Discussion on the role of the Red River shear zone, Yunnan and Vietnam, in the continental extrusion of SE Asia Journal, Vol. 163, 2006, 1025–1036
Résumé
In his recent paper, Searle (2006) acknowledges that the 1000 km long Ailao Shan–Red River shear zone is a large Miocene left-lateral shear zone, but speculates that left-lateral slip started after 21 Ma and claims that the total finite offset remains unknown. From this he concludes that continental extrusion was only a relatively minor tectonic factor during the India–Asia collision, as long argued by other workers (e.g. England & Houseman 1986; Cobbold & Davy 1988; Dewey et al. 1989; Houseman & England 1993). We summarize below the field and geochronological evidence that makes us maintain a viewpoint in better accordance with facts.