Let me quote here some of my older posts
1st, defence in Sindh sector are well configured with regards to terrain. Its an almost 5-Division worth of force now. Armor component equals to more than a regular armored division.
In 1971, Indian Southern Command launched a large, corps-sized force into Sind. Its objectives were exceptionally clear to cut the line of communication between Karachi and Lahore at two points, Hyderabad City and Rahim Yar Khan. The secondary objectives which we must not mistake for the primary ones, were to draw down Pakistani reserves from all over Pakistan, thus easing the task of Indian troops advancing in other sectors, and to occupy as much of Sind as possible, to exchange for possible losses elsewhere.
Some thoughts regarding Indian plans to attack in the desert sector……
On a map, getting to Hyderabad (Sind) from Rajasthan is a simple problem. India may have 4 to 1 superiority in combat power on the ground, superiority in the air, and control of the sea, including a diversionary amphibious landing near Karachi. Along the southern axis of the arrow head thrust from Kokhrapar to Hyderabad is 250 kilometers as the crow flies. From Tanot to Rahim Yar Khan or Reti involves crossing 100 kilometers of Pakistan territory. Given a modest advance of 20 kilometers a day, some critics assume that something less than two weeks is perfectly adequate to cut Pakistan in two. Presumably, there will be Indian losses in the Punjab. But these will be more than compensated for by the immense gains in Sind.
In reality, for all India’s superiority of force, the situation is likely to prove quite different. To see this, we will need to examine a variety of different factors.
In one of India not very recent two-sided wargame, Blue advanced against Red at ten kilometers a day or about 70 kilometers for the attack phase. At 10 kilometers a day it might be possible to reach Rahim Yar Khan or Reti in 12 days, but Hyderabad would require a month.
Can the exercise results be replicated in combat? Particularly as Red was not played by troops specialized in this role. The pressures are all to show Blue in a favourable light and Red in an unfavorable one. If 10 kilometers a day was the exercise advance, in real life it will be less, at least until substantial attrition has occurred and Indian forces enjoy an irresistible advantage, At 1 to 5 kilometers a day, no objective on the Karachi- Lahore railroad can be cut in 12 days. India will capture large areas of sand, and nothing else.
Problems of supplying Indian Strike Forces in Desert
Can 13 divisions (1 and 21 Strike Corps, along with supporting attacks by 10 and 12 Corps, plus reserves standing by) be supported in the desert sector? This does not appear likely. Lets see a possible scenario.
· The northern end is anchored by X Corps with two large divisions, an (I) armored brigade and an (I) brigade a total of ten brigades.
· The middle is I and II Strike Corps with may be three armored, one mechanized, one RAMFOR, two RAPID and two infantry divisions plus one or two ( I ) brigades.
· The southern end is XII Corps with two divisions plus at least one (I) brigade.
· The naval component is an amphibious brigade to the west.
The amphibious brigade will be supported by the Navy by sea, so the army does not have to support it .
There should be no difficulty in supplying and supporting X Corps, as it will advance only a short distance from its bases, which are all located on rail heads.
The initial supply of XII Corps is not as simple, because there is only the rail head at Bhuj and the road network is minimal. Still, cross- country movement through the Kutch in winter should be possible along carefully reconnoitered routes, as the marshes would have dried up to a considerable extent.
It is the nine divisions with I and II Corps that are worrying. The supplies required for the war would have been laboriously assembled over the past four months through the rail heads at Barmer, Jaisalmer, and Jodhpur. But this is a huge force, and that too over the worst terrain in any of the plains sectors. Moving the supplies forward and into Pakistan to support the advancing troops will prove almost impossible only some fraction of the troops can be supported, and this reduces the odds that Pakistan faces.
While the armored spearhead has full trans desert mobility, all the wheeled supply vehicles used for support and for the infantry divisions are limited in this respect. It is unclear if the supplies required for an entire corps can be moved along one or two temporary desert roads since normally, a railhead is required to support a corps.
We can estimate that each division will require for each day’s combat consumption a thousand tons a day for an armored/mechanized division and about half that for an infantry division. The usage of the divisions themselves may well be less, but when all the supporting troops are added, and as the distance from the forward dumps to the front increases with the advance, the logistical requirements increase.
It can be argued that a rapid advance reduces the supply requirement because fixed battles, so greedily demanding of artillery ammunition, are avoided. Against this, the lack of proper roads of any sort multiplies wastages in transport. For example, we know from the World War 2 North Africa experience that three times as much fuel is required as might be thought.
In the desert, limited off road mobility creates another problem. Any blockade of the road leads to blocking of all movement behind the block because possibilities of going around the obstruction are limited. On a road where supplies are competing with the infantry moving up behind the armored spearhead, the possibilities for confusion and a breakdown of all movement are only too obvious. And it is not as if the movement is one way: empty vehicles, evacuated equipment and units, and redeploying units will all be fighting for space.
And as yet no account has been taken of enemy resistance and interdiction which will compound the difficulties by a factor of ten.
It may safely be concluded that the possibilities for supporting nine divisions, including four fully armored and mechanized, and two partially so, are dim. It will not just be the lower priority infantry that will be limited by supply constraints, it will be the spearhead itself. This will reduce Indian margin of superiority against Pakistan.
Problem of Air cover in the Desert
In 1971 Pakistan used an adhoc force from 33 Division to attack from Rahim Yar Khan to throw off 12 Division’s attack. This force appears to have consisted of an armored regiment with T-59s and an accompanying infantry brigade. Though referred to as “Pakistan’s attempt at a lightning Israeli style thrust”’ it had no intention of holding any ground or even precipitating a major battle, only of throwing Indian 12 Division off stride and thus preventing the attack on Rahim Yar Khan aimed at cutting the Karachi Lahore rail line.
