The Baisaran Bloodbath: Will we see a Balakot 2.0?

Are India and Pakistan—both nuclear-armed states—hurtling towards a bloody confrontation?

The Baisaran Bloodbath, the brutal, ghastly massacre by Pakistani terrorists of these unsuspecting tourists in Pahalgam who had been lulled into a false sense of complacency has pushed India and Pakistan to the edge.

Are India and Pakistan—both nuclear-armed states—hurtling towards a bloody confrontation?

Will we see a Balakot 2.0? When Pakistan least expects it? Lowers its guard? Why wasn't there an immediate response to Pahalgam?

Right now, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's strategy to tackle Pakistan’s adventurism - Or should we amend that to the Pakistan Army chief Gen Asim Munir's adventurism – is only unfolding.

India has ticked the usual boxes.

The economic chokehold is being initiated by shutting down the Wagah- Attari border where a tiny trickle of goods goes through. We've pared down Pakistan's High Commissions, declaring the military attaches persona non grata. And then there 's the suspension of the Indus Water Treaty with the the threat to scrap it later – that's a direct threat to turn Punjab, Pakistan's most prosperous and prized Province into a wasteland.

It may or may not be an empty threat, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi clearly sees Pakistan as having crossed a red line with Pahalgam.

The terror attack put him on the spot during a high-profile visit to Saudi Arabia, also a time when the US Vice President JD Vance and his family were on an official visit to India.

Most analysts are saying Pakistan is playing from an age old playbook -- they're drawing a parallel with the Pakistan-sponsored terrorists' massacre of Sikhs in Chhatisinghpora in 2000, just as the US President Bill Clinton was about to address the Joint houses of parliament in Delhi.

While we've seen the attacks on India's Parliament and the Mumbai 26/11 attack – go unanswered, we saw Pulwama and India respond with a Balakot.

There hasn't been a Balakot so far. But will there be a military response?

And is that what Pakistan wants? Is it an attempt to get the US' attention. The world's attention?

Washington at least seems to have an India-leaning stance with the US government slamming the New York Times for calling the terrorists 'militants'.

What is India’s next move going to be?

Do we lash out militarily?

Talking about these issues are three of India's most well-informed experts on the region:

General Sathish Nair – Commissioned into the Rajput Regiment, he has extensive experience of tackling the managing the Line of Control and counter-insurgency operations in that area, as well as high-altitude warfare in Sikkim and Leh. He commanded the CI Force which was responsible for the security in the Rajouri Sector in the lower reaches of Jammu and Kashmir.

Avinash Mohananey, a former officer with the Intelligence Bureau has served in Jammu and Kashmir and and has served in Pakistan as well, and interacted with Pakistan's army officers and its political elite. A prolific writer and commentator, he's a Pakistan expert.

Luv Puri – Author, iournalist and analyst, he has worked on peace and security issues for almost 25 years. While serving with the UN department of political affairs in New York, he worked on key assignments with the UN Secretary General's and office on counter-terrorism. He is an award-winning journalist for his coverage of Jammu and Kashmir who has done field work in Occupied J&K, and is a Fulbright scholar.

First, let's look at the attack on the tourists in the Baisaran meadow –– The Kashmiri tour operators who took them up on horseback were as shocked as the tourists when the terrorists emerged from the surrounding forests and picked out the men and boys –– killing 25 after asking them whether they were Hindus. And a Kashmiri Muslim horseman who attempted to come to their rescue.

Was this an intelligence failure?

It's being said that the Tuesday massacre was a direct fallout of the Pakistan Army Chief Gen Asim Munir's speech at Kakul. Why is the Pakistan Army raking up the Hindu–Muslim identity at this present moment? Was it the fact that J&K held successful elections? That the status of the UNION Territory was now irrevocable – more so now, after the attack.

The Kashmiri tour operators are devastated. The Tourist season is as good as dead in the water. The end of the Kashmiri summer. But looking at the protests across Kashmir, has Pakistan miscalculated the depth of support that militancy once had across Kashmir, even with the abrogation of statehood and the anger at that point. Is that over?

