Hell Hath And No Fury.

[Windjammer]

The last major war between India and Pakistan was fought in December of 1971 almost 40 years earlier. This resulted in the annihilation of Pakistan's Eastern wing and the State of Bangladesh was formed.
Indians see this war as a great victory while Pakistan declares no joy.
Briefly let's relive the scenario.
Although Pakistani POW figure is well documented as around 92,000 but little do the reader realises that less than 50,000 of the overall count were fighting men, the rest were made up of personnel from various utility services. PAF stationed a single Squadron of 16 obsolete F-86s supplemented by three T-33s and a few Helicopters for SAR duties. More over after the murder of 45 personnel by Mukti fighters, all Mobile observer units had been withdrawn effectively blinding the PAF and resorting to a single runway base of Tezgaon near Dacca. The Pakistan Naval strength in East Pakistan was barely mentionable with a few Gun Boats for patrolling inner waterways. The supply line was out of question and the Mukti insurgency was in full swing taking it's toll on the soldier's families.
Compare this with India deploying it's full strength of Eastern Command backed up with all the supplies and logistics. The IAF stationed ten Squadrons of fighter/bomber aircraft including three of MIG-21s while the rest was made up of supersonic SU-7s, Gnats and Hunters, all evidently superior in performance to the vunerable Saber.
The Indian Navy's aircraft carrier Vikrant was deployed in the Bay of Bengal with a Squadron of Sea hawk fighter/bombers and flights of Alize ASW aircrafts.No doubt the aircraft carrier would have all the escort ships performing their duties. The Indian forces had all the unlimited supply of men and ammunition and the crucial advantage of the internal insurgency. So here you have the scenario, 50,000 odd soldiers pitted against a full strength army of 500,000. Single PAF Squadron facing 10 squadrons of much superior aircraft, in fact if the Indian Naval Squadron is included, the ratio is 11:1. And the Pakistan Navy is non existent. However............
Let's shift all this scenario into Indian held Kashmir. !!!!!
Assume that the war is confined to just this State, and since it's land locked, let's keep the Navys of both countries out of equation. We will allow India to station ten Squadrons of say MIG-21s and Jaguars in Kashmir which are somewhat equal in performance to the PAF's Mirages and F-7s. Ten Squadrons make up over 50% of PAF's overall strength a much healthier situation than what PAF faced in 1971. Pakistan only had 50,000 regular troops in East Pakistan where as India reportedly has half million soldiers in Kashmir, ten times more than what Pakistan had. Like in East Pakistan, the ground environment in Kashmir is said to be unsuitable for tracked vehicles hence let's do away with Tanks and APCs. Like Pakistan, India also doesn't has the luxury of reinforcements or a supply line and above all since India claims that all the Freedom Fighters in Kashmir are infiltrators from Pakistan, it wouldn't have to fight in it's back yard like Pakistani Soldiers were faced with Mukti Bahini.
Gentlemen, let the battle commence and conclude for your self keeping in mind that the Pakistan Forces faced a full fledge insurgency for nine months and fought India for over three weeks.

 

[Hutchroy]

Let's shift all this scenario into Indian held Kashmir. !!!!!
Assume that the war is confined to just this State,

I hope you are aware of the 1965 War where the Pakistani Establishment was convinced that India would confine its efforts to Kashmir and not attack Pakistan.

They were wrong then and you are wrong now. India will attack at the Place and Time of its choosing. This "must" be in Pakistani Punjab or Sindh in addition to Pakistani held Kashmir.

 

[Windjammer]

I hope you are aware of the 1965 War where the Pakistani Establishment was convinced that India would confine its efforts to Kashmir and not attack Pakistan.

They were wrong then and you are wrong now. India will attack at the Place and Time of its choosing. This "must" be in Pakistani Punjab or Sindh in addition to Pakistani held Kashmir.

I am well aware that wars can not be confined just to one location, as India at one time configured on surgical strikes, however it was just an assumption based on the crisis and challenges the Pakistan Forces faced in East Pakistan and how would India deal with a such case scenarios.

 

[Luftwaffe]

Windjammer if you are presenting a war-like scenario a "conventional war" with their strength of airforce fleet larger here you need to add a few more things..India is both conventionally strong therefore out of their inventory they have things to use, to cover our gap with strike we would use cruise missiles to pin point assets and mass troops there of setting a somewhat balance does this make sense to you?
Pakistan is alot more i would fairly say in a very good position then we were in 1971 i would stress cruise missiles will play one hell of a role to remind that Pakistan has rapid the progress and development of air land sea based cruise missiles and considerably many fold increased its inventory for both nuclear and conventional use where we had to sent fight jets now cruise missiles can achieve some or many of those targets and this is called "smart job".

