1

Dissertation submitted to the Department of War Studies, School of Social Science and Public

Policy, King’s College London, as partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of MA

War in the Modern World

Submitted by: Kamaldeep Singh Sandhu

E-mail: kamaldeep.sandhu@kcl.ac.uk

Supervisor: Dr. Rudra Chaudhuri

Date of submission: 23 MARCH 2014

Word Count: 14946

2

Abstract

This thesis is based on the narrative that since the arrival of nuclear weapons in South Asia, three

distinct levels of conflict – the nuclear, conventional and the sub-conventional - came into co-

existence. Furthermore, the rivalry between India and Pakistan created a sequenced pattern of

escalation between these three levels of conflict. Pakistan had unleashed a proxy war against India at

the sub-conventional level for the past few decades. Unable to defend itself at the sub-conventional

level, India on several occasions threatened a conventional war against Pakistan. In turn, Pakistan

adopted nuclear first use policy and the associated risky nuclear postures in order to deter an Indian

conventional attack. Hence, a continuum of an ‘asymmetric escalation’ from sub-conventional to the

nuclear level of conflict was established.

This thesis argues that the strategy of asymmetric escalation in South Asia has failed to achieve

the desired results. Firstly, Pakistani nuclear weapons have failed to deter an Indian conventional

response to its proxy war. Whenever the need arose, irrespective of the nuclear threat, India mobilised

its armed forces against Pakistan and prepared for a conventional war. India also took the associated

risks of accidental escalation. Similarly, Indian threat of a conventional war has failed to coerce

Pakistan to stop supporting the proxy war. It has also failed to have a significant effect on the sub-

conventional conflict itself in any way.

Drawing evidence from case studies of serious crises that occurred after overt nuclearisation of

India and Pakistan in 1998 and evaluating the conflict at all three levels, the thesis seeks to establish

that there is a need to segregate the three levels of conflict in order to achieve the desired results and

bring stability in the region.

3

Ethical approval declaration

I confirm that my research on ‘Asymmetric Escalation of Conflict in South Asia’ did not

require ethical approval.

4

Table of Contents

1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 6

2. Part I – Nuclear conflict ..................................................................................................................... 12

2.1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 12

2.2. Kargil War .......................................................................................................................... 13

2.2.1. Indian conventional response .................................................................................... 14

2.2.2. Escalation .................................................................................................................. 14

2.3. ‘Twin Peak’ Crisis .............................................................................................................. 16

2.3.1. Indian conventional response .................................................................................... 16

2.3.2. Escalation .................................................................................................................. 17

2.4. Summary ........................................................................................................................... 19

3. Part II – Conventional conflict .......................................................................................................... 21

3.1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 21

3.2. Multiple power centres in Pakistan .................................................................................... 22

3.2.1. Government ............................................................................................................... 22

3.2.2. Military ....................................................................................................................... 23

3.2.3. Non-state actors ........................................................................................................ 23

3.2.4. Asymmetric escalation on multiple power centres .................................................... 25

3.3. Nature of Pakistan’s support ............................................................................................. 26

3.4. Operational constraints ...................................................................................................... 28

3.4.1. Physical space constraints ........................................................................................ 29

3.4.2. Time constraints ........................................................................................................ 31

3.5. Summary ........................................................................................................................... 32

4. Part III – Sub-conventional conflict .................................................................................................. 34

4.1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 34

4.2. Kashmir dispute ................................................................................................................. 35

4.2.1. Root Cause ................................................................................................................ 35

4.2.2. External support......................................................................................................... 37

4.3. Indian hinterland ................................................................................................................ 38

4.3.1. Root cause ................................................................................................................. 38

4.3.2. External support......................................................................................................... 42

4.4. Summary ........................................................................................................................... 43

5. Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................... 45

6. Bibliography ....................................................................................................................................... 50

5

This dissertation is the sole work of the author and has not been accepted in any previous

application for a degree; all quotation and sources of information have been acknowledged.

Signed: Kamaldeep Singh Sandhu Date: 23 March 2014

6

1. Introduction At a strategic level, an asymmetry in conflict can be defined using the parameters of will

and capability. When two belligerents target each other’s capability to fight (for example

destruction of each other’s armed forces and its supporting infrastructure - a regular feature of

a conventional war) the conflict is said to be symmetrical. At times, when it is not possible to

match the enemy’s capability owing to his superior military power, his will to fight is targeted

(for example by targeting its centre of gravity such as population, which can force the

government to end the fighting). In this case the conflict is said to be asymmetrical. The

United States in Vietnam and the Soviet Union in Afghanistan are examples from the

contemporary history of warfare where the weaker side targeted its enemy’s will to fight and

won.1 Over a period of time the asymmetric warfare evolved and became a favourite and

powerful tool for the weaker side across the globe.

Applying the same parameters to the conflict in South Asia can be a complex matter. This

is firstly because more than one levels of conflict exist in this region between India and

Pakistan; conventional level - both the states have fought conventional wars in 1947-48, 1965,

1971 and a limited war in 1999; sub-conventional level - both have been suffering from

insurgencies and terrorism for many decades; and nuclear level - both have declared nuclear

weapons. Secondly, each state is stronger at one level of conflict but weaker at another. For

example, India is stronger than Pakistan at a conventional level of conflict. At the sub-

conventional level, however, Pakistan had launched a successful campaign against which

India had not been able to defend itself successfully. At nuclear level both were at par but had

adopted different doctrines and postures. Their asymmetric capabilities as well as

vulnerabilities at three different levels of conflict compelled both India and Pakistan to target

each other’s will instead of capabilities which induced asymmetry in conflict and had a de-

stabilising effect in the region. The matter was also exacerbated by the opposite grand

strategic ambitions of the two states. Pakistan favoured a revisionist agenda and wanted to

change the status quo in the disputed state of Jammu and Kashmir, while India was content

with the status quo and was ready to defend it at all costs.

1 Arreguin-Toft (2001), pp. 107-109

7

Having said that, let us consider the following incident. On 13 December 2001, five

terrorists belonging to Pakistan based jihadist organisations attacked the Indian parliament

with the aim of eliminating Indian political leadership. In the ensuing fire fight, all five along

with eight security personnel were killed and by next day the plot was found to have

originated in Pakistan.2 Within two weeks, India mobilised its entire armed forces threatening

to attack Pakistan if it did not stop supporting terrorist organisations. Pakistan, besides

mobilising its own forces, immediately raised the nuclear rhetoric stating that any

conventional action by India ‘would be met by severe consequences’.3 Within a short span of

time, the crisis spiralled from sub-conventional level to threats of conventional and nuclear

level war. This incident echoed the pattern of ‘asymmetric conflict escalation’ that had been a

regular feature in South Asia since the appearance of nuclear weapons. This can be

demonstrated from the following instances.

The first crisis of the South Asia’s nuclear era erupted in 1986-87.4 By then the state of

Punjab had been under a grip of Sikh separatist insurgency for many years. President Zia-ul-

Haq, emboldened by the American assistance for his role in fighting the Soviet Army in

Afghanistan, had decided to raise the costs of insurgency for India by covertly aiding the Sikh

insurgents.5 In response, India planned the largest military exercise in its history near Pakistan

border in Rajasthan. At a military level, the exercise was designed to test the combat

readiness of a number of newly inducted mechanised units of the Indian army along with

indigenously designed command, control communications and intelligence network.6

However, at a political level, the exercise was ‘plainly aimed to counter Pakistan’s pressure -

via subversion and the training of dissident Sikhs - on Punjab’. According to the planners, ‘a

military exercise aimed at Pakistan’s own weak point – the province of Sindh – would be a

fitting riposte to Pakistan, and a threat (with echoes of 1971) that there might be more to

come’.7 The nuclear dimension was added to this crisis by an interview given by A Q Khan,

one of Pakistan’s principal nuclear scientists in which he stated that ‘...let it be clear that we

2 Ganguly (2008), p.60

3 Ibid

4 Hagerty (1998), p.92

5 Ganguly (2002), p.85

6 Ibid

7 As stated by one of the key planners of the exercise. Bajpai et al, Brasstacks and Beyond p.17 cited in

Hagerty (1998), p.107

8

shall use the bomb if our existence is threatened’.8 Although the role of his statement in the

settlement of crisis has been debated, it marked a new epoch for the role of nuclear weapons

in South Asia.9

The second crisis erupted in 1990 against the backdrop of outbreak of insurgency in

Kashmir. The Indian government had begun supplementing its security forces in Kashmir

and Punjab, with reinforcements from the Indian Army primarily out of concern of stemming

the infiltration of Pakistan backed Kashmiri terrorists into India.10

The Indian concerns were

also exacerbated by the continued presence of Pakistani troops across the border in Punjab

and Rajasthan, even after the end of their air-land exercise Zarb-i-Momin. This was followed

by a war of words by political leaders from both sides threatening escalation. The war of

words coupled with the troop movements increased the likelihood of another war in South

Asia. Once again Pakistan resorted to ‘slightly veiled threats’ to signal its resolve to deter a

conventional invasion by ‘making certain visible nuclear preparations or by insinuating such

preparations’.11

Until this time, however, both the countries were under immense pressure to confirm to

non-proliferation laws, especially from the United States. The role of nuclear weapons was

limited to statements given by prominent personalities from both sides. Hence the exact role

of nuclear weapons played during these two crises remained ambiguous. After the nuclear

tests of 1998, both nations became overt nuclear powers and broke free from the earlier

pressures of non-proliferation. This had a profound but opposite effect on both sides. On one

side, India remained content with demonstration of its nuclear weapons ability, putting basic

infrastructure in place and declaring a nuclear doctrine based on ‘no-first-use’ and ‘minimum

credible deterrence’. Pakistan, on the other side, adopted a nuclear ‘first-use’ policy, felt

emboldened in its revisionist ambitions in Kashmir and intensified the proxy war against

India. This resulted in two crises after 1998 - a limited war in Kargil in 1999 and the ‘Twin

Peak’ crisis in 2001-02 - which also followed the similar pattern of escalation from sub-

conventional to nuclear level of conflict.

8 Ganguly (2002), p.87

9 Ibid

10 Hagerty (1998), p.142

11 Ibid, p.165

9

The narrative on which this thesis is based has been derived from the above incidents and

can be summarised by stating the following. The support to jihadist militant groups

responsible for a number of terrorist incidents in Kashmir and in the Indian hinterland was

part of a larger pattern of Pakistani low-intensity conflict, promoted by Pakistan’s nuclear

weapons capacity. Pakistan’s acquisition of an opaque nuclear capability originally

encouraged it to launch a proxy war against India in Kashmir. The overt nuclearisation

emboldened Pakistan even further, facilitating the actual seizure of Indian Territory with

Pakistan Army troops at Kargil as well as attacking important targets such as the Indian

Parliament using its proxies.12

Having conventional superiority and under domestic pressures

India felt compelled to threaten a conventional action against Pakistan. In turn, Pakistan was

constrained to raise the nuclear rhetoric. Hence, a continuum of escalation of conflict

comprising of all three levels – the sub-conventional, conventional and nuclear – came into

being in South Asia. This escalation ladder has been described as the ‘asymmetric escalation

of conflict’, for the purpose of this thesis.

Figure 1: Three distinct levels of conflict and the concept of ‘asymmetric escalation’ in South Asia

12

Kapur (2007), p.139

10

In this thesis, the ‘nuclear conflict’ specifically refers to the nuclear postures adopted by

Pakistan to deter an Indian conventional attack. Similarly, ‘Indian conventional threat’ refers

to the perceived threat of Indian conventional war against Pakistan as well as the conventional

postures and doctrines associated with it. The ‘sub-conventional’ conflict refers to the

insurgency in the state of Jammu and Kashmir and the acts of terrorism associated with the

wider concept of Jihad in the Indian hinterland, carried out by irregulars either based in or

supported by Pakistan. This thesis argues that the strategy of asymmetric escalation in South

Asia has failed to achieve the desired results. This has been done in three parts.

