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Pahalgam to Rawalpindi via DC: Tale of a conflict
India has asserted zero tolerance for terrorism from Pakistan, while Pakistan, backed by China, shows resilience.
India has shown that it will not accept terror attacks emanating from Pakistani soil and displayed serious political intent and military capacity to counter it. Pakistan has shown that it is not a pushover although the asymmetry in power was evident, and that it possesses military and diplomatic capabilities to stand its ground. China has shown that it will leave no stone unturned to use Pakistan to weaken India. And, America has shown that despite being a distracted power with the intent to do less in the rest of the world, it remains the decisive player in the international system to shape the course of war and peace.
That is the big picture that emerges out of the post-Pahalgam churn. But first here is a quick summary of how India and Pakistan got here based on the limited information in the public domain.
Pakistani-backed terrorists killed civilians based on their religion in Pahalgam. India decided that wasn’t acceptable and prepared for a fortnight before mounting unprecedented strikes in both Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and Punjab against nine terror camps and bases. With Chinese equipment and support, Pakistan was possibly able to inflict some damage on Indian air capabilities, a fact that India hasn’t yet publicly acknowledged. Pakistan then began an offensive against key Indian military bases across the western border, which India countered effectively and then responded by neutralising Lahore’s air defence system.
Pakistan then mounted a drone-based offensive against urban centres and military bases in India which were intercepted; India responded with drone attacks of its own on military sites in Pakistan. Pakistan continued its offensive the next day, adding missile strikes on Indian air bases. India lost patience and hit three key Pakistani Air Force bases, including the one in Rawalpindi. This led to a renewed Pakistani offensive against Indian military installations and civilian centres and the likely mobilisation of ground troops. All this while, cross-border shelling at the Line of Control (LoC) kept intensifying with an increasing loss of lives. At this point, on Saturday evening, as the world moved from being exasperated to alarmed, Donald Trump announced that US “mediation” had led to a ceasefire deal.
To be sure, this is a rough and incomplete story. The attacks and counter-attacks weren’t neat and sequential but often simultaneous and multi-domain. In the next few days, all sides will attempt to cast themselves as the victor. And, over the next few weeks and months, we will know a lot more about what happened between the night of May 7 and May 10 in New Delhi, Rawalpindi and Washington DC, at the LoC and International Border, in the skies, and who gained what and lost what. But based on an admittedly incomplete sketch, here is a set of preliminary conclusions.
One, India has institutionalised a new template. Uri gave an indication, Balakot provided further proof, but Operation Sindoor has established for sure that New Delhi has no political tolerance for major terror attacks on Indian soil anymore. From quick cross-border surgical strikes in 2016 and an air strike in PoK in 2019, India moved to conduct strikes in a wider geography against a larger set of targets in Pakistan. This was an impressive logistical and military feat. On Saturday, India also decided that any future terror attack would be considered an act of war.
The principle of zero tolerance for terror, when translated into real policy, means that Pakistan will have to really think hard about whether it wants to incite a wider conflict with India when it sends its boys across the border to shatter the calm in Kashmir or beyond. While one can hope that better sense prevails in Rawalpindi, India will also have to prepare for the worst, boost its military capabilities, plug diplomatic weaknesses, enhance its internal security preparedness given the possibility of terror ground seeking revenge, and prepare its citizens for more frequent bouts of violence, losses and disorder.
Two, Pakistan has shown that while it may be weaker, it is no pushover. Yes, the Indian GDP is eleven times more than that of Pakistan. And yes, India’s government wants to build the country unlike Pakistan’s army which is happy to burn their own country for the sake of propping up terror proxies and to cement domestic legitimacy or make their chief look like a superhero. But it is important to recognise that the army’s dominance, its control over the budget, its historical utility to major powers and therefore ability to extract weapon systems, its dense and intimate relationship with China and Turkey, and decades of anti-India nationalist propaganda and Islamist radicalisation have given the Pakistanis a set of tools.
This operates both at the level of mustering social support for prolonged conflict or escalation and at the level of having more military options. Drones have opened a new chapter of warfare. Pakistan showed an ability to strain India’s air defences. The nuclear blackmail option persists even as India has now thrice successfully pushed the envelope on what’s possible below the nuke threshold, effectively calling Pakistan’s bluff. Pakistan’s mobilisation of ground troops had created a possibility of a prolonged land-based war. And exporting terrorism remains a cheap option for a perennially irresponsible state. Make no mistake: India has overwhelming dominance in all domains, it would have won any war, and it has showed the ability to withstand Pakistan’s asymmetric warfare for decades. But Pakistan’s ability to cause destruction must not be discounted and was visible in this episode.
Three, China was absolutely central to Pakistan’s ability to defend itself. All accounts suggest that Beijing provided diplomatic support at the UN, material support for operations and possibly intelligence support to Rawalpindi. For anyone in Delhi who still harbours dreams of detente or rapprochement with Beijing, if Galwan wasn’t enough, the past five days should be a reminder that India’s tensions with China are deep and have a strong Pakistan dimension. China controls parts of Kashmir. China wants parts of Ladakh. China has an active military presence and upgraded infrastructure at the border. Stability at the Line of Actual Control is fragile. And on top of that, China is behind Pakistan’s nuclear and conventional military capabilities. China’s relationship with Russia has meant that Moscow may no longer be as solid an Indian ally even on Pakistan as in the past. China is, clearly, happy to see India, on the cusp of ripe geopolitical opportunities, dragged back into a hyphenated morass with Pakistan. All of this means that Delhi will have to live with two active and fragile fronts and be prepared for challenges on either or both any time.
And, finally, the entire post-Pahalgam churn has shown the continued salience of America despite the rhetoric of disengagement and the reality of incompetence and limited personnel. Donald Trump doesn’t want wars under his watch; go back to his inaugural speech where he said the one thing he would like to be is a “peacemaker”. He is particularly obsessed with nuclear threats. And America’s ability to wield both carrots and sticks with both India and Pakistan remains enormous. India may not have liked his tendency to claim credit and his use of the word “mediation”. India may well have rejected Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s claims that the ceasefire would be followed by dialogue between India and Pakistan at a neutral place. But it is clear that the US played a central role in facilitating conversations between the two sides and getting the firing to stop. The global cop is still the global cop. At the same time, there were also other players, particularly the UK, Saudi Arabia and UAE, that played a key role in weighing on Pakistan.
India can take satisfaction that it displayed serious political intent to battle terror, showed it had the capability to degrade terror infrastructure, remained unified and mature in its response, and kept the big picture of its developmental objectives in mind even at a highly emotive time as it decided to end this bout of confrontation. But it must also acknowledge that the task of imposing deterrence hasn’t been met fully, and it must prepare for a more volatile security situation and a neighbourhood that may just have got more fragile.
Prashant Jha is a political commentator. The views expressed are personal
