A very detailed and analytical explanation of Kargil operation which has been unduly criticised by some politicians who have no clue about military matters and some ex Generals wanting to raise their stature at the cost of their colleagues while subjecting their Service to undeserved criticism.
No one has brought out the fact that most of our casualties occurred during the withdrawal from occupied area when troops were exposed to Indian Air force and not when they were holding their positions. Without political will and determination military gains were lost since we did not have unity of thought and direction at the top. As Iqbal said:
"Yeh nadan gir gai Sajdon main jub waqte qayam aya" "Victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan". A saying popularised by JFK after the Bay of Pigs invasion has its roots further back in time. Tacitus, remembered as Rome's greatest historian stated that: "It is the singularly unfair peculiarity of war that the credit of success is claimed by all, while a disaster is attributed to one alone". It has become fashionable to criticise the Kargil conflict. A retired Lieutenant General of the Pakistan Army on TV referred to it as a debacle. I would like to believe that we live in a free society and have a right to express our opinion so I would like to be one of those who swims against the tide of the current criticism and present a case in support of Kargil.
At the outset, I would request the reader to disassociate himself from the media images of Indian troops assaulting Tiger Hill, or Indian air strikes on our posts. An extract from an article written by Lieutenant General Mohinder Puri, who was the GOC of 8 Mtn Div at Batalik, may help you in separating fact from fiction.
"Employment of air per se was a morale raising factor for our troops and conversely it had an adverse effect on the enemy. But its effectiveness was questionable. Like us, the pilots were not acclimatised to fight in this type of terrain and did not have the right ordnance to deliver on the target. When they did use the laser guided bombs, their effectiveness improved marginally, but not enough to have an impact on our ground operations or the enemy."
Like the Bay of Pigs, Kargil could be classified as a limited conflict. Limited conflicts are defined as a war whose objective is less than the unconditional defeat of the enemy. But Kargil was on a much smaller scale, more in the category of a border conflict. Some analysts consider total wars as a legacy of the past. In the environment of the 21st Century, increasingly nations will find themselves caught up in limited conflicts like low intensity conflicts, insurgencies and border conflicts. From this perspective it is important to understand the dynamics of the Kargil conflict which were very different to fighting a war.
For military commanders and staff, fighting a total war is in many ways much easier. Hostilities are formally declared by the government, full mobilisation is ordered, contingency plans are implemented, civil transport is requisitioned, reservists are called up, the Armed Forces move into their battle locations as per plan, air bases are activated, war stocks start flowing to the battle front, the national war effort goes into full drive, the exterior manoeuvre is launched, etc, etc. The same is happening on the other side and ultimately, both sides engage through manoeuvre and counter-manoeuvres in all three dimensions of combat; air, land and sea, till through a combination of superior strategy, will and correlation of forces, one side is the victor, the other the vanquished.
Paradoxically, a border conflict like Kargil is much more difficult to plan and execute. The government's and military's freedom of manoeuvre and action is constrained by the environment which in turn limits the political aim and objectives. What was the political aim of Kargil? Wikipedia, the biggest free-content encyclopaedia on the Internet has a fairly objective article on Kargil which states:-
"The aim was to sever the link between Kashmir and Ladakh, and cause Indian forces to withdraw from the Siachen Glacier, thus forcing India to negotiate a settlement of the broader Kashmir dispute. Pakistan also believed that any tension in the region would internationalise the Kashmir issue, helping it to secure a speedy resolution. Yet another goal may have been to boost the morale of the decade-long rebellion in Indian Administered Kashmir by taking a proactive role. Some writers have speculated that the operation's objective may also have been as retaliation for India's Operation Meghdoot in 1984 that seized much of Siachen Glacier."
In the 10 years preceding Kargil, Pakistan's Schwerpunkt or point of main effort in the Kashmir region was neither Siachen nor the LOC. To launch Kargil as retaliation to an Indian operation in Siachen 15 years earlier was meaningless. From 1990 onwards, the main manoeuvre was the insurgency in Indian Held Kashmir which ten years down the line was reaching a stage of exhaustion. To reenergize the Mujahideen, Pakistan needed to display a direct commitment to the cause. The diplomatic manoeuvres in support of the insurgency had not succeeded and the only other option was a military action as a supporting manoeuvre to the main effort.
