2016–2018 India–Pakistan border skirmishes

2016 India–Pakistan military confrontation
Part of Indo-Pakistani conflicts and Kashmir conflict
The Map of Line of Control
Date 28 September 2016 UTC - present (ongoing) Location Line of Control Status Ongoing
Belligerents
India Indian Army	Pakistan Pakistan Army	Lashkar-e-Taiba (claimed by India) Jaish-e-Mohammed (claimed by India)
Commanders and leaders
Pranab Mukherjee (President of India) Gen. Dalbir Singh Suhag (Chief of Army Staff) Lt.Gen. Ranbir Singh (Director-General of Military Operations) Lt.Gen. D. S. Hooda (GOC-in-C, Northern Command) Manohar Parrikar (Minister of Defence)	Mamnoon Hussain (President of Pakistan) Gen. Raheel Sharif (Chief of Army Staff) Lt.Gen. Malik Zafar Iqbal (X Corps Commander) Khawaja Muhammad Asif (Minister of Defence)	Unknown
Units involved
IA Northern Command File:ParasIndia.JPG Parachute Regiment (India) Indian Army 4 and 9 Para (Special Forces)	X Corps	Unknown
Casualties and losses
1-2 soldiers wounded (Indian claim) 8-14 soldiers killed, 1 soldier captured (Pakistani claim)	2 soldiers killed, 9 wounded (Pakistani claim) 9 soldiers killed (Indian claim)	35-70 militants killed (Indian claim) No casualties (Pakistani claim)

On 29 September, a military confrontation between India and Pakistan began. India claimed that it had conducted "surgical strikes" against militant launch pads across the Line of Control in Pakistani-administered Azad Kashmir, and inflicted "significant casualties". Indian media reported the casualty figures variously, from 35 to 50.

Pakistan rejected the claim, stating that Indian troops had not crossed the Line of Control but had only engaged in border skirmishing with Pakistani troops, resulting in the deaths of two Pakistani soldiers and wounding nine. Pakistan rejected India's reports of any other casualties.

It was noted that the details regarding the "attack" were still unclear. The claimed raid came after four militants attacked the Indian army at Uri in the Indian-administered state of Jammu and Kashmir, on September 18, and killed 19 soldiers. India's announcement of the claimed raid also marked the first time India had publicly acknowledged crossing the Line of Control, amidst skepticism and disputing accounts. In the succeeding days, India and Pakistan continued to exchange fire along the border in Kashmir.

Background

From July 2016, there had been large-scale protests in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir against the Indian government, during which more than 80 civilians were killed by Indian forces. Pakistan criticised India's use of force against Kashmiris, while India accused Pakistan of stirring up tensions.

On 18 September, 17 Indian Army soldiers were killed when unknown militants attacked an army base near the town of Uri, in Jammu and Kashmir. Two more soldiers later succumbed to their wounds. India accused Jaish-e-Muhammad, though no group claimed responsibility. The following day, the Indian army said that it had displayed considerable restraint in the wake of the attacks but it reserved the right to respond "at the time and place of our own choosing.”.

However, analysts said that Indian patience had run out due to Pakistan's inaction in curbing the activities of terrorist organisations such as Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad. On 21 September, India summoned the Pakistan High Commission Abdul Bassit and gave a protest letter detailing the involvement of a terrorist group based in Pakistan. Pakistan said India had provided no evidence that the Uri attack was launched from Pakistan. Pakistan's defence minister even suggested that India itself carried out the Uri attack to deflect attention from the popular protests in Jammu and Kashmir. According to Indian sources, this was the "inflection point", after which India decided to respond militarily.

Indian officials said that the cross-border infiltration across the Line of Control had surged since the unrest began in Kashmir, and that those crossing the border showed evidence of military training. According to a government source close to Home Minister Rajnath Singh, a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security was held on 24 September, at which "broad details of targeting terrorists" were discussed.