There's talk about The Resistance Front, which claimed responsibility for the brutal killing initially and has now gone back on its claim, activating its sleeper cells. So while the big question is over the intel failure, will these cells be our first target in the clean-up operation that is underway.

And we must also ask: Whether there's a direct link between the Pakistan Army Chief's speech and Pahalgam? Whether Pakistan still has the support of the local populace? Apart from how well-planned the attack was, and the manner in which the hapless victims' religious identity was an issue, why was there not even one police outpost, no security at all?

Srinagar's duo-centric polity must come under a uniform single leadership if even a semblance of security is to be restored. And the Kashmiris -- from the Gujjars and the Bakherwals, the Muslims in the valley to the pandits in Jammu -- must be trusted to see the benefits of staying on India's side. That they held protests against the Pahalgam bloodshed was the first real sign of the shift, that Pakistan can no longer use fear and intimidation and religion to keep them bent to their will.

Pakistan of course, has predictably denied all involvement, warned India against using False Flag pretexts, all but implying falsely that India engineered the massacre. There's a lot of movement of Pakistan fighter and military aircraft at Pakistan's air bases along the LOC. IS an attack by Pakistan imminent? Or is it merely sabre-rattling?

The Strike

Many of the punitive measures that India has taken seems to be a bid to buy time until it strikes militarily.

Why suspend the Indus waters treaty?

The rationale behind suspending the Indus Water Treaty is, according to Pakistani sources, a precursor to India controlling the waters, and that allegedly is something that India has wanted to do for some time. They say India now plans to divert and store the water in larger storage tanks than the ones they have in place currently. And tap it to increase electricity and power generation.

The differences do go back. The disagreement over the Kishanganga Hydro project across the Neelum River, a tributary of the Indus River, went to The Hague for arbitration and the ruling there went in India's favour. Other Hydropower projects have come up. But in a sign that Pakistan is extremely nervous about India's potent water weapon, it has said any move to deny Pakistan the Indus waters will be considered an act of war.

(Background - Pakistan and India signed IWT in 1960. Pakistan got the Jhelum, Chenab and Indus. India got the Sutlej, Beas and Ravi. India can use western rivers to tap unrestricted hydropower, irrigation, drinking water and navigation.)

What happens to Pakistan's agriculture, and the water supply to Pakistan’s three main cities cod Lahore, Karachi and Multan if India, the upper riparian state goes ahead in the coming years and stops the water?

Pakistan's response?

Chiefly, suspending all bilateral agreements including the 1972 Simla Agreement, which basically lays down the Line of Control as the actual border. Does Pakistan no longer see the LoC as the border? What are the implications of that?

Pakistan is not backing down. It anticipates an Indian military response, which Rawalpindi expects will be different from the surgical strike of Balakot that caught Pakistan napping, although, only for less than 24 hours! Pakistan's retaliation came soon after with Pakistan's counter-strike when It shot down an IAF pilot, took him prisoner and finally handed him over.

What are the lessons learnt from Pulwama?

Pakistan has now closed its airspace to Indian aircraft. It's already moving its air defence assets - its Airborne Early Warning Control and its Electronic Intelligence Units from the Southern Sector to the North, just as it did after the 2016 surgical war strikes. It has held military exercises near the Jhelum River. It has warned that it will test its surface to surface missiles off the coast of Karachi.

What does that signal? Is Pakistan preparing for war? Is it stoking war fears.

And could we revisit Operation Parakram - It's the wat that top strategic analysts described as the war that wasn't! Until now, its been described as the largest mobilization of Indian troops

Can we expect something similar. Or now that technology has changed, would it be more about air power, and drones?

Could you give us an idea of whether – unlike Kargil – the civilian and the military leadership are on the same page in Pakistan. Pakistan's then hand picked Army Chief General Musharraf played dirty with then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif after Lahore - and the Sharifs paid a huge price. But today you have silence from Nawaz – and Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, and his key ministers Khwaja Asif and Ishaq Dar issuing statements that are in line with General Asim Munir, who ironically, owed his appointment as army chief to the Sharifs.

Do Pakistan's civilian leaders not see the perils of going to war with India?

What is Pakistan's game?

