The surgical strikes by India had caught Pakistan by surprise. This, despite India’s warning that it reserved the right to retaliate at a place and time of its own choosing. The highly professional operation was like a slap in the face of General Raheel Sharif, who was hailed in Pakistan as some sort of a self-styled Napoleon. Gen Sharif had nightmarish memories of the flak his predecessor (Gen Kayani) had to face over the US Seals raid on Abottabad. Pakistani auto-rickshaws had painted sarcastic posters on their backs: “Don’t honk loudly, you might wake up the army which is sound asleep”. He decided to brazen it out and denied any such raid had taken place at all.
Sadly, some Indian political parties were quick to pick up the enemy line just to embarrass the ruling party. A needless controversy was created which took some of the shine off the excellent operation. Such events, however, cannot be hidden forever. Bits and pieces of evidence soon surfaced in Pakistan and in radio intercepts. Stung Gen Sharif decided to react almost a month after the strikes. This way he hoped the two events would not be linked. More importantly, this would heat up the LoC just days before his retirement (November 29). If an escalation took place, he might not have to retire after all!
The Pakistani retaliation came in the form of a moderately heavy fire assault that was delivered over an extended frontage of almost 300 km from Akhnoor to Keran sector. Some 70 Indian posts and 40 villages were targeted with battalion small arms and infantry mortars ( 81/82 mm calibre). At some places, heavy calibre 120 mm mortars of the artillery were also employed.
In concert with this extended fire assault, the Pak Army also attempted three BAT actions on isolated detachments. In the Machail sector, terrorists operating with the SSG commandoes beheaded an Indian soldier. This led to outrage in India, and the Army retaliated with a concerted fire assault on four posts in the Keran sector; 75/24 mm artillery guns were used in direct shooting role and these posts were razed to the ground. Pakistan retaliated by more small arms and mortar fire that targeted some posts and villages, and killed eight civilians. India so far has refrained from escalating to the level of medium or heavy artillery or any of its multi-barrel rocket launchers.
Only these have the throw weight to inflict severe damage and punishment of an order which could force Pakistan to de-escalate. Confining fire exchanges to infantry small arms and mortars alone restricts the engagements to the level of the local battalion commanders and in effect delegates it down to the colonels and majors. Such engagements become very difficult to control because Pakistani colonels display a lot of local bravado and often will not heed instructions from their headquarters to de-escalate. Battalion-level exchanges have been going on since 1948 at varying levels of intensity. The only time these were silenced was when India engaged Pakistan in a virtual artillery war from 2000-2003.
The Bofors medium guns were used liberally and their burst fire techniques caused heavy casualties and havoc on the Pak Army which was forced to sue for a ceasefire by November 2003. The fact that this ceasefire held till recently (for 13 long years) was indicative of the punishment that Pakistan had received from Bofors. A similar artillery war had occurred along the Suez canal between Egypt and Israel in 1972.
Use of medium artillery (130-155 mm calibre) constitutes a serious escalation and hence has to be controlled at the corps and Army levels. This takes the initiative out of the hands of the local company and battalion commanders, and makes the process easier to control in a centralised manner. It is my experience that infantry small arms and mortars do little damage to troops in built-up defences and bunkers. There it mostly amounts to a waste of ammunition. Yes, in the open these can take a heavy toll but the entire LoC has now got extensive fortifications.
India seems keen not to escalate further for the time being. However, any such indication to Pakistan will only make it more adventurous. We could end up with a situation in which the use of battalion-level weapons carries on for years with minor casualties on both sides on a daily basis. If we wish to stop this, we clearly have to escalate to medium artillery and multi-barrel rocket systems and, if needed, to fighter attacks and cruise missile/rocket strikes.
The basic issue is to inflict pain of a level which can deter. We should not be too concerned about sending placatory signals on the hot lines. Ambiguity is the essence of such retaliation. The enemy should never be certain of the level to which one is ready to escalate. It should not be the case that India seems ready to strike but is afraid to wound. Pakistan has tested our patience enough and it should be quite clear about the fact that our limit of tolerance has been breached.gagandeep.bakshi@yahoo.com