China Ready for ‘War’ with India, holds Live-Fire Drills Near Border

Image courtesy of War on the Rocks

 

The ruling Communist Party of China has issued a stern warning to neighboring India, with which it is engaged in a bitter border dispute that has recently seen Chinese live-fire drills and media speculation of extensive Indian military casualties denied by both sides.

After accusing Indian troops of crossing over the disputed Sikkim border last month, Chinese Communist Party outlet Global Times published a commentary Tuesday urging restraint by both belligerents, but warning that China was prepared to engage India in a battle for the contested land. The piece chalked up the conflict to a greater competition for economic and political dominance between the two leading Asian powers and said that Beijing would amass troops and armaments at the border in anticipation for what could turn into an all-out war.

PLA Navy to carry out drills, exercises in Bashi Channel

The official Weibo micro blog page of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy announced this week that since 2012, the Miyakato Strait near Japan and the Bashi Channel near Taiwan and the Philippines, have been designated as an area for routine drills and exercises.

The announcement marks a departure for the PLA Navy, which had previously conducted most of its activities in the Miyakato Strait, which is located between Japan and Taiwan.

The Bashi Channel is a waterway that is part of the Luzon Strait in the Pacific Ocean. It’s situated between outlying islands of Taiwan and the Philippines and serves as a natural but often-disputed border between the two nations.

Obama uses EU to confront Israel with tough interlinked choices: borders or nuclear-armed Iran

It doesn’t take a political genius to see how US Secretary of State John Kerry’s arrival in Amman Tuesday, July 16, for his sixth bid to bring Israelis and the Palestinians to the table, ties in with the new EU anti-Israel funding guidelines published on the same day. To avoid a head-on clash with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, the US president has loosed the Europeans in full cry against Jerusalem and its policies. European Union foreign affairs executive Catherine Ashton chairs the international negotiating forum with Iran. And so, the EU has given Tehran a broad wink that it is worth its while to come to a fresh round of nuclear diplomacy while Israel is kept on the run in the settlements-cum-borders dispute.

Israel is further weakened by its own internal political difficulties.

China’s Foray Into Bhutan Worries India

After intruding into the Indian territory of Ladakh, China has made a foray into Bhutan, India’s neighbor and one of its closest allies, according to an intelligence note in possession of the Indian news channel, Times Now.

The channel reported that China’s People Liberation Army (PLA) had intruded into Bhutan and set up three camps and was carrying out patrols.