Dhanoa's 'Plan B' and implications for Pakistan

[Taimoor Khan]

550KM

Are you sure about that? My sources are tight lipped about it .

 

[randomradio]

"With its own forces well within the safety of its own borders, India can launch a volley of cruise missile at Pakistani forward positions, especially airbases. Here, Pakistan is at a significant disadvantage due to lack of strategic depth. And because of India's significant depth, any potential Pakistani response would be significantly muted."


Pakistani standoff weapons like RAAD and Babur, specially if mated with TNWs, can make mince meat of Indian air force installation, specially their airbases all along the relevant war theatre. What if Pakistan strikes first and take out Indian airforce ability to support their ground forces? With land forces already pulled back, it will be walk in the park for Pakistani land forces.

The question is: How many do you need and how many do you have?

What makes you think they will only pull back land forces?

Why are you talking about India pulling back forces? That's not gonna happen.

The idea is to move forward.

 

[Taimoor Khan]

The question is: How many do you need and how many do you have?

Considering that it will only take one to breach and detonate over an Indian airbase, your question frankly speaking is irrelevant.

 

[randomradio]

Considering that it will only take one to breach and detonate over an Indian airbase, your question frankly speaking is irrelevant.

You do realise that tac nukes are not all that it's cut out to be?

Not to mention, there will be plenty of aircraft in reserve underground.

 

[HRK]

Are you sure about that? My sources are tight lipped about it .

as announced during Pakistan day prayed

 

[Taimoor Khan]

You do realise that tac nukes are not all that it's cut out to be?

Not to mention, there will be plenty of aircraft in reserve underground.

Is it so? I hope your high ups are also thinking along the same line.

In our calculations, one Raad or Babur mated with TNW is enough to take out an Indian airbase.

as announced during Pakistan day prayed

I mean the real range.

 

[HRK]

I mean the real range.

official version should be give more weightage

 

[CriticalThought]

The question is: How many do you need and how many do you have?



Why are you talking about India pulling back forces? That's not gonna happen.

The idea is to move forward.

I can talk about anything I want to. Drill this deep within your thick skull.

 

[PakSword]

Saturation attacks are always a good option if we can pull them off. But the main point of this thread is that mere intermediate range threats will have no use. We need credible, reliable offensive capability to strike every inch of India. The question then arises, do we have the wherewithal for it?

Again, the only option is increasing the range of missiles and their quality.. and then comes the number.. I believe that Pakistan is capable of designing a ICBM so we have no issue with covering every inch of India.. But that is not needed if we can create havoc by damaging the infrastructure, specially power generation sites (solar/ hydro/ wind and other power plants), airports, seaports, bridges, dams etc etc.. We don't necessarily need to move deep.. in fact any damage within 1000 kms of the border will achieve the objective.. Eventually, the war will have to be stopped.. and big powers will be involved..

Chinese involvement will be a plus, but I don't believe China will provide any support other than ensuring continued supply lines through air and CPEC.

 

[Hamza913]

Firstly, you don't have tac nukes. We can talk about tac nukes "after" it is deployed.

Second, according to our nuclear doctrine, we will go nuclear the minute you start deploying nukes to the theatre. So if you move your Nasrs around, "after" it's confirmed that they are nuclear, we go nuclear. Just the threat is enough for us to press the button.



We will comfortably match them. I am talking about the long run. With $200B, we will match their current defence spending. And that number will be achieved by 2030.

https://breakingdefense.com/2018/05...hat-much-bigger-than-china-russia-gen-milley/

http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/11/22/americas-military-doesnt-have-enough-money-to-do-its-job/

China's close to achieving this, and that's why you see the PLAN building ships at the same rate the USN does. By 2035, they will comfortably match the US firepower.



Foreseeable future is quite subjective.

It's impossible for your growth to match ours. We are already adding half your defence budget every year. In about three years, we will be adding as much as the entire Pak defence budget every year. In about five years, it will climb to 1.5x. In about 10 years, Pak's defence budget will be less than 10% of the Indian budget. And this is without counting the savings we will gain through indigenization.

Warfare is switching towards the rich and powerful. It's going out of reach of small countries with smaller budgets. For example, just one modern fighter aircraft will climb to $200M+ flyaway before 2030 considering current prices.

Yes, we do, it's called Nasr (as you said).

If that's your policy, then there will be a nuclear holocaust if a war breaks out and a ceasefire is not made within a couple of weeks tops.

