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Strategic importance of Chumbi valley should also be added HIMANCHALI (talk) 07:48, 20 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]
In response to Himanchali, this is very tentative, but India, judging by its press, is apprehensive of a Chinese attack through the Chumbi Valley which at a maximum might be aimed at cutting the Siliguri Neck, the narrow strip of territory connecting Bengal with Assam and the northeastern states. If successful, such an action might make it very hard for India to sustain a defense of Arunachal Pradesh and the northeastern states for a long period if that region also came under attack, and if Bangladesh refused right of passage to the Indian armed forces. The problem is exacerbated by the fact that China already claims Arunachal Pradesh, or most of it. However, because attempting to cut the Siliguri neck a would be a very major attack on India, it is not something likely to be undertaken taken suddenly, or to develop out of border skirmishes. However minor encroachments to improve the position on the ground for such an attack, while maintaining ambiguity of motive, are more likely to be attempted.
The Chinese may be apprehensive that if they ever do find themselves in a major war with India and feel compelled to attack over the land border (given the imbalance of GDPs and military budgets of approximately 5:1 in favor of China, a major offensive attack in the opposite direction seems less probable), a counterattack may come up the Chumbi Valley. In part the Doklam dispute may or may not have been over a strategic move by China to encroach on Bhutanese territory to seize for itself the commanding heights overlooking the Chumbi Valley from which they might hope to block such a counterattack, or to forestall it entirely by making the visible cost to an Indian force too high for it to be attempted. While such a motive on the part of China is plausible, this is not proof that this is what they were trying to do, as the costs to the Sino-Indian relationship, and general reputational costs to China among neighbors, if they successfully took the heights and later fortified them, would likely be sufficiently severe that unless they felt preparation for such an attack were vital to China, it could easily become a notably Pyrrhic victory.
I haven't added this to the main article because I am only a lay person with little knowledge of strategic affairs who happens to have spent time nearby about forty years ago. I leave it so someone more knowledgeable than me to read it over and to amend it for possible partial inclusion in the main article with the benefit of their superior knowledge and judgment.
A good map of the area is essential, showing clearly just where the valley is and the relative heights of land and infrastructure around it. Google Maps does not have the Chumbi Valley listed, at least under that name, so that it is hard for a lay person to understand the location and nature of this geographical feature using easily accessible Internet sites.
FurnaldHall (talk) 03:50, 19 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]
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