"Surgical strike" claim

On 29 September, eleven days after the Uri attack, the Indian army said it had conducted "surgical strikes" against suspected militants in Pakistani-administered Kashmir. Indian Director General of Military Operations (DGMO) Lt Gen Ranbir Singh said that it had received "very credible and specific information" about "terrorist teams" who were preparing to "carry out infiltration and conduct terrorist strikes inside Jammu and Kashmir and in various metros in other states". The Indian action was meant to pre-empt their infiltration. India presented its operation as preemptive self-defence against terrorism, striking against terrorist infrastructure along with "those who are trying to support them", which according to one Indian columnist's opinion included Pakistani soldiers or the elements of Pakistani state.

Ranbir Singh said that his Pakistani counterpart had been informed. The Pakistani military said the DGMO communications only discussed the cross-border firing, which was part of the existing rules of engagement.

Pakistan denied that such surgical strikes occurred. The Inter-Services Public Relations said that there had only been "cross border firing". Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the "unprovoked and naked aggression of Indian forces", which he said resulted in the death of two Pakistani soldiers.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said that the UN Observer Group in Pakistani Kashmir did not directly observed any "firing across the Line of Control" relating to the incident. The Indian envoy at UN Syed Akbaruddin dismissed this statement, saying "facts on the ground do not change whether somebody acknowledges or not."

On 30 September, Indian minister for information and broadcasting Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore said "there were no aerial strikes" and that the operation was conducted "on the ground".

Timeline

28-29 September

Indian version

Indian officials said the strike targeted areas close to the Line of Control, where it believes militants congregate for their final briefings before sneaking across the LoC. An Indian security source said the operation began with Indian forces firing artillery across the frontier to provide cover for three to four teams of 70-80 commandos from 4 and 9 Para (Special Forces) to cross the LoC over at several separate points shortly after midnight IST on 29 September (1830 hours UTC 28 Sep). Teams from 4 Para SF crossed the LoC in the Nowgam sector of Kupwara district, with teams from 9 Para SF simultaneously crossing the LoC in Poonch district. By 2 a.m. IST, according to army sources, the special forces teams had travelled 1–3 km on foot, and had begun destroying the terrorist bases with hand-held grenade and 84 mm rocket launchers. The teams then swiftly returned to the Indian side of the Line of Control, suffering only one casualty, a soldier wounded after tripping a land mine.

Indian army said the strike was a pre-emptive attack to neutralize militants in PoK, about whom the army had received "very credible and specific information". India said that, in destroying "terrorist infrastructure" it also attacked "those who are trying to support them", indicating it attacked Pakistani soldiers too. India later briefed opposition parties and foreign envoys, but did not disclose operational details.

Some Indian media claimed that the Indian army infiltrated 2–3 km into Pakistani territory, but the Indian army did not say whether its troops crossed the border or had simply fired across it. India said that none of its soldiers were killed, though one was injured. India said that one of its soldiers, from 37 Rashtriya Rifles, was captured by Pakistan after he "inadvertently crossed over to the Pakistan side", though not during its "surgical strikes."

Initially, Indian media claimed that the army used helicopters during the skirmish. On September 30, an Indian minister denied that there were any helicopters used, stating the operation was conducted "on the ground".

Pakistani version

Pakistan denied that any surgical strikes occurred. Pakistan's Foreign Office rejected the claim as "baseless" and said India was "deliberately" escalating conflict. The Pakistan Army said that there had only been "cross border firing". Pakistan warned that it would respond militarily should any surgical strike actually occur. However, Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif condemned the "unprovoked and naked aggression of Indian forces", which he said resulted in the death of two Pakistani soldiers. The two soldiers killed were identified as Naik Imtiaz and Havildar Jumma Khan.

Pakistani sources reported that up to fourteen Indian soldiers were killed in retaliatory firing and one was captured, Chandu Bablulal Chohan. Pakistan said India was concealing its casualty figures from the cross-border firing.