No, you won't. China isn't even close to the current power of the US, as for the future, we'll see but I'm still highly sceptical.

As for Hindustan, don't make me laugh, you're a long way from that.

You won't ever be able to expand the gap enough to be able to successfully invade us, no matter how much you cry otherwise.

 

[Darth Vader]

Firstly, you don't have tac nukes. We can talk about tac nukes "after" it is deployed.

Second, according to our nuclear doctrine, we will go nuclear the minute you start deploying nukes to the theatre. So if you move your Nasrs around, "after" it's confirmed that they are nuclear, we go nuclear. Just the threat is enough for us to press the button.



We will comfortably match them. I am talking about the long run. With $200B, we will match their current defence spending. And that number will be achieved by 2030.

https://breakingdefense.com/2018/05...hat-much-bigger-than-china-russia-gen-milley/

http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/11/22/americas-military-doesnt-have-enough-money-to-do-its-job/

China's close to achieving this, and that's why you see the PLAN building ships at the same rate the USN does. By 2035, they will comfortably match the US firepower.



Foreseeable future is quite subjective.

It's impossible for your growth to match ours. We are already adding half your defence budget every year. In about three years, we will be adding as much as the entire Pak defence budget every year. In about five years, it will climb to 1.5x. In about 10 years, Pak's defence budget will be less than 10% of the Indian budget. And this is without counting the savings we will gain through indigenization.

Warfare is switching towards the rich and powerful. It's going out of reach of small countries with smaller budgets. For example, just one modern fighter aircraft will climb to $200M+ flyaway before 2030 considering current prices.



India's not under threat from ICBMs.

But its from mirv much harder to counter

 

[ziaulislam]

@All let's keep the discussion technically correct. BMD is a major game changer and it's efficacy has been clearly seen in the recent Saudi-Houthi conflict. One could argue that Houthi missiles are primitive, but then India is also backed and supplied by Israel, and indirectly by America. India is America's pawn in the Asian game and will benefit from access to latest technologies. And we have not officially deployed MIRV capability... YET!!!!

depends upon type of missles.and its trajectory short range missles have low flight trajectory and are easier to intercept

 

[randomradio]

Is it so? I hope your high ups are also thinking along the same line.

In our calculations, one Raad or Babur mated with TNW is enough to take out an Indian airbase.

That's nice. But conventional weapons are better.

I can talk about anything I want to. Drill this deep within your thick skull.

Sure you can. But you will look foolish among people who know what they are talking about.

 

[MimophantSlayer]

India has conventional superiority

THE INDO-PAKISTANI NUCLEAR CONFRONTATION:
LESSONS FROM THE PAST, CONTINGENCIES FOR THE FUTURE
Neil Joeck1
Senior Fellow
Center for Global Security Research
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
September 2008



Conflict scenarios: what would war look like?
War in the future might look much like war in the past. Pakistani support for
proxy forces, primarily irregular militants operating outside government control, would
most likely originate from Kashmir but conceivably could have a base in Bangladesh or
Nepal. Pakistan’s goal in supporting proxy forces would be to tie up the Indian Army as
much as possible, bleeding and hectoring its forces to convince India that a diplomatic
resolution to Kashmir on Pakistan’s terms must be found. A parallel to this kind of
conflict would be Indian support for the same kind of activity in Baluchistan without the
same longer-term objective of resolving Kashmir, but rather to make clear that two can
play the same game with damaging consequences for Pakistan. India’s goal would be
to force Pakistan to deploy its forces away from other fronts, thus reducing Pakistan’s
ability to respond elsewhere on the IB or LOC.
These proxy efforts have been conducted in the past but without either side
taking the war to the source of support across the border. Although Cold Start was
developed in part to provide India with an ability to intervene in response to terrorist
activities inside India, there are options short of Cold Start that could produce a different
kind of war. Rather than invoking Cold Start as presently conceived, India could
respond to Pakistani support of proxy war inside Kashmir by conducting a “punish and
leave” strategy.31 This might be an incursion by special Indian forces for no more than a
3-4 day period to allow the destruction of key training camps and supply routes. An
alternative might be a “punish and stay” operation, more like the Chinese invasion of
Vietnam in 1979 or the US invasion of Cambodia in 1971. In both cases the invasion
force would be sent in for a fixed but significantly longer period of time with the intent of
disrupting the enemy’s ability to continue resupply or staging. Both run the risk that
Pakistan would expand the war elsewhere along the contested boundary. That,
however, would force India to fight entirely defensively at points of Pakistan-initiated
conflict, which could consequently reduce the dangers associated with Cold Start.
Conflict would look quite different if India invoked its Cold Start doctrine in
response to a Pakistani provocation. Here there could be at least three broad variants:
success on all the seven or eight fronts that Cold Start envisions; success on a few
fronts and failure on the others; or failure on all the fronts. The latter outcome would
create fewest problems from the point of view of escalation and nuclear use, but is also
the least likely given India’s superiority in conventional terms.32 The second possibility
might be a more likely outcome. Pakistan might choose to concentrate its forces at key
defensive points to overcome India’s thinned out forces that are called for by the Cold
Start doctrine. Confronting Indian forces at a few critical choke points or in defense of
vulnerable cities would be more important than stopping every one of the seven or eight
points of attack. The result might be more like a stalemate, assuming that the
successful Indian offensives stopped after achieving the planned shallow penetration.
Battlefield initiative might carry some commanders away, however, especially if they
encountered light and only harassing resistance. Whether Pakistan would interpret a
deeper penetration by a lighter force as crossing the territorial red line would depend on

