Donald Trump rained down on the India-Pakistan landscape, stunning everybody into a ceasefire-or, a pause. We had barely caught our breath from reports of India hitting Pakistani air bases, even reaching Nur Khan which houses its strategic assets. Trump's dive into announcing a ceasefire seemingly came out of nowhere. The pause sits uneasily in India.
Now that the guns are silent, let cooler heads step in. The first call from JD Vance to Narendra Modi had come on Friday. India continued its strikes into the heart of Pakistan. The first call from Pakistan's DGMO was made to his Indian counterpart on Saturday morning. India didn't respond. Instead, the morning was distinguished by hits on three key Pakistani air bases.
The turning point came with a second call from the Pakistani DGMO on Saturday afternoon, which directly led to Trump claiming mediator's credit and announcing a ceasefire on X before India or Pakistan could. Things that bothered Indians:
Trump equated India and Pakistan. For Indians who have been bruised for decades by Pakistan's terror factory, this felt like a betrayal.
He brought Kashmir back into play, promising some dialogue at a 'neutral site'.
There was no mention of the fact that terrorism from Pakistan needs to stop.
He inserted an internationalisation that India has worked hard to avoid.
Pakistan got an emergency IMF bailout for basically being the bad guy, reinforcing every Indian suspicion about the US-Pakistan relationship.
Trump sprang all of this on the world, with no filters. Pakistan declared victory. (They had declared victory in 1948, 1965, 1971 and 1999) By Saturday evening, Rawalpindi had already breached the ceasefire understanding.
But even behind the messiness of the last day, 'Operation Sindoor' achieved some real gains for India. India demonstrated ability to breach and hit the terror headquarters of LeT and JeM-altogether nine sites across Pakistan and POK. In essence, India achieved its objectives on the night of May 7. Pakistan's subsequent retaliation set off a spiral of exchanges to achieve military dominance.
By May 10, despite taking losses and casualties, India prevailed in the skies. Pakistan, as expected, threw out the nuclear bait. The US took the bait.
India changed its war doctrine. Henceforth, terror attacks would be treated as an act of war. Given Pakistan's propensity to use terror as part of its official policy, we can expect that Indian armed forces would have to maintain extreme readiness, because India's western neighbour is far from giving up its prized tactics. Much more importantly, India secured from the ceasefire understanding that it will continue to keep the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) in abeyance. Reviving IWT would have been Pakistan's biggest demand, and it's good that India stood its ground on this.
Pakistan pretended Balakot was a figment of India's imagination. In the last few days, Indian forces left little to the imagination. Hits on Pakistan's terror infrastructure may be rebuilt. But those images and long lists of dead terrorists will endure. The precedent is set. India breached Pakistani air defences, hitting critical infrastructure. India demonstrated it can reach the heart of Pakistan, almost unimpeded. That's the kind of strategic signalling we have been hoping for.
We fell into a perfect storm. A Pakistani military-intelligence establishment that is literally jihadis in uniform, and with a national budget, running a country with a discredited civilian leadership. The earlier Pakistan leadership had a sense of what India is. This lot doesn't.
So, the attacks on religious sites, the Pahalgam massacre, were conducted all under the belief that India is a religious tinderbox waiting to explode. Indian unity is baffling to the Pakistani military leadership.
On the other side, we have a US administration with zero context, and no one to remind them that 75-year-old disputes are not '1,000 years old', and that they are not devoid of their own histories or sensitivities. But we deal with the world as we find it, not as we dream it should be.
India took losses, some very costly. By keeping this information away from Indians, we risk infantilising them. Costs of war are real and felt by every family that sends their sons and daughters to fight. The rest of us can stand with them when we know.
When the nation takes losses, we should take them on the chin and not hide them to present an Instagram-worthy war. That is what has led to dissatisfaction among Indians today. We lost men, we lost aircraft. That's the price we pay. The ordinary Indian is more mature than official keyboard warriors, or infantile TV anchors.
