Indo-Pak issues, terrorism, Kashmir, etc.

[Atithee]

Cyber warfare and falsehoods is also a part of war strategy. That should happen through social media-an ideal tool available in modern world—than media though. Journalistic standards have fallen wayside for many years in India.

[prasen9]

My most-cited paper is unfortunately the one on misinformation/rumor detection. Anyway, this is something that we do not know how to corral. I mean we know how to corral but we do not know how we can have balanced control of the media where the government does not use it for propaganda like the communist countries do and the rampant rumors that fly if you allow a free for all ... Digital education is very important. That can give some hope. If we can teach people to be more discerning from an early age, maybe the next generation can be better equipped individually to counter this.

[prasen9]

Abdul Rauf Azhar who got killed was a terrorsit, he is the IC814 hijacker and is part of his family, Masood Azhar's own brother. There are videos of Military leaders attending his funeral and by the way there is no gurantee Masood Azhar himself didn't die in this strike, he was never seen outside after this strike including in the fenerals that included his near family members but the statement was isssued on his behalf that he would have been glad to lose his life...something like that. Could well be a statement issued to make-believe that he is still alive !!

It was ironic to see Pak saying the state doesn't sponsor terrorism, but terrorsits being given state funerals with Pak flags covered.

And, my prediction is that this death will have zero impact on LeT or whichever terrorist organization he leads. Someone will take his post. We must stop these guys efforts so that whatever they try will not work. We have no credible way to kill them all even if we buldoze their country like Israel is finding out. Maybe for a small place like Gaza, you can get away killing them all. But, Israel is a white country so to say - with different rules. We cannot bulldoze and kill so many in Pakistan. We are a brown country. We cannot kill that many and get away. Not that I am proposing we do that.

[srini]

What became extremely clear over the last three days in India is the utter and complete destruction of any credibility that Indian news outlets (print and online press, as well as online and on-air media channels) ever had. Absolute and unmitigated disaster. The Hindu seems to be the only one source that simply stayed away from pushing out unconfirmed narratives. The others bought lies lock-stock-barrel and made up some of their own.

Trustworthiness of Indian media or rather the lack of it might be surprising for you Jay, most of the resident Indians know their standards and care little on what they report.As you may be aware most of us here in India don't watch cable based programming anymore..but OTT based programming including for the news. So when it comes to online news where every other channel has transformed into so called digital channel,luring users for clickbait becomes occupational hazard. So this media can't report facts even if they want to, they just have to keep their headlines sensational and play to the audience jingoism. You may not be understanding Urdu script but i'm sure Pak digital channels also are offering similar news content that makes their army look like super heroes. And how trustworthy are the western outlets for that matter? They may not sensationalize the events of one day's war but they create a false narrative over a prolonged period of time and make it look real,do we need any other examples other than WMD? If the western media needs to earn respect 1st they need to stop calling terrorists who butchered people after checking their religion as "Armed Militants in Pahalgam".Its cringworthy to see their reporting which conveniently omits the obvious segregation of tourists by asking to read kalma inspite of all the surviving eye witness accounts of women and and atleast children who can't be lying.

If we don't want to be deceited from main stream media then from our end we need to find trustworthy sources like online defense forums, telegram channels which do reporting etc. In my last2-3 days of writeup on this topic, did i ever mention Karachi is bombed, Pak plane got shot and pilot in our custody etc? i also have seen all these things on our main stream media but i guess i gained enough experience not to be gullible by now. Hope you not getting wowed by the Chinese defence equipment just because it had 3-4 kills of Indian aircraft...those kills happened under compulsion for Indian aircraft having to strike deep with in Pakistan on May7th to eliminate the terror camps with the constraint of minimal civilian casualities. Pak pilots weren't under such compulsion to cross the line of control. Hope you also noticed how the same Chinese radar equipment couldn't prevent the Indian attack itself from achieving 100% success. There is nothing great about Chinese equipment in the said case of 3-4 planes, as you may be aware "Beyond Visual Range" missiles allow an aircraft to be shot from a distance of 150 to 200 Kms itself. So i think Indian pilots went there with the operational risk of being shot down and are actually fortunate to survive and crash in Indian territory otherwise there would have been a repeat episode for Pilot of "How is the Chai?". I am hearing no Pilot casualities which is a big relief.You need to check how some Indian attack drones on 2nd day of this operation reached all the way to Rawalpindi without being intercepted and caused fire near the Cricket ground. Wars are not good in general, but i can clearly see how purposeful it is for us to respond strongly in these skirmishes that we happen to be forced into, use this experience in improving our systems and warfare tactics. Actually Chinese don't have a 1st hand experience of how their systems fare, they need to get that data from Pak. In my own assessment so far i think Israeli drones that we used seem to be more precise and lethal than the Chinese,Turkish drones that Pak depend on but Chinese missiles (PL15, PL21) seem to be as good as any of their western counterparts.

