China stacks 60,000 soldiers against India along LAC: US Secy of State

US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo announced on Friday that China has amassed 60,000 troops along the LAC as he urged for closer ties between India and the US by saying that India “absolutely need the United States to be their ally and partner in this fight”.

“They’ve stacked 60,000 soldiers against the Indians in the north. When the Australians had the temerity to ask for an investigation of the Wuhan virus and where it began, something that we know a lot about, the Chinese Communist Party threatened them. They bullied them.” said Pompeo on Fox News.

Ahead of his visit to New Delhi accompanying US defence secretary Mark Esper for annual talks with the Indian contingent, Pompeo spoke about the border conflict between India and China and mentioned about China’s “bad behaviour”. “They absolutely need the United States to be their ally and partner in this fight,” he said.

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Foreign ministers of four countries — the US, India, Australia and Japan also known as the Quad countries met in Tokyo earlier on Tuesday to hold in-person discussion for the first time after the COVID-19 pandemic took over the globe. With his return to the US, Pompeo have given three interviews where he mentioned China and also about the recent strife with India.

He said that the four nations are keen on developing a set of policies to form a resistance against the Chinese and the threats that it poses to each of the members of the Quad.

Speaking on The Guy Benson Show, Pompeo said, “I was with my foreign minister counterparts from India, Australia, and Japan… four big democracies, four powerful economies, four nations, each of whom has real risk associated with the threats attempting to be imposed by the Chinese Communist Party. And they see it in their home countries too.”

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In his third interview post the Quad nations meet in Tokyo, the US secretary of state said on Fox News, “We need partners and friends. They’ll certainly try to react. But what the Chinese Communist Party had become accustomed to, frankly, for an awfully long time was watching America bend a knee, watching us turn the other cheek and appease them.

“That only encouraged their bad behaviour, their malign activity. Our push back ? they understand we’re serious about it. They’ve watched that we’re going to confront them and impose costs upon them. I am confident that this activity, over time, will change the nature of what the Chinese Communist Party tries to do to harm America,” he said.

India and China have been have been at loggerheads along the eastern Ladakh border for over five months now. Talks have been going on between the two sides to ease tensions at the LAC.

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