30 September–4 October

India and Pakistan increased their exchanges of small arms and mortar fire across the Line of Control.

On 1 October, Pakistan said its soldiers had come under fire in Bhimber and they responded to the attack. Indian media stated that Pakistan had started the firing. On 4 October, the Indian Border Security Force said it witnessed Pakistani-operated unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) flying close to the border, presumably to survey Indian positions.

Media reports

The Indian army said that its Pakistani counterpart had been informed of the surgical strike. The Pakistani military said the DGMO communications only discussed the cross-border firing, which was part of the existing rules of engagement.

Pakistan rejected any claims of casualties or other damage inflicted as a direct result of the surgical strikes. General Ranbir Singh, the Indian Army DGMO, only stated during his press conference on 29 September that the number of casualties inflicted had been "significant." Most accounts in the Indian media varied as to the number of militants killed, with most publications giving estimates of 35 to 50 killed, and India Live Today giving an estimate of 50-70 militants killed. The Indian Express stated it had managed to conduct covert interviews with eyewitnesses in the areas hit in the surgical strikes; it had accomplished this by first contacting relatives of the interviewees who lived in Jammu and Kashmir state. According to those eyewitness accounts, along with certain classified documents the Express had obtained, the surgical strikes had been successful; the militants, many of whom belonged to Lashkar-e-Taiba, were caught by surprise. While the terrorist launchpads had been destroyed as intended, the raids had apparently only inflicted a limited level of damage to the overall terrorist infrastructure along the LoC. Eyewitnesses reported around "five, perhaps six" bodies had been swiftly taken away by truck the morning after the raids from the hamlet of Dudhnial, 4 km across the LoC from the Indian Army post of Gulab, while near the hamlet of Khairati Bagh, a Lashkar base, a three-story wooden building was reportedly destroyed and a further three or four terrorists killed. Other accounts reported "fire and explosions" from the east bank of the Neelum River in Athmuqam.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said that the UN Observer Group in Pakistani Kashmir did not directly observe any "firing across the Line of Control" relating to the incident. The Indian envoy at UN Syed Akbaruddin dismissed this statement, saying "facts on the ground do not change whether somebody acknowledges or not."

On 5 October 2016, India's CNN-News18 claimed it conducted a "sting operation" where their news correspondent posing as an inspector-general made a phone call to a police superintendent in Mirpur. According to the report, in the audio conversation, the superintendent revealed details about the military action of 29 September including the places of strikes and the number of Pakistani casualties, quoted as three.

The Indian Express and Zee News reported that eyewitnesses from Pakistan had confirmed that they heard loud noises and that a truckload of bodies were being carried away the next day.

Quint report

On 21 September 2016, the Indian publication The Quint published an unconfirmed report that elite soldiers of the Indian Army had crossed the LoC and conducted a raid earlier that day. However, the claim was dismissed as a "disinformation campaign" circulating as part of war rhetoric on social media, and the Indian army rejected the report. The Quint supports its claim by pointing out that PIA had cancelled flights scheduled to land in Gilgit, Skardu and Chitral on 21 September, and claims that Pakistan had also declared a no-fly zone over Pakistan-administered Kashmir.

Aftermath

Indian intelligence sources claimed that, immediately after the raid, the Pakistan military had buried the corpses of the slain terrorists to erase any evidence and to maintain Pakistan's version of a "skirmish" along the Line of Control. However, Pakistan rejected that any such casualties occurred, questioning: "Where did all the dead bodies go? Where were the funerals? Why haven't the Indians produced any dead bodies if they took them back?". Pakistan's military also pointed to the lack of damage or losses in the site, and welcomed UN observers and journalists to conduct an independent inquiry. Increased firing along the Line of Control was reported the following day.

