Indian senior journalist Shekhar Gupta wrote an op-ed for The Print, surreptitiously setting a pretext to justify future Indian attacks against Pakistan while claiming that Pakistan may attack India in the near future.
Following the debacle called Operation Sindoor, India failed to achieve any military or political objective, instead exposing wide military capabilities gap when Pakistan shot down six Indian aircraft.
Indian government, led by Narendra Modi, blamed Pakistan for the Pahalgam incident on April 22, and Pakistan condemned the attack, calling for an impartial international investigation of the incident.
As Pakistan called for a transparent investigation into the Pahalgam attack, the Indian government and Indian media laid the ground for an Indian attack against Pakistan.
However, the Pakistan Armed Forces managed to surprise the Indian military by shooting down its aircraft and successfully hitting its military targets deep inside Indian territory, avoiding civilian casualties.
India accepted the ceasefire with Pakistan brokered by President of the United States Donald Trump, whose significant peace-making role is denied by the Indian government.
Gupta, a senior journalist in India, continues to lay the groundwork for another Indian misadventure by blaming Pakistan.
He writes, “We can’t time when this miscalculation will come, but it’s nearly inevitable. India, therefore, needs a graded plan. Five years should be the deadline for us to build deterrence to a level where this Munir, or another, won’t have the same temptations.”
In the Op-ed, Gupta tries to paint the picture that Pakistan’s military may attack India shortly so that India needs to “fill in all the critical gaps in missiles, ammunition, sensors, and stockpile in the fastest possible manner.”
Interestingly, the author cleverly hints at “critical gaps,” mentioning that India will need to stock up on “BrahMos and SCALP missiles, long-range ‘smart’ artillery shells (Excalibur category), make the multi-layered air defences much denser.”
Indian political and military leadership have, on multiple occasions, reiterated that the so-called Operation Sindoor is not over but only paused.
International defence analysts have highlighted the professionalism shown by Pakistan military for showing measured response and restraint in avoiding civilian casualties in reply to Indian aggression.
Security sources have remarked that Indian leadership may be planning another round of aggression against Pakistan with the pretext already in works.
Indian media, instead of questioning its government for losses it has incurred, is yet again providing the platform to Modi to attack Pakistan.
Gupta concludes, “To think that this is a strategic lean-back period will be an unforgivable historic blunder. This is a lean-forward, all-hands-on-the-deck moment. The success of Operation Sindoor is a success to savour, but more importantly, it’s impetus for the future.”
