and has added a small terrain-following radar in the radome. In addition, the much longer external sponsons are configured as fuel tanks, as well as mounting the aft undercarriage. The internal width of the load area has been increased from 1.8 metres to 2.4 metres. Some Z-8Ls are fitted with a SATCOM fairing on the tailboom, aft of the engine exhausts. The Z-8L has to date performed flight-tests reaching as high as 29,500 feet.

The twin-engined Z-20 medium-lift helicopter’s series-production, now underway at the Harbin Aircraft Industry Group (HAIG), will give the PLAGF helicopters that are China’s first to use indigenously developed fly-by-wire flight-control systems (FBW-FCS). The Z-20 also features a streamlined aerodynamic structure and new anti-icing technology. In November 2017 the Z-20 in PLAAF colours completed its high-altitude flight-tests at Xiahe airfield (flying up to 4,000 metres, or 13,200 feet) in Gansu province. The Z-20’s requirement dates back to the 1980s, when China was seeking a medium utility helicopter for operations in its mountainous western regions of Tibet and Xinjiang. The PLAAF eventually imported 24 Sikorsky S-70C-2s powered by General Electric T700-701A engines. Since then, the S-70’s performance in such regions has been unmatched, even with the later acquisition by China of Mil Mi-17V5s from Russia. Development of the Z-20 began in 2006, and the maiden flight took place on December 23, 2013.

Although the Z-20 bears a close external resemblance to the S-70, the Z-20 incorporates novel features like the FBW-FCS, five main rotor blades, and a more angular tail–to-fuselage joint airframe, all of whoch contributes to more lift, greater cabin capacity and higher endurance. In addition, a new fairing installed aft of the engine exhausts and another on the tail spine, are housings for the BeiDou (Big Dipper) satellite navigation system’s receiver antennae. Powerplant for the Z-20 is the domestically-developed WZ-10 turboshaft engine, providing 2,145shp of power. The Z-20 will be a key air-mobility and projection platform for the PLAGF.

India’s Options

India’s military posture against China along the entire Line of Actual Control (LAC) is to maintain full strategic defence with minor tactical offensive capabilities. Given the politico-operational compulsions, difficult terrain, and the PLAGF’s track record, it is clear that the IA was, until the previous decade, doing an onerous task. For instance, Sikkim has an area of approximately 8,000sqkm, measuring 113km north to south, and 64km from east to west with heights rising up to 28,000 feet. Militarily, the state is divided into north and east Sikkim. Due to a central massif, north Sikkim is further divided into the Muguthang Valley in the west, the Kerang Plateau in the east, and north-east Sikkim. The Lachung, Lachen and Muguthang Valleys in north Sikkim prevent any lateral movement. Of the 14 passes along the 206km-long Sikkim-Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) LAC, six are all-weather, implying that these are open throughout the year. Three each of these passes are in north and east Sikkim, these being Kongra La, Bomcho La, Sese La, Nathu La (at 14,438 feet in east Sikkim), Batang La and Doka La. Unlike the passes in north-east and east Sikkim, the passes on the watershed border in north Sikkim are fairly wide and motorable. Being windswept, they remain relatively free from snow and are open throughout the year. The watershed and the adjoining Tibetan Plateau are devoid of any cover. The terrain in north and north-east Sikkim is more difficult, rugged and formidable, with the altitude rising suddenly and steeply (one can travel from 5,000 feet to 14,000 feet in just about 60km) than east Sikkim, where surface communications are better developed due to its proximity to the northern West Bengal plains. India’s 435km-long border with Nepal includes a 125km border between Nepal and Sikkim, of which about 50km is most inhospitable.

