Op Sindoor negates Pak’s nuclear blackmail

Over four days, between May 7 and May 10, India’s armed forces defended India’s borders over land, sea and air, to avenge the April 22 Pahalgam massacre. Until the May 10 ceasefire, an intense air battle ensued between India and Pakistan, involving drones, fighter planes and even missiles. This was a new form of fighting, shaped by the Ukraine war and the Gaza conflict.

Swarms of drones and even missiles were intercepted by Indian air defence systems. Similarly, Pakistan’s air defence system was tested, as some Indian missiles successfully hit their targets. India destroyed Pakistan’s air defence system in Lahore, believed to be the Chinese HQ-16, acquired by Pakistan in 2013-15.

Two other vital Pakistani air bases were attacked. The Nur Khan base in Rawalpindi is a transport hub, bordering Islamabad. But, more critically, it abuts Pakistan’s Strategic Plans Division, which controls Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal.

According to the New York Times, this strike inflamed Pakistani fears of India decapitating its nuclear command-and-control system.

International observers see matched exchanges rather than Indian dominance. It’s easier to blame a bias in the Western media, rather than accept the fact that briefings could have been more substantive before the cease-fire kicked in. I hark back to the days I was the government’s spokesman, post-1998 nuclear tests, and remember that PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his office allowed functional freedom in media briefings.

What, then, is the net outcome of Operation Sindoor? Some hyper-nationalist analysts and anchors question why India did not continue operations until Pakistan accepted defeat, before settling for a ceasefire.

US claims of mediation complicate the picture further. Days after Vice-President JD Vance described the South Asian conflagration as “none of our business", Donald Trump announced there would be a ceasefire. Secretary of State Marco Rubio added a third twist, claiming it had engaged the PMs of both India and Pakistan. They would soon “start talks on a broad set of issues at a neutral state," Rubio said.

Trump jumped in again, promising enhanced trade with both countries and a “solution" to the Kashmir issue, a dispute he saw extant for a “thousand years". He reflected a lack of awareness about Kashmir — the fact remains that the region’s defining feature has hardly been communalism, not at least since it was part of Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s empire and after his death in 1839 and that his foreign minister was Fakir Azizuddin.

Pakistan’s PM Shehbaz Sharif grabbed the opening to deescalate the current crisis, thanking Trump for his “proactive role for peace in the region." He proclaimed: “We’ve won, this is a victory."

Trump, having failed to achieve the same in Ukraine or Gaza, is revelling in this unexpected success. Significantly, he has achieved it days before arriving in the Gulf on May 16 to solicit investments, besides controlling Iran’s nuclear programme and Israel’s brutal ambitions in Gaza.

Nevertheless, Operation Sindoor has yielded multiple benefits for India. First, Pakistan’s nuclear blackmail stands negated. Pakistan began to openly sponsor terrorism against India only after acquiring nuclear weapons by 1987. Thereafter, India was constrained in responding to terror attacks, including the 2001 Parliament and 2008 Mumbai attacks. That hesitation now stands negated.

The New York Times believes the US was energised to intervene only after intelligence reports stated the situation was closing towards nuclear escalation. Pakistan has been known to move its nuclear assets to attract international and, especially, US attention.

Second, though India has debated using river waters as a weapon, it restrained itself from rescinding the Indus Waters Treaty. Post-Pahalgam, the Treaty has been suspended and run-of-the-river low-storage facilities employed to alter the water flow to Pakistan. A new weapon has been operationalised to control Pakistani conduct. Pakistan’s implied threat all these years -— to stop terrorism in exchange for Kashmir — now has a matching card.

Finally, India has properly tested Pakistan’s air-attack offensive capabilities and air defences. Pakistan, too, has claimed the same, by targeting 12 Indian cities with 300-400 drones. I’m sure lessons have been learnt, which need to be translated into the upgrading of our defences. Warfare in the 21st century will require more than infantry and armour.

The challenges now are diplomatic and political. Domestically, the government will face questions as to why the US has made claims of “mediating" to end the crisis —remember that post-Simla Agreement, India has maintained that Indo-Pakistan disputes had to be tackled bilaterally. The Composite Dialogue Process, launched in 1997, continued till the BJP came to power in 2014. It rested on the Kashmir issue being tackled alongside more easily handled issues of Sir Creek, trade, etc.

But Pakistani impatience at seeing progress on the Kashmir issue actually stalled progress in achievable areas. This means that CBMs and dispute resolution is sometimes impractical. While the former are usually supposed to facilitate the latter, Pakistan inverted that logic, implying that if the big issue, Kashmir, were to be resolved, the rest would automatically follow. Meanwhile, it continued to sponsor terrorism, reflecting domestic compulsions or civil-military dissonance.

PM Narendra Modi junked this failed approach after the 2019 Pulwama terror attack and the Balakot retribution. Constitutional changes eliminated Article 370 and Kashmir’s special status. Dialogue with Pakistan was shelved, ties downgraded and Pakistan’s existence literally denied. The only pre-condition: dismantle the terror network. Balakot was taken as a bottom line to establish deterrence against future terror attacks. Pahalgam exploded that myth. Thus, if the old dialogue process based on the Gujral doctrine has failed, so has the post-2019 Modi doctrine.

India says it is uncommitted to any talks and that deterrence has been re-established. But there is also a reluctance in Delhi to defy or offend Trump. A new dialogue process, perhaps a back-channel, will become inevitable to discuss at least two issues, that is terrorism and river waters.

Despite Sharif exulting in assumed Pakistani victory today, the civil-military equation will be tested in the coming months. With its popular leader Imran Khan in jail following a Faustian deal between Sharif and the army chief, General Asim Munir, the status quo may not hold much longer.

In India, too, the government’s micro-management of messaging and intolerance of even mild criticism is unsustainable. Pakistan is again being equated with India in large parts of the West. The government must introspect and rectify past tactics as it finds a new path and agenda between the past composite dialogue and total disengagement.

KC Singh is former Ambassador to Iran and UAE. 

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