A senior Indian Home Ministry official subsequently claimed that in the wake of the raid, at least 12 training camps belonging to Lashkar-e-Taiba, Hizbul Mujahideen and Jaish-e-Mohammad had been swiftly moved from their locations at Pir Chanasi, Aksha Maskar and Tabuk near Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. Based on satellite images, inputs from foreign intelligence agencies and unnamed "sources in Pakistan," according to the official, the training camps had been relocated "near crowded towns deep inside Pakistan," in the provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab, to "minimise casualties to their assets." According to the Indian official, the camps had housed around 500 militants, 300 of whom belonged to Lashkar-e-Taiba alone.

An eyewitness living across the LoC was one of five contacted through intermediaries for covert interviews with the Indian Express. He reported that on 30 September, a day after the surgical strikes, several members of Lashkar-e-Taiba had met for Friday prayers at a Lashkar-affiliated mosque in Chalhana. "The Lashkar men gathered there were blaming the Pak Army for failing to defend the border”, he said, “and [were] saying they would soon give India an answer it would never forget." Several days after the raids, a leading Indian security official who had been closely involved in their planning said that Pakistan's continued denial that any surgical strikes took place was a "stance that suits us." "The surprise element in such an operation is key to its success and there will be no predictable repetition. If provoked yet again, we will amend our operational tactics."

Both Indian Defence Minister Parrikar and National Security Advisor Doval were shown original, unedited footage from the military raids on 1 October. After viewing it, Parrikar informed Prime Minister Modi that he was satisfied with what he had seen, and that there was no need to publicly release any footage. In response to calls from members of opposition parties to release the footage, a senior government official stated, "The Opposition should understand the difference between a covert and overt strike. And it is not incumbent on the Indian Army to release video footage every time they do their duty." On 5 October, two senior ministers in the Indian government said the Indian Army had submitted the footage to the government, but that the government, with the concurrence of the army, felt there was no need to release it to the public.

Analysis

Defence experts in Pakistan explained it was not possible for Indian forces to breach the heavily armed and fenced LoC border undetected, perform operations at multiple sites over several hours, and return without casualties and military resistance. According to one source, the Indian narrative matched a "fantastic movie script" created for public consumption. Ejaz Awan dismissed Indian claims of paratrooper involvement, stating: "For pulling out these troops, you need helicopters on the ground." Shawn Snow in The Diplomat questioned the capability of Indian forces to conduct a sophisticated and coordinated attack of such nature. He noted that a cross-border raid was "exceedingly difficult" as Pakistan had highly equipped air defence systems installed along the Indian border, including surface to air missiles.

On October 1, the Pakistani army gave international media outlets including BBC, CNN, VOA, Reuters, AP, AFP and Newsweek a tour of the sites which India claimed to have hit on 29 September. The Pakistan army claimed that had there been a "surgical strike", there would have been more damage. The journalists confirmed that the "area seemed intact", adding that they only saw what the Pakistani army showed them.

Noted South Asia and counter-terrorism analyst Bruce Riedel stated that while India's "surgical military response" was "limited and calibrated," it would send a sharp signal to the Pakistani establishment. He added that India could legitimately cite a right to self-defence in taking such strong action, following the example of United States operations in Pakistan against Osama bin Laden and Mullah Akhtar Mansour. Riedel observed, however, that regardless of outside support for India's position, its situation in Kashmir would only worsen unless Prime Minister Modi addressed "the legitimate demands of Kashmiris." This, according to Riedel, would require Modi to adopt a policy on Kashmir "independent of how he deals with Pakistan," though his "strong popularity gives him much room to act."

Reactions

India

Across India, the military raid was widely praised. Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi said Prime Minister Modi had, for the first time in his tenure, "taken an action that is worthy of the status of a Prime Minister." Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal also praised the raid.

Following the military raid, in anticipation of cross-border shelling from Pakistan, Indian authorities evacuated 10,000 residents of villages located within ten kilometres of the border, in the states of Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir. Military surveillance was also stepped up along the Line of Control.