Geography in terms of boundaries throws up myriad challenges, classified as cartographic anxieties. If not managed well, these magnify into strategic vulnerabilities. The Siliguri Corridor, a tenuous link with eight North-East states and gateway for more than 50 million north-easterners, is indeed one such vulnerability. This 200km stretch with width varying from 17km to 60km is aptly referred to as ‘Chicken’s Neck’ and measures approximately 12,203 sq km. The narrowest 4km strip towards western edge, Tetulia Corridor, is wedged between Nepal and Bangladesh. The eastern part of the Corridor is wider and borders Bhutan and Bangladesh. The Chumbi Valley tapering into the Doklam Plateau is barely 100km away. Mapping the corridor is a challenge as its limits are a matter of interpretation. The Corridor has major Indian Air Force (IAF) air bases: Baagdogra and Hashimara and an Army Aviation base at Shaugaon. A large number of IA and CAPF installations are located in this narrow stretch. In keeping with the ‘one border, one force’ policy, the responsibility of borders is divided between the Army and ITBP for China; SSB for Nepal and Bhutan, and Bangladesh with the BSF. Multiplicity of forces and agencies requires an effective and tailor-made coordination mechanism. Most of the border except for Bangladesh is unfenced and porous with treacherous riverine stretches. Tea, timber and tourism are the main drivers of economic activity, controlled from Siliguri. Notorious for criminal activities, Kaliachak in Malda is hub of counterfeit currency trafficking, narco-terrorism and IED-making. Uncontrolled migration from Bangladesh has complicated demographics and radical Muslim groups and madrassas have proliferated with the tacit support of successive West Bengal state governments. Adding to the complexity are non-indigenous Meitei and Bodo settlements, which provide shelter to cadres, in addition to ULFA and KLO utilising it for transit.  The simmering Gorkhaland problem coupled with Kamatapur insurgency have made this region a potential target for hybrid warfare. The obvious question is: has India allowed it to become an Achilles Heel in her geo-strategic calculus?

Terrestrial communications from mainland to the North-East are based on double-line broad-gauge rail-link, complemented by two National Highways along with vital hydrocarbon pipelines passing through this stretch. Risk mitigation dictates focused investment in strategic storage for critical commodities and alternative connectivities such as Sittwe-Kaladan and a transit corridor through Bangladesh has limited potential. The Siliguri Corridor with low hills, jungles and broken ground dotted with numerous rivers provides multiple formidable defence lines. While India certainly does not want a war, yet for such an eventuality, IA troops, including mechanised forces, are not only earmarked but have regularly rehearsed. In the Eastern theatre, the IA is likely to engage in three separate sub-theatre battles in respective Corps Zones, where primary defensive architecture with inbuilt reserves is already in place.

The Sikkim/Doklam area of operations comes under the IA’s XXXIII Trishakti Corps, based in Sukna near the city of Siliguri. It comprises the Gangtok-based 17 Mountain Division, Binnaguri-based 20 Mountain Division and the Kalimpong-based 27 ‘Striking Lion’ Mountain Division. 164 Mountain Brigade based in Kalimpong and belonging to 27 Mountain Division, which was earlier in Jammu since the year 2000, and in December 2007 relocated to northern West Bengal to bolster IA positions opposite the Doklam Plateau.

So why does the PLAGF continue to remain on Doklam, a scenic, 4,000-metre-high pasture less than 100 square kilometres in spread? China's attempts to upset the status quo in the Chumbi Valley can be understood by looking at a military map. The Valley, created by the Torsa River, flows as the Amo Chu through Bhutan. India dominates the heights on the narrow valley’s western flank, while Bhutan sits on the eastern flank. All of China’s recent attempts have been to widen its presence in this narrow valley and reduce its vulnerability there. The Doklam Plateau gives the PLAGF the advantage of outflanking the IA’s defences in Sikkim where India has a major terrain advantage. The implications are strategic. India will not only lose her major advantage of a strategic offensive/counter-offensive from Sikkim, but will also give the PLAGF a launchpad for an offensive through the Rangpo River valley towards Kalimpong without violating the neutrality of Bhutan.