 

[MilesTogo]

You missed that opportunity in Kargil...

 

[Luftwaffe]

go away troll MilesTogo

 

[Windjammer]

Windjammer if you are presenting a war-like scenario a "conventional war" with their strength of airforce fleet larger here you need to add a few more things..India is both conventionally strong therefore out of their inventory they have things to use, to cover our gap with strike we would use cruise missiles to pin point assets and mass troops there of setting a somewhat balance does this make sense to you?
Pakistan is alot more i would fairly say in a very good position then we were in 1971 i would stress cruise missiles will play one hell of a role to remind that Pakistan has rapid the progress and development of air land sea based cruise missiles and considerably many fold increased its inventory for both nuclear and conventional use where we had to sent fight jets now cruise missiles can achieve some or many of those targets and this is called "smart job".

Yaar, you guys are missing the whole point. The subject is let's see how would the Indian military face the somewhat same situation what the Pakistan Forces did in East Pakistan otherwise fighting with one hand tied. Was there any moral in such a victory.??!!

 

[r0ck]

I think the new generation is not as aware of the consequences of the fall of Dhaka. I've heard from my parents that at the time it was like a huge agony, and that people cried their hearts out. But, what I see today is just Bangladesh. It's doesn't spring up a similar sense of emotions or a comparable degree of loss in me when I think that Pakistan was split, as my parents share with me. It's like hearing from someone about how things were before the partition, and how people felt, now I just can't replicate or even compare those sort of feelings.

All I see forward to is just Pakistan now, and coming from my relevant findings I find the above article quite interesting. IMO, Dhaka was always facing 'impossible odds', yet required an insurgency to be brought down in a potentially 'no-win' war, this I think least adheres to the role of our Armed Forces.

However, it would be foolish to think that any of the consequences can be applicable to Islamabad as to those that were to Dhaka back in 1971. AFIAK, if (and that's a big IF) we're going down this time, we aren't going down alone........

........brothers!

 

[Windjammer]

I think the new generation is not as aware of the consequences of the fall of Dhaka. I've heard from my parents that at the time it was like a huge agony, and that people cried their hearts out. But, what I see today is just Bangladesh. It's doesn't spring up a similar sense of emotions or a comparable degree of loss in me when I think that Pakistan was split, as my parents share with me. It's like hearing from someone about how things were before the partition, and how people felt, now I just can't replicate or even compare those sort of feelings.

All I see forward to is just Pakistan now, and coming from my relevant findings I find the above article quite interesting. IMO, Dhaka was always facing 'impossible odds', yet required an insurgency to be brought down in a potentially 'no-win' war, this I think least adheres to the role of our Armed Forces.

However, it would be foolish to think that any of the consequences can be applicable to Islamabad as to those that were to Dhaka back in 1971. AFIAK, if (and that's a big IF) we're going down this time, we aren't going down alone........

........brothers!

The sad reality is most people are oblivious and some are even ignorant to realise and accept the ground realities of those eventful days of 1971. Under the circumstances, no army in the world could have come out in any better position.

 

[Moorkh]

the article starts off talking about the impossible odds faced by the PA in east pakistan.
it then seems to assert that a similar condition exists in J&K.

this i believe is not exactly true.
there are several major differences between the 2 scenarios

1) level of insurgeny
we probably can not imagine the kind of insurgency that was present in east pakistan. as the bangladeshis claim, the PA had been confined to its cantonments by the people. the amount of public support for the mukti bahini was enormous. when the IA entered east pakistan, they knew everything there was to know courtesy the public support they had. similar conditions dont exist in J&K. while the public there might be at worst unsupportive of the IA (and this is a big concession i am making in assumptions) , they are not as supportive of PA as bangladeshis were of IA. also insurgents dont rule the roost in J&K and the IA is not as handicapped as PA was.

2) force balance:
in east pakistan the PA was hopelessly outnumbered. in J&K there is a large concentration of troops by the IA. so if PA decides to go on the offensive, the IA will have many more options to act and will be able to put up a much much better defence than the handicapped PA could.
the numbers in J&K are large enough that if the IA so chooses it can conduct counterattacks and counteroffensives in pakistan occupied kashmir.

3) supply lines
east pakistan was all the way across the subcontinent. with all the major military infrastructure in west pakistan, the supply lines had to go through sri lanka. this meant that a large force could not be quickly moved to east pakistan while mobilizing or during the actual war.
the case in J&K is different. the supply line is short and if need be the number of troops in J&K can be beefed up quickly to thwart any misadventure.

