The twin terror attacks in Samba today witnessed the expected response from our Parkinson’s afflicted polity – actions following previous set pattern, much to the glee of Pakistan and China. The empty official statements that ‘we will not let peace talks derail by these dastardly acts’. A minister with his artificial accent kept questioning what other political parties had done during their rule. A former diplomat who was earlier trying to justify withdrawal from Siachen and is currently referred to as “PMO’s Puppy” by his veteran colleagues, was seen justifying Manmohan Singh must meet Nawaz Sharif and ask the latter what his forces are up to. Surprisingly, a veteran kept suggesting that Pakistan should be asked to reduce the terrorist camps in POK – as if reducing 42 terrorist camps to say 25-30 will make any difference. Of course his political leanings and supine statements help his repeated appearances on the controlled national TV in backdrop of approaching elections.
…these attacks across the IB are not without the active participation / concurrence of the Pakistani Army; there is every possibility that regular Pakistani personnel participated in the attack; planning for these attacks would have been done by the Pakistani Military…
The Chief Minister, forever dreaming of himself as Sadr-i-Riyasat, keeps harping on talks with Pakistan in complete disregard to loss of lives of J&K Police and civilians leave aside his disdain of the military. What is different from the previous series of incidents? Arguably the only difference is Anthony not repeating “Terrorists came in Pakistani Army uniform” and the Army Chief repeating that ‘we are not wearing bangles’. So where is the peace that is to be talked about and what is the peace process that is being derailed?
What our jaundiced hierarchy cannot understand is the following: these attacks across the IB are not without the active participation / concurrence of the Pakistani Army; there is every possibility that regular Pakistani personnel participated in the attack; planning for these attacks would have been done by the Pakistani Military – more offshoots of the Karachi Project; terrorist camps in Pakistan and POK had been merged with the military posts / establishments even prior to Op ‘Parakaram’ to obviate India undertake their bombing like Israel does; Pakistani Army is actively involved in pushing terrorists across the border – a fact that even the polity of J&K and the central leadership does not deny; Pakistan’s foreign policy with its attenuated strategy of terror is evolved and controlled by the Pakistani Military over which Nawaz Sharif has absolutely no lien; Nawaz Sharif will be meeting Manmohan Singh from a position of psychological strength, more so, because the Paki establishment has already conveyed that any meaningful dialogue with India will be with the next government; should Manmohan Singh muster courage to raise the issue of terrorism, Nawaz’s standard reply will be “we too are victims of terror”; the Pakistani military will be laughing all the way home as the nose of its counterpart is rubbed in the mud, whether you wear bangles or not is not the issue!
Manmohan’s compulsions may well be because of the nudging from Uncle Sam to continue talks though the MEA denies this with the standard response of “no pressures”. But why can’t Manmohan tell Obama that we can’t keep clapping with one hand even if it suits US national interests. There has to be a limit to what India’s public can take even though the hierarchy may have stashed their balls abroad along with all the black money. What the government also needs to seriously examine is whether there is a larger long-term plan to all this and if is it linked with the ethnic cleansing in Kishtwar area that is becoming increasingly clear despite all the official obfuscation. Our lack of strategic culture should not desist us from ignoring the fresh guidelines that were issued by Al Qaeda’s Ayman-al-Zawahiri for jihad on the anniversary of 9/11 which included J&K as one of the areas for spreading terror. Though he also reportedly gave instructions to his followers not to attack innocents including Christians, Hindus and Sikhs living in Muslim lands but then India doesn’t come into the ambit of ‘Muslim lands’. Besides, we just witnessed some 75 Christians butchered in Pakistan – Muslim land and that too nuclear.
There is also urgent need to gear up security of garrisons notwithstanding the fact that whoever takes the initiative will score better. What have we learned from Kaluchak, Tanda and now Samba?
