One month may sound a long time to some excitable people, but to Chinese it is just a prelude of a long show. Remember, China waited patiently for 3 and a half years before they decided to give India a decisive blow that India remembers bitterly for the next half a century. That is what a big power would do, talk nicely with a big stick.
1962 defeat was so humiliating to a young republic that just inherited the British Raj's possession, poised confidently to be the new master of the land it had never owned nor conquered, that India government has not got enough nerve to publish the Henderson Brooks-Bhagat report 55 years after the war.
China may not bother with some small irritating countries around SCS as it has a bigger plan for its own strategic goals, besides there is a factor of US Navy, but it doesn't mean it would tolerant India, a rising regional power with an over-sized ambition. In fact, with military, moral, economical, psychological advantages, it may as well start its final dash to its superpower dome with a decisive victory against India, which started this current stand-off on China side of border.
I have told you, Chinese government behalves very differently from their previous handling with India regarding border disputes, and Xi may just have found a perfect enemy to complete his legacy in China's history as a supreme leader as Mao and Deng are, a victory that any enemy of China would have to take into heart.
Let me tell you one thing, Chinese may not fight with India in Dongland area for a long time, but it may turn entire 2000 KM LOC into hot spot for a long time to come. You go figure who has got more blood to shed.
One observation, Indians are easy to get excited, quick to claim victory, fast to taunting when in advantage...... stop here. Fill the gap from the history how you fought 1962 war with China.
Well the US is now saying both sides continue to talk to each other. China is backing down after the brouhaha. Can just wait for rest of the year to confirm it. You brought this on yourselves, the 2012 agreement clearly said, no activity that changes the status quo in the tri-border area is to be done till all disputed land is settled by all parties. You didn't listen, this is what you get in return.
http://ajaishukla.blogspot.ca/2017/07/with-doklam-negotiations-under-way.html
By Ajai Shukla
Business Standard, 20th July 17
Senior military officials in New Delhi believe Beijing badly overplayed its hand by heating up the rhetoric over the presence of Indian soldiers in the disputed Doklam bowl, adjoining Sikkim. They say in the stalemate that has emerged, India will have achieved its aims.
The planners say that Indian forces have held the upper hand ever since they surprised Chinese troops by confronting them on behalf of Bhutan, and sticking to their position despite unprecedented aggression and threats from Beijing.
“However this plays out, China is going to lose face, since it has made its threats publicly. And India is going to come out looking like a credible and reliable partner for Bhutan”, says a general, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Asked about the possibility of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) launching military operations against India, as Beijing has hinted, Indian generals are sanguine.
“There is no military mobilisation by China, nor will the Indian military mobilise unless war becomes imminent. If it comes to fighting, we are prepared to shed blood to uphold the India-Bhutan cooperation agreement. That would only raise our credibility in Thimphu’s eyes”, says a senior military planner.
“But that will not happen. The Chinese know they can achieve no military goal. They are smart enough to realise they have miscalculated badly”, he adds.
On Wednesday, Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar admitted to a parliamentary panel that diplomatic negotiations are underway, both in Beijing and New Delhi, to resolve the month-old crisis.
On June 16, after Chinese road construction crews entered Doklam – an 89 square kilometre patch claimed by both Bhutan and China – Indian troops also crossed into Doklam and physically blocked Chinese road construction activity. Since then, hundreds of Indian and Chinese soldiers built up there, deployed eyeball-to-eyeball, initially igniting apprehensions of a shooting war.
Over the past week, however, as diplomatic discussions on de-escalation have moved along, Beijing’s foreign ministry spokespersons and government-controlled media have noticeably toned down the aggressive rhetoric they had earlier adopted.
Until last week, China’s foreign ministry insisted that a unilateral Indian withdrawal from Doklam was “the precondition for any meaningful dialogue between the two sides”. On June 6, Beijing threatened: “We once again urge the Indian side to immediately pull all of the troops that have crossed the boundary back to its own side before the situation gets worse with more serious consequences.”
On Tuesday, however, questioned about a briefing that China’s foreign ministry had given to diplomats in Beijing, a government spokesperson answered more benignly: “People will reach the just conclusion. If Indian wants to achieve its political purposes by sending military personnel across demarcated boundary, China urges India better not to do so.”
China’s media too is noticeably softening its stance from early June, when mouthpieces like the Global Times and Xinhua threatened India with a repeat of the 1962 military defeat. Over the weekend, China Central Television (CCTV) broadcast high-altitude, live fire exercises by a PLA brigade, without mentioning that the drills took place before the Doklam incident began.
This week, articles on the Doklam faceoff have been fewer in number. On Tuesday, after Pakistan’s “Dunya News” – a 24-hour, Urdu language television news channel –concocted news that a Chinese rocket attack in Sikkim had killed more than 150 Indian soldiers, Chinese media dismissed the report as “baseless”.
In India, even as the media keeps the spotlight on Doklam, the government is keeping a level tone. On Wednesday, Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar reportedly told a parliamentary panel that hypernationalism and the media spotlight had inflated the crisis out of proportion.
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This guy btw is no big Modi fan (actually attacked him and administration quite a few times on military subjects)...but his summary is spot on here. Again you can sit back and watch what transpires.
