Ladakh ; While the standoff along the LAC in eastern Ladakh is not showing signs of moderating down, the unforgiving winter weather has started to take its toll on the troops.While there is no ruling out Indian troops falling prey this winter to the unforgiving conditions in the standoff zone, it is also true that Indian Army troops have had longer and deeper experience at far higher altitudes than those at Pangong Tso.
Chinese troops have been evacuated from Finger 4 in Ladakh and taken to field hospitals.Meanwhile, China has agreed for Corps Commander level talks.The evacuated troops have been regularly replaced to maintain numbers at these forward posts, some of which are less than a kilometre from Indian positions.As part of the mobilisation on both sides, field hospitals have also sprung up on both sides in the Depsang sector, where tensions have brewed even as the spotlight remained fixed on the Pangong area.
In the Pangong sector, where the situation has been particularly tense since August 29, the edges of the Pangong lake have begun to freeze this week. Temperatures at the heights held by Indian and Chinese troops at Finger 4, for instance, dip to minus 4 degrees. By mid-October, the lake surface will be totally frozen. In the Depsang and Daulat Beg Oldie areas of Ladakh’s sub-sector north (SSN), for instance, minimum temperatures are already hovering around minus 14 degrees and will dip rapidly with each passing day.The Indian Army remains deployed year-round in peacetime in the super-high altitude and super-harsh climes of the Siachen glacier and Saltoro ridge.
Decades at those heights have brought hard-fought Indian Army experience with some of the most painful afflictions caused by those conditions.Chilblains is another painful condition caused by tissue damage from exposure to cold and humidity, one that debilitates soldiers and often requires their removal from their posts and transfers to lower altitudes for treatment.
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