Part one discusses the nuclear level of conflict and drawing evidence from two case studies

- the Kargil war of 1999 and the Twin Peak crisis of 2001-02 - argues that Pakistani nuclear

postures, designed to deter an Indian conventional response had failed to do so. During both

these occasions India responded to Pakistani provocations with its conventional forces in a

diligent manner with a credible threat to escalate. The reasons for not fighting a full-fledged

war, which were non-nuclear in nature, have also been highlighted. These two crises have

been chosen for the purpose of this thesis because they occurred after the nuclear tests were

conducted by both India and Pakistan, which left no doubt about the existence of nuclear

weapons; unlike the previous crises where the role played by nuclear weapons was

ambiguous.

Part two discusses the conventional level of conflict. It argues that the threat of an Indian

conventional retaliation had not been successful in altering the strategic behaviour of Pakistan

and deterring it from supporting the low intensity conflict in India. The chapter highlights

three main reasons behind this. Firstly, the nature of ‘Pakistan as a state’ has been discussed.

It argues that with multiple power centres in Pakistan, any coercive strategy exercised by

India, especially by use of force was unable to target any one centre of gravity. Secondly, it

argues that the nature of Pakistani support to the jihadist groups was ‘passive’13

which created

a strategic space between the jihadist groups and their sponsors. This space or gap worked in

their favour and further restricted the limits to which any coercive strategy could have

worked. Finally, it highlights the constraints that the geo-strategic environment had placed on

the conduct of a retaliatory conventional war between India and Pakistan. It argues that due to

13

Byman (2005) p.128

11

its non viability the Indian conventional response did not have an inherent ability to

significantly impact the sub-conventional conflict.

The third chapter carries the same argument forward by discussing the character of sub-

conventional conflict within the Indian Territory - its causes, ideologies and conduct. The

main argument in this section is that due to the nature of sub-conventional conflict, any action

within the conventional level of the conflict spectrum could not have prevented its growth in

India. The rise of sub-conventional conflict in India in the form of insurgencies and terrorism

was the result of misguided political policies and democratic processes which had alienated a

portion of its population. Given the domestic circumstances, its growth in India and

exploitation by keen adversaries such as Pakistan was inevitable.

12

2. Part I – Nuclear conflict

2.1. Introduction

Pakistan’s defeat in the 1971 war was devastating and it demonstrated India’s

overwhelming conventional superiority. To recover from this strategic asymmetry President

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, within months of taking over as President of Pakistan, decided to initiate

a nuclear weapons project.14

Right from the very beginning nuclear weapons were viewed by

Pakistani leadership as the ultimate guarantor of Pakistan’s national survival. They were

acquired to provide protection from the perceived Indian threat and were specifically aimed to

counter an Indian conventional aggression; something that Pakistanis perceived to be more

pressing than the Indian nuclear threat.15

A report published by the United States Defense

Intelligence Agency in 1984 also observed the same, stating that ‘a small nuclear program

would enable the Pakistanis to do in nuclear terms what their ground and air forces could not

do in conventional terms: threaten to punish any Indian attack so severely that consideration

of such an attack would be deterred from the onset.’16

With the passage of time, the need for nuclear deterrence in Pakistan evolved from being

defensive to offensive. During the 1970s, the nuclear weapons were developed to deter an

Indian attack. However, by late 1980s, Pakistan felt emboldened and started adopting

offensive strategies. Writing in 1983, Bhabani Sen Gupta had professed that ‘nuclear weapons

would enable Pakistan to neutralise an assumed Indian nuclear force... it would provide an

umbrella under which Pakistan could reopen the Kashmir issue...’17

Vipin Narang has called

this nuclear posture as asymmetric escalation posture which is ‘geared for rapid first use of

weapons against conventional attacks to deter their outbreak’. Therefore it can be used by a

state with revisionist preferences to aggress, by using it a shield behind which to attack.18

This chapter argues that for Pakistan, the asymmetric escalation nuclear posture, had failed

to achieve the desired result. This is because India is conventionally stronger and firmly

believes that within the conflict spectrum, adequate space exists for a limited conventional

14

Chakma (2006), pp 116-118. 15

Ibid, p.121 16

Hagerty (1998), p. 74 17

Gupta (1983), pp.39-40 cited by Kraig (1999), p146 18

Narang (2009/10), p.45

13

war. The asymmetry in vulnerability of both sides in case of a nuclear war, also allows India

to take the risks that are attached with inadvertent or even intentional escalation of conflict.19

This can be demonstrated from the two case studies which happened immediately after the

nuclear tests - the Kargil War in 1999 and the Twin Peak crisis in 2001-02. This section

argues that in both the crises not only India responded with diligence using its conventional

power, but was also willing to escalate, had the strategic objectives not been achieved.

2.2. Kargil War

Kargil War was the first attempt by Pakistan to make tactical gains in Kashmir after

becoming an overt nuclear power. The Pakistan army started the war apparently believing that

‘a stable nuclear balance between India and Pakistan permitted offensive actions to take place

with impunity in Kashmir’.20

It also expected a poor Indian response due to following

operational and tactical reasons. Firstly, it was assumed that the occupation of heights in

Kargil would result in Indian forces being rushed to Kashmir. This would further erode the

offensive capability of the Indian forces against Pakistan in the plains of Punjab and

Rajasthan. Secondly, as Javed Nasir, former head of ISI argued, that Indian army had been

fighting low intensity conflict in Kashmir and the north eastern states for many years and was

exhausted and inadequately equipped. He concluded that ‘The Indian army is incapable of

undertaking any conventional operations at present what to talk of enlarging conventional

conflict’.21

Musharraf’s own assessment was that the Indian forces, despite their massive

strength, would never be able to dislodge the freedom fighters and the Northern Light Infantry

from the ingresses and positions held by them.22

And finally, the coalition government in New

Delhi was assumed to be weak and indecisive.23

The rhetoric of nuclear weapons was combined with the above to draw international

attention early in the conflict in order to reach a stalemate, which would have been beneficial

to Pakistan. Pakistani political leaders including Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif made

numerous public statements during the conflict threatening the use of nuclear weapons. On 31

19

The common belief is that a nuclear exchange ‘will be extremely costly to India but would probably mortally

damage Pakistan’. Hence Pakistan is not likely to use nuclear weapons in a full-scale war. Kapur (2007),

p.129 & 133 20

Sagan S D, (2001) cited by Malik (2006), p.51 21

Javed Nasir, (1999), http://defencejournal.com/feb-mar99/chief-bluff.htm accessed on 24/02/14 22

Musharraf (2006), p.96 23

Malik (2006), p.51

14

May 1999 Pakistan’s foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmad explicitly warned, ‘We will not

hesitate to use any weapon in our arsenal to defend our territorial integrity’.24

Raja Zafrul

Haq, the leader of the House in the Senate, declared that Pakistan would use nuclear weapons

if imperative for its security and added - ‘The purpose of developing weapons becomes

meaningless, if they are not used when they are needed’.25

The exact nature of such nuclear

threats has been debated because only a year after carrying out nuclear tests in 1998, neither

India or Pakistan had put in place a properly worked out and approved nuclear doctrine or

command and control structures for their strategic forces.26

Nevertheless, the mere

destructive nature of nuclear weapons and newly acquired overt capabilities on both sides

provided some credibility to the threat of escalation of conflict.

2.2.1. Indian conventional response

Despite the danger of nuclear escalation, whether actual or perceived, India responded

diligently using its conventional forces. As soon as the scale of infiltration in Kargil was

assessed in May 1999, India started build-up of infantry and artillery units. It expanded the

war on 24 May 1999 by committing all three services for waging land, air and sea battles. The

Indian Air Force fighters and helicopters were used on own side of the line of control to

support ground operations; carry out reconnaissance; interdict enemy supply routes and

logistic bases; and destroy enemy footholds.27

Both the Naval Fleets were mobilised in the

Arabian Sea. Besides providing early warning and being a deterrent, the naval combat force

was also prepared to interdict tankers carrying Pakistan’s oil imports, if required. In addition,

a brigade from Andaman and Nicobar Islands was de-inducted and prepared for an

amphibious operation.28

Army formations also started deploying along the entire western

border with Pakistan.29

2.2.2. Escalation

While the use of air force and navy had already expanded the conflict, India was seriously

contemplating escalation by crossing the line of control in Kargil or other sectors despite the

24

‘Pakistan May Use Any Weapons’, The News (Pakistan), 31 May 1999, cited in Malik (2006), p.273 25

‘N Weapons Can Be Used for National Security: Safar’, The News (Pakistan) 31 May 1999, cited in Malik

(2006), p.273 26

Malik (2006), p.273 27

Ibid, p.244 28

Ibid, pp.249-250 29

Ibid, p.272

15

nuclear threat. According to General V P Malik, the army had made adequate preparations to

escalate. On 18th

June 1999 he had warned all Army Commanders to ‘be prepared for

escalation along the Line of Control or the international border and be prepared to go to

(declared) war at short notice’. However, further escalation could not have been possible

without the approval of political leadership, who was bent upon ‘restraint’. In the absence of

any tactical gains on ground in Kargil, even they had begun to succumb to the pressures of

escalation. On 16th

June Brajesh Mishra informed the United States of America’s national

security advisor, Sandy Berger, that India would not be able to continue with its policy of

restraint for long and that the military forces could not be kept on leash any longer. He added

that the Government of India ‘might have to let them cross the border any day’.30

Further escalation was ruled out only when Indian forces started achieving success in

Kargil with the capture of Tololing and Point 5140 (important mountain features overlooking

the national highway in Drass) on 17th

June 1999. Besides, the Indians were also concerned

with the impact that horizontal escalation could have on international opinion. The political

leaders felt that India needed to make its case and get international support.31

It is important to note that the need for escalation was purely defensive and only for one

purpose - to evict the enemy from Kargil and re-capture the lost mountain features. In the

Kargil sector especially, the need to cross the Line of Control (LoC) was purely tactical. The

physical approach to some of those features was extremely difficult from their own side of

LoC due to gradient of hills. However, from the other side of LoC, they were easily accessible

and hence assailable. Similarly, the need to escalate along the international border was only to

exercise pressure on Pakistan and prevent its forces from focusing only on Kargil.32

This fact

is important because besides defining the strategic objectives, it shows the non-belligerent

nature of India’s stand. It also shows the acceptance of the territorial status quo by India and

its willingness to defend it at all costs.

The Kargil crisis can be summarised by stating that Pakistani hopes of capturing Indian

Territory and presenting a fate-accompli under the shadow of nuclear weapons were negated

30

Malik (2006), pp.146-147 31

Kapur (2007), p.127 32

Malik (2006), p.139

16

by a strong Indian conventional response. Not only India used all three services and expanded

the war, it was also ready to escalate the war by crossing the LoC had its main objective of

recapturing the lost territory not been fulfilled.

2.3. ‘Twin Peak’ Crisis

The crisis began on 13 Dec 2001 when five terrorists tried to storm the Indian Parliament

in New Delhi. In the ensuing gun battle, all five along with eight security personnel were

killed. The next day, Indian security agencies linked the attackers to Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).

They also contended that the group had acted at Pakistan’s behest.33

This incident was

another litmus test of the narrative which stated that nuclear weapons had provided Pakistan

impunity from any Indian conventional action.

