By B.RAMAN See also: www.southasiaanalysis.org and the Chennai Centre For China Studies at www.c3sindia.org
Please refer to my article of August 5,2010, titled "China to Counter India's Military Advantages in Arunachal Pradesh"
I have been in receipt of the following comments from a reader, who is known to be well-informed on China:
"This refers to your interesting report on the sucecessful completion of an an important logistic task on the Qinghai-Tibet railways for the PLA Air force. The strategic logistic equipment was the ballistic missiles that were for the first time transported by the rail net work into Tibet for the use of the Air Force & misille units stationed inside Tibet.
These missiles are based in the Qinghai province. For the first time they were transported out from Qinghai in 1985 for display in the national day parade presided over by Deng xiao ping.The live ballistic missiles were paraded by the PLA for the first time. The PLA was shocked to notice that these missiles had bottled up due to the pressure difference between Beijing and the rarified atmospheric pressure in Qinghai.The missiles were repaired in Beijing .
Now the PLA has repeated the same exercise and tested whether these missiles can withstand the pressure difference during rail transporation through rarified atmospheric pressure.The results revealed showed that these were transported successfuly. "
The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate of the Chennai Centre for China Studies.
