The rapid capture of strategic heights by the Indian Army at Pangong Tso a year ago stunned the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA), which gave it (the Indian Army) heft during subsequent military negotiations and made it possible for the first phase of disengagement of rival soldiers and weaponry from the Pangong Tso sector in eastern Ladakh, officials and experts said Thursday.
An army officer says the bold moves at midnight on August 29 ‘tipped the balance in favor of the Indian Army for the first time’ almost four months after the border row began in early May 2020. The PLA hadn’t expected the Indian Army to take control of the southern heights when the Chinese had encroached upon Indian territory and taken up positions on Finger 4 overlooking Indian deployments, said a second official who declined to be identified.
‘The five rounds of talks held before the August 29 action last year focused on the Finger Area and other friction points where the PLA unilaterally changed the status quo. Then suddenly, the heights on the southern side of Pangong Tso were on the negotiating table as well. It gave us greater bargaining power,’ the person explained. In a stealthy midnight move on August 29, 2020, the Indian Army occupied a number of strategic heights in order to thwart the PLA from taking Indian territory on the southern bank of the Pangong Tso. A swift follow-up action from the Indian Army infuriated the PLA, with its front-line tanks and infantry combat vehicles (ICVs) speeding to the new heights held by its soldiers.
According to former director-general of military operations Lieutenant General Vinod Bhatia, India sent a strong message to China with its aggressive move that it had the capability and resolve to reposition the contested Line of Actual Control (LAC) to its benefit. ‘In the ensuing military talks, the Indian Army negotiated the restoration of status quo ante (of April 2020) on the LAC from a position of relative strength’
Due to its control of ridgeline positions on the southern bank, the Indian Army was able to completely dominate the sector and monitor Chinese military activity, whereas previously-held Indian positions were scattered throughout Rezang La, Reqin Pass, Gurung Hill and Magar heights. In early September 2020, the Indian Army continued to exert pressure on the PLA by seizing key ridgelines overlooking the PLA’s deployments on the Finger 4 ridgeline. On the Finger 4 heights, rival soldiers were just a few hundred metres apart.
Read more: Researchers discover a ‘genome link’ to an extinct human group passing through India!!!
Over five months after the ninth round of military talks, rival troops and weaponry were disengaged from the Pangong Tso sector. ‘The events on the southern bank last August hastened the disengagement process. Before that, things were stuck,’ said a third official. Last year, Indian and Chinese soldiers fired their first shots at the Line of Actual Control after 45 years at strategic heights in the Pangong Tso area, where their armies disengaged from forward-deployed troops, tanks, ICVs, and artillery guns. (The last time bullets were fired at the LAC was in October 1975, when the PLA ambushed an Indian patrol in Arunachal Pradesh’s Tulung La sector and killed four soldiers).
In February 2021, after India and China intervened on the southern bank of Pangong Tso, the situation on both banks of the river was extremely tense. The Northern Army commander, Lieutenant General YK Joshi, admitted that both sides were rapidly approaching war. The disengagement saw both sides pull back troops deployed eyeball-to-eyeball on the Finger 4 ridgeline at heights of almost 18,000 feet, as well as demolition of military structures constructed after April 2020.
The second round of disengagement took place in early August when the two armies drew back their forward deployed troops from Gogra or Patrol Point-17A, which was one of the friction points on the LAC, and the breakthrough was achieved after the 12th round of military talks. Almost six months after pulling back their troops and weapons from Pangong Tso, the two armies disengaged on August 4-5.
Post Your Comments