I agree to a certain extent....
It wasnt as much the capability as the lack of a political goal/will....there was no way to escalate the situation without full scale war being an imminent after effect...
Yes the goal was to punish Pakistan, but what is considered "punishment"? Where do we stop? The root of the problem "Kashmir" was not going dissapear and this would have created more problems than solutions...
So in essence, we were basically acting on emotions than brains....and I think in the end we made the right choice...
It was exactly the capability that was lacking, please dont treat me like another Indian troll because its quite obvious that India was not willing to accept the damage Pakistan would have done in return to Indian strikes. India certainly had the capability to knock out those targets in Muridke and the other one whose name i cant remember, but in return Pakistan would have retaliated and caused damage to the Indian side which was politically unacceptable. Your right India was acting more on their emotions as compared to their brains, but if India had the capability to severely punish Pakistan, Indian tanks and planes would have crossed the border.
Pakistan is not a country with immense breadth both an advantage and disadvantage....so it makes sense that mobilizing will be easier, but on a losing foot can be detrimental...
Its not like your Armoured Divisions are deployed all the way over to your border with Bangladesh, they are stationed quite close to the border with Pakistan. If it took them 3 weeks to reach their war time positions, i call that an utter failure.
Op Parakram was a great learning as it helped us understand the weak link in our offense ie. Mobilization...
But it was a failure, it failed to achieve its objectives and cost the lives of 800 soldiers. Although no doubt Indian Army's High Command learned from this debacle and has implemented changes to remedy this problem.
Calling it a failure would be simplistic since it has largely set the tone for future Indian strategy in case of war....
But yes "Punishing Pak" was not achieved from a military standpoint....though diplomatic achievements can be argued.
It was a failure from every angle you want to look at.
Actually I think this is the biggest misconception ever....
Its not a misconception, its the reality but if you want to close your eyes to the reality than its your fault. Doesn't matter how you want to turn a story around, FACTS ARE FACTS.
Yes, I agree that the people wanted blood, but 26/11 was able to achieve more than what we could have through military intervention...
Achieve what exactly? Has India been successful in coercing Pakistan to meet its demands? I dont think so
It highlighted the problem of terrorism that India faced and allowed India to garner world sympathy...
It not only allowed India to get LET and JUD on the blacklist, but also put the links between ISI and LET (You can argue against this) under the microscope...
LET is a terrorist group and that is why it has been banned by Pakistan for quite some time. But there is no proof that there is any link between the ISI and LET, although India made huge hue and cry about this but the world powers largely ignored this because India lacked the evidence to implicate the ISI. Did the UN sanction Pakistan or ISI? No because there is no proof that the State of Pakistan has any links with LET.
But the greatest achievement that 26/11 allowed India was to take the pressure off Kashmir...
It gave India a clean pass for any retaliation and enough propoganda tools to make any Kashmiri "violence" seem motivated through Pakistani links....
All in all, we came out looking as a country that held back from aggression even though having the conventional capability to deliver the blow...It put India in the club of the "victims" of terrorism that only allowed us to find other common causes to partner with nations...
I feel this was "goal achieved"
The issue of Kashmir is right there where it has always been. The Western powers in the past and even after Mumbai have always stayed away from this sensitive topic, so overall you achieved nothing regarding the status of Kashmir. In fact all you guys have done is make noises about China's involvement in Pakistan's side of the Kashmir, how successful is that going?
A plethora of evidence is available:
Cold start being the main motivator behind the "modernization" plans as you put it yourself (even though Indians deny the existance of any such doctrine)
Wikileaks has divulged that the PA/State has been quite Paranoid regarding CS even though the US feels that CS neither exists, nor the Indians have capability to execute as such
CS has been the main reason why PA has shyed away from deploying the much needed troops towards the WOT
Did you also look at the Wikileaks where US officials state that Cold Start is just a hoax and India does not has the capability to pull of something like that? Cold Start has blew up on the face of the Indians because they have failed to make this doctrine operational, they sure had big ambitious plans but failed to make them operational. While on the other hand your enemy embarked on a modernization plan to counter your CDS and has bought exactly the weapons it needs to tame the CDS, so overall this strategy has backfired for you
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Thats not true at all....
Minimum deterrance would have meant a sizeable nuclear arsenal sufficient to keep India at bay...
At the current rate of production, Pak will have the 5th largest stockpile of nukes. There is no need for Pak to be channeling so much money into nukes currently especially when the threshold for minimum deterrance was crossed way back...
I think what we see right now is an arms race where Pak is using its nuclear arsenal as a hedge against being politically sidelined....
Either way, valuable funds are being channeled from your economy into weapons that may never be used and will (hopefully) serve as nothing more than showpieces...
This does bear "some" similarities to the Cold war...
Pakistan has for a very long time kept its defence budget to 2-4% of its GDP, which is very much affordable.
