Russia-China Mar '69 Clash

Was the Damansky Island incident just a random event without any planning? Did border patrols just meet at that first unfortunate day of shooting and accidentally get into something? If it were only chance, there probably would have been more detailed reports by the Chinese. The Russian sources, likewise, would probably have displayed less moral indignity and less discrepancy. We can rule this hypothesis out. There is plenty of evidence to show th

Russians responded similarly. When news spread to them of what had happened they held demonstrations and attacked the Chinese embassy. The sides then went back and forth responding to what the other had done and was doing. The uproar spread across the two countries.

The interesting thing here is that some sources report Russian accounts as saying they were outnumbered by 10:1 and other sources give Russian reports that they had almost 3000 men involved. At any rate, the Russians let the enemy advance, and then counterattacked with all their superior equipment. Soviet artillery buffeted strong at 1 p.m. hitting as much as four miles into the China interior. Finally the Chinese retreated and the Soviets claim they didn’t fire after them. The combat was over by 7 p.m. In that nine hours, the Russians lost about 60 men and the Chinese lost about 800. The Soviet machinery and maneuvering obviously worked.

Jackson, W. A. Douglas. The Russo-Chinese Borderlands: Zone of Peaceful Contact or Potential Conflict? Princeton, NJ: D. Van Nostrand Company, Inc., 1962.

Some topics in this essay:
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