Some interesting bits from today's telegraph:

www.telegraph.co.uk/ne...China.html

www.telegraph.co.uk/ne...years.html

www.telegraph.co.uk/ne...-race.html

China against India.

Now THAT would be a conflict to behold!!

Well, they've already had one in the 1960's, but it was very conventional - just ground troops. India lost.

There's two more disputed areas, both at great height. India and China have both, and are both increasing their spending on arms dramatically. Within the next 10 years, India will spend more on defence than the UK does - China already does, and by 2020 will be spending around 5 times as much as the UK on defence.

China and India both see Asia as their markets, and China is making no bones about it's political and military manouvering in the area - one of which is to effectively surround India with poltical enemies AND military forces.

At some point within the next 20 years, I foresee that China IS going to have a pop at Taiwan, and is VERY likely to have a pop at both of the disputed regions bordering India.

China has been for time been cosying up to Pakistan to cover one side of India, and will continue to do so, including building a deep-sea port in the Indian Ocean, and another well equipped port and fleet on the other side of India to the North East.

China and India are both acquiring nuclear and conventional submarines.

A quick look at the USI Journal is instructive in how they see self-assertion differently depending on whether it's India or someone else doing it. The border scuffles of the 60s have spluttered out and there's more military cooperation between the two than there is confrontation these days. LINK

China gave up claim to Sikkim in 2003, which they'd claimed for decades. The article suggests they claim the whole of Arunchal Pradesh, but they don't: just the northern part and that pretty much as a bargaining chip only. Combat Indicator. They'd previously taken the line that this chap didn't need a visa to visit China as he came from 'Chinese territory'.

Both economies are pretty fragile but I'd reckon India is in the worst shape. The managed to enter the 21st Century with some 40% of their population still landless peasant farmers subsisting below the official WTO poverty line. They're also not in such good shape for diversifying their economic base. High wage, high skill employees are still being churned out in too small numbers to meet the demands of economic expansion. My own experience of Indian University graduates is that a frightening proportion of them are one-trick ponies. Computing graduates particularly come away with degrees in Computing Science or Software Design but often don't have any better skills than a certified tech support.

All told, Salmar Haidar has a far more realistic view of the situation, IMO. China doesn't have a deep-water navy worthy of the name, PLAN is a coastal defence force with some ocean capability and not at all capable of closing sea lanes or strategically encircling any country - including China, if it came to that.

I can't see that happening, I'm afraid. It was talked up by the seppoes in particular during the 90s and it suited the DPP (Taiwanese seperatists) to keep the spectre in the minds of the world, but since the KMT (Chinese nationalists) took the reigns in Taipei earlier this year cross-strait relations have been astoundingly cordial. PRC are using HK as bait under the 'One Country, Two Systems' strategy to tempt RoC back into the fold and Beijing knows full well it stands every chance of getting its way without war. You only have to look at the results since the first free elections in 1990 to see that the China-Unity KMT enjoy sustained majority support across the general population, so the chances of Taiwan doing something stupid are pretty slim unless Beijing force them into it.


China's relations with Pakistan have been cooling for some time, most notably since the Red Mosque farrago and the apparent targeting of Chinese workers by Islamists. The 'failure' of Pakistan to quash extremists in the Tribal Areas is a thorn in their sides as well, since they see Pakistan as being the logistics area for their own Muslim terrorists.

They're certainly both acquiring nuclear and conventional submarines, patrol boats at the moment so far as I know. Seems like a sensible precaution, given the rise of piracy on both the Indian Ocean and South China Sea. If only we were doing the same I'd sleep sounder at nights. Ballistic missile capability is another matter, but it wouldn't surprise me if they were going for that as well. They're the big boy's toys, after all.

I understand,don't ask me from where, but wasn't the point of the Peking to Tibet railway, to enable the Chinese to move a mechanized division to the front line in a couple of days.
john

Where's the armour going to go when it gets there? The terrain in that locale spends more time going up and down than it does going along. Easy to defend and hard to attack.

Plus where's the payoff? Unless there's big mineral reserves lurking in the lumpy bits, all the PRC would gain is international opprobrium, some sherpas and a few yaks.

