India-Pakistan military engagement came to a pause at 5 pm on May 10 following a telephonic talk between the directors general of military operations of the two countries, with a plan for the next round of talks. However, Pakistan violated the truce barely a few hours later when it launched artillery and drone strikes on the night between May 10 and 11.
Operation Sindoor, launched on May 7 in response to the April 22 Pakistan-backed terror attack on civilians in Pahalgam, has not been formally called off yet, but efforts are on to restore peace. Indian combat aircraft, long-range stand-off weapons, missiles, drones and counter-drone systems played a key role in the operation. However, drones had a unique place due to their disruptive and asymmetric capabilities.
India kicked off Operation Sindoor by striking nine terrorist sites in Pakistan in the early hours of May 7. To prevent escalation, no Pakistani military or civilian installations were targeted. Sindoor (or vermilion) is traditionally worn by married women on the head or forehead, and is wiped when they become widows. This code name was chosen to honour the women who had lost their husbands at Pahalgam.
Pakistan, however, struck Indian military and civilian sites on the night of May 7 using armed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), loitering and other drones en masse, moving up the escalation ladder that India had tried to avoid. The Pakistan Air Force tried to engage the Indian Air Force in aerial battle; in response, the IAF struck deep and neutralised airfields, radars, command and control centres, air defence systems, military installations, and other critical targets and war-waging potential of the PAF.
Pakistan predominantly employed five low-cost options: drones, missiles, artillery guns, terrorism and propaganda. Out of these, the scope and extent of employing four elements—missiles, artillery, terrorism and propaganda—are reasonably well known. However, it is the use of drones that is changing the dynamics of military engagement between the two countries. It remained below the threshold of conventional war despite some initial concerns about nuclear blackmail by Pakistan.
Pakistan’s inventory primarily comprised Akinci drones from Turkey, CH-3 and CH-4 from China, manufactured under licence from Italy’s FALCO, Luna-2000 from Germany, indigenous Shahpur-2, Shahpur-3, Sarfirosh kamikaze munitions, GM-500 Turah stealth drones, Uqab-II drones, and small drones developed by the country’s private entities. Turkey offered not only solidarity to Pakistan, but also supplies of Assiguard Sonagar armed drones and Byker Yika III loitering drones.
Pakistan employed drones en masse for probing and striking at military and civilian targets, and saturating air defences. It also unsuccessfully tried to use drone strikes to create religious disharmony by aiming at religious sites and spreading rumours about similar strikes by India. Its periodic and large-scale employment of drones was effectively countered by Indian integrated air defence and counter-drone systems, and inflicted high attrition on Pakistan.
India deployed a number of missiles, stand-off weapons, drones, and counter-drone and air defence systems for defensive and offensive operations. Its indigenous systems emerged as bright sparks in this aerial contest. The Akash missiles, radars, loitering drones, drone swarms, D4 (drone detect, deter and destroy) systems, drone jammers, other unmanned systems and Akashteer network were at the forefront. Light combat aircraft and helicopters were ready to take on contingencies. These systems, developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation, public sector units, startups and Indian innovators played varying roles in this short contest. Its upgraded L-70 and ZSU-23 guns were in action in blunting Pakistan’s drone strikes.
The battle experience provided an opportunity to test and validate capabilities, and the limitations and challenges of the indigenous systems. The lessons learnt would help in instituting design improvements, raising quality standards and planning of future upgrades with the end result being better products that are likely to be more robust and could have greater global acceptability in the global market.
The unexpected attack, India’s graded response and phased escalation would have given Ministry, users, finance, and other stakeholders an opportunity to analyse challenges that could be leveraged for fine tuning policies, structures and mechanisms for stimulating indigenous research, innovations, spiral development, facilitating smooth procurement of indigenous equipment and their operationalisation.
The aerial contest may have been halted for now, but the threat of rogue and hostile drones and drone swarms may increase in future. The early induction of indigenous quick-reaction surface-to-air missiles or QRSAMs and fire control radars; launching the development of advanced indigenous autonomous anti-aircraft cum anti-drone guns, and using stealth wing flying test bed or SWIFT as armed precision-strike platforms are areas for introspection.
Operation Sindoor is a proof of the salience of thoughtful employment of air power in less-than-war scenarios and the benefits of indigenous technologies. The significant contributions of indigenous drones, counter-drones, missiles, integrated air defence and other systems in defending the country were the result of India’s push for atmanirbharta and innovation initiatives comprising indigenous design, development and manufacturing, innovation for defence excellence or iDEX, and the Mehar Baba unmanned aerial system swarm competitions.
Group Capt R K Narang, VM (Retd)
Former IAF officer and Senior Fellow at the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses
(Views are personal)