[srini]

We have no credible way to kill them all even if we buldoze their country like Israel is finding out. Maybe for a small place like Gaza, you can get away killing them all. But, Israel is a white country so to say - with different rules. We cannot bulldoze and kill so many in Pakistan. We are a brown country. We cannot kill that many and get away. Not that I am proposing we do that.

I agree we can't be bulldozing like Israel does, infact by this genocide Israelis are probably giving Hamas more advertising material for new recruits. There is a high chance that the innocent children who saw their parents and siblings die in front of eyes may end up terrorists growing up with too much spite for Israelis. But if people in Pakistan can see and feel that India is making every effort not to inflict civilian casualities, chances are it may put a lid on recruiting for these camps. Difficult but not impossible if you have the conviction not to cross the rules we set for ourselves.

[Sin Hombre]

I agree we can't be bulldozing like Israel does, infact by this genocide Israelis are probably giving Hamas more advertising material for new recruits. There is a high chance that the innocent children who saw their parents and siblings die in front of eyes may end up terrorists growing up with too much spite for Israelis. But if people in Pakistan can see and feel that India is making every effort not to inflict civilian casualities, chances are it may put a lid on recruiting for these camps. Difficult but not impossible if you have the conviction not to cross the rules we set for ourselves.

This is all a fantasy.

I often agree with prasen but the uncomfortable truth is that Islamists will continue to fight everyone who is not them, that religion needed a modernization and instead got Wahhabism. And has only gotten worse in recent decades. Peace or war, they will continue to fight you because you are the enemy. We might have gotten a different outcome if the US hadn't brought the Shah back and Iran would have become a bastion for a democratic Muslim country.

We are in an unfortunate position where we are surrounded by two Muslim majority countries and one of them was given nukes by China.

[Sin Hombre]

And of course, Pakistan immediately violated the ceasefire.

Which is no surprise to anyone who has followed this big country for decades.

[ericcw]

Looks like big big attack on Srinagar and elsewhere. Wow. Sad that India hasn't advanced enough in technology to be still be bullied with terror and army attacks at will and as per their terms by Pakistan.

Shows the lack of spine in India which the great congress leaders like Indira Gandhi had.

This 56 inch idiot is all talk.

[srini]

Not really, today was a really bad day for Pakistan in combat terms...ground skirmishes and casualities matter less in today world, air losses are big.Seems India was the last one to fire missiles on Pak airbases before ceasefire was agreed and PAF lost 5 of its airmen in Bholar air base, 1 being the squadron leader.

https://pakobserver.net/pakistanis-mour ... se-attack/
https://en.dailypakistan.com.pk/10-May- ... f-martyred

They all got hit while getting repairs done by maintenance staff in hangar, some maintenance staff of about 10-20 people also lost lives.This heavily tilts the losses on Pakistan side as everyone is aware trained airmen are lot more valuable than equipment like jets in airforce.

True....though Indira failed the country in all other realms, she was a good war time leader as she struck to the plan of splitting Pak into 2 inspite of fierce opposition from then US president. Otherwise we would have been suffering from a 2 front war with Pak. But let's not add other great congress leaders in your statement who couldn't advance the military technology even a single stride from 1971 until 2014. We kept doing fighter plane dog fights until 2019 Balakot which was left by rest of the world after WW2.Thanks to 56 inch who got us some precision warfare equipment like attack drones which got 100% success on terror training camps in 2025 and S-400s to intercept enemy missiles.I'm sure our army and political leaders have taken some lessons out of the real world military situations from last 1 week and would now know how to develop the capabilities further if similar situations arise in future.