4) other theatres/doctorine:
this point might be moot if we consider the war to be localised to J&K only . however i am including it for a sense of completeness.
in east pakistan the PA was at a clear disadvantage. it had a doctorine to "defend the east from the west". but even in the west the PA was unable to create a condition where india would have to divert resources from east to west.
india does not follow such a doctorine. also it has parityor an advantage in conventional terms all across the border. PA is numerically inferior and to gain an advantage in J&K it will have to take resources from other fronts. this makes it extremely risky for pakistan to attack india in J&K.

in conclusion we can assert that it would be foolhardy to compare J&K with east pakistan as the situation in J&K is far better for IA than it was for PA in EP.

please correct me if i made a mistake somewhere in my analysis

 

[Windjammer]

the article starts off talking about the impossible odds faced by the PA in east pakistan.
it then seems to assert that a similar condition exists in J&K.

this i believe is not exactly true.
there are several major differences between the 2 scenarios

1) level of insurgeny
we probably can not imagine the kind of insurgency that was present in east pakistan. as the bangladeshis claim, the PA had been confined to its cantonments by the people. the amount of public support for the mukti bahini was enormous. when the IA entered east pakistan, they knew everything there was to know courtesy the public support they had. similar conditions dont exist in J&K. while the public there might be at worst unsupportive of the IA (and this is a big concession i am making in assumptions) , they are not as supportive of PA as bangladeshis were of IA. also insurgents dont rule the roost in J&K and the IA is not as handicapped as PA was.

2) force balance:
in east pakistan the PA was hopelessly outnumbered. in J&K there is a large concentration of troops by the IA. so if PA decides to go on the offensive, the IA will have many more options to act and will be able to put up a much much better defence than the handicapped PA could.
the numbers in J&K are large enough that if the IA so chooses it can conduct counterattacks and counteroffensives in pakistan occupied kashmir.

3) supply lines
east pakistan was all the way across the subcontinent. with all the major military infrastructure in west pakistan, the supply lines had to go through sri lanka. this meant that a large force could not be quickly moved to east pakistan while mobilizing or during the actual war.
the case in J&K is different. the supply line is short and if need be the number of troops in J&K can be beefed up quickly to thwart any misadventure.

4) other theatres/doctorine:
this point might be moot if we consider the war to be localised to J&K only . however i am including it for a sense of completeness.
in east pakistan the PA was at a clear disadvantage. it had a doctorine to "defend the east from the west". but even in the west the PA was unable to create a condition where india would have to divert resources from east to west.
india does not follow such a doctorine. also it has parityor an advantage in conventional terms all across the border. PA is numerically inferior and to gain an advantage in J&K it will have to take resources from other fronts. this makes it extremely risky for pakistan to attack india in J&K.

in conclusion we can assert that it would be foolhardy to compare J&K with east pakistan as the situation in J&K is far better for IA than it was for PA in EP.

please correct me if i made a mistake somewhere in my analysis

No No No !!! We are not at the same level in observation, assertion or conclusion.
The sole aim was to assess if i repeat if the East Pakistan scenario was to be repeated in Indian Occupied Kashmir, what would be the out come for Indian Forces in the more of less the circumstances faced by the Pakistan Military.

 

[Kamakazi 69]

No No No !!! We are not at the same level in observation, assertion or conclusion.
The sole aim was to assess if i repeat if the East Pakistan scenario was to be repeated in Indian Occupied Kashmir, what would be the out come for Indian Forces in the more of less the circumstances faced by the Pakistan Military.

They don't get it do they?

But it would make for a hell of a battle.
I would assume that artillery would be used by both sides, to suppress enemy troops, take out important targets (bridges, fuel dumps etc.), for psychological warfare, the use of smoke shells to hide allied movement.

This raises a few questions I hope someone could answer:
So which side is better off in the artillery department?

Also, in the initial attacks, the side with the better artillery positions would be at an advantage.


Also, attack helicopters would be useful here. It was stated in a thread about the army operation in Swat that the AH-1 Cobra, the Pakistan Armys front line gunship, suffered in performance and weapons load in the mountainous region of Swat.
If that is a problem in Kashmir, the Pakistanis have a big problem.
I doubt if the Indian Mi-24 Hinds have any such problems.

Ambushes could be a tool used by both sides to slow down the enemy advance, as well as to lower enemy morale.

Just my two cents.:pdf