by Vivek Ahuja
“That bad?” Chen asked.
“They just nuked Korla! Korla! And Uxxaktal!” Wencang shouted at Chen, releasing his rage on his old comrade.
“26TH Air Division,” Chen replied calmly as he evaluated their losses.
“And the 19TH Division,” Feng added as he walked into the room with some papers in his hand.
Wencang balled his fingers into fists, turned back to the wall phone and leaned down to grab the hanging speaker. He stood up after taking it and called up Dianrong at the NCC: “Get me 813TH Brigade commander on the line right now!”
Chen and Feng turned away from the papers in Feng’s hand as they heard Wencang talking.
“What are you doing?” Chen asked. Wencang ignored the question, his knuckles white from rage.
“General, what is your launch readiness?” he asked on the speaker.
“Wencang!” Chen shouted but dared not approach closer.
“Good,” Wencang continued on the phone. “Prepare strike package ‘Typhoon’ on my orders. Keep the activity hidden as much as you can. I want launch readiness within the hour. Report back to me when you are ready!”
As he slammed the phone back into its place, Wencang turned around to see Chen and Feng standing there in stunned silence.
“What on earth did you do?” Chen said more as a statement than a question. He knew exactly what nuclear strike package ‘Typhoon’ was.
“I gave the Indians what they were begging for,” Wencang replied as he fished into his pockets for a smoke using the cheap cigarettes he always had handy on him. It was a habit he had picked up from his years out at Korla all those years ago. He lit one up and turned to Feng:
“Get in touch with the Foreign-Minister and inform him that we are evacuating and moving to the N-C-C. I want him to call me to get a draft of a message I want sent to the Indians via Bogdanov. And this time let’s be more careful with the evacuation for all our sakes! We can’t afford any more carelessness like this morning! Go!”
“Sir!” Feng saluted and walked out. Wencang turned to Chen:
“Liu had a good idea in taking out the Indian satellite before the launches. Let’s see if we can’t blind them permanently this time before Typhoon wipes their miserable little existence from this planet!”
“You want to do this?” Chen asked calmly as Wencang took a long puff of the cigarette and released the smoke into the room.
“I did not bring them here,” Wencang replied, “but they forced my hand. Theirs is not the only country that has to worry about saving face! Our people will hang us, you and me, from this ceiling here if we sued for peace now. That opportunity is long gone.”
“But they struck us with only two warheads.” Chen continued. “Surely that is a message? Otherwise why just two warheads? They must know what will follow? And we launched the first strike here! They had to respond and they chose two far away airbases! Why?”
“You give them credit for intelligence,” Wencang replied. “I don’t!”
“Their actions thus far have indeed been intelligent, Wencang. Think about it! You and I know more about their intelligent military operations against us than anybody else in Beijing!”
Wencang thought about that as his cigarette smoke filled the room…
MOSCOW
DAY 15 + 1530 HRS
“So they got our message?” Ambassador Tiwari asked as he took the paper from Bogdanov.
“They did,” was the short answer to that question from the Russian Minister. “And they responded with this.” Bogdanov nodded to the paper in Tiwari’s hand as the latter removed his reading glasses and then glanced over the details quickly.
“They have to be joking!” Tiwari said with surprise.
“Indeed,” Bogdanov said with a grunt. “Going by the rhetoric that General Chen laid out for their state media two hours ago, I thought we might have been too late! The president ordered full readiness on our part in case Beijing began lashing out on other parties in the region as well.”
Tiwari grimaced as he folded that paper and put it back on the table between the two men.
“Don’t bet your money yet!” he replied to Bogdanov. “We are not out of the woods. We want to know what they have in mind before we commit to anything at this point!”
“Just get them to start talking, Tiwari!” Bogdanov stressed emphatically. “If they are talking, they are not lobbing nuclear warheads at each other. That is all there is to it at this point!”
“I agree.” Tiwari nodded.
“And if we are lucky,” Bogdanov continued, “we might all make it out of this mess in one piece…”
JUNWEI KONGJUN
BEIJING
DAY 15 + 1830 HRS
“You sure it will work?” Chen asked.
“It has to,” Wencang said as he leaned for the phone and pressed the speaker. He waited while the prearranged process took place from the foreign ministry office. It would take a minute.
“You know,” Chen said as he took his seat on one of the other chairs around the big conference table in the room, “as much as I am responsible in convincing you to put Typhoon on hold, I fear very much that our people will never accept this.”
“They will have little choice on the matter,” Wencang replied plainly as he waited for the connection process to complete. “My worry is the Indians. Let’s just hope they are as smart as you make them out to be and take what is on offer without holding for more.”
The call went through a few seconds later. Wencang sat straighter in his chair and looked to the phone on the center of the table.
“This is General Wencang, commander of Chinese military forces and acting President for the People’s Republic of China. I have Lieutenant-General Chen from the People’s-Liberation-Army-Air-Force and other representatives from the Chinese government and military here with me.”
“General, this is the Prime-Minister of the Republic of India. And I have my cabinet and military commanders on this end,” the PM said. He noted that Wencang was fluent in English. That would make this conversation go easier and leave little for misinterpretation.
