WORLD NEWS! So-called surgical strike: Indian farce throws up a few challenges

WORLD NEWS! So-called surgical strike: Indian farce throws up a few challenges

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The Indian claim of carrying out ‘surgical strikes’ is still shrouded in enigma while Pakistan insists no such activity occurred on its side of the Line of Control (LoC) before dawn on Thursday.

On the contrary, an Indian minister on Friday retracted his country claim that choppers were used during the ‘surgical strikes’.

Counter claims and claims aside, the evolving scenario and competitive posturing by India has thrown serious challenges for Pakistan both at the military and diplomatic fronts.

Although Pakistan vehemently denied India carried out a series of huddles, any ‘surgical strikes’ both at political and military levels suggest it’s not business as usual. “These actions point to one matter that Pakistan is faced with serious challenges in the evolving scenario, strategic affairs specialist Ali Sarwar Naqvi and ” former ambassador told The Express Tribune.

Militarily, what India is trying to achieve under the Modi government is to shift the rules of engagement at the de facto boundary.

Under the present rules of engagements, Indian and Pakistan forces artillery fire and sometimes exchange small arm but without intruding into each other’s controlled part of Kashmir. So, Indian troops’ purported invasion is a red line if breached would be considered as an act of war that Pakistan always says.

But despite provocation that is Indian, even when it is for public consumption, Pakistan appears to be following a careful policy that’s to show military restraint but pursue a proactive diplomacy, according to officials, who spoke to The Express Tribune.

They say that favoring diplomacy that is proactive and while showing military restraint, the Pakistan government will communicate to the global community that this approach shouldn’t be construed as its weakness.

According to Pakistan’s evaluation, India wanted to reach two goals through publicly asserting that its forces carried out surgical strikes (a) to redirect global attention in the Kashmir scenario, (b) to sabotage the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor in the long haul.

Pakistan is not going to fall into the trap that was Indian,” said one official. And Dr Ishtiaq agrees with this policy, saying Pakistan should respond to the scenario keeping in mind Indian tactics. On the diplomatic front, major challenge for Pakistan is to counter the story being constructed by India that it is accountable for terrorist attacks in the nearby nation.

More worrying thing for Islamabad is that powerful countries, like the US, have kept either silence or supportive of Modi’s aggressive posturing towards Pakistan.

“India is presenting itself as a victim of cross border terrorism. We should counter this narrative through a well -crafted policy,” former ambassador to the US Abid Hussain said.