I have explained this to establish that obviously, Kargil was not conducted in isolation nor as some analysts have stated a misadventure by the Pakistan Army. It was executed as part of a larger canvas and in support of an ongoing insurgency that every political government was aware of and supported since 1990. Consequently it had its linkages in the decision making circles within the government, its agencies and the military.
When a government decides to engage in a military conflict the instructions to the military, take the form of a War Directive. The War Directive lays down the aim (ie what are the end expectations of the government), the manner in which the operation is to be conducted and particularly in the case of a limited conflict, limitations imposed on the military in the shape of scale of operation (time, space and quantum of forces), the area and duration. These "limitations to the aim" are essential to ensure that the conflict is restricted to achieving the specific aims and does not spiral out of control.
The military transforms the War Directive into an operational plan that converts the political aim into a military aim, identifies the military objective, the strategy to achieve aim, distribution of forces and a host of other details that need to be addressed. Obviously no formal War Directive was issued but the military planners of Kargil had the professional acumen, experience, and knowledge of the operational environment to understand what were the effects to be sought and the limits to the military operation. In the absence of a formal War Directive the military would most likely have constructed a political aim from which the rest would have flowed.
How do I know that? Was I involved in the planning process? No! But that is exactly how the Pakistan Army does all its planning. That is how through an intensive process of training it approaches all strategic and operational problems and why should they have done it any differently for Kargil. Lieutenant General Tauqir Zia who was the Director General of Military Operations at GHQ at the time of Kargil had been my instructor at the National Defence College and had taught us exactly this, as I (and many before and after) taught the same process at the College. Following a structured thought process is part of our military culture and if everybody was not privy to the planning for Kargil, it is wrong to conclude that it was based on a whim and a song. The general perception that one morning the army commander rolled out of his bed and said "Hey boys! Lets go and take Kargil", is based on a total lack of understanding of the military planning process.
At this stage, I am tempted to hypothesise and reconstruct a politico-military aim the planners at GHQ would have set for themselves in the absence of a War Directive.
Political Aim. While ensuring security along the LOC and the international border, and keeping the dimensions of the conflict restricted, launch a limited operation to seize and hold critical terrain across the LOC with a view to engage sizable Indian Forces thus facilitating the operations of the Mujahideen in IHK.
The aim has four distinct components: firstly ensuring security along the LOC and the international border; secondly keeping the dimensions of the conflict restricted; (these two in operational parlance are defined as the limitations to the aim); thirdly seizing and holding critical terrain through a limited operation; and fourthly engage sizable Indian forces. Facilitating the operations of the Mujahideen was an end product that lay in the political dimension.
Let us see how well was the aim was achieved. War is both a science and an art. The science of war is reflected in the doctrine that the military is structured under and the procedures it follows. The art of warfare has no laws but a set of principles that are tenets used by military organisations to focus the thinking of leaders toward successful prosecution of battles and wars.
The environment under which the operation is to be conducted will dictate which principles will take precedence over others. In Kargil the element of surprise (and consequently secrecy) was paramount. The political aim limited the scale of operation and the only way a small force could achieve the effects sought required that the build-up was conducted under a tight umbrella of secrecy. It goes to the extreme credit of the commanders and staff at GHQ, 10 Corps and FCNA that not a word leaked out till the first contact with an Indian patrol. No written instructions; just directive control. The German Army fought the whole of the Second World War under directive control. And for us it paid. From the strategic through to the operational and the tactical level, surprise on the Indian side was absolute. On the Pakistani side, information was on a strict need to know basis. Neither the rest of the Army, nor the Air Force or the Navy had any advance information. This decision (much criticised) was based both on historical precedence as well as a very sound analysis and conclusions drawn from the environment, as well as the Indian and own capabilities.
In 1965 when the raiders were launched into Kashmir as part of OPERATION GIBRALTAR, the Indians with a much smaller force in IHK didn't immediately respond with an offensive across the international border. In spite of the sensitivity of Kashmir, it was a limited operation which the Indians could and did curtail. It was the thrust towards Akhnur through Chhamb with tanks and a regular infantry division of the Pakistan Army that triggered the Indian assault towards Lahore and elsewhere. In 1999, with two corps and seven division stationed in IHK it was safe to conclude that there would be no knee-jerk reaction by the Indian with an attack across the international boundary. The time it would take for the Indians to assess the situation and decide whether to restrict the conflict to the Drass-Kargil Sector or expand the dimensions, was sufficient for the Pakistan Armed Forces to balance themselves against a counter offensive either in Kashmir or across the International border. The limited mobilisation of the Pakistani Armed Forces was carefully regulated. There was no panic, no mass movement of troops, and no mad rush to the battle locations. Through a sound appreciation of the environment and ensuring that there was no escalation through deployments that would have initiated a spiralling effect running out of control, the military avoided a full scale war and succeeded in keeping the dimensions of the conflict limited (part of the limitations to the aim).