2.3.1. Indian conventional response

For the second time within a span of three years, Indian armed forces reacted with vigour

and intensity. Between December 2001 and January 2002, the Indian army had mobilised to a

scale as large as that of the 1971 War and its key military formations including the three strike

corps were moved to forward deployments. The Indian Air Force was permitted to carry out

repeated sorties near the border. Within the first two weeks, plans were also prepared to carry

out a series of air strikes against some fifty to seventy-five insurgent training bases, followed

by Special Forces action to physically attack these camps.34

During the second phase of the crisis, after the terrorist attack in Kaluchak in May 2002,

the Indian Air Force moved several squadrons of fighter aircrafts to forward bases. The navy

rushed five of its most sophisticated battleships from the eastern to the western fleet and the

only operational aircraft carrier, INS Viraat, was taken out of dry dock and placed on alert off

the coast of Bombay.35

India had reportedly planned to drive three strike corps from

Rajasthan into the Pakistani Thar Desert, engaging and destroying Pakistan’s two strike corps

33

This point is debatable. It is not understood as to why Pakistan would have supported a conflict with India at

a point when its armed forces were engaged in assisting the American forces on the western front in

Afghanistan. It supports the theory that the Islamist Jihadist groups act semi-independently without the

approval of the government (elaborated in chapter 2). It was during this crucial time when Osama Bin Laden

and Mullah Omar escaped from the US forces from the hills of Tora Bora. The movement of Pakistani troops

from Western to Eastern border might have facilitated their escape. Whether it was a sheer coincidence or a

collaborated effort between Al-Qaeda and Lashker-e-Taiba, needs to be established. Ganguly & Kraig (2005),

p. 298. 34

Ganguly & Kraig (2005) p.302 35

Josy Joseph, ‘The Mood is for War’, India Abroad, 31 May 2002, cited in Ganguly & Kraig (2005) p.305

17

and seizing territory in the Thar. These plans, which were ‘so audacious that they had never

been war-gamed before’ would have given India two advantages: Pakistan’s military centre of

gravity - its two strike corps - would have been destroyed in detail and land captured in the

Thar would have yielded some advantage on the negotiating table after the war.36

2.3.2. Escalation

The following factors indicate India’s resolve to escalate the conflict. Firstly, the Indian

Air Force sent regular reconnaissance missions across the border into Pakistan. This is evident

from the shooting down of one such Indian unmanned aerial vehicle on 07 June 2002 by

Pakistan near Lahore.37

Second, which is also one of the most credible indications of India’s

intent were the ‘mine-laying’ operations carried out by the forward Indian formations. ‘Mine-

laying’ is a laborious and dangerous process which involves laying ‘armed’ anti-personnel

and anti-tank mines over vast stretches of land in front of the defences, in order to disrupt and

delay enemy’s attack. Mine laying operations are executed at the last moment only when the

hostilities are extremely eminent, because if the war does not take place and normalities are

established, de-mining becomes extremely dangerous for the troops involved in de-mining as

well as for the civilians if any mines are left behind. During Operation Parakram, as it was

called on the Indian side, the Indian army had carried out extensive mine laying operations

along the entire stretch of the border with Pakistan. Indian army had suffered as many as 100

soldiers killed and 250 injured only in mine laying operations.38

The next evidence can be derived from the fact that there was a definite associated risk of

accidental or inadvertent escalation of conflict. With short distances and proactive command

and control mechanisms and both the armies sitting eyeball to eyeball, the standoff could have

easily escalated into a full scale war within a short span of time. Despite this, the Indian

government was willing to go ahead and take this risk. Thirdly, during the crisis, there came a

point that even the United States, an actor with a lot at stake in this crisis due to its ‘War on

Terror’ in Afghanistan with Pakistan’s partnership, seriously came to believe that the war was

36

Interview of Brijesh Mishra, the national security advisor of India with Paul Kapur cited in Kapur (2007),

p.135 37

http://vayu-sena-aux.tripod.com/other-Parakram-IAF-UAV-Wreckage.html, accessed on 24/02/14 38

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Op-Parakram-claimed-798-soldiers/articleshow/104948.cms,

accessed on 24/02/14

18

imminent. Washington issued a travel advisory urging all Americans to leave Pakistan, which

was followed by the United Kingdom, Japan and Germany.39

India, however, de-mobilised its armed forces in October 2002 without firing a shot. Once

again this can be attributed to reasons that were non-nuclear. The foremost reason was the

operational constraints of the Indian Armed Forces. For instance, during the initial phase

when the Indian Air Force and Special Forces were being prepared for strikes against the

insurgent training camps, the decision was turned down by the Cabinet Committee on

Security on the advice of top-level army officers. Their main argument was not the fear of

nuclear weapons. It was the fear of provoking a pre-emption from Pakistan in a series of

armoured counter-thrusts in Punjab and Rajasthan at a time of its choosing, most probably at

night.40

Since Indian forces were without night-vision equipment they would have been

acutely vulnerable to any such well-orchestrated Pakistani attack.41

The issue of Indian armed

forces’ operational limitations has been elaborated in the next chapter. The second reason was

that some of the stated objectives of Operation Parakram were perceived to be achieved. India

was successful in strengthening the international perception of Pakistan as a ‘near rogue’

country that exported terrorism and instability. It also succeeded in forcing Pakistan to

acknowledge complicity in Kashmiri terrorism and a ‘promise’ to change its course, though

only temporarily.42

India believed that the coercion had succeeded and that military action

was unnecessary. India had already lost the strategic surprise due to prolonged mobilisation of

the army and there was a fear of high casualty rates in the event of war. There was also a

desire to avoid angering the United States of America by attacking its key ally in the Afghan

War.43

It has been widely argued that India could not accomplish a conclusive termination of

Pakistan’s involvement in terrorism directed against India.44

Chapter 3 argues that this aim

was beyond the scope of Operation Parakram, or any other conventional action by India.

39

Ganguly & Kraig (2005), p. 305 40

Due to the lack of strategic depth, pre-emption of war is a strategic necessity for Pakistan, also evident from

previous wars of 1965 and 1971. 41

Ganguly & Kraig (2005), p.302 42

Ibid, p.306 43

Kapur (2007), p.136 44

Ganguly & Kraig (2005), p.306.

19

Irrespective of that, it could be established from the above that during the crisis of 2001-01,

the Pakistani nuclear weapons did not deter India from mobilising its conventional forces with

a clear intent of utilising them for an armed action against Pakistan.

2.4. Summary

During Kargil conflict, the nuclear weapons provided rhetorical cover to Pakistani military

action in Kargil with a hope to deter the Indian conventional response both in the local sector

as well as along the International Boundary in Punjab and Rajasthan. India not only

responded by expanding the war to include its army and navy, but was also willing to cross

the Line of Control, had the objective of re-capturing the lost territory, not been achieved.

Similarly, during the ‘Twin Peak’ crisis in 2001-02, India carried out the largest mobilisation

of its armed forces with a credible threat to escalate, in retaliation to a terrorist attack

conducted by Pakistan based terrorist groups. India also took the associated risks of accidental

and inadvertent escalation. The reasons for not escalating further and later de-mobilising its

forces completely were primarily non-nuclear. Firstly, the stated objectives of coercing

Pakistan to stop its support to Jihadist organisations and cross border infiltration in Jammu

and Kashmir were perceived to be achieved. Secondly, India had lost the element of strategic

surprise and felt constrained by the operational level limitations of its armed forces.

Three crucial points that can be derived from these case studies are as follows. Firstly,

during both the crises, India responded diligently and the option of escalation to a full-fledged

war was seriously considered by the political leaders. Secondly, India willingly took the risks

that were associated with accidental or inadvertent escalation of war, especially along the

international border in Punjab and Rajasthan. Thirdly, the main reasons that prevented

escalation were non-nuclear in nature. From this it can be concluded that Pakistani threat of

asymmetric escalation had failed to achieve the desired results. The Pakistani strategy of

aggressing under the cover of nuclear weapons - through a limited or a proxy war – with

impunity from an Indian conventional response was effectively neutralised by Indian

conventional superiority and its willingness to use its conventional forces aggressively.

To take this argument a step further it can be said that only a limited war is possible

between India and Pakistan and that nuclear weapons have successfully deterred India from

initiating an ‘all-out’ war against Pakistan. This statement is also debatable. It can be argued

20

that having become economically and militarily stronger India does not need to fight an ‘all-

out’ war with Pakistan in order to defend its territorial integrity. Being a non-revisionist state

content with the territorial status quo, India can safely ignore Pakistan’s nuclear postures,

acquired to deter an Indian conventional attack. At the same time, India can use the space

available for a limited war to defend itself from an external aggression.

21

3. Part II – Conventional conflict

3.1. Introduction

In the previous chapter it was argued that India was not deterred by Pakistan’s nuclear

rhetoric and was ready to use its conventional forces in order to pursue its political objectives.

This chapter looks at the conventional level of conflict and discusses the viability of an Indian

conventional response and the impact that it was assumed to have on the sub-conventional

conflict.

It is beyond doubt that the nuclear weapons have made any future wars between India and

Pakistan much more risky and dangerous than before. India cannot base its future

conventional engagements with Pakistan on the precedence laid by the 1971 War. With

Pakistan adopting risky nuclear postures, it is doubtful if India can push Pakistan beyond a

limit.45

Indian analysts conclude that although the nuclear thresholds between India and

Pakistan are not as low as Pakistan claims them to be, it is broadly acknowledged that

Pakistan will use nuclear weapons if and when it faces an existential threat.

This means, the conventional response that India visualises in the future military

engagement with Pakistan is limited in scope and objectives. Indian Army’s ex-Chief of

Army Staff, General V P Malik, while addressing the army commanders in April 1999, also

stated that:-

‘Pakistan’s military’s strategy against India is based on low-intensity conflict or nuclear

conflict: an all-or-nothing approach. We cannot accept this. We must be prepared to

make use of the space between low-intensity conflict and nuclear war for conventional

retaliation if Pakistan ups the ante in Jammu and Kashmir. This space would be limited

in time, geography and scope and the threshold need to be very carefully assessed’.46

This belief to be able to fight a limited war with impunity from nuclear escalation had

resulted in India’s threat of asymmetric escalation from the sub-conventional to the

conventional level of conflict. This chapter argues that the Indian strategy of asymmetric

escalation of conflict (or the threat to escalate) from the ongoing sub-conventional level to a

conventional level has not been successful. The threat of a conventional war has failed to

45

Narang (2009/10), pp. 73-75 46

Malik (2006), p.35

22

deter Pakistan from supporting the low intensity conflict in India. The chapter highlights three

main reasons behind it.

The first section discusses the nature of the Pakistani state with more than one power

centres. It argues that the coercive strategy associated with the conventional threat had not

been able to target any one centre of gravity effectively. The second section highlights and

elaborates how the Pakistani support to the jihadist groups, responsible for executing the sub-

conventional conflict, changed from ‘active’ to ‘passive’, which allowed the jihadist groups to

nurture themselves and become self-reliant. This created a manipulative space between the

jihadist groups and their sponsors which worked in their favour and set a limit to which any

coercive strategy could have succeeded. The final section highlights the constraints of time

and space that limited the conduct of a conventional war and hence rendered it incapable of

having any significant effect on the sub-conventional conflict.

3.2. Multiple power centres in Pakistan

To elaborate this point, there is a requirement to re-state the narrative. It says that – ‘the

Kargil episode and the terrorist attacks in India were part of a larger pattern of Pakistani low-

intensity conflict, which was promoted by Pakistan’s nuclear weapons capacity’. When the

nature of Pakistani state (as described below) is considered, it becomes slightly difficult to

comprehend the above narrative. Pakistan has failed to function as a unitary actor and meet

the requirements of a modern state that enjoys the monopoly on the legitimate use of force

within a given territory.47

Evidence suggests that there are multiple power centres acting

semi-independently within Pakistan, with their own ideologies as well as incentives for

pursuing the low intensity conflict in India. Hence, it is not clear what does ‘Pakistan’ refer to

in the above narrative. This has been elaborated as follows.

