China and India flex military muscle near disputed border
- Satellite images indicate that the People’s Liberation Army has built new bunkers near the site of a deadly clash
- PLA forces hold live-fire drills in Tibet while India deploys battle tanks close to conflict zone
The images, taken on Monday, showed bunkers, tents and storage units for military hardware set up in an area where there were none last month.
Both sides have nuclear weapons and thus that really limits how far they can push this crisis
The latest exercise was reported by the PLA’s own TV channel on Wednesday, with ground troops in Tibet organising an operation to test the logistics and engineering skills of a frontline brigade unit.
The channel also reported a live-fire drill on Monday, in which combat tanks, rocket launchers and repair vehicles were mobilised to test the unit’s capacity to mount a strike.
The Monday programme showed at least three Type 15 light tanks firing targets in an open field. At least five PLZ-07 tracked self-propelled howitzer armoured vehicles and three Type 81 self-propelled 122mm multiple rocket launchers were also involved in the drill.
Liu Jian, a company commander who took part in the exercise, was quoted as saying that the objective was to test the gunners’ ability to hit targets 1,800 metres away within eight seconds while the tanks were moving.
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Chinese exercise in Tibet after border clash with India