Lets have a discussion on Kargil over here gentlemen. Strictly Pakistani point of view though.
Some rules of discussion. Please keep it civil and no personal attacks (regardless of you having someone close who faught, got injured or was martyred) since we are all on the same side. This issue tends to get hot but I think we should discuss it to learn more about it.
Last edited by SSAAD; 04-21-2006 at 09:09 PM.
I read about Kargil briefing to PM Nawaz Sharif. When the commander asked him if he has any question, Mr. Sharif asked to raise hands for a prayers to the success of the mission!
This notion that PM Sharif did not know about the mission, or Musharraf did not know about the mission or DG NLI acted on his own behalf is purely concocted.
I personally think that Air war factor was kept in mind. That is why we were able to bring down two Migs.
What I can not understand is why the mission was planned in the first place. I do not think Kargil is as high as Siachen. Was it planned to get hold of more bargain chips at the table?
just to involve America into the conflict of Kashmir.
2.it was calculated rightly that unlike 1965 India will not be able to attack international border
3.Move forward was extremely secretive and that is why no assembly of troops were reported by Indian intelligence.
4.to relieve off the pressure of Indian forces in the valley on mujahideen kargill resulted in temporary thinning out of the Indian troops
5.The area did not have any approach towards the valley and it was not possible for for attacker to construct roads/tracks and fight so that is why it was not backed by induction of more forces at the maximum it was about 2000 strong force consisting of mujahideen and few regulars
6.AIM was to internationalise the Kashmir issue by crossing over LOC and force the Indians to retaliate and fight at the ground of our chosing.Causing maximum attrition to enemy in the process
7.Hold/exit according to international situation.
The only weakness in the operation was Exit strategy at highest level which did not cater for psychological impact of Pull out.Army was not willing to commit more forces in kargill rather was waiting an all out attack by India along LOC in that case Kargil would have been last priority.
I think the plan itself was gutsy, brilliant and perhaps very well executed. The wisdom of doing it I am not so sure of.
My understanding is that the idea was to cut off the Indian supply route to Siachin. I don't buy the Internationalization thing. For that they should have discussed the plan with the Foreign Office. It sounds more like an after thought. And it did not internationalize the issue.
But here are the problems with it.
1. It was a very significant plan with major repurcussions which I think were not properly thought through. Every action has a reaction but we failed to fully understand what India might do. Why the AF and Navy were not informed is just mind boggling.
2. Pakistan lost all credibility when it started saying that this was not an army action but the freedom fighters were responsible for it..
3. I think it would remain a mystery what would have happened if we had stayed there. I wonder if that would have made India leave Siachin or in a full scale war.
I really like the plan and how it was executed. And I just wish it had worked.
Yes there would have been escalation across the IB if Siachen had been choked off (however I think it would not have been a full scale war).Originally Posted by msalman
My own understanding is that the CoAS, PM, DGMO, FCNA, as well as Gen Aziz and Mahmuds were aware of all that went on. The assumption on the Pakistani side was that the ingress into Kargil would be perceive by the Indians as a continuation of the ongoing Siachen conflict (where both sides have mutually agreed to keep the affair an all-army one without the respective AFs playing any part). This is the gamble that did not work out from the Pakistani planning standpoint.
The availablility of MANPADs in the unit was not an indication that the planners had taken into account the possibility of the IAF getting involved as even units in Siachen are equipped with MANPADs and prior to the recent peace talks, downing of each other' s helis in the Siachen region was a routine issue (BTW, the IAF was not a major player in this whole affair as has been repeatedly made out by the Indian media and the Pakistani detractors of the Kargil planning). In my own research (backed up Indian sources), the much touted LGBs, which supposedly turn the tide of war according to Indians, were used in such a limited number (7) that they may have helped with taking of one or two positions, but along the width of the Kargil front, Pakistanis had taken over 120 positions, 95% of which were vacated voluntarily by us.
The Indian Artillery was more effective (as was Pakistani) but the air support from a tactical standpoint was ineffective and with the downing of their aircraft and helis, the aircraft were under a greater threat than the defenders. From a PR standpoint it gave Indians a plus (since the induction of air support gave the world this impression that things had heated up beyond the normal).
Although now we have the benefit of hindsight, however I too think that had we maintained those positions till the winters, aside from losing a few of the 120 or so positions/piquets, it would have been impossible for the Indians to do anything about it. However, they would have definetly stirred up trouble in other areas.