3.2.1. Government

First there is the civilian government and the bureaucracy whose main competition with

India is due to its irredentist claim on the state of Jammu and Kashmir and a related issue of

water – the federal government claims that since three rivers flow from the state of Jammu

and Kashmir into Pakistan, if the state acceded to India, then India would be able to throttle

47

Perkovich (2012), p. 6 http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/11/13/non-unitary-model-and-deterrence-

stability-in-south-asia/eihm# , accessed on 14/12/2013

23

Pakistan’s economic lifeline based on agriculture at any time.48

The cause for Kashmir also

gives it a rallying cry and helps to smooth over differences between the dominant province,

Punjab and the smaller provinces of Baluchistan, Sind and the North West Frontier Province.

India-as-an-enemy is also useful to distract the Pakistani public from other concerns such as

social inequality, sectarian conflict and distinct absence of social progress in many sectors of

Pakistani society.49

3.2.2. Military

Another power centre is the Pakistan military along with the Inter Services Intelligence

(ISI), which has literally run the country for nearly half the time since its independence in

1947. The weaknesses of Pakistan’s political parties, their problematic legitimacy and

continuous failures of its civilian governments have repeatedly strengthened the military’s

position as the saviour of Pakistan. This prominent institution has a deep distrust towards

India which can be traced back to its humiliating defeat in 1971 war. Besides this distrust, the

Pakistan Army has its own reasons to maintain conflict with India and not follow the peace

process. The perceived threat from India allows the Pakistan army to remain the most

powerful institution in the country responsible for shaping the domestic security and the

foreign policy. It also legitimises the continued high defence expenditures in Pakistan and

preserves the bureaucratic primacy of the military.50

By continuing the strategy of low

intensity conflict in India using proxies, the army also aims to tie up hundreds of thousands of

Indian troops in the counterinsurgency grid in Kashmir, which otherwise would be deployed

in Punjab or Rajasthan and ‘pose a serious threat’.51

The military’s main reason for supporting

government’s claim on Kashmir is that if the complete state of Jammu and Kashmir acceded

to India, Indian military deployed on its western borders would always be dangerously close

to almost all the major cities of Punjab in West Pakistan.

3.2.3. Non-state actors

Thirdly, there are the jihadist tanzeems and extremist groups that Pakistan had nurtured and

relied upon to pursue the low-intensity war with India. Over a period of time, these tanzeems

48

Singh (2002), p. 87 49

Cohen (2002), p.39 50

Tellis, Fair & Medby (2001), p.65 http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1450, accessed on

10/11/2014 51

Tellis, Fair & Medby (2001), p.65 http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1450, accessed on

10/11/2014

24

and groups have taken a life of their own and risen to the position of prominence by virtue of

their importance in pursuing the low intensity conflict strategy in India. Having attained this

position, they have become capable of pursuing their own political agendas - such as aiming

to have an Islamist Pakistan - which are in variance with Pakistan’s own interests. Jihadist

groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed and Harkat-ul-Ansar also view

themselves as being in the van-guard of a worldwide Islamist resurgence, which aims to

establish an Islamist Caliphate stretching from Kashmir to Western Sahara.52

They consider

India as an enemy of Islam and a part of larger ‘Crusader-Zionist-Hindu’ world. It has been

argued that Pakistan cannot shut them down, even if it remotely wanted to, given the

momentum these groups have attained in pursuit of their strategic objectives.53

The associated problem is that all three are semi-independent of each other and sometimes

act against other. Indian and American officials by and large believe that Pakistan’s civilian

government does not control the military (or ISI), or their policies toward militant groups

operating in and from Pakistan.54

Similarly there is room to doubt the degree to which

Pakistani government authorities themselves control the growth and operations of the Jihadist

groups.55

The Kargil war suggested that Pakistan army is capable of acting on its own without

the knowledge or approval from the government. The terrorist attacks on the Indian

Parliament in December 2001, at Kaluchak in May 2002 and in Mumbai in November 2008

suggest that non-state actors operating in Pakistani territory are capable of pursuing their own

aims which are contrary to those desired / stated by Pakistani government. For instance, the

Kaluchak massacre happened right in the middle of Operation Parakram when Pakistani

President General Parvez Musharraf had announced publically that ‘Pakistan will not permit

any terrorist activity from its soil’. Having seen three main power centres in Pakistan we now

move on to discuss its impact on the conflict spectrum.

52

Kilcullen (2005), p. 600 53

Tellis, Fair & Medby (2001), p.65 http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1450, accessed on

10/11/2014 54

Tellis et all (2009) p.16, http://www.rand.org/pubs/occasional_papers/OP249, accessed on 28/12/2013 55

Perkovich (2012), p. 8 http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/11/13/non-unitary-model-and-deterrence-

stability-in-south-asia/eihm#, accessed on 14/12/2013

25

3.2.4. Asymmetric escalation on multiple power centres

When Pakistani authorities deny that terrorists known to be based in Pakistan have

anything to do with state agencies or objectives, they acknowledge that state sovereignty is

incomplete. When it is not clear as to what level of control the civil government exercises

over these non-state actors and what level of support they enjoy from the military and the ISI,

it becomes difficult for the coercer to choose one particular centre of gravity and deal with it

that would also have a cascading effect on the others. The fact that three power centres exist

and operate semi-independent of each other creates a dilemma of a zero-sum game for India,

where destruction of one can make the other more powerful, which can further exacerbate the

problem. It is not clear which power centre is to be blamed for the proxy war and destruction

of which will make any significant contribution towards its end.

Destruction of its armed forces would surely have reduced Pakistan’s war fighting ability

and weakened it to a level to readily accommodate Indian demands. It also entailed clear and

achievable military objectives – the combat power embodied in armoured and mechanised

divisions, elite air squadrons, major surface and sub-surface combatants, either or both of

Pakistan’s strike corps along with its headquarters and the army reserves.56

By targeting the

Pakistani armed forces, however, India could have destroyed the only source capable of

controlling the jihadist organisations (which have not started to hurt Pakistan itself). Targeting

the armed forces could also have been a dangerous endeavour since the nuclear red lines

corresponding to its ‘military threshold’ were not known. Since Pakistan’s inception in 1947,

the Pakistani armed forces had played a crucial role in holding the state together, promoting a

feeling of nationhood among disparate peoples and providing a bastion of selfless service in

the midst of a venal government system.57

Causing considerable damage to its armed forces

could give a near fatal blow to Pakistan. In other words, its ‘military threshold’ was

considerably commensurate to the ‘territory threshold’, a red line that India acknowledged

and was likely to draw a nuclear response from Pakistan.58

The jihadist elements simply could not be destroyed or even deterred by a conventional

action. The extremism and the idea of Jihad exist as an ideology amongst the population

56

Tellis (1997) p.16 57

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/pakistan/army.htm accessed on 05/11/13 58

Chakma (2006) p.127

26

spread all over the country, which cannot be identified and targeted by a military action. The

destruction of terrorist training camps was not viable because the terrorist training camps are

not comprised of much physical infrastructure, destruction of which would cause any

significant damage to the terrorist organisation or their training. Such strikes would also not

cripple the wider infrastructure of terrorism in Pakistan, given that the militant groups had

assets in every province of Pakistan.59

The only effective, though temporary, setback that can

be given to terrorist organisation is the decapitating strikes, where the key leaders are targeted

but cannot be achieved without accurate intelligence. It took the United States of America

almost ten years before they could hunt down Osama Bin Laden and India has failed to even

prove the presence of Dawood Ibrahim in Pakistan, the most wanted terrorist related to the

1993 bomb blasts in Mumbai which killed 250 persons and injured over 1100.60

In the

absence of accurate intelligence, attack on terrorist training camps can only be used for short

term purposes such as signalling or indicating resolve to the enemy and using it as a face

saving measure in front of the Indian polity exhausted with Pakistan based terror. It could not

have achieved any long term results.

3.3. Nature of Pakistan’s support

Moving on to the nature of Pakistan’s support to the Jihadist groups, this section

establishes the impact it had on the limit of coercion that a conventional action was expected

to achieve. As the jihadist groups in Pakistan grew in size and structure, they got interwoven

with Al-Qaeda, an umbrella organisation convicted of initiating a global Jihad. Besides

having a shared ideology – believing in the need for Islamic government, the importance of

Jihad as an individual duty and the fundamental hostility to India and the United States61

-

they also shared training infrastructure and the vast network of charities that collected funds

for them. Islamabad sent many fighters bound for Kashmir to Afghanistan to train and gain

combat experience.62

After September 11 attacks, however, the nature of Pakistan’s support to these groups

changed. Under American pressure, Islamabad had to tread a fine line between supporting Al-

59

Tellis et all (2009) p.14, http://www.rand.org/pubs/occasional_papers/OP249, accessed on 28/12/2013 60

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/12/newsid_4272000/4272943.stm, accessed on

05/03/14 61

Byman (2005) p.126 62

Ibid

27

Qaeda and the groups fighting against India in Kashmir. While it acted overtly against Al-

Qaeda, its support for other Islamist groups fighting against India became covert and

‘passive’.63

Passive support has been defined by Daniel Byman as - when the state

government supports terrorist organisations by merely not acting against them; and turning a

blind eye on their activities such as fundraising, recruitment and training.64

The Pakistan

government’s withdrawal of open support against these jihadist groups and an overt action

against their associate organisation, the Al-Qaeda, indirectly helped the jihadist groups to

become self-sustaining. It forced these groups to rely less on the government and more on

popular support at the grassroots level (which they already had to some extent). The perceived

legitimacy of their cause (Jihad) amongst the population made them even stronger and less

prone to the control and influence of the government.

The change of the nature of Pakistan’s support from active to passive had several

consequences. For jihadist groups, becoming self-sustaining also meant that they gathered a

life of their own and started acting independently. As a result, in case of a terrorist act carried

out in India, the Pakistani government could conveniently plead not-guilty of the act and save

themselves from the repercussions from either India in particular or from the international

community in general. Hence it set the limits of coercion that the India or the international

community could exercise on the Pakistan, especially by the use of force or limited military

action. The passive support created a ‘manipulative space’ between the jihadist groups and

their sponsors, which was exploited by both for their own advantage. This can be

demonstrated from the following example.

During Operation Parakram, a coercive exercise (by the use of its conventional military

power) by India, Pakistan government made only cosmetic changes to their support to the

jihadist groups. Although many radicals were arrested and militant Islamist organisations

banned, those arrested were later released and the banned organisations re-emerged under

different names. The coercive exercise did not completely succeed because the ‘manipulative

space’ that existed between the jihadist groups and their sponsors, worked in their favour. It

worked in favour of the sponsors in case they were ‘unwilling’ to completely shut down the

63

Byman (2005), p.128 64

Ibid, p.117

28

jihadist groups (the Pakistani leaders certainly wanted to keep the option of increasing ties

with the radicals open in case external aid and support, especially from the superpowers was

suddenly cut).65

On the other hand, it worked in the favour of the jihadist groups in case their

sponsors were ‘incapable’ of shutting them down, owing to the prominence that the militant

organisations had risen to.

The first two sections analysed the Pakistani side and reasoned why the Indian threat of

asymmetric escalation could not achieve the desired results. The last looks at the Indian side

and evaluates the ‘instrument of escalation’– the Indian armed forces and their capability to

have the desired impact on the sub-conventional conflict. It argues that due to the operational

constraints on the conduct of a limited war, any action within the conventional part of conflict

spectrum lacked the inherent capability to affect the sub-conventional conflict in any way.