[Atithee]

Looks like big big attack on Srinagar and elsewhere. Wow. Sad that India hasn't advanced enough in technology to be still be bullied with terror and army attacks at will and as per their terms by Pakistan.

Shows the lack of spine in India which the great congress leaders like Indira Gandhi had.

This 56 inch idiot is all talk.

Ok, you’re back with your original agenda which laid dormant for a while. Thank you and Mubarak ho.

[pancakesdonuts]

Had a chance to fk up this terrorist nation once for all but failed.

[jayakris]

I think the disappointment that some of you have, in not "finishing off" Pakistan, getting POK, etc, is understandable, but you are all being unrealistic. Maybe all the hype in the Indian press got to you, but that was all never on the cards, and never in the plans. The reason why I say that is the one thing the Indian press was never pointing out. The Indian army had not moved an inch (technically till a day or so ago, when some Rajasthan division or something had gotten ready to move, as Pak got a few trucks or tanks out somewhere). The Pak army had not moved otherwise either. No war ends with territorial capture or "finishing off" a country, without using the army. Both India and Pakistan knew that there was no such end game. This battle was for something else.

India fully achieved what we wanted to establish. That was in telling any budding terrorists in Pakistan that India can hit even a chimney there, and that their families are in danger if they continue with what they are doing. We also wanted to show that Pakistan has zero (and I mean absolute zero) defense against our missiles. Heck, we hit Masood Azhar's family and killed 10 people. Take a look at this before and after picture of the Bahawalpur mosque's roof (IndiaToday) where we sent three missiles precisely to hit 3 of the 5 roof domes. Not a single hit anywhere else on the building or around it. I was not exaggerating when I said "chimney". Amazing that we are able to hit within a 5 meter radius circle at night.

That is the kind of precision that only USA and perhaps Israel have demonstrated. We have our own satellites that allow that kind of guidance precision. China surely is capable and have their own satellites, but they never fight an actual war, so no demonstration. Pakistan might have had delusions after Balakote, that we were not that capable because we even hit some trees in Balakote, but none of that this time!

If you are young fellows taking to terrorism or camps in Pakistan, good luck, brothers, on seeing your family alive if you try anything. Any budding terrorist will think twice now, once they hear of what happened to Jaish-e-Mohammed's mosque. This was no mean achievement.

We also let Pakistan demonstrate that they really have no missile guidance technology to hit the broadside of a barn. They did not even hit anything within a 50 meter of where they wanted to. They can randomly send missiles in but that is no big deal. And we showed that we have drone defense and other air defenses that are nowhere near as porous as Pakistan expected.

Now, PAF is pretty damn good, and can fully match IAF in what they can do in the air with Chinese jets and air-to-air missiles which seem to be excellent (China defense stocks are up some 40% this week, so the world agrees), but what is the use with PAF and air-to-air missiles when they cannot hit a target spot on ground with a guided missile? (Note: You need satellite-based accurate guidance for hitting a specific spot on earth. Pakistan doesn't have it. Locking a Chinese missile from a jet to an Indian jet in near-visual range is a totally different matter - and you get multiple chances for a rare hit).

Their missile hits to some 8 "areas" in India were just that - a show for their domestic consumption in the end (by which time they were already talking with the US and saying they might go for a ceasefire if India would stop). They knew there was nothing they could do to India as they were not capable of any accurate hits. I am sure they had hoped that the Turkish drones would do something, but that had done nothing either. They were already doomed, after sending 100s of Songar and other drones into India and not achieving anything specific. They had lost the battle by Friday, as they already knew that they could not set a target in India and hit it with missiles, except something big like a cricket stadium. That they possibly considered and India got word of it, which might explain the sudden evacuation after 10 overs in the Dharmasala match. Pakistan was down to sabre-rattling with their nuke threat, as they set up a meeting of the National Command Authority (NCA) that handles their nukes.... But India then forced the issue on Friday. That was quite an interesting turn of events.

All of you realize by now what exactly was happening from Friday, right? Again, the Indian print press has been found wanting, in figuring things out and explaining it properly, but read this excellent New York Times article that came up a few hours ago
(Reluctant at First, Trump Officials Intervened in South Asia as Nuclear Fears Grew).

