Chinese Army (PLA) Commanding Officer Too Killed When They Attacked 16 BIHAR REGIMENT At Galwan
Taiwan News : A People’s Liberation Army (PLA) commanding officer too was killed during a fierce LAC clash when the Chinese attacked the Indian troops earlier this week.
On 16 June, a melee broke out in Galwan Area when Chinese troops suddenly attacked Indian Army troops from 16 BIHAR Regiment on a disputed LAC, on Indo Tibetan border in the Ladakh region.
In the attack with clubs and rods, the Indian side suffered 20 dead and the PLA suffered 56 dead though allegedly they reported only 43 dead and that too much later.
Initially they refused to disclose their casualties. It has now been confirmed that a commanding officer of a PLA unit dispatched to eastern Ladakh, as well as his second-in-command, perished in the bloody brawl.
Among the Indian dead was a colonel, marking the first casualties seen in a border confrontation between the two countries since 1975, when four Indian soldiers from paramilitary Assam Rifles were killed in a deadly ambush laid by PLA troops.
A high-ranking Indian military official has asserted that the unusually violent clash occurred on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) “because India now has the capability and the will to stand up to an aggressive China.”
After the brawl broke out between the Chinese and Indian troops along the LAC in Ladakh on May 5-6, a tense stand-off has been simmering for weeks. On Monday (June 15), delegations from the two sides met in an attempt to resolve the border row.
An argument reportedly broke out between the two parties after the PLA tried to build a structure on the Indian side of the border. Chinese troops reportedly did not withdraw from positions they were occupying, as agreed, and several hundred PLA soldiers suddenly attacked an Indian patrol.
According to an Indian official, the Chinese soldiers were trying to implement the PLA’s “Walk in Strategy” in the Galwan Valley. However, PLA troops were met with fierce resistance by Indian soldiers and had to evacuate “nearly 35 soldiers and officers,” who were either wounded or killed in the melee.
The official said the “Chinese side lost the commanding officer of the battalion deployed near Patrolling Point 14 of the Galwan region where the two armies clashed.” In addition, the government source said the battalion’s “second-in-command” was also killed in the clash.
China has been squarely blamed for the incident, as China “unilaterally attempted to change the status quo” through a violent encounter as a “premeditated and planned action.” This incident could mark a turning point in Sino-Indian relations, both in terms of increased animosity and a more assertive approach by India towards China.
“This face-off has demonstrated that Ladakh isn’t the South China Sea where the Chinese would be able to unilaterally change the status quo,” said one Indian official.
Since 1993 both sides have been following an agreed convention of sending their troops without weapons for any kind if engagement on the LAC. Till now it had worked in Arunachal,Dokalam, Sikkim and even Ladhak. However now all bets are off and new violation of LAC by the Chinese may see a rerun of 1967 Nathu La incident, where the Chinese had suffered over 600 killed and wounded against 88 Indian casualties.
