Overall, the People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) has focused on building ground-based air defense networks and network-centric operations rather than trying to match the Indian Air Force (IAF) in terms of straight fighter numbers along the border. All air assets fall under the Western Theater Command of the PLA, the largest geographic region of China's five military theater commands.
Chinese President Xi Jinping has announced that the 2.3 million strong People's Liberation Army, the world's largest, will be trimmed by three lakh.
'No one needs to lose sleep if a person with better operational credentials supersedes lesser endowed peers,' says Group Captain Murli Menon (retd).
'A couple of Pulwamas will bring the two nations to war and it will be limited to J&K itself.'
10 Things You Didn't Know About Manikarnika, Rani of Jhansi.
The outgoing BSF DG said that Head Constable Narender Singh was killed in an "action of the Border Action Team" of Pakistan.
An impressive array of warships, including nuclear capable submarines, and about 8000 men and officers of Indian Navy presented an exquisite display of operational capabilities in an exercise reviewed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi off the Kochi coast in Kerala on Tuesday.
'The Congress, all these decades, worked on a slow Hindi-isation and Indianisation of Arunachal tribes. The RSS wants rapid Hinduisation,' says Shekhar Gupta.
'We have worked to create road blocks in the path of those who thought that there was space for conventional war despite Pakistan's nuclear weapons.' 'Pakistan's nuclear weapons programme is not open-ended and aligned with India only.' 'In this unstable regional environment, one nuclear power is trying to teach lessons to another nuclear power through the medium of small arms and mortar shells on the Line of Control, and bluster.' 'A historic opportunity of a lifetime beckons the leaderships of India and Pakistan to grasp, sit together and explore the possibilities of conflict resolution.'
The attack on the Balochistan Police College, 20 km from Quetta city began around 11:10 pm on Monday night, triggering an operation by Pakistani security forces who rescued hundreds of cadets from the academy.
It is important to protect fissile material from extremists in Pakistan more than nuclear bombs because the latter has multi-layer security unlike the former, a senior Pakistani nuclear expert said on Saturday.
Pakistan is a "haven" for several Islamist terror groups and successive Pakistani governments are widely believed to have supported some outfits as proxies in the country's conflicts with its neighbours including India, a US Congressional research report has said.
Pakistan is a 'haven' for several Islamist terror groups and successive Pakistani governments are widely believed to have supported some outfits.
'The thin line is a permanent dilemma with soldiers. You have to appreciate that in that dilemma and chaos there are officers who stand and lead their men.
'The Chinese navy is large and expanding both in numbers and capability by the day.' 'India too must take measures to safeguard its own interests, now and in the future.'
'She preserved national unity against great odds.'
'The Pakistani military has encouraged and supported terrorist organisations, especially in Kashmir, as a means of waging proxy war against the Indian military and the country's superior economic resources.' 'The evidence is irrefutable with the recent killing of 46 paramilitary troops being just the latest example.'
When China protested strongly over the August decision on J&K -- not once but twice -- we ignored it. And to compound matters, we simply turned our back and walked over to the 'Quad' alliance with the US, upgrading it to ministerial level, and thereafter began following the American footfalls on Taiwan and COVID-19 to taunt and humiliate Beijing, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Dhanteras, the prime minister said, has become even more special.
The agonising wait for justice notwithstanding, the former navy captain soldiered on, doing low-paying jobs for Rs 20,000 a month and even ploughing farms owned by others to sustain his family. He has lost many jobs because of his past.
'India, which climbed the escalation ladder first, has climbed down.'
'It remains unclear what Indian objectives have been realised in precipitating the crisis in the first instance last Tuesday,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The perpetrators of the 2008 Mumbai attack, who shot dead 166 people, had confessed to details that should have been enough to hang him, but Pakistan enjoyed his anti-India rhetoric and let him spread his tentacles. A revealing excerpt from Khaled Ahmed's Pakistan's Terror Conundrum.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said resumption of talks with Pakistan was to "try and turn the course of history" and to bring an end to terrorism, but made it clear that the neighbouring country would be judged by its commitment on terrorism.