The war in Afghanistan has firmed the nexus between Al Qaeda and LeT with the latter opting for global jihad that does not exclude India. Large number of LeT cadres have been joining Al Qaeda and even filling up voids in Al Qaeda hierarchy that occurred because of US Predator attacks – as acknowledged by US intelligence. There is no reason, why JeM and Hizbul Mujahideen will not join them with all the political links in J&K including PDP and Hurriyat no matter the denials. After all it is all about power, big money and spreading jihad. Add to this the extended terror factories of Pakistan post US withdrawal from Afghanistan and the hoards of Taliban that the Paki military will like to divert to India, which may well be Punjabi Taliban. It may be remembered that of the 9000 Pakistani Taliban fighting in Afghanistan along with Pakistani military disguised as Taliban at the time of the US invasion, 6000 were from Pakistan’s Punjab and the US facilitated their air evacuation from areas like Kunduz and Khost.
The question is where do we go from here? First, the most difficult part will be for the polity to retrieve their balls in order to build some will. Second, there is no reason to talk to Pakistan till they shut down their terror camps in POK especially since these can’t be ignored under cover “we too are victims of terror”. It is only after this that we should think of any talks. Third, India must develop a coherent deterrent against unconventional threats, mere diplomacy having failed miserably and threats having magnified. Our Special Forces potential must be optimized and be central in responding to asymmetric threats. Fourth, years back when terrorist started appearing in military uniforms, demands had been raised that such cloth should not be available in open market. This must be given due thought including military accouterments, badges of ranks etc. Incidentally, no country including Pakistan permits its police and para-militay forces to wear same badges of rank as the military. This nonsense only continues in India, which needs to be stopped.
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As for the Army, what downward spiral its prestige is taking must be acknowledged and checked. Showcasing empty statements that the morale of the Army is not affected either does not cut ice with the public even though uniformed personnel cannot be expected to say otherwise and veterans currying favour with the hierarchy will continue to deny it. What the Army also needs to do is to go pro-active commensurately. There is also urgent need to gear up security of garrisons notwithstanding the fact that whoever takes the initiative (Paki army-terrorists do and we are shy of it) will score better. What have we learned from Kaluchak, Tanda and now Samba ?
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For some reason, this site does not publish my comments, which is unfortunate.
Well analysed article. It is a pity that inspite of our clearly knowing that all terror activities across the border are sponsored and managed by Pak army, our Govt functionaries try to give it a twist to bail out Pak. Also as rightly pointed out by the author, we should stop listening to Pak’s argument “We are also victims of terror”. So what? They are the victims of their own creation and hence must pay the price for it. We need to debate the issue at national level (by taking all political parties into confidence) whether the country ought to continue the talks; the UPA govt alone cant decide the issue. There is no doubt that “Enough is enough” and we ought to act tough and ignore uncle Sam’s personal interest in the world affairs.
Compliments to the author for also bringing out that the morale of the forces can not be sustained if we keep taking beating so often and remain handcuffed to retaliate.
I am no military person but I have heard about various military options to tackle Pakistan which are short of full scale war. Generals on TV and print media keep talking about launching artillery attacks on camps in PoK, inserting special forces and of course launching air attacks by the IAF. But the caveat is that the things can escalate and spiral out of control leading to a potential nuclear exchange. What I have understood is that our defensive thinking has made us incapable of launching aggresive attacks and owning up the consequences in a manly fashion. We are scared of being labelled as aggressors even when we are under tremendous cross border attacks. Our political and diplomatic elite are very happy to remain eternal good boys in the eyes of international community. Our humungous military and nuclear weapons just doesn’t deter any one. Fear of escalation and collateral damage has totally frozen our will power. We will keep on justifying our weakness with scholarly platitudes and the nation will keep on waiting till our rulers get their balls back which will eventually bring them out of wretched impotency.
Any great achievements you would like to boast of yourself as senior general in the army since you seemed not to be affected by Parkinson’s disease.
I agree to general consensus in India that, send a commando unit across the border in civilian clothes and shoot the Pakistanis out.
But an advice to you General; wars are easier to start but difficult to manage later. So remember that in your hawkish views.
Read the book ‘India’s Special Forces – History and Future of Indian Special Forces, wait for my autobiography or you are welcome to drop in and discuss. Your questions cannot be answered within constraints of this space. You have another alternative – to say that we are doing just fine!