In recent days, Chinese media has kept up its overheated rhetoric, culminating in the release by a state-run news agency of a bizarre video mocking India as a bad neighbor — with an actor wearing a turban, fake beard speaking in a put-on Indian accent. Indian netizens immediately denounced the video as racist. Perhaps more troubling, the Global Times reported that the government was setting up blood collection centers and moving its blood supplies closer to the area in Tibet.
India has undertaken a variety of preparedness measures with its eye on Chinese escalation, Joshi said, including advancing the operational alert status of several units by two months, which involves moving two of its mountain divisions toward the region and allowing troops to begin acclimatizing to higher altitudes.
“Clearly, there are a whole set of measures they’ve taken as discreetly as possible to shield themselves from snap Chinese offenses,” Joshi said.
Yeah, my impression is that this is more than a routine border dispute that could get real ugly real fast at the slightest spark.
Not that I expect full-scale war, although that is possible once shooting starts.
But each side has the motivation to strike first to grab territory and then dig in while brandishing nuclear weapons to deter a counter-attack.