The US knew that Pakistan had realized that they were fully pushed to a corner, after India hit the Nur Khan airbase in Rawalpindi. That is the airbase right next to the Chaklala cantonment, with the secretariat were their National Command Authority is. India did not hit NCA but showed that we can if we wanted to. This was Pakitan's long-time nightmare coming true (read NYT's description!). They then wanted to end this war whichever face-saving way they could, and they decided to send their "approximate-location" missiles to the Indian military areas. By then, it appears that Vance was already well on the way to getting India's and Pakistan's DGMOs to talk after their chest-thumping "strikes" on India. What a miserable existence it is, to be Pakistan!

(Side note: Interesting that NYT reports their sources' comment that PM Modi listened to all the options for de-escalation that Vance gave him, but did not commit to anything. If I am remembering the timelines right, Vance's first call to Modi was Friday noon EST in the US, and India hit Noor Khan 3 hours after his call to convey the "alarming intelligence" that USA had got)

So in other words, India dared Pakistan to try their missile strikes and finish the fight, with our Noor Khan strike right next to NCA headquarters. That was to prevent them creating a nukes chimera with an NCA meeting and getting the world to pressure India to back down. We had already achieved what we wanted to prove to Pak leaders and terror camps in Pakistan, which was that we could hit them precisely where we wanted to, at any time, and that they cannot stop our missiles nor do a damn thing to us with any precision... That is unless they wanted to shower missiles or use a nuke, which would only kill civilians and that country would be summarily finished if they ever tried that.

[jayakris]

What India gained - a lot, by proving that we are missile strike gurus now.
What Pakistan got - a little bit more of clarity that India means business.
What jingoists in India and Pakistan gained - anticlimax
What China gained - a big boost to their defense product quality and 40% boost in defense firm stocks.
What Trump gained - a much needed boost in the seriously damaged reputation for mediating (thanks to Vance and Rubio)

The two losers - Turkye whose drones were proven to be duds, and France, whose Rafales are now no longer invincible.

[sameerph]

What was the main purpose of our launching this strike, I guess to create a deterrent for any future terrorist strikes emanating from Pakistan. Because, anyway eliminating 15-20 terrorists is not going to totally damage their network.

Did we create that deterrence after this action ? Maybe for temporary period. Many think we could have done some more damage to Pakistan to create more such deterrence. I also agree that what some are saying about breaking Pakistan into 4 or even taking POK is going to happen with all the international powers involved.

Also, what is lacking is we are not able to put forth our point of view strongly in international TV networks. What I see in CNN/BBC or even some others, Pakistan view is more strongly seen. Also Shabaz Sharif and others in Pakistan are claiming to their public that it is a victory. Why do we have only briefings from MEA spokesperson. Why Modi is not addressing the nation on what we achieved and why we agreed to ceasefire. Maybe not everything but at least something which will boost the morale of people here.

[srini]

Yes, all of of Pak's air-to-air missile hits can be attributed to the thermal seeking PL15 missiles but all their surface-to-surface missile misses probably are not only due to lack of satellite guidance ability but also because of S-400 interceptions because Chinese may not only be supplying the missiles but the satellite data too which should be reasonably accurate.

I still think the 2-3 Rafaele kills that PAF probably had were due to Indian airforce being under compulision to conduct Air-to-Surface strikes to minimise civilian collateral damage and IAF could have achieved a few Jet kills had Pak Jets ventured into Indian airspace. IAF did try its best to draw out the PAF jets out into Indian airspace by taking aggressive hits on its military installations, but PAF struck to their defensive tactics.

Over all Bharat could hit all of Pak's forward bases (90% of all bases Pak has) with atleast 5 PAF casualites. where as Pak could only try attacking india's western border bases which are not even 10% of our total bases and inflict no casualities.
Drones have hit all major cities in Pak including Rawalpindi the place which is considred the head quarters of their defense establishment but Pak could use drones only on border cities like Jammu,Srinagar,Amritsar Jaisalmer etc

So we have crossed all the previous Red lines and Pak could cross none. Before ceasefire came in a new redline was drawn by Modi cabinet meeting stating that "Any terror act with Pak links would be considered an act of war". So I am not exactly sure how long this ceasefire will last, Trump negotiated ceasefires haven't lasted long, Isreal-Hamas ceasefire didn't last more than couple months.