On the other issue, the PLAN is a littoral force and will remain so until they get a couple of carriers; their blue water aspirations seem to be on the back burner at the moment as other than squabbling over the Spratlys and willy-waving at Taiwan, they don't seem to have anything beyond pirates to deal with. Bottom line is that the Indians could probably take the PLAN in a straight fight, and the Spams could hand them their arrse on a plate with one hand tied behind the back.

Yeah ya right the Tank/APC is deed, hence all these new modern footslogging armies.
john
Good ta see ya have signed the Yanks up on the Indian side, smart move, soon be time for King George III.

The tank's not automatically dead, but it would be if it tried crossing the PRC-India border. You do realise that the border between India and Tibet is actually the Himalayas, don't you? It's pretty much the ultimate 'no go' terrain. If anyone got tanks onto the Tibetan plateau, that would be good tank country but it would mean a massive tunnel, levelling the mountains or an airlift of unprecedented scale. Then you'd have the problem of what next?

The Lhasa railroad is about two things: bringing Tibetans into the fold through economic development (similar to our NI tactic of 'drowning them in cream') and allowing the security forces to reinforce quickly if they kick off.

Meanwhile, HERE's a quick peek behind the curtain. India's a paper tiger. True, you can still get a nasty cut but it's not exactly a strategic threat to anyone but the Pakistanis.

After reading those links, China spends £35 billion on defence compared to the UK's £34 billion........

The UK has around 174,000 members in the Armed Force while China has well over a million...... so the fact they spend more on defence doesnt mean anything to be honest!

You linked to a pakistani blog which has pics of sadhus posted in the article as evidence of indian poverty. You deserve the oxygen thief tag.

However with the cost of living in China being so much lower than the UK's their salary and pension costs per soldier are much lower than ours. It would be interesting to see how that £35 billion breaks down between things like salaries, training, infrastructure, equipment - both personal and the large stuff like tanks and jet aeroplanes etc. to get a more realistic idea.


Which quoted Indian government figures and the chairman of an Indian government commission. I notice you don't try and rebut the claims, merely try and throw mud at the source of the article.

There was a thread about google earth that had the co-ordinates for the biggest model i've ever seen (via satellite). IIRC, it was in China and showed some part of the China / India border. I assume it was one of the disputed regions!

Searching now for the thread.......

I imagine by 2020 Pizza Hut will spend 5 times as much as the UK on defence.

If it's the one I'm thinking of it was. IIRC the theory was they built it to help train their helicopter pilots to get an idea of the terrain. Here's an El Reg article with pictures showing the scale and detail of it all.

PLA has just recently gone to a professional model - that's automatically more expensive than conscripts. The savings in manpower costs by cutting numbers are more than offset by paying off and pensioning superfluous officers and senior ranks, as well as through funding the higher wages, pensions and better living conditions needed to attract volunteers. A large part of the recent spending increases have been on HR costs, high tech weapons and C3 come next and the costs of supporting increased peace-keeping/support ops make up a fair chunk too.

I think it would be fair to say that the current Chinese mindset is a slightly Israeli-esque 'never again' one. They're not quite so belligerent, but they're going to let Western powers or the Japs trample them again either.

Yeah - thats the one. I remember it being mountainous with a few lakes thrown in as well. Wish i could make a model that well!!!!!

Indeed I did. It's interesting to see what that side of the border make of the Indian situation, but most importantly most of the sources of information quoted were official Indian ones. Spin that how you like.

Gets better and better
"http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2957578/India-targeting-Chinas-oil-supplies.html"

john

Palpable tosh; if the Indians were daft enough to try to plug the Straits, the PLAN would have to get in line to have a pop at them; the ASEAN members would be at the front of the queue, with the Spams and the RN backing them up. I don't know if you are familiar with the SLOCs around Singapore, but they're like hydepark corner at rushhour, only with ships; a very large proportion of the world's shipping funnels through those straits and any attempt to stop it would likely be welcomed with a fairly robust naval response.

Typical journo walting about something he doesn't appear to know much about. I notice that it's a general who comments about blockading the strait; says it all really, I always ask admirals when I need advice about army issues.