Pakistan

Pakistan rejected the claim of a surgical strike, stating that Indian troops had only engaged in firing upon Pakistani soldiers, killing two Pakistani soldiers and wounding nine. Journalists surveyed the area where the 'surgical strikes' are said to have taken place, and spoke to locals who explained: “They are lying...they never crossed the L.O.C.” The spokesperson for the Pakistani Army asked: “Where is the damage?”, referring to the lack of any evidence of any surgical strikes. ISPR spokesman Asim Bajwa termed the "surgical strike" claim an "illusion being deliberately generated by India to create false effects" and a "fabrication of the truth".

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif convened an all-parties conference and an emergency cabinet meeting. He stated Pakistan would take any steps necessary to safeguard its territorial integrity. "We will defend our homeland against any aggression. The entire nation is standing shoulder to shoulder with our armed forces."

In a public address in Faisalabad, Lashkar-e-Taiba leader Hafiz Muhammad Saeed threatened a "befitting response" to India from Pakistan. "We will tell you what is a real surgical strike...and you will get the deserved response soon...the United States will not be able to help you. Now it is Pakistan’s turn to give a befitting response to India. Narendra Modi will now know what is meant by surgical strikes."

Other states

• Afghanistan - Shaida Abdali, Afghanistan's ambassador to India, expressed support for the military raids by India, stating the actions in Pakistan-administered Kashmir had been conducted in "self-defence." He added his hopes that "no one will allow safe havens for terrorists to be used against neighbours."
• Bangladesh - Iqbal Chowdhury, the advisor to the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, stated India had the "legal, internationally accepted right" to take action. "Bangladesh always believes that any aggression or attack on the sovereignty of the independence and legal right of a country is not acceptable and Bangladesh always feels that any country must honour and respect the sovereignty of a third country."
• China - Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Sheung stated that China, "as a shared neighbour and friend to both India and Pakistan," was concerned about the "continuous confrontation and tensions" between the two nations. He said China called on "all relevant parties to exercise restraint and refrain from actions that would escalate tension," and expressed hopes that both parties would address their differences through dialogue.
• Germany - Martin Ney, the German ambassador to India, expressed Germany's support for the military raids and that it stood beside India in its counter-terrorism efforts. Stating that under international law, every nation was obliged to ensure that terrorism did not emanate from its territory, he said there existed a clear international law "that any state has the right to defend its territory from any form of global terrorism."
• Russia - The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressed concern over "aggravation" of the situation along the Line of Control, and stated it expected Pakistan to take "effective" steps in stopping the activities of terrorist groups operating from its territory. "We are calling on the parties not to allow any escalation of tension and to settle the existing problems by political and diplomatic means through negotiations. We stand for decisive struggle against terrorism in all its manifestations." Russian Ambassador to India Alexander Kadakin subsequently said that the Russian Federation was the only country to directly state that terrorists came from Pakistan; he called upon Pakistan to end cross-border terrorism and welcomed India's surgical strikes. "[The] greatest human rights violations take place when terrorists attack military installations and attack peaceful civilians in India. We welcome the surgical strike. Every country has [the] right to defend itself."
• United States – White House spokesman Josh Earnest encouraged continued talks between India and Pakistan, to avoid further escalating the situation.

Supranational organisations

• United Nations – Stephane Dujarric, spokesperson for Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, stated the Secretary-General was following the developments "with great concern," adding that the United Nations "calls on the governments of India and Pakistan to exercise restraint, and encourages them to continue the effort to resolve their differences peacefully and through dialogue." In a press conference on 3 October, Vitaly Churkin, the Permanent Representative of Russia to the United Nations and the President of the UN Security Council for that month, refused to comment on the India-Pakistan situation, stating the Security Council had not been discussing the matter.

See also

• India–Pakistan border skirmishes (2014–2015)
• 2016 Uri attack
• India–Pakistan relations

External links

• CNN-News18 News360: PoK Cop Confirms India's Claim of Surgical Strike on YouTube