‘We can also be aggressive’: IAF chief on possibility of Chinese aggression at LAC

Indian Air Force chief Air Chief Marshal RKS Bhadauria, on Saturday, said that India “can also be aggressive” if China tries to get aggressive along the Line of Actual Control (LAC).

“If they can be aggressive, we can also be aggressive,” the IAF chief said when asked about the possibility of the Chinese aggression at the LAC. Last month, Air Chief Marshal Bhadauria had said that any “serious conflict” with India is not good for China at the global front.

Speaking at a press conference, the IAF chief had said, “Any serious India-China conflict is not good for China at the global front. If Chinese aspirations are global then it doesn’t suit their grand plan. What could be possible Chinese objectives for their action in the north?… It’s important that we recognise what they have really achieved.”

He had also said that there is a heavy deployment of Chinese troops along the LAC, adding they have a large presence of radars, surface to air missiles and surface to surface missiles. “Their deployment has been strong. We have taken all actions required to be taken,” he said.

The IAF chief further said that the evolving “uncertainties and instability” at the global geopolitical front has provided China with an opportunity to demonstrate its growing power and it has indirectly also brought to fore the inadequate contribution of major powers to global security.

India and China have been locked in a bitter standoff in eastern Ladakh for nearly the past six months. The border tension between the two countries flared up manifold in June when troops of both sides engaged in a violent face-off in GalwanValley in eastern Ladakh, in which 20 Indian soldiers were martyred and several others injured.

The two sides have held several rounds of military and diplomatic level talks in the past few months to end the deadlock but failed to achieve any major breakthrough.