It currently has between 140 and 150 nuclear weapons in its control and stockpiled around 200 to 300 kilogram of plutonium.
'His essential doctrine was only the local police can fight terror.' '"You can't fire at mobs throwing stones," he said, adding one has to think innovatively, even defensively, sometimes.' Shekhar Gupta remembers the uncoventional SuperCop.
'It is purely based on real-time hard intelligence.' 'Timing is important. When you are attacking at 3.30 am, then everybody will be in the academy of terrorists.' 'If you attack at 10 am then someone will be out, so timing is very important.' 'Therefore, 3.30 am is the time when every terrorist is sleeping.'
'A deadly combination of money and religion lures them into the murky world of terrorism.' 'You will reach heaven if you kill -- what a doctrine!' Professor Ajoy Roy, whose son blogger Avijit Roy was brutally murdered in Dhaka last year, tells Rediff.com's Indrani Roy.
'How does one get to weaken all those pillars on which the Deep State of Pakistan and the Separatists rely to prevent the situation reaching that point; how must this stage of the proxy war be countered? In many ways the strategy being followed by the adversaries is a smart one, acting within threshold and avoiding overpitch,' says Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain (retd).
'With Pakistan's 'first use doctrine' threatening the use of nuclear weapons early in a war with India, the S-400 will shield vulnerable targets like Delhi and Mumbai, complicating Pakistan's targeting calculations.'
'Aspects of escalation control and broad targeting aspects have been discussed by all and sundry.' 'Let us cut the hype for a bit and give a break to our planners and decision makers,' says Group Captain Murli Menon (retd).
'The strategy has to be restoring order in one part and countering the very effective propaganda through a very nimble monitoring and response system,' says Lieutenant General Syed Ata Hasnain, who retired as the General Officer Commanding of the Srinagar-based 15 Corps.
'When Modi was having his maiden meeting with Donald Trump, China is up to its old tricks again, by causing a distraction on the Doklam plateau,' says B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
'The Gita was propounded on a battlefield and regards the use of force to establish Dharma or righteousness, as not only legitimate but one's highest duty,' says Colonel Anil Athale (retd).
'As India and Pakistan observe the 50th anniversary of the 1965 war, the one lesson that ought to have been learned by Pakistan is how vulnerable its heartland is to a sudden attack. The only alternative to this inherent geographic weakness is to have a policy of peace with India. In an extreme scenario, India can destroy Pakistani strategic targets by just artillery shelling, crossing of the border is not even necessary,' Colonel Anil A Athale (retd)
'For India, the phase of pure restraint has passed.' 'Restraint has failed to reform Pakistan or rein in terrorism,' says Vivek Gumaste.
'From Doklam to Wuhan and the return of the India-China relationship to its previous equilibrium is indeed a major contribution of President Xi and PM Modi. Without any doubt they deserve the kudos for their sagacity and their wisdom,' says Ambassador Gautam Bambawale, India's envoy to China during the Wuhan summit.
'The response to terror is not always reciprocal terror, nor is launching a conventional response the best response.' 'The best response is to make the sponsor pay a price he cannot afford,' says former RA&W chief Vikram Sood.
Talmiz Ahmad is a former Indian ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Oman and the UAE. In an interview with Aditi Phadnis, he says the disequilibrium in Iraq will continue to prevail. Ahmad also says there are indications that the US is now anxious to avoid intervening militarily in West Asia, and that this is the appropriate moment for Asia to assume responsibility for its own security. Edited excerpts:
'The border standoff, if not properly addressed by both sides, could escalate to a conventional or sub-conventional conflict between India and China,' predicts Srikanth Kondapalli, one of India's leading China experts.
A spirited turn at the mic by Mahua Moitra, first-time MP from Trinamool Congress, in which she listed the "signs of early fascism", has been hailed as the "speech of the year" on social media.
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