The Chinese Army is now trying a new trick to lower the morale of Bharatiya Army troops during the ongoing stand-off between both Armies: loudspeakers blaring out Hindi messages against PM Modi and the political establishment.

On the southern banks of Pangong Tso where Bharat’s Army has occupied commanding heights, the Chinese loudspeakers tell Bharatiya troops in Hindi about the ‘futility of being deployed at these heights in winter season on the whims and fancies of Indian politicians back in Delhi’.

Another psyop (psychological operation) is attempt to create dissatisfaction among soldiers over absence of ‘hot steaming meals’, something which Chinese state propaganda outlets are claiming is served to Chinese troops through drones! There are also reports of Punjabi songs being played at Finger 4 on north bank of Pangong Tso, presumably to lull our soldiers into false sense of complacency!?

Army veterans say these are old tactics seen during the 1962 war and 1967 Nathu La skirmish as well.

Chinese Communist party mouthpieces and other propaganda outlets like Global Times have been ranting non-stop in recent days about the 1962 war, the gap between Chinese and Bharatiya economy, the Covid-19 pandemic that is raging across Bharat while China has allegedly brought it under control, and of course portraying Modi government’s tough stance on the Ladakh encroachment by Chinese as a ‘tactic to divert attention from domestic issues’.

China’s allies in Indian media, politics and think tanks

China’s propaganda is being reflected by large sections of Bharat’s media, some knowingly and others unwittingly. When the news of Chinese encroachment first broke out in May, there were sneering editorials and commentary about the PM’s ’56-inch chest’. Many were asking what the Government is doing to avenge Chinese perfidy – basically, provoking the PM to go to war in the heat of the moment.

While the intelligence failure to pre-empt the Chinese infiltration and build up definitely needs to be fixed coming as it does just 20 years after Kargil, some claims were clearly exaggerated such as those put out by controversial defence ‘experts’ like Col. (retd) Ajai Shukla, who writes regularly for Business Standard, Rediff and The Wire. Another ex-Army officer and defence journalist Praveen Sawhney, who edits the FORCE newsmagazine & also writes for The Wire and does make sense on topics such as the AI-led future of warfare, would have you believe that CDS Bipin Rawat is responsible for the conflict with China, and that all hope is lost.

When the Govt. took non-military actions like banning Chinese mobile apps and cancelling contracts given to Chinese telecom vendors, there were naysaying articles there too. The Hindu even ran a piece which explained how the app ban could be challenged in Bharat’s courts!

Now that the Army has gradually built up its logistics and presence in the area, and taken counter-measures to capture commanding heights in both south and north banks of Pangong Tso, there were opinion pieces asking for ‘due caution to be exercised to avoid war.’

The latest line of attack by repeat-offender The Telegraph is branding a loan taken from a multilateral commercial bank, where Bharat is one of the key stakeholders, as a ‘Chinese loan’, all just to run down the Govt. and PM Modi:

This is utter rubbish headline. AIIB is as much Indian as it is Chinese. And it is a multilateral institution, not a commercial bank. Just because HQ is in Beijing doesn’t make it Chinese bank. https://t.co/qtCAq0KDZr

— Sandeep Parekh (@SandeepParekh) September 16, 2020

Basically, our left-liberal English MSM wants to have its cake, and eat it too! Many of these outlets have lost all sense of proportion and will oppose anything and everything Modi does; some adopt a neutral tone, but their real agenda lurks beneath the surface and can be easily spotted by a seasoned observer.

Every second article in our English language media about the border stand-off quotes ancient Chinese thinker Sun Tzu’s Art of War with respect. But you will never hear any of them refer to Acharya Chanakya’s Arthashastra. Even the irony of this self-alienation and mental colonisation will be lost on our editors and analysts.

On the political front, when even someone like Mamata Banerjee is standing behind the PM, the likes of Rahul Gandhi and Sitaram Yechury are taking juvenile potshots. The fact that a treacherous Communist organisation like CPM, which has sided with China in past conflicts, and toes the same Marxist-Maoist ideology that even China has long abandoned, even has the temerity to comment on foreign affairs, shows the abysmally low standards of Bharat’s polity.

Conclusion

Our policy wonks and think tankers need a reality check – they are not sharing any earth-shattering insights. It is common knowledge that China has raced far ahead of us economically and militarily. We all know that dislodging China from its entrenched positions along LAC will not be easy – this will be a war of attrition that will stretch over coming decades.

But not one celebrated analyst has the intellectual honesty to diagnose the root cause of our woes: a slothful bureaucracy, flawed judiciary and law enforcement, broken education system, diffident or outright anti-national politicians, and most importantly – an ill-suited system of governance sourced largely from erstwhile colonisers.

The naked power-play of BreakingIndia forces which our elites cheer as a form of ‘dissent’ or ‘freedom of expression’ is a clear example of what holds us behind. Modi-bashing is easy. Dissing politicians for everything wrong in the country is also easy. Owning up to one’s own colonised mindset, admitting the absence of a civilizational grand narrative, is difficult.

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