From handshake to hand-to-hand combat

From handshake to hand-to-hand combat

AgenciesUpdated: Thursday, June 18, 2020, 04:37 AM IST
article-image
Photo: PTI

It is understood that the Chinese ambush was premeditated and part of a sinister game plan. Around 120 Indian soldiers -- almost an entire company -- was trapped, the commanding officer was killed within minutes, and the Chinese People's Liberation Army, perched on a high altitude ridge, resorted to a savage attack in which boulders and batons were used. Earlier, the Chinese retreat, marked by thinning of troops, was part of an exercise in subterfuge and deception. The fact that the rules of engagement don’t permit the use of small fire arms in faceoff with the Chinese added to the helplessness on the Indian side; they were reduced to being sitting ducks.

Vicious hand-to-hand fighting raged for over eight hours on Monday night, as PLA assault teams armed with batons wrapped in barbed wire – which again suggests an element of pre-planning – lynched the troops of the 16 Bihar Regiment. (This is the account of a senior government official familiar with the debriefing of survivors at hospitals in Leh, as told to News18.) A wire agency IANS) has, meanwhile, cited sources as saying that the Indian troops were outnumbered 1:5 when they came under attack near an observation post on Point 14 in eastern Ladakh.

The PLA is also said to have used thermal imaging drones to ferret out the unarmed Indian soldiers, who had scattered on the treacherous terrain after the slaying of the Commanding Officer, before brutally attacking them. ‘‘Even unarmed men who fled into the hillsides were hunted down and killed,” one officer was quoted as saying by News 18. “The dead included men who jumped into the Galwan River in a desperate effort to escape.” ‘‘It was the deadliest attack carried on Indian Army personnel by the Chinese in our memory," the government sources said. Pointing firearms at their faces, the PLA tortured some soldiers to death, sources have told IANS.

Many of the soldiers, entrapped on a narrow ledge, fell off the cliff. Two dozen soldiers are currently "critically injured" and undergoing treatment. The "fatalities could increase," it is feared.The Indian Army official, however, refused to comment on the numbers. Sources stated the deceased Colonel wanted to verify whether the Chinese troops had withdrawn from the standoff position, as promised by them. The Chinese trapped the soldiers and brutally attacked them to the "point of mutilation". On Tuesday, Indian helicopters flew 16 sorties to ferry the bodies and the injured personnel from the site of the attack. The killings mark the Indian Army’s worst losses since the 1999 Kargil war, and mark the most intense fighting between India and China since 1967, when 88 Indian soldiers and perhaps as many as 340 PLA troops were killed in the course of intense skirmishes near the Nathu La and Cho La passes, the gateways to the strate.

RECENT STORIES

Bihar Lok Sabha Election 2024: INDIA Bloc Seals Seat-Sharing Deal, RJD To Contest 26 Seats, Congress...

Bihar Lok Sabha Election 2024: INDIA Bloc Seals Seat-Sharing Deal, RJD To Contest 26 Seats, Congress...

Don-Turned-Politician Mukhtar Ansari's 'Hummer' Wish That Remained Unfulfilled

Don-Turned-Politician Mukhtar Ansari's 'Hummer' Wish That Remained Unfulfilled

Amit Shah's Convoy Rammed By Speeding Car In Delhi's Kemal Ataturk Marg; 1 CRPF Constable Severely...

Amit Shah's Convoy Rammed By Speeding Car In Delhi's Kemal Ataturk Marg; 1 CRPF Constable Severely...

Who Is DSP Shailendra Singh? All About Ex-Cop Who Fought Against Mulayam Govt To Invoke POTA Against...

Who Is DSP Shailendra Singh? All About Ex-Cop Who Fought Against Mulayam Govt To Invoke POTA Against...

Artificial Intelligence Should Not Be Seen As Magic Tool: PM Modi In Interaction With Bill Gates

Artificial Intelligence Should Not Be Seen As Magic Tool: PM Modi In Interaction With Bill Gates