First, there was an intense
debate on whether the government should publish videos or photographic evidence
of the strike after Pakistan claimed that no such strike had taken place.
Similar demands, made by politicians such as Delhi chief minister Arvind
Kejriwal, were dubbed “anti-national.” They were projected by the ruling
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and some news channels, as questioning the Indian
Army itself. This was not as if this kind of operation never happened before, but
they were not to be made public.
As part of the government’s
policy of “strategic restraint,” the government allowed the army to deal with
cross-border actions against Pakistan at an “operational, tactical level.”One
of the important national news paper “The Hindu” published a detailed
account of “Operation Ginger,” carried out in 2011. This “strike”
was executed to avenge the killing and beheading of Indian soldiers.
During Operation Ginger,
Indian soldiers meted out the same treatment to Pakistani personnel across the
LoC. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s national security adviser, Shiv
Shankar Menon, added his weight to these claims. Covert operations were not
announced to the country because the primary goal was to pacify the LoC and cut
down infiltration and ceasefire violations, not to manage public opinion at
home.
By keeping operations covert rather than
overt, it was made possible for the Pakistan Army to climb down and for a
temporary peace to be re-established.
Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar,
had reportedly decided to launch a surgical strike across the border while
watching a television live debate and it sounds so ridiculous that it is
incomprehensible to any sound bodied person.
BJP did not lose any time to take its
political mileage as some of its leaders in UP started reminding all of us that
prime minister’s Modi’s chest is “56 inches wide” and posters also appeared in
UP celebrating the surgical strike, juxta positioning the prime minister’s
photo with the image of the silent soldier and some handy text threatening
Pakistan.
In some of these, Prime
Minister was also portrayed as Lord Ram and his Pakistani counterpart as the
demon king Ravana.
Party president, Amit Shah,
said, “We will go to the people with this issue—because every responsible party
should motivate the army.”
The then
Defense Minister, Manohar Parikar, had compared the Indian Army to Hanuman (the
powerful monkey god). In the epic Ramayana, Hanuman, who could move mountains,
had to be made aware of his capabilities by Jambawan (the bear king) and he
also planned a “victory rally” in his home state Goa; but following criticism,
he postponed it.
NOW A SHAMEFUL TURN
Yesterday (7th December 2018), Lt General (retired) D S Hooda, who was the Northern Army Commander in September 2016 when Indian troops carried out surgical strikes on terror launch pads along the Line of Control in the wake of the Uri attack, said the “overhype” of the strikes did not help and “it is not good” when “military operations get politicized”.
He was speaking in a seminar on the ‘Role of
Cross-Border Operations and Surgical Strikes’ at the ongoing Military
Literature Festival and he further added that, following the surgical strikes,
there were accusations that the issue had been politicized, that there was an
“attempt to keep a purely military operation in the political domain by
selective leaks of videos, photographs etc”.
He did not stop here and
said, “Did the overhype help? I say, completely no. If you start having
political resonance in military operations, it is not good. There was too much
political banter, on both sides, and when military operations get politicized,
that is not good.”
On the possibility of the
strikes impacting the thought process of decision-makers in future operations,
the former Army Commander said “if you hype a successful operation, then even
success has its burden”. He further added that Indian army will think twice
next time (what) if there are casualties because it has been so overhyped, and
politicized.
Have we ever thought that
what happens if it does not have the same level of success? It may impose some
caution in future. If the country had done it quietly, it would have been much
better. The strikes were purely tactical in nature with short-term goals and of
no strategic value to deter the Pakistan Army from backing future terror
attacks.
The retired general summed
it up at the end that when his team was planning it, there was no thought in
their mind that Pakistan would stop doing Uri-like incidents.
The conclusion of his talk is
very clear and a very straight message has been sent about this government’s
Pakistan policy, “As we all know that the aim of the strikes could have been
fulfilled through artillery fire. We had had massive artillery duels, but it
was not helping.