And what is the PLAGF doing in Bhutanese territory over 150km northeast of Doklam? Presently, there are three incursion camps in western Bhutan almost 7km deep and not far from where the Royal Bhutan Army has its own camps. All of these camps came up over the past decade. In the past, PLAGF-BDR patrols merely came up to these Bhutanese posts and went back. Post-Doklam, they are there to stay. China claims approximately 495 sq km of Bhutanese territory in the central sector and 269 sq km of territory in western Bhutan, including Doklam. Each of the three PLAGF incursion camps in western Bhutan are meant to house a Platoon-sized formation of around 30 soldiers and include infrastructure and tents, permanent white buildings with green roofs and communications trenches, which allow soldiers to move between positions when under fire. The incursion camps in Chumbi and also the road at Doklam are part of the PLAGF’s larger plan to widen its presence in the narrow Chumbi Valley, which protrudes like an inverted thumb of territory between India and Bhutan. The IA believes these posts are to widen China’s eastern road that travels down towards the Chumbi Valley. The road is presently too close to Bhutanese territory. The IA has wartime contingency plans for a Mountain Division to take up defensive positions along western Bhutan in case of a thrust down the Chumbi Valley by China. But a wartime contingency clearly cannot become a peacetime exigency.

In the Indian context, there are only very few such places and each of these so-called gaps or funnels in northern Sikkim and eastern Ladakh can be converted into traps and killing grounds like Khemkaran in Punjab, thereby providing an ‘Asal Uttar’ or real answer to PLAGF’s forays as and when they are attempted. While India does have some challenges in Ladakh, her domination over the Kerang Plateau in Sikkim is real and effective. The Chumbi Valley is a 100km dagger-shaped north- south salient that lies between India (Sikkim) to the north-west, west and south-west, and Bhutan to the north-east, east and south. Some 100km south of the dagger point is Bangladesh and, in between, lie 70km of rugged mountainous terrain of India/Bhutan and the Siliguri Corridor, which has a number of rivers running in north-south direction. On the face of it, at the strategic level, it gives the PLAGF a launch pad to choke India’s vital lines of communications running through the Siliguri Corridor to the North East. But this will require a major offensive by up to six PLAGF Divisions as part of an all-out war, with holding forces to contain the north western, western and eastern flanks. Given the existing road communications, limited deployment space as the Chumbi Valley at Yatung (Yadong) is only 30km wide as the crow flies, vulnerability to the Indian Air Force’s (IAF) offensive airpower and IA counter-offensives from the flanks, this hypothetical threat is a non-starter. In fact, the Chumbi Valley is more vulnerable to an IA offensive or counter-offensive from the north-west and west from Sikkim and ‘by your leave’ complementary offensive via Bhutan from the east. In fact, advancing to the Siliguri Corridor would require PLAGF troops to break through strong Indian defences in Sikkim and advance southwards more than 100km through difficult jungle terrain—a tough military task. The beleaguered PLA units that do make it to Siliguri would have to beat back inevitable Indian counter attacks. Even assuming that China obtained control over the Siliguri Corridor, India could simply bypass the Corridor, moving through Nepal or Bangladesh. If India’s sense of vulnerability over Siliguri is thus overblown, Beijing’s wish to extend the Chumbi Valley southwards is incomprehensible. Of all China’s border vulnerabilities, the Chumbi Valley is perhaps the greatest. It is a narrow salient overlooked by Indian defences, which can cut off the Valley from Tibet by wheeling east from North Sikkim via the Sora Funnel, capturing it at leisure. Strategists regard the capture of the Chumbi Valley as an obvious wartime target for the IA. By extending the Chumbi Valley southwards, therefore, China would only be expanding a key vulnerability. In addition, the flat and wide terrain of the Plateau facing northern Sikkim is ideal for armoured warfare, one reason why the IA had pre-positioned two Regiments of T-72CIAs and BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicles (ICV) there since 2009.

Again this can only happen in a major war, the probability of which is very low. Nations armed with nuclear weapons do not generally risk an all-out conventional war, though the probability of border skirmishes or a limited war cannot be ruled out.

OP FALCON In Wangdung, Arunachal Pradesh 1986-1987