Coming back to the issue of who was responsible for what, let me just make one point about all of this finger-pointing. The key planners involved are tasked with looking at areas of vulnerability for the Indians and taking advantage of those. MO directorate is constantly churning out proposals and plans and it is upto the senior commanders and then the civilian (or military if the country is being ruled by an officer of the armed forces) leadership to approve or veto the plans. Some people seem to be putting blame on some of the officers for planning this as if they did something wrong. I do not think so. They did what any commander would do in an area which is disputed. Even the Indians agreed initially that the ingress was in a disputed region, as such their planning is no different than what the Indians planned and executed at Siachen. The BS benevolent excuses made by Indians are full of $hit now simply because they themselves have taken advantage of all similar situations whenever a chance has risen.
We should be proud of the guys who planned these ops and tried to execute them becuase tactically and militarily it made sense to put pressure on Indians at Siachen. The fact that the country had been screwed beyond belief economically and politically is the fault of the then civilian leadership. The military saw a chance where they could gain advantage and ran it by the leadership, this was their job! They got the approval and went for it. It was the govts responsibility to ensure that either Pakistan was economically and politically capable of going through such thing or the PM should have called it a no-go. Maybe the civilian leadership did not appreciate the scope of the operation and as such was caught totally illprepared? Don't know, but overall I think it was the right move militariliy against the Indians, geo-strategically, the govt should have done a better job of gauging its implications (in which it failed) and maybe somethings were kept from the government, but after a while, I think both the Army and the Govt went on auto-pilot to see how things turn out.
I agree with Junaid about the logistics issue. I think the planning did not take into account the impact of interdiction of the supply lines. As such units upfront ran short of supplies and ammo.
Last edited by SSAAD; 04-23-2006 at 07:38 PM.
We have started a objective review of the Kargil Operation and its ramifications. Please continue and lets bring some tactical, logistic and specific objective reports and view.
There is a book written by Sharin Mazhar, I think, is it the only analysis from Pakistan side?
H Khan
Pakistanis (irrespective of their standing in society) exult gossip, paranoia, superstition, and conspiracy theories more than the science of history- H Khan
I agree with Saad sahab 100% when he says that who ever planned kargil, always calculed it on the premis that it will remain a localised affair visa vie siachin and the planners did no anticipate the strong reacion from india.
Even though we kicked their butt royally(in terms of losses), still we suffered loses and if we take a look at them the thing that strikes me the most is the percentage of officers martyered in comaparsion to O.R/JCO's. (i am not sure if its apprpriate to give numbers here but ull have to take my word for it). Which shows the courage of our men in uniform and their willingness to laydown their lives for the country.
The fighting spirit was so high that the PMA course that was passing out in those days, had signed a patition in which all had valuntered to serve in Kargil.
The AC gilgil at was an ex-PAF(GDP) he too had made him self available for service with the PAF and had written to this effect.
We as a nation were united and behind our men in uniform.
But were let down again by our leader both civil n military.
First my apology as Saad sahab as rightly poined out that at the time NLI did fall under FCNA, so the person in question was commandand FCNA.
For those who say that it was planned and executed by DGMO, than please tell me
1. Why was the logistics head of FCNA a Col. (who i wouldent want to name) was being court martialed, on charges off non supply of materials to the front line soldier. He in subsiquent brirfings explicitly said "that he was not informed of any operation and all the resources at his disposal were for normal opp and not enough for any operation. (The only reason why he was not courtmartialed was his father knew PM personaly). Now it is that the planners forgot to make provisions available for the opperation and on top of it forgot to inform the man whose job is o make provisions available. The result being that the situation had become so desperate that the soldier in the front line was surviving by puting "energile on snow and eating that
2. Two full brigades of the PA reached the area of operation after the hostilities was over ie over a month.
3. The ia has been vecating these heights since simla accord(when hey were given to bindia) ie they vecate them in winters and return in summers. Why did the army top brass feel the need to take this advneture at this point in time.
4. You plan to conduct an opperation on this scale n forget to involve the AF n navy. Some planning!. Result being that bindia deploys a corp. + srength of artiliary right in front of ur positions. And shelling the sh*t out of you, wih airburst shells, with impunity. Just imagine IA selecting a grid and than plotting a grid reference and than shelling it till not even a rock is left standing..
