Operation Sindoor vs Operation Bunyan Marsoos Bharat s evolutionary war strategy against Pakistan

 

At the outset, Indian has to do more than the cost-imposition strategies of sanctions and challenges rather than direct conflicts as their primary counter-terrorism tool. The security threat is large enough that India requires, besides - pushing policies such as the Indus Water Treaty, Deft regional diplomacy to isolate Pakistan, and international coordination against terrorist financing - a broad National policy tools, including not only peacetime intelligence operations but also more hard Military operations for supporting effort to manage External Risks. In addition, recent Indian Heroic Military Operations, managing public expectations have to now face even bigger challenge. Operation Sindoor infused the Indian populace with high expectations-some Nationals greeted the conflict as blissful and others decried the ceasefire.

Managing these public passions means government would have to manage with unrealistic expectations in the next crisis. Ultimately, as the Government knows such cost-impositions conceptsare fundamentally a strategic, It does not cover the country for lasting resolution of any of its security challenges. These strategies would mean India’s challenge can, at best, be contained, alas, there rising risks for India’s External Security would hardly end.

War Triggers

Latest war crisis with Pakistan was triggered by a terrorist attack at Pahalgam on April 22 which was especially provocative and calculated to be so, by targeting specifically Hindu men for point-blank execution. Tensions rose immediately, with consistent exchanges of small-arms fire across the Line of Control that separates Indian and POK. Then, soon after midnight on May 7, India launched its military response, called Operation Sindoor.

 It used a mix of Long-Range Stand-off Weapons, including Air-Launched Missiles and Loitering Munitions, to target Nine Sites belonging to terrorist groups Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad, groups that have frequently attacked India, including at Pahalgam and were razed to groundjust in 23 minutes of Air StrikeslikeMarkaz Taiba,Muridke-1;Sawainala Camp,Muzaffarabad-2;Syedna Bilal Camp,Muzaffrabad-3;Barnala Camp,Bhimber-4; Abbas Camp, Kotli-5, Sarjal Camp, Narowal-6, Mehmona Joya Camp,Sialkot-7,GulpurCamp,Kotli-8, MarkajSubhanallah Camp, Bahawalpur-9. Later, against massive drone attacks India struck inside Pakistan on May 9 and 10, with intensified effective AirStrikes against 11 key Pakistan Air Force bases like Nur Khan, Rafiqui, Murid, Sukkur, Sialkot, Pasrur, Chunian, Sargoda, Skaru, Bholari&Jacobabad, leading to destruction of main capabilities of Pakistanis Air Force Strength by destroying their facilities including Pakistans’ 2 Air Defense Systems in Lahore and Karachi and 3 Radar systems in Pasture Sialkot, Sialkot and Kasur Districts.

Pakistan had launched its own counter-offensive, Operation Bunyan Marsooswhich was totally encountered Harmlessand Grossly Ineffective by India. Once more, the two sides escalated again to unprecedented levels, before agreeing to a ceasefire. It was much larger replay of the last Indo-Pakistani crisis of 2019, but in fact it signified a notable shift in India’s military strategy towards Pakistan. For India, this crisis represents an important evolution in its military strategy against Pakistan; shifting from the issuance of threats to change Pakistani behaviour, to the indirect conflicts to degrade terrorists’ capacity.

Now, this new striking strategy has a compelling logic, which has to be executed with improvisations in future crises.

Uri, Balakotand Sindoor

Over the past decade, India has progressively transformed its response to Pakistan’s campaign of terrorism. Its actions have grown in scale, using new technologies, triggering larger cycles of violence, and seeking more expansive effects. For years, despite grave provocations such as the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament, the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai, and even multiple smaller attacks during Prime Minister Modi’s first term in office (leaving aside attacks before tenure of PM Modi), India resisted responding militarily to terrorist attacks. That pattern of inaction began to change in 2016, when in response to an attack at Uri, Indian special forces raided terrorist camps just across the Line of Control.

 At the next crisis, India’s response was notably more aggressive. In 2019, in response to an attack at Pulwama, India launched an air strike targeting a terrorist site at Balakot which sought to deter Pakistan by crossing multiple new thresholds. India used Air Power against Pakistan for the first time since 1971, and reached into undisputed Pakistani territory beyond Kashmir and by deliberately generating risk to intimidate Pakistan. That strike, despite its tactical effects validated for Indian decision-makers the notion that they could use military force to punish Pakistan without triggering a war or nuclear retaliation.

 Operation Sindoor took that evolution further. India struck a larger set of initial targets, with more force, and more types of weapons, including Cruise Missiles and Loitering Munitions of Drone. Whereas in Balakot the use of Air Power was a radical departure, in Operation Sindoor, Airand Ground-Launched stand-off weapons had become India’s primary tool. India already boasted some such capabilities, for example, with its indigenously-produced BrahMosCruise Missiles, and Israeli-Made Spice Bomb Kits and HaropLoitering Munitions. But it made a concerted effort to grow these capabilities since Balakot, most prominently with the procurement of French-made RafaleFighters carrying Scalp Air-Launched Cruise Missiles and Hammer Bomband coupled with Its layered, Integrated Air Defenses,including, Akashdeep and S-400 Surface-to-Air missiles imported from Russia, much to Washington’s disdain, also proved to be exceptionally effective.