“Very well, Mr. Prime-Minister. You know the reason for this call. I think this war has gone on far too long and taken the lives of far too many of the young men and women on both sides. Following your nuclear strikes against an airfield known to me like the back of my hand all these years, I would say you are extremely lucky that I had commanders here who could see past my rage. Else I might very well have wiped your nation from the face of this planet!”
“General,” the PM replied, reading from the notes that Ravoof and Chakri had prepared, “I think we have demonstrated time and again our capability for sharp precision strikes against the Chinese leadership, notwithstanding your state media broadcasts. I am sure you have the capability to launch devastating nuclear strikes against our nation, but if that had been your only concern, I think we would not have been here talking right now. You know very well that we will launch and take out all your major cities as well. Millions would have died on both sides. And all for nothing!”
“I agree, Mr. Prime-Minister.” Wencang said neutrally. “As much as I would like to see your country brought to its knees on the battlefield for what it has done to mine, I would not like to end the lives of millions of Chinese civilians in doing so. That said, I think it is prudent to set the ground rules for this conversation. I will go first,” Wencang stated.
“Very well General, go ahead.” The PM replied.
“Firstly, I want to make sure that you understand that I am a professional air-force officer. I do not condone the murder of civilians through the use of nuclear weapons or otherwise although I wouldn’t hesitate in the slightest if I had to do it for my nation. Secondly, I am going to go as far as to admit that India has fought us to a draw in multiple sectors. Thirdly, your nation is waging all-out war on mine by attacking our merchant shipping lines, splintering Tibet and launching decapitating strikes against this country’s leadership. A
nd as such, if this continues, I am left with no recourse but to use nuclear weapons even more liberally than this morning. That is where we have come,” Wencang said and leaned back in his chair.
“General,” the PM stated, “I accept your points but I want to remind you that your country has already tried doing all of what you stated and more! Simply because we were more effective in doing what you tried and failed does not eliminate the perpetrators and their guilt. Secondly, we are at the point now where your nation has already used nuclear weapons against a third party, Bhutan, after invading it without provocation! We did not wage war through Bhutan as your media has been claiming for the last two weeks. But we did respond to your country’s blatant aggressions there. And when defeated, you resorted to the vile use of nuclear weapons. There will be reparations for that, General. I assure you.”
“You used Tibet to try and bleed us! We did the same to Bhutan! I see no difference whatsoever between the two!” Wencang replied sharply.
“And I disagree. So what is the purpose of this conversation, General?” the PM asked calmly. Wencang now leaned forward.
“To end this war while our nations are still left standing, Mr. Prime-Minister. I propose that both sides declare a ceasefire at midnight tonight and withdraw immediately to their pre-war locations. That both sides issue statements to that effect and initiate multiple level government contacts to ensure that there are no misunderstandings.”
“We want more than that, I am afraid,” the PM stated.
Wencang sighed. Of course you do!
“Very well, Mr. Prime-Minister. I am listening.”
EAST OF DAULAT-BEG-OLDI
LADAKH
DAY 15 + 2330 HRS
“Fire!” Kulkarni ordered.
The Arjun tank shuddered and the smoke escaped into the turret as the expended shell casing dropped back from the main gun. The smell of cordite was thick in the cramped surroundings. He continued to peer though the sights while the gunner began loading up the next round from the ready-to-use storage.
Further north, a small fireball erupted and metal pieces flew up in the air followed by flames, visible on his night-vision optics as licks of white on a green background. Kulkarni felt the tank rumble as the driver turned it left to maneuver. But the turret remained stabilized on the target lazed by the gunner.
“Sabot up!” his loader shouted over the comms traffic chatter.
“Rhino-One, this is Rhino-Command,” the radio squawked in his headset. Kulkarni identified the voice of his 43RD Regiment Commander calling from headquarters collocated near Colonel Sudarshan’s. Kulkarni pressed the headset closer over his ears as the message came in: “We are seeing enemy armor opposite your lines in retreat to the northeast! Can you confirm? Over.”
He poked through the optics again. He saw three remaining Chinese T-99s turning their hulls to the northeast as they retreated, deploying aerosol clouds from their turret canisters…
“Uh, roger,” he replied, his voice reflecting the uncertainty over what was happening amongst the enemy positions. “I confirm enemy armor retreating in full to the northeast, abandoning prepared positions along the M-S-R! Over!”
Kulkarni checked around and saw on his battlefield-management-system that there were seven other Arjun MBTs still reporting active from the regiment. They had been fighting here for days. And had taken heavy losses while doing so. But there had been few, if any, reinforcements. More to the point, the arrival of the 43RD Armored Regiment had stabilized the front opposite numerous Chinese armor units. And so both sides had been slugging it out over here for days with ever dwindling resources on either side.
The 43RD AR was down to a force of just three effective platoons, but they still occupied positions two kilometers east of the original LAC…
“Rhino-Command,” Kulkarni said as he looked away from the BMS and peered through the optics again, “Rhino is ready to charge and pursue! I have two platoons with me here and I am good to go! Over!”
“Negative, Rhino-One,” the regiment commander replied. “Do not pursue enemy armor. Rhino will hold positions and terminate all further combat operations until further orders! Do you copy?”
