China Flanker Thread II
- Thread starter sumdud
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tanlixiang28776
Junior Member
Guess we don't take the IAF seriously then.
antiterror13
Brigadier
should they ? IAF is a joke anyway
Hyperwarp
Captain
plawolf
Lieutenant General
China has never considered India a serious threat. Maybe it's hubris to do so, maybe it's
not.
But either way China is not going to be negligent and display weakness to the point of inviting attack on
it's western boarder. They did the critical but usually overlooked logistic preparations by upgrading their airbases and test deploying a token Flanker force so they are ready to redeploy their best assets en mass if it is required.
But even doing that much has got the Indians all worked up. As amusing as it might be to watch, it's generally best not to trigger their paranoia too much.
Besides, it's silly to forward deploy too much of your best assets where they could be sneak attacked. Fair enough if you have major population centres or key strategic assets to defend, but putting a huge chunk of your fighting strength within easy reach of the enemy can invite attack and result in unnecessary losses in a surprise first strike, a la Pearl Harbour.
In forward deploying too much of your forces, you are displaying weakness instead of strength. Weakness of the military in feeling they need such overwhelming advantages to hold their own and weakness in leadership in placing so much of your hard to replace assets at risk.
I mean if China really had it in for India, they could wipe out a huge proportion of the IAF's fighting strength with a surprise alpha strike with a wave of cruise and ballistic missile strikes followed up by massed bomber and long range strike aircraft coming in from bases deep within China.
If India tried something similar, they would at best bag a few old flankers and J7s with their support equipment. The PLAAF will hardly notice such losses. With air superiority, the IAF might bomb a few token boarder garrisons.
If the PLAAF launched the first strike and gain temporary air superiority they could potentially devastate India's entire northern armies. Forcing the IAF to deploy a huge force to protect them and thus exposing themselves as well.
If they just bothered to build some proper roads and railways, they could do away with exposing themselves so and base their main strengths far enough to not be in easy strike range but also able to respond to any incursions.
Do I understand this correctly:
In 1962 the Indian army encroached on East Tibet even farther than the Curzon line. China quietly collected a superior force and drove the Indians out of Tibet, then gave up such small parts of Tibet it considered indefensible in order to establish normal relations as soon as possible. Is it that experience that make the Chinese think India is not a serious threat, beside of course that the economic and strategic value of the area concerned is slight?
In 1962 the Indian army encroached on East Tibet even farther than the Curzon line. China quietly collected a superior force and drove the Indians out of Tibet, then gave up such small parts of Tibet it considered indefensible in order to establish normal relations as soon as possible. Is it that experience that make the Chinese think India is not a serious threat, beside of course that the economic and strategic value of the area concerned is slight?
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