The is the biggest Indian Army loss in any India-China face-off
Agencies
NEW DELHI: Chinese soldiers of the People Liberation Army (PLA) used nail-studded iron rods to to ambush and kill 20 Indian soldiers in on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Galwan Valley in Ladakh on June 15.
Former Indian Army colonel and noted defence and strategic affairs writer Ajai Shukla posted on Twitter this picture of the deadly iron rods used by the PLA soldiers used.
He wrote, “The nail-studded rods — captured by Indian soldiers from the Galwan Valley encounter site — with which Chinese soldiers attacked an Indian Army patrol and killed 20 Indian soldiers. Such barbarism must be condemned. This is thuggery, not soldiering.”
Furious hand-to-hand fighting between soldiers of the two countries raged across the Galwan river valley for over eight hours on Monday night, as PLA assault teams armed with iron rods as well as batons wrapped in barbed wire hunted down and slaughtered troops of Indian Army’s 16 Bihar Regiment, reports News18.
“Even unarmed men who fled into the hillsides were hunted down and killed. The dead include men who jumped into the Galwan river in a desperate effort to escape,” the report quoted an Indian Army officer as saying on the latest on the India-China face-off.
Led by 16 Bihar’s commanding officer, Colonel Santosh Babu, a patrol party of Indian soldiers came face to face with Chinese troops in a steep section of the mountainous region they believed the PLA soldiers had retreated from, in line with a June 6 disengagement agreement, according to The Guardian.
The killings are the worst losses for the Indian Army since the 1999 Kargil war with Pakistan. It is also the worst toll between India and China since 1967, when 88 Indian soldiers and over 340 PLA soldiers were killed in fighting near the Nathu La and Cho La passes in the Chumbi Valley.
India and China share a 3,488-km border and there are three broad areas of dispute.
In the western sector of the border, India claims China is in illegal occupation of 43,000 square km of its territory in Ladakh, including 5,180 square km in the Shaksgam Valley which was ceded by Pakistan to China in 1963.
In the central sector where Indian states of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand share border with Tibet, there is a dispute around Shipki La and Kaurik areas in Himachal and Pulam, Thag La, Barahori, Kungri Bingri La, Lapthal and Sangha areas around Uttarakhand.
In the western sector, China claims the whole area of 90,000 square km of Arunachal Pradesh state, calling it South Tibet.
The current India-China face-off is the worst between the two countries in the past 40 years.
