Shankar
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At last India might attack POK
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06/07/02 at 02:43:39 » |
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India’s armed forces have asked New Delhi permission to carry out strikes against terrorist camps in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) in mid-June, according to a report in the Daily Telegraph.
The Indian High Commission in London declined to react to “speculative media reports that try to place an imaginary time frame on military action”.
The report said Indian forces would adopt the pattern of the US attack on Afghanistan in which air strikes would be followed by helicopter-borne commando raids.
India has been building up stocks of smart bombs and “other advanced ordnance” for its Mirage 2000H and MiG-27 warplanes, said the report. Observers note Israel’s National Security Advisor, Uzi Dayan, was in New Delhi last week. Israel reportedly equipped India's Mirages with precision-guided missiles during the Kargil war.
Diplomatic sources say the Indian military has made no bones about the fact that if action is to be taken, the preferred window of opportunity would be after the visit of US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and before the onset of monsoon in early July.
The Telegraph article says India's plan of attack would be to seize and hold bits of PoK. The Indian Air Force would execute standing plans to strike at 50 to 75 militant bases and targets like the Karakoram highway connecting China and Pakistan.
Most Indian defence officials expect the conflict to last about a week before the world forces a ceasefire. One officer is quoted as saying, "We will call Pakistan’s nuclear bluff. (The nuclear factor) cannot deter us anymore."
However, this is a major source of difference between New Delhi and Washington. In repeated war games simulating an Indo-Pak war, US agencies have always found even a limited war escalating to a nuclear exchange.
Indian analysts argue the simulations are flawed because the players are always Americans. In the only war game conducted by the US in which Indians and Pakistanis were brought in as players, the war did not escalate beyond conventional weapons.
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The gameplan
* Phase 1: War begins with IAF strikes against terrorist bases and strategic targets in PoK
* Phase 2: Helicopter-borne Indian troops cross the mountains
* Phase 3: Indian troops seize and hold bits of PoK
* Phase 4: Army believes Pak’s nuclear threat is a bluff; assumes week-long war before world forces ceasefire
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/070602/detfro02.asp |
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