On the heights of the Himalayas, where tensions have been high for six months, the Indian army is preparing for the cold weather. Fifty thousand soldiers are deployed in extreme living conditions (and as many on the Chinese side of the border). The story of a mobilization without equal in Indian military history.
The “General Winter”. This is the name historians have given to the adversary who, more than a century later, defeated both Napoleon and Hitler in Russia. The Indian and Chinese forces deployed along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) stare at each other in faience, sometimes only separated by a few hundred meters [en juin 2020, des affrontements ont fait 20 morts côté indien]. But they face the same formidable enemy, in a way that the ambitious military strategists of previous centuries might not have imagined. Eastern Ladakh is not Russia. Here, the peaks reach over 5,500 meters. The winter deployment of over 100,000 soldiers from two armies stretching over 872 kilometers is quite simply unparalleled in military history.
“In Ladakh, the first problem a soldier faces is survival, fighting against the enemy comes after… The peculiarities of geography have a key impact on combat and its results” : it is with these words that begins the chapter “Fighting in Ladakh” ofOfficial History of the 1962 India China War (“Indian official history of the conflict with China in 1962”, not translated into French), published nearly thirty years after the events.
At this time of year, on the forward positions of the LAC, it is no more than 3 ° C. Temperatures can drop between −10 ° C and −15 ° C, or even between −30 ° C and −40 ° C, with snow, in December and January. Added to this is the icy wind, as the official history of 1962 recalls. “In general, the wind starts to blow from midday and then continues without weakening”, and these climatic conditions combined “Can cause cold injuries comparable to burns”. “It is dangerous to touch metal with your bare hand.”
After the eighth meeting between commanders, China’s disengagement proposal has still not been successful, and it is still unclear when the next talks will take place. [une décision de démanteler les installations n’a pas été suivie d’effet]. As a result, nearly 50,000 Indian soldiers must be prepared to stay in place for a long time, to defend heights over 4,500 meters above sea level, and so do the units aligned by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army ( APL).
A “normal” rate of cold-related losses
Acute mountain sickness, high altitude pulmonary edemas, severe forms of venous thrombosis, cerebral thrombosis, psychological disorders: these are just some of the dangers that await them. With the drop in temperatures will come frostbite, glare from snow, frostbite, not to mention peeling skin due to the extreme dryness of the environment.
Even today, when the toughest months are yet to come, conditions “Related to cold” cause casualties on a daily basis, military sources say – many soldiers being sent back to the front lines as soon as they recover. While information on altitude disturbances is confidential, an official source explains that these non-lethal losses did not “Nothing alarming” and that they correspond “At the expected rate”. Evacuations were also reported on the Chinese side, from the heights of Finger 4 [l’une des huit barres
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Krishn KaushikNirupama Subramanian
Eight months of provocations on a border that does not exist
The current border conflict between China and India began in April 2020, when the Indian army noted unusual Chinese troop movements on the north shore of Lake Pangong, with the establishment of new camps for the People’s Army. release in a buffer zone theoretically prohibited from access to both parts. Beijing will say later that it has taken new positions in reaction to the infrastructure projects that Delhi has been carrying out in this Himalayan region in recent years, a road, a bridge and an airfield in particular.
After the war that opposed them in 1962 and which resulted in the annexation of nearly half of the Indian province of Ladakh by China, with the aim of establishing a land link between Tibet and Xinjiang, the two giants of Asia observe a status quo along a line 872 kilometers long, at more than 4,000 meters above sea level. This Line of Actual Control, or LAC) “Has never been the subject of an agreement”, reminded last summer The Hindu, “It has never been clearly drawn on a map, nor physically demarcated on the ground”.
On May 5, 2020, the Indian and Chinese soldiers engaged in hand-to-hand combat, with stone throwing, on the shores of Pangong Lake. On June 15, a little further north, in the valley of the Galwan River, a new skirmish occurred, without any fire. The clinch resulted in the deaths of 20 Indian soldiers (and an undisclosed number of Chinese soldiers). “This is the first bloodshed in the region in forty-five years”, highlighted The Wire.
Since then, the armies have observed each other without moving. While diplomats organize rounds of negotiation that come to nothing, fighter jets are making a show of force on both sides of the LAC : Shenyang J-11 on the Chinese side, Rafales just delivered to Delhi by Dassault on the Indian side.
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S’autoproclamant “India’s only national newspaper”, The Indian Express is the great rival of Times of India. He is known for his combative tone and his “Journalism of courage”, as well as for its investigations into
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