3.4. Operational constraints

During the ‘Twin-peak’ crisis, the Indian armed forces were mobilised with an aim of -

compelling Pakistan to ban the extremist and Jihadist organisations; hand over twenty

individuals accused of carrying out terrorist attacks in India; and stop cross border infiltration

of militants in the state of Jammu & Kashmir.66

Operation Parakaram, the military name

given to the mobilisation of armed forces, reflected India’s resolve to escalate the conflict

vertically. At the same time, it highlighted its limitations and shortcomings to do so. The

delay caused in the mobilisation and deployment of the Indian army helped Pakistan to

manage the crisis, before India could bring its military force to bear. The time gap allowed

Pakistan to appeal to the United States of America who intervened and successfully

counselled restraint. The delay also helped Pakistan to deploy its forces in defence. But most

importantly, the military leadership was given no clear strategic objectives that were to be

achieved at the end of the mobilisation. After some time, India mitigated this operational gap

by creating a new limited war doctrine known as ‘Cold Start’. The aim of this limited war

doctrine was:-

‘To establish the capacity to launch a retaliatory conventional strike against Pakistan that

would inflict significant harm on the Pakistan Army before the international community

65

The use of irregulars under the nuclear umbrella is a low cost option for Pakistan in pursuing its aims with

India in the absence of external mediation or support 66

Ganguly and Kraig (2005), p.298

29

could intercede, and at the same time, pursue narrow enough aims to deny Islamabad a

justification to escalate the clash to the nuclear level’.67

Walter C Ladwig has highlighted several shortcomings that Cold Start doctrine suffers

from. Besides being incapable of preventing escalation, the mere reason it was designed for,

the doctrine was also inadequate for achieving any strategic objectives that would have any

effect on the sub-conventional conflict. The success of Cold Start in inflicting considerable

punishment to Pakistan depended upon its ability to confuse Pakistani forces and disrupt their

decision cycle through speed, surprise and deception. Ladwig argued that this was likely to

exacerbate the fog of war and provide an incentive to the already keen Pakistani authorities to

escalate the war. In addition, the geography in South Asia does not favour a limited war

doctrine. Given Pakistan’s lack of strategic depth, even small incursion into Pakistani territory

would threaten its main cities which could pressure Pakistan to escalate or expand the

otherwise intended limited war.68

3.4.1. Physical space constraints

The limited war doctrine also favoured ‘bite and hold’, which meant capturing shallow

stretch of territory along the international border. The captured territory would be too less to

prompt a nuclear response but adequate to coerce Pakistan to a negotiating table. To explain

the non-viability of this plan, a terrain analysis along the border between India Pakistan is

required and has been done briefly in the following paragraphs. Broadly, the boundary

between India and Pakistan can be divided into three main sectors as shown in Figure 2

below. In the northernmost part, the terrain in the Jammu & Kashmir sector is mountainous

and snow bound. Operations in this sector are extremely difficult and slow, capable of being

carried out by only a large number of highly trained, acclimatised and equipped troops. The

use of mechanised forces is not possible. Any tactical gains by the infantry in this sector are

likely to be very slow and insignificant to the stated strategic objectives vis-á-vis the sub-

conventional conflict.

Further south is the sector of Punjab and North Rajasthan, an area of immense political and

economic importance to both sides. The terrain is plain and semi-desert; very conducive for

67

Ladwig (2007/08), p.164 68

Ibid, p.164

30

Figure 2 : Theatre of Operations along India-Pakistan Boundary69

conduct of mechanised operations. However there is an array of canals and ‘ditch-cum-bunds’

running parallel to the international boundary which are formidable obstacles for the

mechanised formations. Crossing these obstacles involves complex ‘bridge-head operations’

where a groups of bridges are laid against the enemy opposition for crossing main battle tanks

and armoured personnel carriers. The only such successful operation was carried out by the

Egyptian army on the Suez Canal during the Yom-Kippur war in 1973. One of the main

reasons of its success was that most of the Israeli troops were on leave, away from their

defences, celebrating the festival of Yom-Kippur.70

The chances of its repetition in the Indo-

Pakistani context are debatable.

69

Rough categorisation based on the geographical terrain. Also see http://www.bharat-

rakshak.com/MONITOR/ISSUE3-6/sbm.html accessed on 24 Dec 2013 70

Young and Kent (2004), pp. 423-425, Parker (2001), pp. 82-90

31

The South Rajasthan sector comprises of Thar Desert and marshy wasteland of Kutch. The

terrain provides a free run for mechanised forces but the area, void of any main population

centres or communication nodes near the international border, holds no strategic importance

for any side. Any significant push beyond the deserts, however, would threaten a major

North-South road and rail link of Pakistan which might be perceived as an effort to bisect the

state into two halves. It would also threaten major cities of Sindh province and thus entail an

inherent danger of crossing the ‘territory threshold’ prompting a nuclear response. Thus, there

is very limited physical space available for the Indian formations to seek military objectives

that lie within the given terms of reference of keeping a war limited and at the same time, are

likely to pursue the desired political objectives.

3.4.2. Time constraints

Strategic as well as operational war endurance is another hindrance in achieving the stated

objectives. At operational level, analysts have estimated that India has a war endurance of not

more than 2-3 weeks.71

India does not have a significant military industry and imports most of

its military weapons and equipment. It is also doubtful if India possesses maintain-and-repair

capabilities required to sustain the desired force level beyond this period. The army had felt

the heat of deficiencies during the Kargil War when it was fighting on a frontage of only

about 135 kilometres. According to General V P Malik, the ex-Chief of the Indian Army:-

‘It was not the vintage but the deficiencies of weapons, equipment, ammunition and

spars that worried us more. Even infantry weapons such as medium machine-guns,

rocket launchers and mortars…were in short supply’.72

In spite of numerous reforms initiated by the government after the hard learnt lessons of

the Kargil War and Operation Parakram, not much had changed in the last decade. Speaking

in 2011, Brigadier Gurmeet Kanwal stated:-

‘Inordinate delays in decision-making and bureaucratic red tape continue to mar

acquisitions, a large chunk of the defence budget is still surrendered year after year,

large equipment shortages continue to persist’.73

71

Tellis (1997) p.14 72

Malik (2006), p. 286 73

Kanwal (2011), http://www.indiandefencereview.com/spotlights/lost-opportunities-in-operation-parakram/0/

accessed on 17/12/13

32

At strategic level, international interference is a major factor that dictates the time available

to pursue an offensive strategy. An important lesson learnt from the Kargil War was that the

international community, especially major powers with vested interest in the region such as

the United States of America and China, were absolutely intolerant against any change in

status quo, especially by the use of force.74

Even the most trusted allies turned their back

towards Pakistan, once the Kargil misadventure was uncovered. Similarly during Operation

Parakram, the United States intervened vigorously to prevent the commencement of

hostilities. The mere presence of nuclear weapons makes this much more urgent than before.

Out of sheer fear of escalation to the nuclear level, the international community would spur

into determined action to enforce termination of hostilities.75

This might further reduce the

war fighting window from weeks to days.

3.5. Summary

In the past all Indo-Pakistan conflicts, with the exception of 1971 War, have ended with

each country’s leader interpreting the result as satisfactory / victorious for their respective

sides.76

In the contemporary age, where perceptions matter more than the actual battlefield,

anything less than a decisive victory can be highly problematic. Only a decisive victory can

ensure that in the long run Pakistan will accommodate India - by not challenging India

militarily or in its internal affairs, toning down its Islamic identity and also settling the

Kashmir dispute by making major concessions to New Delhi. And only an achievement of

this scale would make a conventional war capable of significantly altering the course or sub-

conventional conflict sponsored by Pakistan in India. Unfortunately, it is something that is not

likely to be achieved by a limited war, which is fought for limited scope and objectives.

Besides, it is highly unlikely that Pakistan will obediently follow India’s diktat through

military belligerence.77

Pakistani armed forces in particular, are resistant to any compromise

or accommodation with India. Stephen Cohen, who has extensively interviewed Pakistan

military officials, states:-

74

Tellis, Fair & Medby (2001), p.39 http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1450, accessed on

10/11/2014 75

Garg (2011), p. 98 76

Ibid, p. 95 77

Ibid, p.100

33

‘Its officers argue that Pakistan may be smaller but not weaker. It is united by religion

and a more martial spirit than India and need not lower its demands of India.’78

While nuclear weapons ruled out an all-out war between India and Pakistan, other non-

nuclear geo-strategic constraints reduced the space available for a limited war by laying down

some compulsory yet extremely contradicting conditions. In addition to that there were other

shortcomings of the Indian armed forces which could be summarised as – inadequacy of the

existing doctrines; lack of direction from the political rulers leading to lack of workable

alternatives in the face of crises; stalled or imbalanced modernisation; lack of surgical strike

capability; inefficient logistics; and inter-service differences.79

All these factors contributed to

the non-viability of a conventional response to the sub-conventional conflict.

Furthermore, the nature of Pakistan state as an adversary - with multiple power centres –

made it difficult to identify one centre of gravity that could be manipulated even if a viable

conventional response was possible. And finally, the ‘passive’ nature of Pakistan’s support to

the jihadist groups created a gap between them, successfully exploited by both to neutralise

the coercive military action threatened by India. All these factors make asymmetric escalation

of conflict to a conventional level inherently incapable of significantly impacting the sub-

conventional conflict. Empirical evidence also suggests that a conventional response to a sub-

conventional conflict tends to backfire. Considering the American experience in Vietnam, the

Soviet Union in Afghanistan and the current dilemmas of the United States in Afghanistan it

can be concluded that the benefits of using a military force in combating an irregular force are

far from clear.80

78

Cohen (2002), p.40 79

Dahiya (2012), p.77 80

Prakash (2012), p.125

34

4. Part III – Sub-conventional conflict

4.1. Introduction

The previous chapter discussed the conventional level of conflict and highlighted the

limitations of a retaliatory conventional war that India had threatened and how it was not

likely to have any significant effect on the sub-conventional conflict. In this last chapter, the

nature of sub-conventional conflict will be discussed. Within the Indian Territory, if the threat

from Maoist insurgency is excluded, there are three theatres or regions where India confronts

the threat of terrorism in varying degree of intensity – the North Eastern states of Assam and

Manipur, Jammu & Kashmir and the Indian hinterland.81

Out of these, the two theatres that

fall within the context of this thesis are that of Jammu & Kashmir and the Indian hinterland.

The popular belief has been that Pakistani based jihadist groups such as Jaish-e-Mohammed

and Lashar-e-Taiba, which played a prominent part in the insurgency in Jammu & Kashmir,

expanded their operations towards the Indian hinterland, under the wider scope of Jihad. The

terrorist attacks such as the one on Red Fort in Delhi on 22 December 2000, the attack on the

Indian Parliament on 13 December 2001 and the Mumbai attacks on 26 November 2008

supported this belief.

This chapter highlights that in spite of having suffered from insurgencies and terrorism for

a long time India did not carry out an internal audit of the ideologies, motives and the

grievances that provided force to these movements.82

Having failed to do so, the Indian

security agencies and political leaders continued to characterise these movements as activities

of jihadist groups based in Pakistan. Therefore, without looking within domestic political set

up, which was the real cause of the sub-conventional conflict, the India security analysts

continued to seek its solution in the conventional realm of the conflict spectrum.

The chapter argues that even if the conduct of an offensive conventional action was

possible, it would have very limited effect on the sub-conventional conflict. This was because

Pakistan was only one part of the problem – having provided material support to the terrorists.

The root cause of the sub-conventional conflict in India lay within the boundaries of India.