32 The Military Balance 2008 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies,
2008), pp. 341-345 and 349-351.

the dynamic circumstances at play elsewhere along the border. The most dangerous
scenario would probably be the first, where Indian forces succeeded in surprising
Pakistan and were able to penetrate along seven or eight fronts and then dig in and
hold their positions. Seeing itself defeated along a broad swathe of territory would force
Pakistan into making critical decisions about nuclear escalation.
Such a decision would also be forced on Pakistan’s leaders in the event of an
outright cross-border war such as what India was threatening in 2002. Whether the new
Cold Start doctrine will be flexible enough to allow a massed invasion consistent with
the earlier Sundarji Doctrine is not clear. But a powerful deep thrust into Pakistani
territory at one or more points would likely overwhelm Pakistan and force it to
counterattack elsewhere in a flanking maneuver. The dynamics of that kind of conflict
would again be difficult to predict but it is more likely that India would be able to prevail
on the ground than Pakistan. In such a case, Pakistan would have to decide whether
escalation to nuclear weapons would make any sense. How those weapons may be
employed will be discussed in the next section.

 

[randomradio]

Yes, we do, it's called Nasr (as you said).

There is no confirmation from the Pakistani side that the Nasrs are equipped with nuclear warheads.

If that's your policy, then there will be a nuclear holocaust if a war breaks out and a ceasefire is not made within a couple of weeks tops.

Of course. But we believe that in a Cold Start setting, you won't use nukes anyway. Your tac nukes are a bluff. The reason is if you stick tac nukes on the Nasr and move them around at the beginning of hostilities, we will go nuclear first.

Total war, you will likely use nukes, but we want to build up our BMD and counterforce capability before we start talking about war.

People here are claiming you will use Ra'ad and Babur with nukes. But if you do not properly define and separate your conventional armaments from nuclear ones, then we will be justified in using strategic nuclear weapons the minute you start moving around a Ra'ad with a conventional warhead.

Ours are properly defined and separated. As of now, so are yours. If you upset that balance, you know the consequences.

No, you won't. China isn't even close to the current power of the US, as for the future, we'll see but I'm still highly sceptical.

You have to look at it long term. China will very soon have the capacity to build up at the level of the US today. Which means they will take 10-15 years to build up to American levels.

As for Hindustan, don't make me laugh, you're a long way from that.

Sure. For India, 10 years to equal US/China in terms of expenditure. And 10-15 years to build up to their level.

So 2030-35 for China, 2040-45 for India.

And this is only for the navy. When it comes to the army and air force, it is obviously much faster.

You do realise that India already has 3 submarine lines, right?

2040-45 is a long ways away.

You won't ever be able to expand the gap enough to be able to successfully invade us, no matter how much you cry otherwise.

This is how our thinking is currently.
Your tac nukes don't exist.
IAF will get air superiority over Pakistan in 2 days, 3 days tops.
Current generation IA tanks cannot be stopped by your current generation tanks and LAT/HAT teams.

But its from mirv much harder to counter

MIRV won't matter. By the time enough is deployed, we will be moving towards laser based BMD as well.