It is said that the Indians did not launch a full scale counter offensive because they held the moral high ground. This is partially correct. The Indian Army lacked the forces to develop an offensive manoeuvre elsewhere in Kashmir. Having failed in their initial efforts to retake even a few of the posts, the Indians had to commit up to four infantry divisions with the bulk of the Indian Army's 155 Artillery Guns and the best of their air force ground attack capability, in an attempt to dislodge 5-6 lightly equipped battalions holding semi-prepared positions. Even with this force, by the time of cease-fire they had only retaken some of the features by launching battalion sized attacks on platoon positions. What then were the chances of success of a counter offensive anywhere else in Kashmir against regular infantry battalions holding defences hardened over 30 years?
As the Kargil conflict sucked in reserve formations within Kashmir (like 8 Division) which were deployed on internal security duties, to fill the void the Indians denuded troops from tank and artillery regiments in the Sialkot Sector and pushed them into the Valley. For the Indians, the Sialkot Sector is the most sensitive part of the entire 1500km front with Pakistan. Weakening its defences further closed the option of launching even a limited counter offensive against Pakistan. For the Indians to even contemplate an offensive across the international border, would have subjected their decision makers to tremendous international pressure. Two nuclear powers fighting a limited conflict in a disputed area somewhere in the high reaches of the Himalayas, where either side could only achieve tactical gains, is not so dangerous a scenario. Of more serious concern to the global community was two nuclear powers fighting a full scale war in belt 800kms wide and stretching 1500km along an international border with armoured and infantry divisions grouped and employed to create strategic effects and a conflict that could degenerate into a nuclear exchange. Our years of effort in developing a nuclear capability with the necessary delivery means had paid off. Without fighting a total war as in 1965, we achieved a stalemate on the international border. Even if the Indians had decided to launch an offensive across the international border the scale of operations would have been severely constrained by the need to keep within Pakistan's nuclear threshold.
Actually the Indians had only a small window of opportunity to launch a full-scale counter offensive. That window was available before the Indians decided to concentrate on retaking the heights overlooking Kargil at all cost. Once that decision was taken and the Indian saturated the narrow valleys in the Drass and Batalik Sectors with troops, artillery, ammunition and supplies, they foreclosed the option of expanding the dimensions of the conflict. In a total war scenario in which operations would be conducted in all three dimensions including the air, such a heavy concentration in restricted terrain was extremely vulnerable to an air strike. No air defence is impregnable and ground attacks by Mirage-IIIs armed with cluster bombs would have had devastating effects. The cream of the Indian artillery, one hundred and twenty two 155mm guns were deployed in the valleys. That is why the Indian planners, in spite of pressure from the field commanders, strongly resisted air attacks against our bases across the LOC. They were themselves extremely vulnerable.
In conclusion, the aim of Kargil was not to "win". It was to deliver a statement to the Indian Government and the Mujahideen that the Pakistani nation and the army is fully committed to the cause of Kashmir. It goes to the credit of the commanders, planners and the troops on ground, that the military dimensions of the aim as hypothesised for the Kargil Conflict were totally achieved. The LOC and the international border remained secure; the conflict remained restricted to a specific area; critical terrain features were occupied and sizable Indian forces were engaged. To what extent this achieved the political aim of facilitating the operations of the Mujahideen in IHK and reenergizing them is a subject for a separate debate. However, what did go wrong was the manner in which the conflict terminated with India appearing to be the victor both on the battlefront as well as the international arena. Our public and the media wanted a "victory" but neither had the ability to comprehend what that meant and the commanders and planners could not reveal the politico-military objectives of the conflict. So from a military position of strength we withdrew domestically and internationally to a position of weakness. Unfortunately the nation didn't have a Churchill who could even turn a military debacle like Dunkirk into a symbol of pride for the British nation. (The views expressed in this article are not necessarily those of the newspaper).
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