This fire was so accurate n effectinve that more often than not our soldiers would loose their ammo or if the ammo servived than they would loose their weaponary. This was not all, the artillary salvos were followed very very closly by bindian foot soldiers. In quite a few cases as our soldiers had lost their ammo or weapons or both, so they resorted to throwing or tumbling stones down the slopes to quell the bindian advance.
All this as PAF was not involved. Not only this but our forces did not have heavy guns to support our soldiers. Wt was avilable did not have the range. When they eventually did reach the area of opp, the hostilities had ceased. (some planning)
Kargil was an episode full of decite n deception, i can give you instances where PM in paricular was decived to the hilt and kept in the dark. I can go on and on. but than again this is not the place to air our dirty laundry.
Last edited by JunaidNasir; 04-22-2006 at 11:16 PM.
To cut of supply rout to Siachin was not aimed PA had kept Road Srinagar-Leh blocked and is still in position to block it by fire. Indian had other road available i.e Manali-leh so cutting off of supply rout was not possible anyway.
The second thing about able to replenish the troops or did not do the forward dumping is bit vivid we had to weigh between surprise and logistical support both were not achievable at same time.priority went to surprise initially but there was a time gap between occupation and loss of surprise that is when Indian patrol was ambushed by own troops/mujahideens.This time gap was fully utilized to do forward dumping plus if not wrong IA would do the ration dumping in summers to cater for eventuality of manning the heights in emergency situation in winters so the lack of supplies was not a problem.
About Commander FCNA no body in PA ever liked him even in case of hostility
people would prefer to be exposed IA snipers then to be seen by their own commander who was blunt rude but a very thorough professional who would make sure every detail is worked out so tactically there was no error in the plan.He simply will not let the mistake to happen not even by his juniors .He did it with in the resources of FCNA and it was a job well done at his level.
Probably the Indians cried too loud all over the world but strategically it benefited Pakistan but it is questionable that why America was involved in it with out keeping american track record in mind.
Last edited by Noman Habib; 04-23-2006 at 10:19 AM.
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I havent gotten to finishing the book but I will leave a comment after I finish it up.
The true Qaumi Tarana is the one written by Jagannath Azad, not the current Tarana by Ahmad G. Chagla.
junior moderator
Reading what Musharraf writes about him in the book it is not exactly a surprise that he reacts, and well in many ways he confirms Musharrafs views about him aswell.
Shoaib
Life's no life when honour's left
Man's a man when honour's kept
Nation's honour and nation's fame -
On life they have a prior claim
With thoughts of these I do remain
Unvexed with cares of loss or gain.
By Khushal Khan Khattak
I think the issue with Ali Quli Khan is that the guy is too high on his own performance...yes he was a good officer but many, many good officers with solid opertional experience have been superceded or side-tracked unfortunately. I think the legacy of his father, Gen Habibullah and his run-in with Ayub has haunted Lt Gen AQK for a while and the same sort of happened to him as well.
Musharraf said that AQK was an officer who is mediocre in his opinion.
Ali Quli Khan is within his rights to respond back if facts are incorrect. In a way AQK was right in advicing Karmat to stand firm - whether he asked for martial law or not is a case of "he said , he said".. we will never know.
However the comments on kargil shoudl be taken with salt. i think he had let his personal bias come into the picture.
Kargil shaheeds number put as 357
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/14208.html
“Yudh viram se pehle hamare 157 sainik shaheed huey aur 250 ghayal huey. Sena ki wapasi ke dauran hamare 200 sainik shaheed huey aur 415 ghayal huey, (Before the ceasefire, 157 of our soliders became martyrs and 250 were wounded. While the Army was on its way back, 200 soldiers became martyrs and 415 were wounded),” writes Musharraf in Agnipath.
http://www.thenews.com.pk/print1.asp?id=27838
The US version of Kargil http://www.thenews.com.pk/images/shim.gif http://www.thenews.com.pk/images/shim.gif http://www.thenews.com.pk/images/shim.gif The writer is a senior Washington-based Pakistani journalist
President General Pervez Musharraf has reignited the explosive and controversial issue of Kargil by making direct and categorical statements about his own role and that of the then prime minister, Nawaz Sharif. The contradictory versions of these two leaders accuse each other of lack of vision, leadership and courage. But the role of the US in the conflict has been elaborated by the man in the middle, the then commander-in-chief of the US Central Command (Centcom), General Anthony Zinni, who penned down his version in a book after his retirement.
