By Satish Aparajit
The recent terror attack in Pahalgam has reignited heated debates across the nation. As temperatures soar, so does the rhetoric—with anchors on primetime shows acting as self-styled experts, drowning out dissent and fuelling public emotions. The media frenzy, driven largely by agenda-laden commentary, has led to a surge of emotional responses on the streets, many influenced by what’s commonly referred to as ‘godi media’.
Taking a step back to assess the situation logically: why would an average Kashmiri, whose livelihood depends on tourism, risk destabilising the region? While some fringe elements may be susceptible to radicalisation, it is unlikely that the broader population supports or is involved in such brutality. The attack, executed with chilling precision—including head-mounted cameras and calm, cold-blooded questioning—clearly reflects professional training. This strongly suggests that the perpetrators were not local youth but highly trained militants, likely backed by Pakistan’s ISI.
This raises a critical question: why do such intelligence and security failures keep recurring? The ISI, always looking to exploit India’s internal vulnerabilities, seized upon the growing communal polarisation in the country. This gave them the perfect opportunity to strike when our attention was divided and perhaps overconfident about having subdued militancy in the Valley.
Intelligence failures happen—even the renowned Mossad couldn’t prevent the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack in Israel. So rather than indulging in a blame game, India must now focus on a calculated, long-term response.
For Pakistan’s army, keeping the Kashmir issue alive is vital to its relevance. Without it, their primary focus would shift to the Afghan border, and their “1,000-year war” rhetoric would lose credibility. Surgical strikes, while symbolic, haven’t served as lasting deterrents. What’s needed is a decisive, strategic blow to the infrastructure that sustains terrorism—something that breaks the spine of the Pakistani military establishment.
The government’s recently announced five-step plan sounds promising, but many of these measures are reversible and largely symbolic. For instance, the idea of stopping water flow into Pakistan is intriguing but complex. The first PM of India actually stopped the water flow into Pakistan canals which created chaos there. The matter reached the UN and it took over nine years to formalise the treaty. The Indus Waters Treaty, signed in 1960, allocated 70% of the river waters to Pakistan. Reversing or leveraging this treaty would require massive infrastructure—such as 30 dams across six rivers—and decades of investment. Furthermore, without adequate planning, storing such vast amounts of water could lead to flooding in the Kashmir Valley itself. While reviewing the treaty is justified given environmental and demographic changes, India must tread carefully, especially since China controls crucial water sources as well and could retaliate in kind.
Looking back, insurgency in J&K peaked between 2001 and 2003, coinciding with US involvement in Afghanistan. Emboldened by American reliance on Pakistani supply routes, the Pakistan Army intensified its support for cross-border terrorism. Although India responded with surgical strikes in 2016 and the Balakot air strike in 2019, these actions did not deter Pakistan from continuing its proxy war. The real solution lies in kinetic action—a decisive military campaign, similar to the planned but aborted Op Parakram, which could have been a turning point had it been executed. The reasons it was shelved remain unclear.
After Kargil, another opportunity – Op Kabbadi -was conceived to strike across the border but was again abandoned for undisclosed reasons.
Today, while India may not match the technological edge of the US or Israel, it holds significant conventional advantages: superior mechanised forces, air power, and naval strength. However, any full-scale war would require long-term preparedness, including logistical and economic resilience. The ongoing Ukraine-Russia war offers a sobering reminder of how prolonged conflicts can become.
A broader strategic concern is the possibility of China opening a second front or even smaller misadventures from neighbouring countries like Bangladesh. These would strain India’s resources considerably.
India must also weigh the economic cost. A prolonged conflict could set the country back by five to ten years in terms of development. Yet, if the goal is to end terrorism at its roots, the country must be prepared to pay that price.
Finally, there’s the nuclear threat—a card both nations hold, which effectively acts as a deterrent and levels the field to an extent.
My take: Go India, go – but with clarity, coordination, and courage
(Satish Aparajit is a retired Air Force Wing Commander and a Shaurya Chakra awardee.)