The acts of terrorism and insurgencies were the consequences of political disenchantment

81

Kalyanaraman (2012), p.112 82

Ibid, p.107

35

caused by the repeated interventions of the central government in the states’ political

processes and the failure of the organs of Indian state to safeguard Muslims and their

interests.83

The first section highlights the causes and evolution of the ‘Kashmir dispute’. It

argues that the ‘Kashmir problem’ was a self-inflicted wound, which Pakistan was able to

exploit at the right moment. Similarly, the second section elaborates that when the conflict

spread over to the Indian hinterland, the population there was already alienated and ready to

express their grievances in the form of an armed struggle.

4.2. Kashmir dispute

The year 1989 is considered to be an epoch in the history of Kashmir. This was the year

when two timelines, which had run parallel to each other since 1947, visibly merged with

each other. One timeline belonged to the Kashmiri’s indigenous struggle for self

determination and the other to that of Pakistan’s irredentist claim over the state of Jammu and

Kashmir. The tell tale signs of the local discontent had existed as early as 1960s. For instance,

in 1967 a group of people had attempted to murder a CRPF constable. In 1968 an attempt was

made to steal rifles from the rooms of the National Cadet Corps in the Islamia College. In

1971 Jammu & Kashmir Liberation Front operative Hashim Qureshi hijacked an Indian

Airlines aircraft to Lahore while a decade later their cadres were implicated in the murder of

London based Indian diplomat Ravindra Mhatre.84

4.2.1. Root Cause

The discontent reached its peak in 1989 when the state exploded with incidents of

widespread violent protests. Contrary to popular belief, the rise of insurgency was actually the

result of India’s misguided policies, steady erosion of the state’s special status and neglect of

its people over many years. From the outset the leaders had followed manipulative policies,

political persecution and suppression of free opinion in Kashmir, which led to the alienation

of the population. One of the main reasons was the decay of the democratic institutions in the

state for which both Kashmiri and Indian national leaders were responsible.85

For instance,

the National conference and its operatives under the leadership of Sheikh Abdullah had

dominated the politics of the state. It is well known that Sheikh Abdullah did not allow any

83

Kalyanaraman (2012), p.113 84

Swami (2007), p.57 85

Ganguly (1997), p.29

36

honest political opposition to develop in the state during his time, which limited the growth

and development of political institutions through which Kashmiri population could express its

resentment. Almost all elections in the state of Jammu & Kashmir were largely a farce, except

the ones in 1977 and 1983. The central government was also to be blamed because during this

time it did little to stay the hand of National Conference as long as it did not question the

accession of Jammu and Kashmir into the Indian Union.86

The resentment against India was also fuelled by the lack of economic development of the

state during the 1970s and 1980s. The failures of the Kashmiri leaders and the federal

government to create jobs, stop corruption, provide factories or power generation stations led

to their fallout. They had no jobs and could not get admission into colleges without paying

bribes to the politicians. The youth more or less, felt neglected and over a period of time got

distant and alienated from the rest of India. Their grievances were as much economic as

political and led to their loss of faith in the system and eventually the revolt.87

During the late

1980s, majority of the youth who joined the armed rebellion and turned into militants were

the disappointed political workers, well educated doctors, engineers, teachers and policemen

who had become alienated by Indian government policies.

One of the immediate causes of the insurgency was the elections of 1987. The elections

were a contest between the Muslim United Front (MUF), a conjunction of fundamentalist

Islamist parties and the alliance between National Conference and Congress. The MUF was

popular amongst the population with expectations and high hopes of change, especially the

youth who had found console in the fundamentals of their religion, in the absence of any other

political expression.88

Watching the surge in support for the MUF, the National Conference-

Congress alliance rigged the elections in 1987. Not only was the vote rigged, several electoral

candidates of the MUF were also physically assaulted. Those who were manhandled crossed

the ever porous Indo-Pakistani border and joined the extremist groups. The leadership of the

insurgency two years later came from some of these contestants. Syed Mohammad Yusuf

Shah, also popularly known as Syed Salahuddin was one of them, who had contested a seat

from Srinagar’s Amirakadal constituency. He later became the chief of Hizb-ul-Mujahideen.

86

Ganguly (1997), p.29 87

Schofield (2010), p.145 88

Ibid, p.125

37

At this moment in time, the Valley and some of its contiguous areas lost all residual

confidence in India’s political system.89

The people got disgusted, disappointed and

disillusioned by the complete process. They were trying to change the political framework by

democratic and peaceful methods, but were led down.90

They rejected the entire political

framework as hopelessly corrupt, denounced Indian authority over Jammu and Kashmir as

illegitimate and launched a campaign to overthrow it by taking up the gun.

4.2.2. External support

The insurgency in Kashmir coincided with the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in

1989 and subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union. The American arms and weapons left

behind from the Afghan war were now available to back up the brewing trouble in Kashmir.

This was also an opportunity for the Pakistan’s military to shake off the effects of the

previous three wars with India. Pakistan was quick to seize the moment by providing moral

and materialistic support to the Kashmiri insurgents. The ISI actively provided money,

training and weapons to the Kashmir insurgents, most notably to the Jammu & Kashmir

Liberation Front.

In a few years, however, the struggle for ‘self determination’ began to fade away. The

Hindus of Jammu and the Buddhists of Ladakh, who had always demanded full and

unconditional accession to India, acted as a countervailing force to the Valley’s demand for

independence.91

After a poor track of human rights violations, the security forces too changed

their tactics and played a crucial role in winning over the population by conducting surgical

and people friendly operations. The population’s support to militant groups operating in the

valley and the violence associated with them, slowly diminished.

By the mid 1990s, the separatist struggle began to falter and Pakistan sponsored Jihad

against India gained momentum. Pakistan reacted by cutting off aid to the nationalist Jammu

and Kashmir Liberation Front and switching support to pro-Pakistan Islamist groups and

funnelling its own jihadists and other ‘graduates of Afghan War’ into Kashmir. Table 1 below

shows the transition of conflict from ‘the war of liberation of Kashmir’ to ‘Jihad’. It is

evident from Table 1 that the Kashmiri groups more or less ceased to use violence as a means

89

Bose (2003), p. 94 90

Schofield (2010), p.138 91

Behera (2006), p. 242

38

to pursue their cause and the insurgency was transformed into an ‘Islamist crusade to bring all

of Kashmir under Pakistani control’ taken over by groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT),

Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM), Harkal-ul-Mujahideen (HuM) and its subsequent offshoot Jaish-

e-Mohammed (JeM).92

Overall in Kashmir, the grievances which became the root cause of the

conflict were local and domestic. Pakistan’s role can be described as an external power which

was quick to grab an opportunity presented by domestic circumstances. The conflict in the

Indian hinterland also followed a similar pattern.

4.3. Indian hinterland

The essence of Jihad in the Indian hinterland can be drawn from the two tables below

which show the terrorist attacks outside Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab and North-Eastern states

between 2000 and 2010. Table 2 shows the organisations involved in the terrorist incidents

and table 3 shows the extent of damage or the severity of these incidents.

It is evident from this data that the front-runner organisation that led the Jihad in the Indian

hinterland was the Student Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) and its offshoot the Indian

Mujahedeen (IM). The radicalisation of SIMI and its transformation into IM had taken place

in the 1990s in response to the rise of Hindu right. The Hindu right had mobilised its cause

using the Ayodhya issue which resulted in demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992.93

This has

been elaborated in the following paragraphs.

4.3.1. Root cause

The Indian state and the secular nature of its constitution had granted equality to its

population and prohibited any discrimination on the basis of religious, race, caste or gender.94

However, since independence, the organs of the Indian state including the police, the judiciary

and the political system at large had failed to safeguard Muslims and their interests.95

The

facts derived from the statistical data also implied that India could not protect its Muslim

minority which had suffered from relative deprivation and had been victims of communal

92

Kalyanraman (2010), pp.709-710 93

Ibid, p.705 94

Tankel (2012) p.10 http://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/jihadist-violence-the-indian-threat accessed on

05/01/14 95

Kalyanaraman (2012), p.113

39

MILITANT GROUP 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 Total

Moslem Janbaz Force 2 1 3

Mujahedeen Kashmir 6 6

Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front

42 1 2 1 1 2 49

Ikhwan-ul-Muslimeen 2 1 3

Muslim Brotherhood 1 1 2

Kashmiri Hizballah 1 1 1 3

Al Faran 2 2

Al Jehad 2 1 3

Harkat ul Ansar 2 7 2 11

Separatists (J&K) 25 15 1 41

Kashmiri Militants 10 17 23 7 11 6 1 75

Muslim Separatists (Kashmir) 11 2 3 64 33 3 1 117

Muslim Militants (Kashmir) 20 8 22 9 5 2 2 1 9 78

Hizb-ul-Mujahedeen (HM) 6 1 1 2 3 1 6 11 11 4 8 4 5 63

Al-Umar Mujahedeen 3 3 1 2 1 10

Jamiat ul-Mujahedin (JuM) 1 2 1 3 1 8

Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) 6 9 21 13 4 6 8 67

Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) 4 4 1 2 1 12

Al-Arifeen 2 1 1 4

Al-Madina 3 3

Al-Mansoorian 1 2 3 6 12

Al-Nasireen Group 2 2

Mahaz-e-Inquilab 3 3

Table 1 – ‘Kashmir dispute’ related terrorist incidents between 1990 and 200596

Groups shaded in grey belonged to indigenous Kashmiri movement, while those not shaded had jihadist agenda

96

Global Terrorism Database http://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/ accessed on 20/12/13.

Fro

m

‘W

ar

o

f

libe

ratio

n’ to

‘Jih

ad

’

40

Group 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 Total

Student Islamic Movement of India / Indian Mujahedeen 2 1 4 1 3 11

Lashkar-e-Taiba 1 1 2 4

Jaish-e-Mohammad 1 1

Harkat-ul-Jammat-e-Islami 1 1

Muslim Defence Force 1 1

Unknown/Pending investigations* 2 2 2 3 2 5 1 2 19

Total 1 3 4 5 0 3 3 5 7 1 5 37

Table 2: Terrorist incidents and the militant organisations involved in India (outside Jammu and

Kashmir, Punjab and the North-Eastern states) between 2000 and 201097

(* Mostly attributed to the Hindu Right)

Years Incidents Civilians

Killed SFs

Killed Terrorists

Killed Total Killed

Total Injured

2000 1 9 0 0 9 60

2001 3 8 9 5 22 51

2002 4 35 5 2 42 147

2003 5 67 2 0 69 289

2005 3 63 0 6 69 166

2006 3 261 0 1 262 1088

2007 5 141 0 0 141 262

2008 7 330 27 9 366 783

2009 1 2 1 0 3 0

2010 5 20 0 0 20 109

Total 37 936 44 23 1003 2955

Table 3: Terrorist incidents and casualties in India (outside Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab and the

North-Eastern states) between 2000 and 201098

violence. For instance, according to the Sachar committee commissioned in 2005 to examine

the social, economic and educational conditions of Indian Muslims, Muslim graduates had the

highest unemployment rate of any socio-religious group while they had the highest presence

in the prisons.99

97

Data from South Asian Terrorism Portal: http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/countries/india/database/OR9-

1majorterroristattacks.htm accessed on 10/02/14 98

Ibid 99

Tankel (2012), p.11

41

In December 1992 Babri Masjid was demolished in Ayodhya by Hindu fundamentalists.