Zinni's book, "Battle Ready" written with fiction writer Tom Clancy and published by GP Putnam's Sons, a member of the Penguin Group in May 2004, covers Zinni's career from Vietnam to Kargil and Pakistan is mentioned in less than 10 pages scattered over the 450-page hard cover edition. Zinni's account of Kargil is, however, detailed and covers pages 346 to 350. Earlier he also devotes one page to Pakistan 's position when in 1998 Nawaz Sharif was about to detonate the nuclear bomb in response to the Indian test.
According to him America intervened decisively in 1999 to end the Kargil stalemate between India and Pakistan and provided a face saving exit to Nawaz Sharif. General Pervez Musharraf, according to Zinni, "encouraged the then PM to hear out the US withdrawal proposal". When Kargil took place General Zinni was sent on a special mission to Pakistan by President Bill Clinton.
The Pakistan Army had at the time claimed that its troops were not involved in Kargil and it were the Kashmiri Mujahideen who were fighting but Zinni writes with full authority and knowledge that the entire operation was carried out by the Pakistan forces. More proof of this was, incidentally, provided in the Punjab Assembly on June 1, when the provincial government placed data in the house stating that 2,000 acres of special land in Punjab had been allotted to the Pakistan Army for distribution among the families of the troops killed in the Kargil war.
General Zinni writes: "On the 21st of April, (1999) I traveled to Pakistan for several days of meetings with the new Chief of Staff General Pervez Musharraf. The two of us connected quickly and easily. He was bright, sincere, and personable. A fervent nationalist who nevertheless leaned toward the West, he was as appalled as General Karamat over the ever-worsening corruption within the civilian government.
"He also understood the various, powerful Islamist currents running through his country, and saw them as the threats they were to bringing his country into the twenty-first century; yet he also understood that his country would never modernise and solve its myriad ills without the emergence of some kind of religious accommodation, and hopefully religious consensus.
"It was a great meeting, despite the chill cast by our sanctions. As I was leaving, we both agreed to stay in close touch (we exchanged our home telephone numbers). Our friendship would later prove to be enormously valuable to both our countries.
"In May, Pakistani forces made a deep incursion into an area called Kargil, on the Indian side of the Line of Control. Though there was normally 'fighting' near the Line of Control, the area for a long time had been quite stable. There would be probes and shooting during the good months of the year, but nothing ever changed much; and in wintertime, everybody would pull back down into the valleys, and the two sides would create a 'no-man's-land'. As spring came, they would go back up into their positions.
"Every so often, somebody on one side would be a little late getting up to their spring position, and the other side could grab an advantage of a kilometer or so. It was like "Aha, I've gotcha!" on a tactical level. But it didn't really change things. This time, however, the Pakistanis waylaid the Indians and penetrated all the way to Kargil. This was such a deep, significant penetration that it wasn't tactical; it threatened Indian lines of communication and support up to Siachen glacier.
"The Indians came back with a vengeance. There were exchanges of fire, there was a mobilization of forces, there were bombing attacks, planes were shot down. Then the two sides started to mobilize all their forces all along the line; and it was beginning to look like the opening moves of a larger war. It got alarming.
"I was therefore directed by the administration to head a presidential mission to Pakistan to convince Prime Minister Sharif and General Musharraf to withdraw their forces from Kargil. I met with the Pakistani leaders in Islamabad on June 24 and 25 and put forth a simple rationale for withdrawing: "If you don't pull back, you're going to bring war and nuclear annihilation down on your country. That's going to be very bad news for everybody."
"Nobody actually quarreled with this rationale. The problem for the Pakistani leadership was the apparent national loss of face. Backing down and pulling back to the Line of Control looked like political suicide. We needed to come up with a face-saving way out of this mess. What we were able to offer was a meeting with President Clinton, which would end the isolation that had long been the state of affairs between our two countries, but we would announce the meeting only after a withdrawal of forces. That got Musharraf's attention and he encouraged Prime Minister Sharif to hear me out.
"Sharif was reluctant to withdraw before the meeting with Clinton was announced (again, his problem was maintaining face); but after I insisted, he finally came around and he ordered the withdrawal. We set up a meeting with Clinton in July."
