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| India-Pakistan |
| India adds troops on Chinese border |
| 2009-11-14 |
| The India-based Hindustan Times newspaper reported Thursday that India is quietly enhancing its defenses along the Chinese border in southern Tibet, a disputed region India calls Arunachal Pradesh. The Indian Army will deploy its new 15,000-strong 56 Division in the region within four weeks, the paper quoted a senior defense official as saying. It has also put out a Request for Information (RFI) to acquire 300 lightweight tanks that can be deployed in the Northeast, Jammu and Kashmir, according to the report. A second division will be deployed in the area in the next 12- 18 months, the official added. The army's RFI said the light tanks should be capable of destroying bunkers and soft-skin vehicles up to 3,000 meters away and should have armor-piercing anti-tank guided missiles and anti-aircraft machine guns. The RFI also stipulates these tanks should "have protection against nuclear, chemical and biological warfare," the newspaper said. Fu Xiaoqiang, an expert on South Asian studies at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Studies, told the Global Times, "As has been repeatedly discussed in the Indian media, the beefing-up of military power in southern Tibet is a strategy of India to fix its control, in addition to other motives, such as encouraging the visit of the Dalai Lama and armament adjustment." "But I don't think the rivalry of two rising powers in Asia will do any good to either side," Fu added. "It is a very ruthless move because it is against the trust treaty reached by the two countries," said Zhao Gancheng, director at the South Asia Research Division of the Shanghai International Affairs Research Institute. "India officials have tried to convince us that the border is peaceful. But now the fact betrays the words," he added. The escalating tension has drawn the attention of other countries, such as the UK. An article in The Times Thursday went a step further, saying that a "cold war" is "brewing ... between China and India," citing India's plan to reopen a Cold War outpost on the Maldives abandoned by the British Royal Air Force decades ago. "It is natural that the UK is concerned about India, which is its former colony," Fu said. "It is like sitting on top of the mountain to watch the tigers fight." |
| Posted by:john frum |