After the Surrender of 1971, Pakistan Chose a Low Cost Option of Proxy War - Using Terrorism as a State Policy against India
By
Satish Dua
14
December, 2020
Forty-nine
years ago, in 1971, India imposed a crushing defeat on Pakistan — the country
was split into two. Pakistan Army surrendered with 93,000 soldiers, which was
the biggest ever surrender after World War II. Smarting with this humiliation,
and earlier experiences of 1947 and 1965, Pakistan realised that it could not
match up to India in conventional terms. Therefore, in the eighties, they
adopted a different strategy — of bleeding India by a thousand cuts — based on
a proxy war, using terrorism as a State policy to wear out our security forces
and impose a heavy cost on India.
Lt. Gen. Jagjit Singh
Aurora (L) who played a significant role in India's victory in the 1971 war
with Bangladesh | Twitter/@ashokgehlot51
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Pakistan
Chose a Low Cost Option
Pakistan
began supporting militancy in Punjab, all the while fostering religious and
fundamentalist links with the Kashmir Valley. Pakistan had surplus ‘jihadi’
fighters, as their mission in Afghanistan was over after the Soviet
withdrawal. They also recruited and
supported disgruntled youth from the Valley. Pakistan encouraged fissiparous
forces in India by offering physical, moral, ideological, diplomatic and
financial support to terrorism — a low cost option.
Pushing
terrorists across the border or Line of Control (LoC) to perpetrate violence in
India ties up a disproportionately large number of Indian troops, and has the
added advantage of playing the deniability card. They actively disown the
terrorists. During the Kargil War, Pakistan even disowned its regular army
soldiers and refused to accept their bodies, in a bid to show that the
intrusion was the handiwork of irregulars.
India
obviously did no such thing. Hence, we suffered the consequences. We could only
take defensive measures. And this emboldened the adversary to become more
adventurous. The Mumbai bombings of 1993, Parliament attack of 2001 and 26/11
Mumbai attacks are scars hard to forget. And yet our response was less than
strong. In domestic discourse, and even beyond borders, India was labelled as a
soft State.
The deep
State of Pakistan continued reinventing the terror tactics. Palestine intifada
taught them that stone pelting is more acceptable in the Western world, which
sees it as a form of unarmed protest. Eventually, stone pelting was used
adroitly as a force multiplier while encounters with terrorists were in
progress in Jammu and Kashmir. In 2015, we began to witness use of social media
by terrorists and separatists to create anti-India narratives for
radicalisation and mobilisation of mobs for stone pelting and more.
India’s
Paradigm Shift
In 2016,
there was a spate of high-profile terror attacks – Pathankot Airbase attack,
and terrorists taking over 60 hostages at a six-storey building in Pampore. Uri
attack in September 2016, in which we lost our 18 soldiers, was the last straw.
India
decided to take the bold step of hitting at terrorist camps across the LoC in
Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). An even bolder step was taking the ownership
of the surgical strike, in sharp contrast with the deniability card that Pakistan
employs after pushing in terrorists across the LoC. This was India’s
announcement to Pakistan, and to the world, that we carried out these raids in
response to the terror attacks on our country, most notably Uri.
Uri brought
a paradigm shift in our modus operandi in dealing with cross-border terrorism.
A little over two years later, when we lost 40 CRPF men in Pulwama, true to its
recently stated stand, India launched precision air strikes at a terrorist camp
in Balakot, deep into Pakistani territory, beyond PoK. It was a bold attack on
a pinpoint target, and once again we took ownership. India also articulated the
doctrine of pre-emption — in case there is credible evidence of preparations
being made to target India, we reserve the right to launch a pre-emptive
strike.
India has
drawn new red lines, shed the soft State tag and started using State power as a
legitimate instrument for the protection of the State and furthering its
objectives. But, are such strikes enough by themselves? Are we drawing wrong
lessons from them?
Such
strikes, whether pre-emptive or retaliatory, are not as simple as they seem. In
addition to operational risks at the national level, the country has to be
prepared for any response at an escalatory ladder, from a skirmish to a
localised to a full-scale war. Therefore, while a bold response is a good shift
to tackle the terror paradigm, our armed forces also need to be muscular and
well prepared for retaliation at conventional levels.
For over a
decade, India’s military modernisation has been on the back burner for many
reasons. Armed forces have to be modernised and strengthened in conventional
terms, not so much to prosecute war, but more to avert one — by deterring the
enemy.
In the last
couple of years, some serious steps have been taken on defence modernisation,
and it paradoxically got an impetus due to the stand-off between India and
China in Ladakh, which amply demonstrates the need to have a muscular
capability, if we are to adopt a bold security policy successfully.
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Lieutenant
General (retd) Satish Dua @TheSatishDua was Corps Commander in Kashmir and
retired as the Chief of Integrated Defence Staff. Views are personal.
Original
Headline: Pakistan never ‘surrendered’ in 1971. Kashmir, 26/11, Parliament show
why
Source: The Print
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