India didn't get upper hand' in past, won't get it now, says China's PLA website

Beijing: An article on China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) website, on Tuesday, warned that the Indian Army would not win against their army if the military clash in the Sikkim sector led to an “armed conflict”.

According to a report in Hindustan Times, the article by strategic analyst Wang Dehua said that the Chinese had launched two major counter-attacks against the Indian armed forces in the 1967 conflict in the same region.

Dehua, who is the head of the Institute of South and Central Asia, Shanghai Institutes for International Studies wrote that India didn’t get the “upper hand” in the past and wouldn’t get an advantage now since the Chinese military has developed over the last few decades.

Read: China accuses India of ‘betrayal’ over Sikkim

The article also restated China’s accusation that Indian troops had illegally infiltrated the border and entered Donglang or Doklam region which China says, is a part of Tibet Autonomous Region. It also added that Chinese troops had shown restraint and not used force to ward off Indian troops during the standoff.

The article went back to the 1962 border conflict, saying that China had no intention of fighting the war and only acted in self-defence, and the conflict ended in India’s defeat.

Wang, in his write-up, made an implicit reference to Defence Minister Arun Jaitley’s recent remarks that the conditions had changed after India’s defeat in 1962. The article said that India should keep the historical lesson in mind and not be mistaken that it has better advantage over China due to the favourable terrain, its advantageous mountain division and air force on the border.