Valleys and Valour

  CURRENT ISRAEL PALESTINE FLARE UP LINKED TO BYZANTINE WEST ASIA GEOPOLITICS   “West Asia is the cradle of ancient civilisations, venerated birthplace of the three Abrahamic religions, harbours huge petroleum reserves, and is the epicenter of world trade routes of importance.”   Geographic Extent and Significance Geographically West Asia encompasses the 23 countries of Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Oman, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Kuwait, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, West Bank, Gaza Strip, Israel, Lebanon, Cyprus and Turkey. Geostrategic significance of West Asia lies in its straddling the junction of the continents of Europe, Asia and Africa. It is also the epicenter of critical international trade routes, and harbouring huge natural hydrocarbon reserves , its major source of revenue. Within West Asia, Iran enjoys a unique geostrategic outreach capability . It sits at the hub of one of the most critical trade junct...

  VIGNETTES FROM THE MECHANISED INFANTRY THE MECHANISED WARFARE FILES – 1   ADOPTING DISRUPTIVE STRATEGY TO COUNTERVAIL CHINA     “Capacity building for implementing a disruptive strategy is the surest way to deter China from adopting a coercive geopolitical path.”   GENERAL China has set for itself the most audacious vision of establishing a China centric geopolitical, economic, banking, and commerce world order by the end of the coming decade . The chosen route to achieve this goal is by gaining lead in advanced technologies, and their disruptive use to decouple the international banking and commerce system from the US Dollar. The rise of a resurgent India is looked at as a major stumbling block by China to realise its world vision. Its coercive deployment of armed forces in northern Laddakh in May 2020 to overawe and deter India from emerging as a regional challenger in Asia h as not met with success. This has forced China to revise its nati...

  VIGNETTES FROM THE MECHANISED INFANTRY THE KARAKORAM FILES – 3   THE SIACHEN GLACIER ‘Whether I sense god or the hallucinations of rarefied air I know not,  Is it the death trap of the Devil or the bounteous creation of God is dilemma to me,  But the truth I understand is that my puny self is alive and awestruck, As I walk on the Hell below and the Heaven around me!’   A Savage Romance! The three aphorisms shared below convey in the most apt and crisp language the savageness of the environment, the survival protocol that it dictates, and the human tragedy of fighting a war on undeniably the most unforgiving battlefield in the world:-   ‘Theoretically there is a  possibility of suffering a heatstroke and frostbite near simultaneously on the dizzying heights of the Siachen Glacier, if one were to lie down long enough with exposed toes in the shade and exposed head in the sun!’ -         ...