The gunner and the loader turned around from their stations to face Kulkarni who looked just as surprised. But he wasn’t about to question his orders…
“Wilco! Rhino is holding!”
What the hell… He thought as he backed away from the optics just as the radio chimed off.
“Sir, did the war just get over?” his loader asked softly.
Kulkarni shook his head in silence, opened the hatch above and pulled himself out into the freezing cold winds. He heard the sounds of artillery fire stopping on the horizon and so did the infantry gunfire noises.
He pulled out his binoculars and noticed that all other seven Arjun tanks around him had also ceased fire. He put the binoculars to his eyes and observed northeast to see the departing dust clouds as Chinese armor pulled away. All surviving Arjun MBTs on the frontline also jerked to a halt and switched off their engines.
Kulkarni heard the whipping rotor blade noise of helicopters and turned back to see the two LCHs under Wing-Commander Dutt and 199HU banking away, departing the warzone as they disappeared into the darkness to the south. There were still random bursts of distant gunfire over the horizon, but they were more erratic and random now.
An eerie silence fell over the valley that soldiers in Ladakh from both sides had not heard for more than two weeks…
“Rhino-One, this is –Two. Did the war just end?” the radio squawked.
“Looks like it, –Two,” Kulkarni replied, removed his headset and rubbed his eyes as the moment finally hit him.
It’s over!
EPILOGUE
CHUMBI VALLEY
DAY 16 + 1030 HRS
Colonel Thomas saw the column of PLA soldiers trudging through the valley to the south under watchful eyes of his paratroopers, now wearing their red berets instead of the combat helmets. Their Tavor rifles were slung on their chests and their heavy backpacks were on their shoulders as they carefully escorted the last few columns of the survivors from the PLA 11TH Division who had surrendered. His radioman was standing behind him as Thomas watched the column of men pass by him. Each of them gave Thomas a silent, grim glance but said nothing. When the last of those soldiers had walked away, he sighed and began walking as well, leaving the exposed positions they had occupied a few days before.
The encirclement was over.
And their job was done.
The valley would remain unoccupied by both sides for now. As with the rest of Tibet, Bhutan and Ladakh, there were plans in place for the valley as well in the coming weeks.
THIMPU
BHUTAN
DAY 16 + 1230 HRS
The Dechencholing palace grounds were a hotbed of activity as the King of Bhutan stepped out of the interior buildings wearing the traditional Bhutanese formal dress along with General Potgam in his camo-uniform and beret. The vast number of journalists that had arrived in Thimpu immediately following the ceasefire began throwing questions in a flurry as the King and Potgam walked up to them.
Potgam winced from the camera flashes as the King stared to the south and remained silent. The journalists caught his glare and turned back as well to see the massive light-brown dust cloud rising into the blue afternoon sky above the white-capped peaks south of Thimpu.
The King then turned to see a similar cloud drifting east from the northern hills as well. It took him every ounce of self-restrain he had to prevent tears in his eyes, but even so, a single tear ran down his cheek which was instantly grabbed on camera flashes by the media.
He turned away and saw Potgam standing stoically next to him while the cold winds were shaking the blades of the parked AW-101 helicopter on the grounds behind him, its cockpit glass reflecting the noon sunlight. He removed a small handkerchief from his dress and wiped the tear away, cleared his throat and then turned back to the flashing cameras to
outline his request for humanitarian assistance to deal with the nuclear fallout over his once-pristine Himalayan Kingdom…
CHAGRI DORJEDEN MONASTARY
NORTHERN BHUTAN
DAY 18 + 1430 HRS
Vikram took the three cups from the monks and walked over into the courtyard to find Captain Pathanya lying on the small wooden plank-sheathed bed, his left leg wrapped with thick bandages applied by the monks the day before. He was soaking up the sun despite the chilly winds battering hillsides that day.
Vikram walked over and Tarun took his cup from Vikram as he did a balancing act with the cups. Vikram walked up to the edge of the cot and handed Pathanya one of the two steaming cups just as the latter sat up straighter on the bed. Vikram finally took his last cup and walked over to where he had set his backpack and the Tavor rifle on the wall. He sat down, leaned against that wall and sipped the steaming tea, enjoying the taste, the hot fluid and most importantly, the calm…
Bhutan was quiet now, and for the last two days the three men had heard no more explosions or gunfire. And that was a welcome change to Vikram in particular, who had grown tired of it after so many days out here. But at the time they did have other problems on their hands.
The three men had walked south from their positions west of Barshong after the nuclear attack.
They had trekked over the freezing snow-capped ridges south of Barshong and had walked for more than a day and a half, with Vikram and Tarun taking turns to help Pathanya with his crushed left leg, until they had spotted the orange-brown rooftops of this monastery northwest of Dotanang.
They had walked over to the gates of the monastery on the verge of exhaustion and had been found by the monks inside. The occupants of the monastery had taken the three Indian soldiers inside and given them hot food and whatever medical aid they could. They had even sent a couple of young teenage monks as runners to try and reach the surviving Indian paratroopers at Dotanang to the south for assistance.