Are they looking at International intervention – looking at the Trump of 2015, who offered to mediate, rather than the Trump of today, who has condemned the terror attack and taken the New York Times to task for calling the Pahalgam killers 'militants' rather than terrorists.

I'm not sure whether the pictures that are being circulated on social media showing them dressed in army fatigues and armed with weapons are accurate. But either way this President Trump doesn't seem inclined to play mediator and has even described Baisaran as India's Hamas moment. JD Vance, meanwhile, had a first-hand taste of it being as he was in India. What can India expect from Washington?

On the possible military response?

What are Pakistan's strengths and weaknesses? Do they have superior air firepower with their F-16s as opposed to India's ageing MIGs and S-400s. Granted we have brand new Rafales, but they are as yet untested in combat.

Has India not kept its security apparatus up to date? What do we need vis-a-vis our Airpower and our Ground Combat capabilitiesto monitor movement along the LOC.

Could you tell us where we stand militarily – if we do go to war?

AND

What will be Pakistan’s response to an Indian cross-border attack?

Will there be collateral damage on the Indian side of the Line of Control - hundreds of families live along the border villages in Kathua and Suchetgarh – in thatched roof houses - the Indian population would be at huge risk.

Do we have the capability to thwart it? As Israel does with its David's Sling, its Iron Dome and its drones?

The other key question is SHOULD the military have the ability to react suo moto -- without the sanction of the civilian leadership, in cases like this? Or would that be politically incorrect?

AND if India does attack selected targets –- not just the headquarters of one of the terror groups as we did in Balakot, but a multiplicity of madrassas, this could actually kill thousands of young students and children, the kind of attacks in Gaza that Israel executes with impunity. Would we choose to take that path? Could we live with that?

How much of a threat are the Jaish e Mohammed and the Lashkar e Toiba and the Lashkar e Jhangvi today? Are they still active, are they backed and funded by the Pakistani Inter Service intelligence and ISI and the military to the same level that they were in the past?

There were reports some years ago that there was a complete electrical power grid shutdown in Mumbai, and this was China messing with our systems.

Do we have the capability for a non-kinetic – non-attributable options – like cyber offense , electronic warfare , cognitive psy wars against Pakistan public.

What will be the aim of the kinetic options be against Pakistan?

What about the military options?

Are we aiming at capturing territory, destroying terror infrastructure, degrading the Pakistan military by attacking one of its airbases -– the Sargodha air base?

Will that invite huge repercussions? Or are we attempting another 1971.

With Nuclear weapons

Pakistan is no pushover either.

India and Pakistan are both nuclear-armed countries. But back in 2000, when Nawaz Sharif was summoned to Washington after Kargil, he was told by President Bill Clinton that the biggest threat was to Pakistan itself as nuclear weapons were under the control of mid-level officers. The international community has now long seen Pakistan as a nursery of terror. 26/11 and the Mumbai attacks clearly pointed to the role played by Pakistan ISI backed terror groups and now that Tawahurr Rana has been sent to India, and David Headley has spilled the beans - Pakistan's game is up. Even the middle east is looking at it with grave suspicion. Do you agree?

AND Could we also look at Beijing. Where does that leave China? Does it have the mindspace to bring Washington down but tackle its wayward ally Pakistan as well?

All eyes are on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has received support from all the major countries across the world. He has spoken in English from the heart of Bihar's Madhubani, clearly sending a message to the West.

What exactly India does receive in terms of that support will be seen in the coming days; will it be better intel, state of the art military equipment from Washington and Israel?

In conclusion, as India sets out the narrative to put an economic chokehold on Pakistan, put it back on the Financial Action Task Force watchlist, steps up the diplomatic pressure to isolate Pakistan internationally, with a public shaming, with incontrovertible proof of the Military–Inter Services Intelligence involvement, we must also step up our sanitization of the Kashmir Valley. Track down terrorists in the upper reaches of the mountains to the terror launchpads so that there is no repeat of Pahalgam.

India may be leaning towards a war by other means as it whips up world anger against an enemy it had mistakenly thought it had outmanoeuvred, even whipped into submission. But for Pakistan, a second provocation, another Pahalgam would only be a nuclear Armageddon.