Reports have emerged that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army are laying a network of optical fibre cables south of the Pangong Lake in eastern Ladakh.
Over the last three months, Eastern Ladakh has been the area of a standoff between India and China. According to Reuters news, the Chinese have been laying optical fibre cables in the area south of the Pangong Lake, at “breakneck speed”.
“Our biggest worry is that they [Chinese] have laid optical fibre cables for high-speed communications..They have been laying optical fibre cables on the southern bank at breakneck speed,” Reuters quoted the official as saying.
This important development only means one thing and that is the Chinese Army is getting ready for the winter and it is unlikely de-escalation will happen in the coming weeks.
This is not the first time where reports have emerged China laying optical fibre cables in the territory it has occupied in eastern Ladakh. Last month Indian intelligence agencies had found that China was laying a network of optical fibre cables in areas controlled by the PLA.
This development comes just weeks after Indian Army and troops from India’s Special Frontier Force occupied heights in the area south of the Pangong Lake. The Indian Army along with the Special Frontier Force took control of strategic heights in the LAC at an elevation 5,000 to 6,000 metres, overlook Chinese positions that left China surprised, angry and rattled because it gave India a significant tactical advantage.
According to experts, the laying of optical fibre cables helps China in two ways.
One, it will provide PLA secure lines of communication to their bases in the rear.
Two, it makes Chinese communications robust and secure.
“These lines were judged by Indian experts — and corroborated by foreign intelligence agencies — to be communication cables laid in trenches, he said, including near the Spanggur gap, among hilltops where soldiers fired in the air recently for the first time in decades,” the Reuters report reads.
The advantage of optic fibre cable communication is that is very secure and it will allow the frontline troops the ability to exchange data such as pictures and documents with their bases in the rear without being compromised.
Radios which the Indian military uses for communications are not considered a very secure method of communication. “If you speak on the radio, it can get caught. Communications on optical fibre cables is secure,” the intelligence official is reported to have said.