On the evening of 15 June, when the Indian Army personnel clashed with the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) at Galvan, the river temperature was close to zero (and in some places below). A large number of soldiers on both sides were experiencing hypoxia (low oxygen levels due to elevation) and hypothermia (extreme cold).
According to Indian military commanders, this information is relevant as the weather changes rapidly in eastern Ladakh from September. Survivors in the violent clash reported, when a skirmish between the two armies began, a large number of Chinese soldiers came up, but soon began to go down due to lack of oxygen at 16000 feet. Those who survived the lack of oxygen were hit by the frozen Galvan River.
On June 15, 20 Indian soldiers were killed in a skirmish in the Galvan Valley. In addition, more than 40 Chinese soldiers were also killed, but the Chinese government has not yet accepted it. However, China did accept the death of some commanders. On the night of 15 and 16 June, two Chinese helicopters took the dead and injured to nearby hospitals.
After the clash, the editor-in-chief of the Global Times, the mouthpiece of the Chinese government, admitted that India had killed many soldiers of their country. He tweeted that as far as I am aware, soldiers on the Chinese side have also been casualties in the incident.
The boundary dispute between India and China started in early May. The situation in eastern Ladakh worsened when on May 5, about 250 soldiers from India and China clashed with iron rods and sticks in the Pegong Lake area. There was also stone pelting on both sides, in which soldiers of both countries were injured. The incident continued for the next day as well. The two sides separated after this, but the deadlock continued.
The two countries agreed to end the deadlock at a special representatives’ meeting on July 5. By September, troops of both countries will retreat from all deadlocked points. And a senior military officer said, “The temperature in these areas may not kill you, but the icy wind bothers us.” In Galvan, Gogra-hot spring, the weather gets very bad. ‘
The military commander said that the adverse weather and up to seven feet of snow could disturb Chinese troops. China’s forces in Aksai Chin are largely protected by conscripts who were prepared to practice in Tibet and Xinjiang in the summer of three months. At the same time, Indian soldiers not only walk on foot during patrolling, but also in bad weather, live in Siachen or Sikkim or La Ridge of Tawang.
The Indian Army has been fighting enemies in the Siachen, Kashmir and North-East mountain areas since 1984. The commanders told that even today the Indian Army stands on Indira Colonel West, Siachen Glacier, Sikkim finger area, the farthest area on Doklam and the mountain in Arunachal Pradesh.
