https://aliahd66.substack.com/p/op-sindoor-2-nuclear-portents-are
Op Sindoor 2: Nuclear portents are darker than General Chauhan puts it
Once while serving (19:34) and a second time when retired (37:41), former Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Chauhan held forth that limited military operations like Operation (Op) Sindoor will unlikely escalate to the nuclear level. He assumes that Pakistan cannot escalate twice-over: first to the conventional level and thereafter also to the nuclear level.
In both talks, he noted that space for conventional operations owes to three factors. One is India’s No First Use doctrine, which - self-servingly - allows India scope for exercise of its conventional advantage over Pakistan. It does help keep the nuclear threat in abeyance, allowing India the option of limited war.
The second is that there is no threat of capture of territory in primarily non-contact - if kinetic – operations, such as Op Sindoor. This precludes tactical nuclear weapons’ use by Pakistan, allowing India greater scope for standoff, non-contact operations.
The third is that the onus for escalation on to the conventional level is in the hands of Pakistan, and once exercised, Pakistan loses out on also taking the war to the nuclear level. He believes that the escalation to the conventional level by Pakistan makes the ‘notion of escalating into the nuclear domain slightly difficult’ (38:30).
This infeasibility of a second step by Pakistan - having taken the first – presumably allows India the rationale and legitimacy to proceed with conventional operations with greater vigour. Trifle complacently, he concludes, ‘So, we are quite sure that we should be able to manage that.’
Dangerous possibilities
To Chauhan, Op Sindoor led to a ‘falsification’ of the notion that nuclear weapons deter all kinds of conventional conflicts. This is strange, considering that a limited war fought within a year of nuclearization of South Asia – at Kargil – put paid to the notion right at the outset.
Speaking of space for conventional operations (36:58), he noted that while Pakistan through its full spectrum deterrence (FSD) doctrine tries to diminish this space, India – for its part – is constantly at expanding that space. The Indian cold start doctrine, and lately, the dynamic response doctrine (cold strike) are testimony. Now, the doctrinal tussle continues as the real thing.
Chauhan believes that, ‘in future… it’s going to be a combination of contact and non-contact warfare (57:00),’ with additional space for conventional operations squeezed out of the other, newer domains of operations: cyber, space and cognition. In light of the escalated violence, it is not clear why Pakistan will abjure from FSD.
Busting the assumption
Chauhan makes the case that by initially restricting targeting to terror camps in Op Sindoor, India kept the conflict at the subconventional level. This is only partially true, since conventional ordnance was hurled across borders by conventional armaments. Amounting to an armed attack on a sovereign state, it can hardly be said to be subconventional. At best, the operation can be characterized as one at the subconventional-conventional interface. Only Op Sindoor’s first phase meets the definition in the army’s subconventional operations doctrine:
“Sub conventional operations arena comprises armed conflicts that are above the level of peaceful coexistence amongst states and below the threshold of war. These include militancy, insurgency, proxy war and terrorism either employed as part of an insurrectionist movement or independently. Border skirmishes also fall within this category (p. 8).”
However, the subsequent days of Op Sindoor can be characterized as medium-intensity ‘operations other than war’ (OOTW), that can be cached in the term subconventional operations. The army defines OOTW as: ‘OOTW encompass a wide range of activities where military power is used for purposes other than large scale combat operations (p. 15).’
The operations on the last day arguably took the conflict into the ‘large scale’ realm, which per the air chief were conducted over a 1200 km-wide front with 200 km in depth, and, per his vice chief, used 50 long-range, precision-guided munitions. This amounts to a limited war, which on the spectrum of war is subset of conventional war (p. 12). The army defines such a war thus: ‘Conventional war conforms to the traditional image of war and is fought to achieve strategic and military objectives…. It may be total or limited in terms of duration, the range of weapon systems employed, scope, objectives and its ultimate outcome (p. 15).’
Chauhan’s claim that Pakistan escalated to the conventional level is a case of ‘the chicken or the egg.’ If limited conventional war is taken as Pakistan’s launch of Op Bunyan um Marsoos, then it must be recalled that India had already blinded a proportion of Pakistan’s surveillance and air defence capability in earlier strikes, shaping of the battlefield for the large scale strikes of the following day.
