Operation Sindoor 2.0: Expect more concrete action in near future

It seems the dust has settled somewhat on the India-Pakistan conflict, but only for now. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh indicated that ‘Operation Sindoor’ was only a ‘trailer’, and more actions are in the pipeline. Other statements also outline India’s objectives.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said that India would pursue terrorists and their backers to ‘the ends of the earth’, that India reserved the right to give a ‘fitting’ reply to any further terrorist attack, not differentiating between terrorists and their sponsors, and that the Indus Water Treaty would remain ‘in abeyance’ till terror stopped. In sum, the main thrust is to get a full stop on terrorism. Delhi has had enough. And so have the people.

Know Your Enemy

However, a strategy is based on knowing the enemy and why he attacked at all. After all, the Balakote strike demonstrated clearly that India was prepared to hit conventionally despite a nuclear overhang. For five years, there was relative peace, though matters began to spiral again with small attacks in late 2024. Then on April 16th Chief of Army Staff Asim Munir, rather than a civilian leader, chose to address a group of overseas Pakistanis, proclaiming Pakistan’s prowess, that Hindus and Muslims were ever different, and Kashmir as a ‘jugular vein’.

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The Pahalgam attack occurred five days later. That attack not just identified and hit Hindus but also had terrorists tell hapless widows to ‘go and tell Modi’. On April 26, Munir chose to reiterate the whole diatribe, this time to cadets of the Pakistan Military Academy. Clearly, Pakistan’s army wanted war and was prepared to take the risk of escalation. That’s point one.

This assessment is backed by an influential Pakistani media report which observed, “Pakistan’s historic military victory over India is expected to yield multiple dividends, with the most immediate being the all-time high public respect for the armed forces and a surge in the popularity of the country’s political and military leadership, especially… General Asim Munir.” Munir is now a field marshal. That’s all rather a contrast from the time when the army was facing the worst protests of its history after the arrest of Imran Khan, which led to ‘shoot at sight’ orders even in late 2024, and arrests of spy chief Lt Gen Faiz Hameed and other senior officers, leading to cries of “yeh jo dehshatgardi hai, iss ke peeche vardi hai” resounding across the country.

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Add to this massive protests in April just before the Pahalgam against a massive canal project that would have denied water to Sindh. All that is forgotten as the army’s position surges on perceptions of a ‘victory’. The trouble is it won’t last long, and the terrorists will be back when the army feels necessary. In sum, as long as the army is in power, nothing is going to change. That’s point two.

The US Roped In

Second, the army had another objective. Pakistanis’ resentment was more than apparent at Track 2 dialogues attended by this author at their complete sidelining, even by Delhi which was preoccupied with other matters. Weeks before Pahalgam, US officials were in Pakistan discussing a deal – with the Army Chief present – which would centre on Balochistan’s and Khyber Pakhtunkwa’s considerable mineral wealth. That might or might not go through, given the extreme instability already. But Pahalgam did the trick and ensured a US tilt towards Pakistan’s favour. That’s nothing new.

The US has always stepped in to stop a possible nuclear escalation, but Pakistan calculated that Trump would once again offer mediation – he had done this twice in his previous term – and he did. That was not all. Worse was Secretary Rubio’s condoling ‘loss of civilian lives’ in Pakistan. Islamabad therefore has welcomed the US role and its equating of the two countries – something it has long manoeuvred for, even as Delhi rejected it, reiterating its position on this as a bilateral issue.

In short, Islamabad has gained points, even as it was given the much awaited loan from the International Monetary Fund. True, it has imposed 11 new conditionalities, making a total of 50, the highest ever. But it got the money. Notice also that Pakistan has also managed to completely erase any mention of Lashkar-e-Taiba or Jaish-e-Mohammed from United Nations reports on counterterrorism.

The narrative of ‘Pakistan as a terrorist state’ has frayed in the US and allied countries as their attention is taken up with bloody wars in Ukraine and Gaza. True, US intel folks know their Pakistan. Recently, Islamabad traded in an ostensible planner of the Abbey Gate attacks in a nicely calculated move during Trump’s inauguration in a ‘joint’ operation. That’s intel dependency. Any chasing after terrorist backers may be difficult, though perhaps not the terrorists themselves. That’s point three.

Taking all these together, it is apparent that India’s strategy has to adjust to new geopolitical realities. The first move is to trace and punish terrorists; it can be undertaken together with diverse intelligence agencies who have a stake in terms of their own national security. Many who will cooperate, regardless of political statements.

Second, diplomacy needs to push towards tying every penny of grants and aid given by European and Japanese governments – among others – with progress in democracy. If the US can be persuaded to join this drive for its own interests in stability for mineral exploitation – then all the better.

Third, in a move that might seem almost blasphemous, it’s in our interest to start empowering the politicians, industrialists and plain business folks in Pakistan with the promise of cross-continent trade in the future so that a powerful group forms that has strong stakes in peace. It’s possible. After all, the idea is already out there, given that former COAS Gen Qamar Bajwa had called for just that.

Fourth, mainstreaming the dangers of terrorism will require trade as leverage for a ‘transactional’ president. Pakistan is already on that game, engaging with the Trump family-backed World Liberty Council through the newly formed Pakistan Crypto Council, roping in Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange. With the army in power, matters are moving fast. We need to get our snail’s pace bureaucracy to go places.

Finally, the threat to stop water has to be calibrated carefully using all media sources to convey the message that a shortage of water is due to Pakistan army adventurism. All these are intermeshing activities with a clear common objective. Get the Pakistani people to send the military back to the barracks with the backing of an ‘international community’ that is at present distracted by wars on their doorstep. It’s a challenge of giant proportions.

Ironically, however, such an outcome would probably be the best possible result for Pakistan itself. For India, the whole exercise will be aimed at denying the equating of the world’s largest democracy with what is, after all, a terrorist state. It’s good that our delegations are talking terrorism again. But Operation Sindoor’s next phase needs more action.

The author is Director (R&A) at the Centre for Land Warfare Studies. She tweets @kartha_tara. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.