This became another source of grievance for the already alienated Muslim population. The

Hindu rallies celebrating the mosque’s destructions further aggravated Muslim sentiments and

contributed to the frenzied protests.100

This incident proved to be a turning point for the

radicalised youth of SIMI. During the course of the decade, they began to trickle into terrorist

training camps in Pakistan. Inspired by the multiple jihads waged by the terrorist groups

based in Afghanistan and Pakistan, they began to entreat the Indian Muslims to fight against

Indian democracy, nationalism and secularism. This gave rise to indigenous terrorist

organisations such as the Indian Mujahedeen comprising of radical Indian Muslim youth. It

also exploited the over-response by the security forces to Islamist terrorism and further

reinforced the narrative of a communal Hindu war against Indian Muslims.101

The Hindu Right in India also played its part in communalising the political scene and

becoming a cog in the vicious cycle of revenge and repression. It had organised itself in the

1980s and had used the Ayodhya issue to mobilise its cadres, culminating in the demolition of

Babri Masjid in December 1992. When this triggered the transformation of Indian Islamist

movement (SIMI) into terrorist organisation (IM), the Hindu right became incensed by the

repeated terrorist attacks unleashed by them and sought vengeance against the perpetrators of

these attacks and their sympathisers.102

The Hindu Right extremists turned into militants in

order ‘to defend society and the social fabric against...Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence

and Bangladeshi infiltrators’.103

Camps were organised to train its members in the use of rifles

and pistols. It was from cadres such as Bajrang Dal and Durga Vahini that right wing terrorist

emerged in the later year. For instance, a Durga Vahini member, Pragya Singh Thakur was

involved in a bomb explosion outside a mosque in Malegaon in 2008.104

The bomb attacks on

the Mecca Masjid in Hyderabad and at Ajmer Sharif in Rajasthan were also attributed to such

organisations.

100

Tankel (2012), p.15 101

Ibid, p.65 102

Kalyanaraman (2012), p.113 103

Interview of Bagran Dal’s president in 2004. Kalayanraman (2010), p.705 104

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/probe-into-hindu-groups-link-to-

blasts/article1362696.ece accessed on 04/03/2014

42

4.3.2. External support

Pakistan had nurtured the militant Islamist organisations such as the LeT, JeM, HM and

HuM, with an aim of using them against the Indian rule in Kashmir. The government

supported their recruitment drives, fund collection activities, training and access to weapons

for volunteers. Over the years, the rampant corruption and stagnated economy in Pakistan

repeatedly discredited its secular leaders and their political parties, which bolstered the

strength of these militant Islamist groups.105

As discussed above, during the late 1990s, the conflict waged by the jihadist groups such

as LeT and JeM had remained confined to Jammu and Kashmir. With the passage of time, as

they became battle-hardened and their campaigns gathered momentum, they shifted their

focus to include all of India. For instance LeT, because of its ideology - pan-Islamist and anti

Hindu - was not content with waging jihad in Kashmir alone. It wanted to prosecute its

terrorist operations in other parts of India as well. During the Kargil War in June 1999, LeT’s

chief Hafiz Mohammed Saeed had stated that the Mujahedeen were not waging jihad only for

the liberation of Kashmir but also ‘for independence of 200 million Indian Muslims’.106

Later

in December 1999 he announced the advent of a new phase in its pan-India operations in a

rally organised by Markaz Dawat Wal’Irshad, its parent organisation.107

They backed it up by

carrying out some high profile attacks in Indian cities during the first few years (as evident

from table 1) one of which was on the Indian Parliament, which brought India and Pakistan

on a brink of war. However, as a consequence of September 11 2001 attacks in New York, the

strategic scene changed drastically in South Asia. The United States of America got involved

in the region by initiating a ‘global war on terror’ in Afghanistan with Pakistan as its major

non-NATO ally. The international environment changed in such a way that blatant and overt

support for militancy against India became untenable.108

At the same time, however, the

domestic situation in India worked in favour of the jihadist groups who found willing recruits

in India within SIMI and IM. These volunteers under a deep sense of grievance and revenge

carried forward the task of spreading terror within India. The jihadist groups sidestepped to

105

Byman (2005) p.128 106

Kalyanaraman (2010), p.710 107

Tankel (2012), p.25 108

Ibid, p.25

43

the role of providing training, safe haven, logistical support, foreign actors, money, weapons

and explosive materials.

There are two important points that need to be considered. Firstly, although SIMI and IM

drew their support and motivation from LeT; at its essence, their ideology boiled down to

exacting revenge for communal injustices and not that of spreading pan-Islamic jihad. Their

gangs evolved more as a terrorist network than a jihadist organisation. The overwhelming

majority of youth that joined the organisation were motivated primarily by a sense of

grievance and a desire to seek revenge rather than be associated with waging or expanding the

global jihad. Its captured operatives specifically cited the demolition of the Babri Masjid and

the widespread communal violence that occurred in its wake as well as targeting of Muslims

in the communal violence in Gujarat in 2002 as main reasons for waging a war against

India.109

Secondly, Pakistan was not the only country where the network of jihadist organisations,

both Indian and Pakistani, was based. The members of these terrorist organisations also

operated in Bangladesh, Nepal and several Persian Gulf countries. Bangladesh was most

notable out of all. Due to the contiguous and porous borders with India, it facilitated travel,

safe havens, staging areas and smuggling of money and material for the operatives. The lack

of effort made by a succession of governments in Dhaka to crack down on these militant

activities facilitated their ability to do so.110

4.4. Summary

This chapter defined the character of unconventional conflict in India by identifying its

causes, the sources of the perceived grievances, the prevalent ideologies and the nature of

external support. It argues that one of the main reasons why any offensive conventional

strategies directed towards Pakistan were unlikely to affect the sub-conventional conflict in

India was because the root cause of the conflict lay within India. The conflict had sprung out

of the failure of Indian domestic social and political policies that alienated a portion of its own

population and led to the emergence of pure indigenous terrorist groups. This section argued

that given the circumstances, the role of Pakistan was more as a catalyst, which helped the

109

Kalyanaraman (2012), p.113 110

Tankel (2012), pp. 70-71

44

transition of conflict from the ‘liberation of Kashmir’ to spread of ‘jihad’ to other parts of

India. It also highlighted that the need for jihad arose from both sides of the border. While

grievances and willing recruits originated in India, the guidance, ideology and materialistic

support came over from Pakistan. Pakistan did not incite insurgency or terrorism in India. In

fact most of its previous attempts to do so had failed, for instance, in 1947-48, 1965 and to

some extent in 1999 Kargil War. It was only when favourable conditions appeared in the

Indian mainland that Pakistan’s jihad was able to spread successfully across the border.

Overall, due to the nature of unconventional conflict within India, it became difficult to

counter it with offensive conventional strategies, as employed in Brasstacks or the ‘Twin

Peak’ crisis.

45

5. Conclusion Going back to the parameters of will and capability, the following can be established. India

could not gather the capability to counter Pakistan’s sub-conventional conflict in India.

Therefore, it targeted Pakistan’s will by threatening a conventional war and coercing Pakistan

into submission, thus resorting to an asymmetric escalation from one level of conflict to

another. Similarly, Pakistan was unable to match India’s capability at the conventional level.

Hence it targeted India’s will to fight a conventional war by adopting nuclear ‘first-use’ policy

and thus threatening an asymmetric escalation.

This thesis argues that the strategy of asymmetric escalation had failed to achieve the

desired results. At the nuclear level, Pakistani nuclear weapons had failed to deter an Indian

conventional response. Indian leaders firmly believed that adequate space existed for a limited

conventional war in which Pakistani forces can be drawn and destroyed. On two occasions

after the nuclear tests of 1998 – the Kargil war in 1999 and the Twin Peak crisis in 2001-02 -

India mobilised its conventional forces diligently, with a credible threat to escalate, in

retaliation to Pakistan’s sub-conventional initiatives.

Similarly, India’s threat of a conventional war failed to deter Pakistan from supporting the

sub-conventional conflict in India. The thesis highlighted four main reasons for it. Firstly, the

nature of Pakistani state with multiple power centres made it difficult for the Indian planners

to target any one centre of gravity in a conventional engagement. Secondly, the nature of

support that Pakistani sponsors provided to the jihadist groups was ‘passive’ which allowed a

gap to exist between them. This strategic gap worked in their favour and set a limit to which

any coercive action could have succeeded. Thirdly, the geo-strategic constraints further

limited the scope of a limited conventional war that India perceived and made it inherently

incapable of having any significant effect on the sub-conventional conflict. Fourthly, the

nature of the sub-conventional conflict itself had been such that any action directed towards

Pakistan would have only a limited impact on the conflict. There was an expanding

participation of Indian population in the Islamist violence.111

The nature of the sub-

conventional conflict was political and had risen from failed domestic political policies. The

acts of terrorism and insurgencies, which characterised the sub-conventional conflict, were the

111

Tellis et all (2009) p.15, http://www.rand.org/pubs/occasional_papers/OP249, accessed on 28/12/2013

46

consequence of political disenchantment caused by the repeated interventions in the states’

political processes and the failure of the organs of the Indian state to safeguard Muslims and

their interests.112

On the contrary, the asymmetric escalation of conflict had a destabilising effect in the

region. It made the region crises prone with high likelihood of accidental or inadvertent

escalation due to short distances and contiguous borders between the two states. In case of

Pakistan, the desire to employ its nuclear weapons to deter an Indian conventional attack has

led them to adopt nuclear ‘first use’ policy. Furthermore, to attain credibility for this policy it

had to deploy risky nuclear postures. This increased the chances of accidental or inadvertent

use of nuclear weapons. The ‘delegative’113

command and control structures resulted in the

loss of centralised control along with the need to quick dispersion and deployment which

could have generated a serious risk of theft or unauthorised use.114

The nuclear postures

adopted by Pakistan also gave a setback to its efforts to convince the United States and other

international actors that it was a responsible nuclear power and would not use nuclear

weapons except as a last resort in extreme self defence.115

Similarly India’s desire to use its conventional forces to exploit the space available for a

limited war led to the development of more offensive options at the conventional level. This

further exacerbated the Pakistani perceived existential threat from India and gave a setback to

the already slow process of its democratisation by keeping the seat of power within its armed

forces. In other words it strengthened the hands of the military establishment, whose very

raison d’être was anti-Indianism built on the foundation of the pressing threat posed by India

to Pakistan’s very existence116

The Indian conventional threat also increased the support of

jihadist groups which constantly thrive on anti-Hindu rhetoric and accuse India of bullying

and coercing Pakistan. India’s military action to force Pakistan to crack down on support for

the jihadist groups proved to be counterproductive for yet another reason. It reinforced the

112

Kalyanaraman (2012), p.113 113

An ‘assertive’ command and control system is where the decision to launch nuclear weapons is exclusively

retained by top political leaders. Where as a ‘delegative’ postures emphasises certainty of wanted nuclear use under defined circumstances in which subordinate commanders are authorised to launch nuclear weapons. Chakma (2006), p.131 114

Narang (2009/10), p.75 115

Sagan (2009), p.240 116

Kalyanraman (2012), p.114

47

image of India as a bully trying to crush Pakistan’s identity and that of jihadist warriors as the

saviours, thus expanding their fundraising and recruitment. Most of all, it had no significant

affect on the sub-conventional conflict.

Therefore, it can be concluded that visualising, identifying and segregating the three

different but overlapping levels of conflict in South Asia is very important. Segregation of

three levels of conflict will help in calibrated and limited responses which are not likely to

exacerbate the problem. The role of strong conventional forces needs to be limited to deter the

perceived adversaries’ conventional action. At best it can be restricted to special operations

which take place within the sub-conventional part of the conflict spectrum. Any belligerent

and offensive strategies in the conventional part of the spectrum are bound to create a vicious

cycle of security dilemma and destabilise the region. It will also help in employing all the

available resources within the required level of conflict more effectively. For example, if the

response is limited to sub-conventional level, resources belonging to conventional forces such

as the Special Forces, the unmanned aerial vehicles, communication and surveillance

equipment can be used to supplement the police and paramilitary forces responsible to defend

against the low-intensity conflict. Concentration on one level of conflict will also help in

proper identification of the nature of conflict that will lead to informed and appropriate

responses. It took India many years to recognise the Indian face of jihad because the focus on

a conventional response did not allow the required scrutiny to take place at the sub-

conventional level.

