‘Operation Sindoor’: Possibilities Of Military Escalation – OpEd
Within a fortnight, following the Pahalgam massacre, Indian media extensively covered the news how New Delhi demonstrated its resolve to take determined actions against terrorism by carrying out “Operation Sindoor” – precision attacks on terrorist camps inside Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied-Kashmir without any damage to Pakistani military facilities, civilian infrastructure and civilian lives. International media, however, reported loss of civilian lives notwithstanding such claims.
These actions targeted at nine sites were undertaken from across the border and were meant for the consumption of audience at the domestic as well as international level. At domestic level, the actions sought to mellow boiling public sentiments while at the international level, New Delhi sought legitimacy for its actions. However, several questions raised their ugly heads such as will Indian actions be limited to this? What will be Pakistan’s reaction? The impacts of the Indian attacks are clearly visible as they have been quickly responded by drone and missile attacks by Pakistan in Jammu and Rajasthan provinces of India and New Delhi has successfully neutralized the attacks and downed F-16 and JF-17 fighter jets of Islamabad.
While many would have believed Pakistan would call ‘Operation Sindoor’ a bluff or unsuccessful, it did not do that rather it is trying to escalate the war. Both countries are undergoing a phase of an undeclared war which will turn into a full-fledged war unless constrained by external actors. Unlike India whose target was solely terrorist infrastructure, Pakistan is targeting military facilities and civilian infrastructure.
The diplomatic rupture between India and Pakistan and closing down of all kinds of communication channels following the Pahalgam massacre quickly escalated into a war without restraining domestic and international factors. Kashmir again turned into a global hotspot raising the spectre of a nuclear warfare as a possibility between the two nuclear powers. Pakistan violated the ceasefire agreement and continued firing to demonstrate its resolve, India kept its air, army and naval forces on high alert and nimbly responded to the Pakistani attacks. Total rupture of communication between two countries was a cautious step by India to stop asymmetric challenges that Pakistani aided militant groups posed against India. On the flipside, the disruption of communication channels between the two countries removed the bilateral hotline to prevent the war from escalation.
While Pakistan kept denying its involvement in the Pahalgam massacre of 26 tourists, ‘The Resistance Front’ (TRF)- a group allied with Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba claimed responsibility for the actions which it eventually withdrew. For its Pakistani connections, the group had been banned in India in January 2023. In the past cases of terror attacks in India, Pakistani involvement has been evidenced by Indian intelligence and investigating agencies.
The Pakistani military is under tremendous pressure to demonstrate strength and resolve amid the economic and political crisis. While its most popular leader Imran Khan is in jail, its economy is in a mess. The only way the army could prove its relevance and resilience is by sending a public message that it prevailed over India militarily. Pakistani military’s disproportionately bigger role in the country’s politics has relied on its projection as a defender against Indian aggression.
Pakistan’s Army Chief Asim Munir is no way comparable to his predecessor General Qamar Javed Bajwa in terms of management of crisis and preventing military escalation. Bajwa maintained open lines of communication with India even during military tensions. On the other hand, Munir has been flaunting Pakistan’s nuclear capabilities and called Kashmir Pakistan’s ‘jugular vein’. He has been trying to arouse public sentiments around Kashmir and deviate public attention from other significant issues. It is likely that Pakistan will not accept any form of symbolic military defeat such as the one aimed by ‘Operation Sindoor’. It will prefer to orchestrate certain military activities against India just to a send a public message that Pakistan will not let Kashmir go out of its hand. It is very much likely that Pakistan and China are developing back channels for strategic collaboration as Beijing has stakes in Ladakh which became a bone of contention between India and China since the region was tightly integrated into the Indian territory and later on resulted in a military stand-off between the two powers since 2020. China has many significant stakes in the forms of infrastructure projects in the POK region under the ‘China-Pakistan Economic Corridor’ mega project. Hence, China will not like to let Pakistan militarily lose the battle making India emboldened enough to claim POK as part of its territory.
Instead, assisting Pakistan in muddling through the military escalation will pay rich dividends to Beijing. China’s muted reaction to the Operation so far maybe a tactic to buy time for deeper Pakistan-China collusion. Many scholars view that abrogation of special constitutional status for Kashmir in 2019 and exercise of tight control over the Valley strengthened pro-Pakistani elements which would help protract the conflict and make it harder to return to normalcy.
Nationalist sentiments in India seem to be in a all-time high following the massacre and particularly after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech in Bihar which dubbed the massacre as a threat to India’s sovereignty, territorial integrity and nationhood and the country must punish those who breached the national spirit by killing innocent tourists. India is swiftly becoming one as a political as well as national community.
The growing anger among the Indian public may be satisfied and embers cooled by Operation Sindoor by now but any retaliation from Pakistani side will fan public sentiments supporting massive push back against which will boil down to dealing serious blows to the perpetrators of massacre. Neither India not Pakistan perceives hardly any economic stakes involved in each other’s economy in the form of trade or investment to bother if the conflict escalates. Pakistan faces constraints from the Afghan front as well as from Baluchistan which would push New Delhi to capitalize on Pakistan’s weaknesses.
The situations are likely to spiral out of control unlike the aftermath of Pulwama attacks in 2019 when India could undertake covert operations such as airstrikes and could satisfy the simmering public sentiments and this also turned out to be one of the significant factors behind Modi’s triumph in the national elections. The US and other Western powers played a third party role then in mitigating the conflict from further escalation. Pakistan handed over the apprehended pilot to India who was captured inside Pakistan. The US and European powers now seem to be least concerned about South Asia following NATO’s pullout from Afghanistan. The US President Donald Trump is yet to appoint key diplomatic officials and envoys in both the countries. The wars between Russia and Ukraine and between Israel and Hamas have consumed much of the resources, energy and attention of all these powers.