This is General Zinni's account of Kargil and what he says is the US version of how things were perceived in Washington and how they were settled. No matter what Nawaz Sharif or General Musharraf may claim, the truth has to be sifted out from what the others have to say about the issue and Zinni has given the most authentic third-party account. Analysts and historians can now determine whether General Musharraf has written the truth or what Nawaz Sharif has been saying is right.
Email: ssehbai@hotmail.com
zinni is forgetting withdrawal started after July meeting therefore his story does not hold credible grounds.His rational regarding nuclear annihilation is also false.Pakistan was in a position to threat India during ''brassteck'' with nuclear response but it is interesting to note that influence of USA increased many folds in India after kargill.Pakistan army under musharaf managed to kill two flies with one stone
1.Killed the rapprochement to words India with out solution to Kashmir by NS
2.Involved America in Kashmir and helped USA in increasing influence over GOI
However the hypothesis of USA forcing India towards solution of Kashmir has failed not because of lack of US influence over India but unwillingness of USA to words solution acceptable to Pakistan.Ex defence attache to Washington javed hassan,masters in clausewitz from USA who was thenDGMO and Pervez musharaf were architects of this plan .it might not be a surprise that after declassification of documents at Pentagon it is established that Kargill had american blessing to start with.It can be compared to Henry kissinger's secret voyage to Beijing in 1971 which served America and what we got???
Kargil was air forces least fine hour. They chickened out pretty much. As a result quite a few promsing careers came to end. At leats two Air Marshals (one who died fairly recently) were if not disgraced found their careers at an end. The use of the airforce to say shoot down a couple of Indian planes, or to attack the Indian fomations in Kargil could have turned the whole thing in our favor. Unfortunatly the air force at that moment did not live up to the standards of Rafiqui, Minhas and Nur Khan.
where in the world did you get the idea that PAF chickened out???
The PAF was ready. The only thing that the Air Chief said was that if you use air power you could escalate the conflict. It was decided that PAF will not carry any missions beyond the border. Infact the IAF also did the same.
As Saeed, Saad, and Mazhar have said READ the article and than make your punny statements
H Khan
Pakistanis (irrespective of their standing in society) exult gossip, paranoia, superstition, and conspiracy theories more than the science of history- H Khan
Asalamo-a-laikum.
I can't see what the fuss is about. The article is pretty good and unambiguous. Short of arranging for a braile version to be typed, it only needs to be read to be understood.
Kargil was a damn fine plan, and it should have worked, but for that SOB Ganja. yet again our poltical leadership let us down.
LOVE OR LEAVE PAKISTAN.
Wa-salaam.
Zia.
infact one of the interesting things Jamshed gulzar said in his interview to dr. shahid masood was that NAWAZ Sharif approved the plan saying that i will support it as long as it is successful!!!!!!!!!!. i was amazed when i heard this.
the interview raised a lot of questions but shahid masood was not interested in raising them asit did not suit his agends of score points against pervez musharaf.
I can hardly imagine the fact that forces can decide or have the room to act on their own. And when it started one cannot staying quiet. If you lost one man you will get his body back. Soldiers should have atleast that right. Waiting in the mess with a whiskey and watching them being buthchered by last minute Israeli laser guided bombs is a shame. It is all for one, one for all. Otherwise we have no forces. My 2 cents.
well one thing is very clear it was poorly planned and well fought by the jawans. not only paf and navy were kept out, political govt n i believe some parts of army were also not involved. and supply lines were never properly managed. accusing paf of "chiken out" while u never consulted them in first place neither considered there operational readiness in the region and the prevailing strenght of paf at the time. its only logical they did not come for help. and its not the first time that poor planning has let the army and nation down. it raises some serious doubts abt army command structure. specially the fact that musharaf was permoted out turn n i think was unfit for the job.
the demand for kargil commision is not doubt politically motivated but it can answer a lot quetions. which can avoid such situation in the future. specially the commision should tackle the issue of responsibilty and who should have the authority to give the final go a ahead.
the bay of pigs is a very clear example. cubans knew well ahaed that it was coming and were ready for it. us army poorly planned it. but since the president ordered it no body blames us army for foul play.
no doubt in today's time full fledge war is not a very feasible solution. but covert operation of kargill scale is also not one man show. it does require lot more than wat then we were able to do.
To all commentators above:
Did you guys really read and fully understand the article posted above? The whole purpose of this article was to counter the claims and arguments posted in your responses!
"India is merely a geographical expression. It is no more a single country than the Equator." Winston Churchill
yeah I think folks need to re-read it.
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