Finally, on a contrarian note, ceasefires are just that, they're not a resolution. Edward Luttwak, in an insightful essay in Foreign Affairs, wrote, 'A ceasefire tends to arrest war-induced exhaustion, and lets belligerents reconstitute and rearm their forces. It intensifies and prolongs the struggle once the ceasefire ends-and it does usually end.'
#Operation Sindoor
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Punjab's hopes for normalcy dimmed by fresh violations
The turning point came with a second call from the Pakistani DGMO on Saturday afternoon, which directly led to Trump claiming mediator's credit and announcing a ceasefire on X before India or Pakistan could. Things that bothered Indians:
Trump equated India and Pakistan. For Indians who have been bruised for decades by Pakistan's terror factory, this felt like a betrayal.
He brought Kashmir back into play, promising some dialogue at a 'neutral site'.
There was no mention of the fact that terrorism from Pakistan needs to stop.
He inserted an internationalisation that India has worked hard to avoid.
Pakistan got an emergency IMF bailout for basically being the bad guy, reinforcing every Indian suspicion about the US-Pakistan relationship.
Trump sprang all of this on the world, with no filters. Pakistan declared victory. (They had declared victory in 1948, 1965, 1971 and 1999) By Saturday evening, Rawalpindi had already breached the ceasefire understanding.
But even behind the messiness of the last day, 'Operation Sindoor' achieved some real gains for India. India demonstrated ability to breach and hit the terror headquarters of LeT and JeM-altogether nine sites across Pakistan and POK. In essence, India achieved its objectives on the night of May 7. Pakistan's subsequent retaliation set off a spiral of exchanges to achieve military dominance.
By May 10, despite taking losses and casualties, India prevailed in the skies. Pakistan, as expected, threw out the nuclear bait. The US took the bait.
India changed its war doctrine. Henceforth, terror attacks would be treated as an act of war. Given Pakistan's propensity to use terror as part of its official policy, we can expect that Indian armed forces would have to maintain extreme readiness, because India's western neighbour is far from giving up its prized tactics. Much more importantly, India secured from the ceasefire understanding that it will continue to keep the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) in abeyance. Reviving IWT would have been Pakistan's biggest demand, and it's good that India stood its ground on this.
Pakistan pretended Balakot was a figment of India's imagination. In the last few days, Indian forces left little to the imagination. Hits on Pakistan's terror infrastructure may be rebuilt. But those images and long lists of dead terrorists will endure. The precedent is set. India breached Pakistani air defences, hitting critical infrastructure. India demonstrated it can reach the heart of Pakistan, almost unimpeded. That's the kind of strategic signalling we have been hoping for.
We fell into a perfect storm. A Pakistani military-intelligence establishment that is literally jihadis in uniform, and with a national budget, running a country with a discredited civilian leadership. The earlier Pakistan leadership had a sense of what India is. This lot doesn't.
So, the attacks on religious sites, the Pahalgam massacre, were conducted all under the belief that India is a religious tinderbox waiting to explode. Indian unity is baffling to the Pakistani military leadership.
On the other side, we have a US administration with zero context, and no one to remind them that 75-year-old disputes are not '1,000 years old', and that they are not devoid of their own histories or sensitivities. But we deal with the world as we find it, not as we dream it should be.
India took losses, some very costly. By keeping this information away from Indians, we risk infantilising them. Costs of war are real and felt by every family that sends their sons and daughters to fight. The rest of us can stand with them when we know.
When the nation takes losses, we should take them on the chin and not hide them to present an Instagram-worthy war. That is what has led to dissatisfaction among Indians today. We lost men, we lost aircraft. That's the price we pay. The ordinary Indian is more mature than official keyboard warriors, or infantile TV anchors.
Finally, on a contrarian note, ceasefires are just that, they're not a resolution. Edward Luttwak, in an insightful essay in Foreign Affairs, wrote, 'A ceasefire tends to arrest war-induced exhaustion, and lets belligerents reconstitute and rearm their forces. It intensifies and prolongs the struggle once the ceasefire ends-and it does usually end.'
(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this column are that of the writer. The facts and opinions expressed here do not reflect the views of www.economictimes.com.)
Indrani Bagchi