I appear to have given offence in some way not clearly understood, so it seems better to leave these preliminary remarks aside until greater comprehension is achieved.
It is a failing of any brief note or comment that much valuable detail gets lost.
The PLA can afford to run rail lines right up until the border, since it has a high plateau to deal with, and sufficient ground between mountain ranges to build roads and railways. The IA cannot. It had entirely different terrain.
The intention was to convey the need to strengthen and expand existing lines, and allow more traffic to pass. The intention was also to enable strategic reserves from the left bank of the Brahmaputra to move forward fast and at lower cost than by lorry.
Both, as far as I can make out.
This will also address the popular demand for better roads in the hill country.
As for time frames, the background preparation, infrastructure building, re-orientation of troops, all such things considered, fitness to meet the needs of the northern border may take five years to bring about.
Delays taken into account, around five years is the estimate.
This is in any case necessary in order to try and put in place a permanent and lasting peace both on the west as well as on the north.
It is difficult to see dissuasive Strategy and deterrent strategy as working at cross purposes.
A purely dissuading strategy is not possible, because this region is well-populated, not thickly so, but enough to count in a democracy. Development has to come to the hills, along with infrastructure, so maintaining a wilderness as a defence is not much more than an accidental option, one which will disappear very shortly.
On the other hand, it is possible to postulate a fortress defence at known locations of geographic or strategic importance, coupled with a plan for swift and sufficient reinforcement on the direction of thrust and the dimensions of thrust of the enemy becoming clear, and with clear ideas about the critical tip-over point between defence and structured withdrawal.
Counter-attacks are seen as completely independent of this. But counter-attacks will also have to cope with the PLA's own tactics of flanking enemy positions, enfilading them and rolling them up from one end in a concentrated, asymmetric attack, while mounting ambushes on probable lines of retreat. Catching an enemy in flank who is himself moving fast to inflict flanking attacks on one's garrison troops, in mountain terrain, in the fog of war, with uncertain communications links in the mountains, is a hazardous task at best. It requires very high standards of physical effort, and of battlefield command abilities by field officers. Only a dedicated force, trained to the inch, can even think of pulling this off.
It has already been discussed that such a strategy may not be available for very long. However, to examine the potential of this partial capability scenario, we note that 1000 MT may be transported at a time. That defines the size of force that might intervene at a time. Of course, admittedly, this effort can be repeated after a gap, once enemy intentions become clearer, but it all depends on the size of the enemy effort, and it does not seem wise to keep such a partial capability in place.
Oho no offence was meant or intended. I think, the light hearted comment got lost somewhere between, English, Urdu and Bengali languages. Ha ha ha
In the absence of having physically seen the areas under discussion, I am at a clear disadvantage and beyond a certain level my analysis may just be nothing more than being speculative.
I can merely make general comments about India-China military environment after having gained information from the discussion here. If I may, I will highlight some of these:
Chinas defence effort is much bigger than that of India. This can pose a potent threat to India.
A major geographical imbalance places many of Indias political and economic centres close to the Himalayan Ranges.
Siliguri Corridor places India in a delicate position if there is uncertainty in the area.
Contrarily, almost all of Chinas economic and political centres of gravity are in Eastern China though Tibet certainly is a sensitive region.
China has carried out major improvements in her logistical infrastructure in areas to support operations inside India.
The possibility of Chinese gaining a strategic surprise against India are indeed low, with fair bit of warning time available to India.
China is unlikely to embark on any major adventure to disturb the status-quo along the border in the near to mid-term future, unless events spiral out of control.
Indians feel that the Chinese would be able to deploy about 33 Divisions against them which indeed is a potent threat.
The Indians feel that as Chinese and Indian interests clash, Chinese may enhance military presence and may initiate support to insurgent groups in disputed areas.
The Chinese could also use Burmese territory to extend threat and may use Bay of Bengal for limited projection of power.
India is likely to follow a strategy of dissuasive defence. However, as dissuasion being a comparatively weaker option, it will be coupled with strategic offensive capability having a potent deterrence.
Indians are putting due emphasis on improved logistics infrastructure while reducing the teeth to tail ratio.
To gain appropriate warning time, India is enhancing its integrated surveillance capability linked with satellite based surveillance. Improved intelligence acquisition capability in particular collusion with Americans and allied Western nations.
