China capable of defeating India: expert
By Yang Sheng Source:Global Times Published: 2017/8/16 21:29:16
China is more than capable of defeating India in potential military conflict with its advanced weapons and air bases, analysts said on Wednesday.
According to a Reuters report on Wednesday, a source in New Delhi, who had been briefed on the military situation on the border, said soldiers foiled a bid by a group of Chinese troops to enter Indian territory in Ladakh, near Pangong Lake. Some of the Chinese soldiers carried iron rods and stones, and troops on both sides suffered minor injuries in the melee.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying on Wednesday did not directly answer a question on whether the friction in Ladakh is connected to the Doklam standoff. She reaffirmed China's position that the withdrawal of the Indian troops in Doklam is the precondition to solving the problem.
"This means that even when India withdraws its troops from the Doklam Plateau, China will not let the matter drop, because withdrawal is just the precondition, not the solution. China will still make India pay for its offensive and provocative behavior even if India withdraws its troops as China requests," Ye Hailin, director of the National Institute of International Strategy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times.
"We don't want the upcoming BRICS summit to be disrupted. The BRICS summit should be focused on cooperation between rising economies, not an emergency multilateral meeting for conflict mediation. If India keeps its troops in Chinese territory, China's foreign and defense ministries are very likely to release an ultimatum before September," Xu Guangyu, a retired rear admiral and senior adviser to the China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, told the Global Times.
"The ultimatum will clearly tell India and the world that China will give a certain number of days to India to withdraw its troops. After the deadline, if Indian troops still remain within China's territory, India will be responsible for all the consequences. China has multiple ways of pushing India back to its own soil if India ignores the ultimatum, as a few dozen military personnel and one bulldozer [in Doklam] is a piece of cake for the Chinese military," Xu said.
China should prepare for the possibility of escalation, because Indian troops will resist, and if there is bloodshed, China needs to be fully prepared for military conflict. The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is more than capable of dealing with any escalation, Xu further said.
Military preparation
In general, the quality of Chinese weapons and military personnel is overwhelmingly better than India's, and though India has purchased some US and Russian-made weapons in recent years, the PLA's advantage remains the same, said Song Zhongping, a military expert who served in the PLA Rocket Force.
Air forces, helicopters, long-range attack weapons and light armored vehicles are very important for combat in mountainous and plateau regions. In the air, China's J-10C and J-11 fighter jets, H-6K bombers, Z-10 attack helicopters and other types of transport helicopters, no matter the quality or quantity, are all better than India's, Song said.
China's long-range rocket artillery is not only better than India's, but is the best in the world. The rocket boasts a terminal guidance function, which means it can search for its target before it strikes. Although one rocket costs 700,000 yuan ($104,555), it's still cheaper than a guided missile, and it has a range of more than 105 kilometers. With this kind of weaponry, the geographic barriers of mountains and plateaus are not an obstacle for the PLA to destroy its enemy, Song said.
India might think that the Chinese air force doesn't have enough air bases in the Tibet Autonomous Region, but they are seriously mistaken, Xu said. According to open information, China has at least five large airports in Tibet, and the furthest one from Doklam is only 1,000 kilometers away. The combat radius of J-10C and J-11 planes is more than 1,200 kilometers, so the Indian military had better abandon their illusions, he stressed.
In Tibet, civilian airports can also be used for military aircraft.
Many hospitals in different provinces are controlling the use of blood, and according to a reliable anonymous source from a hospital in Changsha, capital of Hunan Province, the blood bank has been relocated by the PLA and the local government is organizing a blood drive to replenish supplies.
The same is also true of some other top hospitals in Hubei Province, and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, according to multiple sources from these regions.
The stocks of blood were transferred before the Jiuzhaigou earthquake in Sichuan Province on August 8, and they are likely to be transferred to Tibet, the source told the Global Times.