 The most strategically significant evolution of India’s actions, from Uri to Balakot to Sindoor, is the nature of the effects that India attempted to create at each iteration. In each case, it tested and pushed the boundaries of what it could do without triggering a war, and what it could achieve. The Post-Uri Raid was designed only as a symbol of India’s new willingness to introduce military action after years of inaction. The BalakotAir Strike was designed to demonstrate Indian capabilities to strike deep into Pakistan, and its willingness to cross previously sacrosanct thresholds. And, indeed, with Operation Sindoor, India did strike exactly those sites, among others, in a larger retaliation designed to inflict real material damage to the groups.

Evolution of Military Response from Symbols to Threats to Infliction

India’s New Military Strategy against Pakistan is therefore no longer satisfied with the symbolism of an aggressive posture, as in Uri, or threatening future punishment, as in Balakot. Its new strategy centers on exacting a direct infliction on the Pakistani Military-Terrorist Complex.

 The Central Logic of this strategy of Victory is subtly but importantly different from India’s prior approach. India no longer expects that threatening a major punitive response can dissuade the Pakistani establishment from its campaign of terrorism. Instead, it accepts that Pakistani intent is practically immovable, and seeks to materially degrade the adversary, keep it on the defensive, and thereby thwart its offensive power against India. The execution of Operation Sindoor and the explanation by Modi Govt, however, suggest that Indian thinking has now evolved. Threats of future punishment offer no guarantee of peace because the Pakistani Military-Terrorist Complex cannot be dissuaded. For the Pakistan Army and its terrorist partners, violence against India is not a rational instrument of policy, but a core organizing principle, foundational to their identity and political legitimacy. They will persist with the campaign of sub-conventional provocations infuture, even with, the prospect of Indian retaliation. New Delhi appears to have now concluded that the best approach for such an adversary is attrition. The adversary’s intent cannot be changed, but the regular imposition of meaningful material decimations could at least degrade its capacity to act. Such a concept accepts that India cannot realistically hope for peace, the absence of terrorist attacks but should instead accept that the simmering, violent rivalry is protracted and intractable. Future attacks are inevitable.

 But if India can effectively degrade the enemy, meaning both the terrorist networks and their Army backers, then future attacks may at least be less destructive and less frequent. This strategic concept depends on India retaliating swiftly and heavily to every attack; why not, this form of coercion is especially suited to enduring rivalries, where the two sides expect a continuous cycle of violence. There are, of course, precedents for this strategy against rivals like Isra l’spattern of periodic conflicts against its terrorist adversaries, especially Hizballah andprior to the current destruction of Gazan Hamas. Israel decades ago acknowledged it could not alter its adversaries’ hostility toward Israel, but it could “Mow the Grass” to degrade their capabilities. India’s growing strategic partnership with Israel has manifested not only in highly visible arms transfers, but also apparently in the transmission of these strategic concepts.

To Conclude

 In Operation Sindoor, India has successfully implemented this concept. Its initial attack on May 7 struck nine terrorist sites, in which over 100 terrorists have been killed, including a handful of Senior Terrorist Leaders. For the first time in a crisis, India struck across the length and breadth of Pakistan, and groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed will now have to spend energy and resources to reconstitute their ranks and develop new hidden facilities. The evolution of India’s military responses was crystallized by Modi in a victory speech he delivered on May 12. He pronounced that henceforth India would by default respond militarily to terrorism, that Pakistan’s nuclear threats would not deter India, and that India would consider both terrorists and their military backers to be equivalent and that this would be “a new benchmark in India’s fight against terrorism and a new norm”. Further, Modi proclaimed at an Indian Air Force base on May 13, “there is no such place in Pakistan where terrorists can sit and breathe in peace. We will enter their homes and kill them.” Noteworthy, is that in Operation Sindoor India still resisted crossing some important thresholds in and crossing them would have accelerate the escalation. India did not, for example, cause mass civilian casualties; Also, India has denied striking any Nuclear-Related Facilities. Terrorist group headquarters at Muridke, Muzaffarabad, Bhimber Bahawalpur etc.,

 were well-known sites, This concept of degrading adversary capacity will, in the future, demand ever better tactical acumen. and Indian intelligence agencies certainly have extensive coverage across Pakistan, With Operation Sindoor now kicking off, a cat and mouse game, where the terrorists previously enjoying safe haven in Pakistan will take greater measures to hide in peacetime and go to ground in crisis. They also have a very deep bench of Cadres and Recruits, so in the absence of very large attrition, India intelligence services will have to further improve their targeting skills, just as Israel and the United States have recently done, in Gaza, to identify and strike meaningfully important personnel and facilities. All said and done, One thing is for sure world has witnessed New India’s Military Power & Prowess just in 4 days of Decimation of Pak and its Military–Especially, it is an eye opener for India’s Close Expantionist Neighbours!

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Courtesy: RAJESHWAR DHAR and  Spade A Spade-June 2025