After surgical strike against Pakistan across LoC, Indian Army girds up for retaliation

NEW DELHI: The Indian Army is anticipating a retaliatory action by Pakistan, which would indicate the trajectory of the current conflict: whether it would escalate and, if it does, how intense and widespread it would be.

• The army's assessment is based on the assumption that the Pakistan Army will find it humiliating that Indian commandos could penetrate their lines despite the state of high alert following the September 18 Uri killings.

 

• At the same time, there are some in the security establishment who believe that Pakistan may have closed its option for escalation by denying that Indian troops carried out "surgical strikes" in its territory.

• "They have called it a minor ceasefire violation," one official said. The most likely action, it is assessed, may be in the form of militants tying up with the Pakistan Army's Battalion Action Teams to inflict raids on Indian installations across the Line of Control.

 

• Security forces on high alert in border areas of Nowgam in Handwara (JK). HM Rajnath Singh to chair meeting to review internal security.

 

•  "We really cannot expect them to use nukes because a few terrorists have been killed," said another official. Apart from recognising the LoC as a dividing line between Indian- and Pakistan-controlled Kashmir, both sides have acknowledged in the past that this is a zone for a limited level of armed action.

 

• Before the 2003 ceasefire, shelling with heavy calibre artillery was almost a norm. Since the ceasefire, cross-border firing has been limited to small arms, occasionally escalating to mortar fire. Mortar fire is indirect and is meant more to intimidate than to target posts.

 

• But skirmishes on the LoC have escalated to war earlier, specifically in 1965. Typically, with each side attacking in the area they assess they are stronger, the threat of the skirmish spreading, first across the LoC and then to the International Boundary, remains.

 

• The Punjab government asked for urgent evacuation of villagers who live close to the International Boundary. Villages in RS Pura, Samba sectors are being evacuated.

 

• The state government and central authorities last night switched off lights on major water harnessing assets such as dams. This is a precautionary measure in case of raids, either from the ground or from the air.

 

• Part of the reason the Indian establishment expects Pakistan to calibrate its response is because the DGMO, Lt Gen. Ranbir Singh, has spoken to his Pakistani counterpart and has expressly said the raids were aimed at terrorists.

"The operations aimed at neutralising the terrorists have since ceased. We do not have any plans for continuation of further operations. However the Indian armed forces are fully prepared for any contingency that may arise," Singh said at the news conference where he announced the surgical strikes. Although the Indian forces have not shown that they are preparing to mobilise in the way they did in 2001 following the attack on Parliament (Operation Parakram), officers and soldiers of crucial formations have been asked not to take leave. But those who are on leave are not yet being recalled urgently. The air force says it is continuing with an exercise in its western command area that was rescheduled till September 30. The Indian Navy is continuing with its scheduled sailings and not recalling its ships that are sailing on official-diplomatic missions.