Curiously, in the recent laudatory documentary the air operations’ chief lets on that the air force’s crack at Pakistani airfields preempted Op Bunyan um Marsoos, saying, “Toh us raat yani ki dus ki subah, is se pehle ki voh hamla kar sake, hum hamla kar chuke the unki major air fields, radar sites aur command and control set up par (“That night or morning of 10th, even prior to their strike, we had already attacked their major air fields, radar sites and command and control set up”).”
To the extent this version of events holds water, India too is implicated in upping the ante to the conventional level. Thus, neither the sequence of events nor definitional exercise vindicates Chauhan’s theorizing.
Indeed, exercising a choice in favour of escalation by either side cannot be discounted, since each side would continue to have agency in conflict. Therefore, the nuclear step is but a decision away; which if made in the ‘free hand’ environment existing on both sides, can spell radioactive trouble.
Rationally, Pakistan would to begin with resort to nuclear signaling with only if forced on the back-foot by India – which, taking Chauhan’s description of a future military conflict as guide, can only be a matter of time in a conventional war. Therefore, even if Pakistan reaches to brandish its nuclear card, it cannot be an isolated act, shorn off context, with the onus solely on it. Instead, India could well be stoking a risk to itself.
Never be too sure
The three operations – the one post-Uri, at Balakot and Op Sindoor – reinforce the Indian belief that a conflict can play out at the subconventional-conventional interface. India’s preparedness through partial and creeping mobilization of forces on the borders and the Line of Control discourages Pakistan from responding with contact warfare. Pakistan is thus restricted to a level of Indian choosing, at which India believes it demonstrated a marked advantage in Op Sindoor.
Such a perception does not account for Pakistan having kept its powder dry for most part in this exchange. The likelihood of Pakistan staying in the fight for longer next time, may make for an imitation of recent conflicts elsewhere: no victor, no vanquished. Such a circumstance can multiply political pressures within India, as a self-regarding stronger power that ought to have made short work of its weaker adversary.
Saving face is also important institutionally for a professional military. Take the case in Op Sindoor, when under the cover of a ‘free hand,’ the military continued to pummel Pakistan through the forenoon, even after it had assessed that it had already prevailed by early morning on the last day. The only rationale for this can be that the air force was given a greater leeway to get back at Pakistan after it lost aircraft to a Pakistani aerial ambush.
Pakistan has been known for its ambushes: Kargil, Op Swift Retort and the opening phase of Op Sindoor. Its next one may well be springing a contact war, escalating India’s launch of a limited military conflict into a limited, conventional war. The aim could be to force an outcome it desires: talks. Though only intended to deter, Indian readiness for this – seen in mobilizations of varying extent since Op Trident of the mid-eighties - makes a wider conventional war inevitable; setting stage for the nuclear backdrop to foreground itself.
This is not to forget the hardy perennial of human affairs, Murphy’s law on inadvertence; an instance of which in Op Sindoor was the alleged glitch in the Indian military operations’ hotline to its Pakistani counterpart. Chauhan – in a first - admits to the play of inadvertence in Op Sindoor. Warning against taking the nuclear angle lightly (59:00), he requires that next time round nuclear sites be taken out of the target list, such as the Nur Khan air base. As regards Kirana hills, he alleges the strike was unintended. Rightly, he cautions that ‘one will have to be more careful in future… so there cannot be such mistakes.’ His very sane observation is that in the heightened pace of operations errors and miscalculation can only elicit further wrong decisions. It is moot if the targeting was on account of nuclear signalling or ignorance on India’s part; both of which demand accountability.
The notion of victory
While it can be readily accepted that to begin with every effort of the military will be towards war limiation and its early termination, it’s a Clausewitzian verity that escalation is intrinsic to conflict. The military needs reminding of its own doctrinal rendering of two decades back: ‘War is prosecuted by the employment of strategy which aims at breaking the enemy’s will to fight. Disengagement from war is difficult because it develops its own dynamics and pace, which in themselves are unpredictable and could spin out of control (p. 13).’
Chauhan at his new perch as head of a well-endowed and privileged think tank in the national capital has his work cut out: either better explain why Pakistan cannot escalate twice-over or rethink his quip, ‘we are quite sure that we should be able to manage that.’