Similarly, the sub-conventional conflict can be dealt with more effectively when the

strategies that lie at the lower level of spectrum are employed. For instance, insurgencies are

dealt with most effectively with strategies of counter-insurgency and terrorism with those of

counter-terrorism. Any escalatory strategies that lie within the conventional level are not

likely to succeed at best or are likely to have a negative impact at worst. India had a

successful record of beating insurgencies in some of its states such as Manipur and Jammu &

Kashmir which support this notion.

48

Most important of all, the role of nuclear weapons will be reverted back to where it

belongs and is relatively safer – to deter the use of nuclear weapons by other states. As long

as nuclear weapons are around, deterrence is the best policy to deal with them117

.

Six years after Operation Parakram, another terrorist incident - more audacious and

ambitious in scope - happened in Mumbai which went on for almost 60 hours. Once again

Pakistan was convicted as the terrorists belonged to LeT and were launched from Karachi via

the sea route. The actions taken by India partially support this thesis. There was no response

from India in the conventional part of the conflict spectrum and all the actions were limited to

the sub-conventional level. Firstly, India made an effort to improve the domestic security

arrangements to deter the terrorist attacks. Although these measures are still in the process of

being implemented and have not reached the desired level, initiatives were taken to equip the

local police forces with counter-terrorist training and equipment, improve the response

mechanisms of specialist paramilitary forces such as the National Security Guard

commandos, improve hostage-rescue plans, strategic communications and information

management.118

Secondly, India and Pakistan de-linked terrorist attacks from the peace

initiatives and confidence building measures between the two nations, thus severing the cord

that these semi-independent jihadist groups were using to derail the peace process time and

again. It helped isolate those elements that thrived on vertical escalation. In addition, India

made a comprehensive diplomatic offensive to persuade the international community to act

more forcefully and influence Pakistan to shut down LeT, JeM and other militant groups

operating in and from Pakistan. As a result in December 2008 United Nations Security

Council proscribed Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the parent organisation of LeT which forced Pakistan to

put its leaders under house arrest and seal its offices in different cities. 119

Asymmetric escalation of conflict has been a consequence of asymmetric vulnerabilities of

India and Pakistan coupled with a long history of distrust towards each other. It goes without

saying that segregation of three distinct levels of conflict is not possible unilaterally and needs

a bi-lateral effort from both Indian and Pakistani strategic communities. Owing to the distrust

and enmity that both have towards each other, it may take a long period of time for it to be

117

Delpech (2012), p.1 http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG1103.html accessed on 16/07/2013 118

Tellis et all (2009) p.22, http://www.rand.org/pubs/occasional_papers/OP249, accessed on 28/12/2013 119

Ibid, p.17

49

achieved. Until then, the confidence building measures, the ongoing trade agreements,

cultural exchanges and other such steps are positive initiatives towards this direction which

also bring much needed peace and stability in the region.

50

6. Bibliography

Ahmed, A. (2012). Nuclear Doctrine and Conflict. In P. George, & K. Venkatshamy, Grand Strategy for

India: 2020 and Beyond (pp. 138-145). New Delhi: Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, New

Delhi.

Arreguin-Toft, I. (2001). How the Weak Win Wars. International Security, Vol. 26, No. 1, 93-128.

Ashley J. Tellis, R. A. (2009). The Lessons of Mumbai. Retrieved December 28, 2013, from RAND

Corporation: http://www.rand.org/pubs/occasional_papers/OP249.

Badri-Mahraj, S. (2001, May-June). Bharat Rakshak. Retrieved December 24, 2013, from Bharat

Rakshak Monitor: http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITOR/ISSUE3-6/sbm.html

Balance, T. M. (2013). Chapter Six: Asia. The Military Balance 2013, Vol. 113, Issue 1, 245-352.

Behera, N. C. (2006). Demystifying Kashmir. Washington D.C.: Brookings Institution Press.

Bose, S. (2003). Kashmir: Roots of Conflict, Paths to Peace. Cambridge, Massachusetts & London:

Harvard University Press.

Byman, D. (2005-06). Passive Sponsors of Terrorism. Survival Vol. 47, No. 4, 117-144.

Chakma, B. (2006). Pakistan's Nuclear Doctrine and Command and Control System: Dilemmas of

Small Nuclear Forces in the Second Atomic Age. Security Challanges, Vol. 2, No. 2, 115-133.

Cohen, S. P. (2002). India, Pakistan and Kashmir. Jornal of Strategic Studies, Vol. 25, No. 4, , 32-60.

Dahiya, R. (2012). Reforming the Military Institutions and National Security Strategy. In K.

Venkatshamy, & P. George, Grand Strategy for India: 2020 and Beyond (pp. 72-82). New Delhi:

Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses.

Delpech, T. (2012). Nuclear Deterrence in the 21st Century: Lessons from the Cold War for a New Era

of Strategic Piracy. Retrieved July 12, 2013, from RAND Corporation:

http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG1103.

Ganguly, S. (1997). The Crisis in Kashmir: Portents of War: Hopes of Peace. Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press.

Ganguly, S. (2002). Conflict Unending: India-Pakistan Tensions since 1947. New Delhi: Oxford

University Press.

Ganguly, S. (2008). Nuclear Stability in South Asia. International Security, Vol. 33, No. 2, 45-70.

Ganguly, S., & Michael, K. R. (2005). The 2001-2002 Indo-Pakistani Crisis: Exposing the Limits of

Coercive Diplomacy. Security Studies, 290-324.

Garg, R. (2011). Positive Prospects for Limited War in South Asia. Journal of Defence Studies, Vol. 5,

No. 2, 90-108.

Global Terrorism Database. (n.d.). Retrieved December 20, 2013, from Global Terrorism Database:

http://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/

Hagerty, D. T. (1998). The Consequences of Nuclear Proliferation: Lessons from South Asia.

Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

51

Hoyt, T. D. (2001). Pakistani Nuclear Doctrine And The Dangers of Strategic Myopia. Aisan Survey,

Vol. 41, No. 6, 956-977.

Institute for Conflict Management. (n.d.). Retrieved from South Asian Terrorism Portal:

http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/countries/india/database/OR_9-11_majorterroristattacks.htm

Kalyanaraman, S. (2010). India and the Challenge of Terrorism in the Hinterland. Strategic Analysis

Vol. 34, No. 5, 702-716.

Kalyanaraman, S. (2012). Thinking About Counter-Terrorism in India's Grand Strategy. In K.

Venkatshamy, & P. George, Grand Strategy of India: 2020 and Beyond (pp. 107-115). New Delhi:

Institute For Defence Studies & Analyses.

Kanwal, G. (2011, December 13). Indian Defence Review. Retrieved December 13, 2013, from Indian

Defenc Review: http://www.indiandefencereview.com/spotlights/lost-opportunities-in-operation-

parakram/0/

Kapur, S. P. (2005). India and Pakistan's Unstable Peace: Why Nuclear South Asia is Not Like Cold

War Europe. International Security, Vol. 30, No. 2, 127-152.

Kapur, S. P. (2007). Dangerous Deterrent: Nuclear Weapons Proliferation and Conflict in South Asia.

Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Kennedy, A. B. (2011). India's Nuclear Odyssey: Implicit Umbrellas, Diplomatc Disappointments and

the Bomb. International Security, Vol. 36, No. 2, 120-153.

Kilcullen, D. (2005). Countering Global Insurgency. Journal of Strategic Studies, Vol. 28, No. 4, 597-

617.

Kraig, M. R. (1999). Nuclear Deterrence in the Developing World: A Game-Theoretic Treatment.

Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 36, No. 2, 141-167.

Ladwig, W. C. (2007/08). A Cold Start for Hot Wars? The Indian Army's New Limited War Doctrine.

International Security, Vol. 32, No. 3, 158-190.

Malik, V. P. (2006). Kargil: From Surprise to Victory. Noida, Uttar Pradesh: HarperCollins.

Musharraf, P. (2006). In The Line of Fire: A Memoir. London: Simon & Schuster.

Narang, V. (2009/10). Posturing for Peace? Pakistan's Nuclear Postures and South Asian Stability.

International Security, Vol. 34, No. 3, 38-78.

Nasir, J. (1999, Feb-Mar). Defence Journal. Retrieved February 24, 2014, from Defence Journal:

http://defencejournal.com/feb-mar99/chief-bluff.htm

On This Day 1950 - 2005. (n.d.). Retrieved March 5, 2014, from BBC:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/12/newsid_4272000/4272943.stm

Pakistan Army. (2011, November 20). Retrieved November 05, 2013, from Global Security:

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/pakistan/army.htm

Parker, R. B. (2001). The October War: A Retrospective. Florida: University Press of Florida.

52

Perkovich, G. (2012, November 13). The Non-Unitary Model and Deterrence Stability in South Asia.

Retrieved December 14, 2013, from Carneige Endowment:

http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/11/13/non-unitary-model-and-deterrence-stability-in-south-

asia/eihm#

Prakash, D. (2012). International Terrorism and National Security Strategy. In K. Venkatshamy, & P.

George, Grand Strategy for India: 2020 and Beyond (pp. 116-128). New Delhi: Institute for Defence

Studies and Analyses.

Raghavan, V. R. (2001). Limited War and Nuclear Escalation in South Asia. The Nonproliferation

Review, 1-18.

Sagan, S. D. (2001). The Perils of Proliferation in South Asia. Asian Survey, 1064-1086.

Sagan, S. D. (2009). Inside Nuclear South Asia. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.

Schofield, V. (2010). Kashmir in Conflict: India, Pakistan and the Unending War. London & New York:

I.B. Tauris & Co Ltd.

Singh, J. (2002). Kashmir, Pakistan and the War by Terror. Small Wars and Insurgencies, Vol. 13, No.

2, 81-94.

Swami, P. (2007). India, Pakistan and the Secret Jihad: The Covert War in Kashmir, 1947-2004.

Oxon: Routledge.

Tankel, S. (2012). Jihadist Violence: The Indian Threat. Retrieved January 05, 2014, from Wilson

Center: http://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/jihadist-violence-the-indian-threat

Tellis, A. J. (1997). Stability in South Asia. Retrieved November 10, 2013, from RAND Corporation:

http://www.rand.org/pubs/documented_briefings/DB185.

Tellis, A. J., Fair, C. C., & Medby, J. J. (2001). Limited Conflicts Under Nuclear Umbrella: Indian and

Pakistani Lessons from the Kargil Crisis. Retrieved November 10, 2013, from RAND Corporation:

http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1450.

The Hindu. (2008, October 24). Retrieved March 04, 2014, from The Hindu:

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/probe-into-hindu-groups-link-to-

blasts/article1362696.ece

The Times of India. (2003, July 31). Retrieved February 24, 2014, from The Times of India:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Op-Parakram-claimed-798-soldiers/articleshow/104948.cms

The Times of India. (2011, May 6). Retrieved February 21, 2014, from The Times of India:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/Kayani-doesnt-back-Zardaris-no-first-use-nuclear-

policy-WikiLeaks-/articleshow/8179491.cms?referral=PM

Vayu Sena. (2004, July 6). Retrieved February 24, 2014, from Vayu Sena: http://vayu-sena-

aux.tripod.com/other-Parakram-IAF-UAV-Wreckage.html

Young, J. W., & Kent, J. (2001). International Relations Since 1945: A Global History. Oxford: Oxford

University Press.