It succeeded in its aim, as Indian 12 Division never really got going after that, though it captured some insignificant areas. The division was, of course, very badly handled and there were other problems, such as bad intelligence which led the division to believe it had a good (by desert standards) road on which to advance to Reti, whereas only an indifferent track existed.
The contributory factors do not alter the situation that when lateral mobility is limited, a small force can completely throw out of gear a much larger force. Committing less than a brigade to neutralize a division, and that too in an action lasting less than three days, is not a bad investment.
Conversely, the Pakistani attack was held by a lone company of 23 Punjab with a couple of recoilless rifles till daybreak. Then six Hunters from the Armament Training Wing at Jamnager, deputed to Jaiselmer to provide air cover for 12 Division’s attacks began their action. In 30+ sorties over two days the Hunters caused the tank regiment heavy damage. The Hunters included two trainers with limited ordnance capability, and two of the combat Hunters became non- operational during the course of operations. The aircraft used only canon fire and rockets, no bombs, The Pakistani force withdrew in good order.
Doubtless there were special considerations here too: the P.A.F., for example, was largely absent during this time and the Pakistani force had no integral anti-aircraft cover. The example is nonetheless valid.
There are reasons for this. (1 ) Neither India nor Pakistan can really operate in the face of enemy air attacks and the absence of their own air cover. This is no reflection on their courage or their training: only armies with a very long history of working without air cover, such as the North Vietnam Army, can adequately acquit themselves in such circumstances, (2) Acquisition of ground targets in the desert is a most simple affair because of the dust moving vehicles kick up. The dust cloud from a brigade-sized force can be visible at upto 80 kilometers. The ground troops, in effect, solve the problem of target acquisition, a most difficult one in normal terrain, by marking themselves for all to see.
It is easy to see one of the reasons Pakistan was not overly worried about protecting Sind. It would have let India come well in, and then attacked the large, conspicuous Indian armored formations from the air. Because they would be advancing, the Indians would be especially vulnerable.
In South Western Air Command India’s bases are well back. Once Indian force advance any substantial distance into Pakistan, the armored spearheads will outrun their air cover and become helpless. Pakistan, on the other hand, has at least six, perhaps more, bases available in the area.
The I.A.F. has a simple strategy for dealing with the problem of enemy air over the Desert: suppress all relevant P.A.F. air bases in 72-hours, and keep them suppressed. The I.A.F.’s inability to provide extended air cover to the armored spearheads is then of no consequence: the P.A.F. will be in no position to fly, and the few sorties can be handled by the air defence groups.
In 1971 , the IAF quickly put out of commission the seven Pakistani fighter air fields in East Pakistan. It first put Dacca out of action. The airfield was repaired in four hours. The IAF then reattacked and this time the airfield was repaired in six hours. The third time the IAF caught the repair crews in the open killing or wounding about 80 men, and after the PAF simply gave up leaving Dacca permanently out of commission.
In 1971, the PAF failed to keep even one IAF base out of action for one day. Generally bases were repaired within 6 to 8 hours. Today the same would apply to IAF attacks on Pakistani air bases. The 1971 Eastern example is not relevant today. Against the lone fighter squadron based in the East Pakistan, India deployed ten combat squadrons and there was a huge disparity in performance between the F-86 and the IAF Su-7s and Mi G-21s. Today the PAF will fight at much lesser odds, not 10 to 1. When 16 aircraft had to protect seven fighter fields and the entire Eastern wing to boot we need not be surprised that India succeeded so easily. And even then Pakistan was still flying from Dacca as late as seven days into the war. If we reran the scenario with three F- 7 squadrons and two fights of F-16s defending against ten IAF squadrons we would get a totally different outcome. If runway attack techniques and weapons have increased lethality airfield repair techniques have also improved.
Then comes the Pakistani Defence itself….
It is worth examining the Pakistani defences against Indian Southern Command’s attack in 1971. India had two divisions, about four armored regiments, and perhaps two (I) brigade groups plus commandos and BSF troops. Pakistan had its 18 Division out of Hyderabad, plus probably at least two brigades of 33 Division in southern Punjab, perhaps two regiments of armor, Rangers and Mujahids.
India appears to have committed everything except one (I) brigade, so that Pakistan faced seven infantry brigades and four tank regiments. Yet Pakistan held India back with two partially committed brigades. Part of 51 Brigade at Naya Chor held back 11 Division. Part of one brigade from 33 Division opposed 12 Division in the Reti-Rahim Yar Khan area. So Pakistan had the equivalent of four brigades uncommitted.
The results are well known: after an initial long jump to Naya Chor, India was stalled throughout the war.
There were two reasons Pakistan could hold off the Indian attack with minimal force. (I) It was prepared to trade space for time and allow the Indian advance to over stretch itself, and (2) because of the adverse terrain Indian forces could not leave the single axis / road of advance in each sub-sector to maneuver around the defenders. So India may have had a division each at Naya Chor and Ranigarh, but actually only a brigade at a time could fight. Moreover, increasing numbers of troops were required to hold down the line of communications as India advanced, further reducing the number of troops available. In as much as Pakistan itself was limited by the desert, it could not make any effective or decisive counter attacks and so did not throw back the Indians.
The point is that a large Indian force was stuck in the desert a long way from home. Had Pakistan used its 1 Armored Division in this area instead of keeping it facing Indian Foxtrot Sector, and had air cover been available, India would have been pushed out with huge losses.
