“…In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour’d rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect…“ — William Shakespeare, Henry V; Act 3; Sc 1

“[Is] a ‘decisive battle’ the true metric of victory? Does the usual claim hold even about the most famous instances, bearing names so familiar they are fixed in our minds…? How do we know that a victory in battle was “decisive”, in the larger sense of fixing the outcome of a war? — Cathal J. Nolan in The Allure of Battle

The battles won by England’s Henry V at Harfleur and Agincourt, set apart by just over a month in 1415, were spectacular as battles go but were part of the Hundred Years War, a war the French ultimately won at the Battle of Castillon in 1453. England and France were to go on to fight many more wars, with both sides scoring battlefield victories until they found themselves allied when World War I began. Since then, the two have been on the same side, after centuries of bloodletting.

Why do I mention this? The “Once more unto the breach” speech by Henry V, which is more about William Shakespeare’s eloquence than Henry V’s, might proffer us an insight into the passions of a battle, but it fails to satiate our urge to find clarity in war.

The notions of victory and defeat, military historian Cathal J. Nolan informs us, are “emotive terms, subject to passions that distort memory and understanding.” And when battles are fought more for domestic-political reasons than some important strategic goal that “gains a lasting advantage [to secure] one side’s key values and interests, the terms become vacuous and devoid of any real meaning.

After the recent slugging, both Pakistan and India are claiming victory. The fact is that wars are not just about bean counting in terms of losses. In the case of conventional blows between a nuclear dyad, unless the two sides walk away from a confrontation or near-confrontation drawing the same lessons, stability will not return. Violence will.

What are the lessons to be learnt from the recent military face-off between Pakistan and India? Given India’s escalatory adventurism, its adoption of the Israeli playbook and the continuing war rhetoric coming from Indian PM Narendra Modi, can another conflict be far? And what can Pakistan do in response?

During the Cold War, there was much talk of fighting under the nuclear overhang and even discussions on whether a limited nuclear war could be fought and won without forcing the other side to resort to a massive response. The Cuban Missile Crisis played a significant role in establishing deterrence, highlighting the risks of escalation and flagging the importance of communication and confidence-building measures between the US and the USSR.

In doing so, the crisis contributed to a stable centre at the heart of which then-West and East Germany were situated. While the periphery was destabilised through proxy wars, the centre remained quiet through a stalemate. This is what is today called the instability-stability paradox.

No such periphery exists between Pakistan and India. The entire theatre is the centre. Escalation inheres in India’s policy. Given India’s stated position, its government has boxed itself in and, even if it didn’t want to, the entry point of every new conflict will be on a higher escalation rung on the ladder.

Let me quote Nolan again because nothing describes India’s wanton aggression against Pakistan better than these lines: “More often, war results in something clouded, neither triumph nor defeat. It is an arena of grey outcomes, partial and ambiguous resolution of disputes and causes that led to the choice of force as an instrument of policy in the first place.”

Let’s now get to the heart of the matter, India’s ‘Operation Sindoor.’

Far from poppycock masquerading as intellectual concepts, the basic fact about statecraft and any viable strategy is to increase one’s options, not reduce them to the point where one is boxed in. That is exactly what Mr Modi’s Hindutva-driven government has done. And this is not just with regard to Pakistan but every neighbour in the region. As it happens, when the actual shooting began, no one stood with India except Israel, which indicates the kind of company India keeps.

INDIA’S GAMBIT

Many analysts in India and the West are trying to provide a conceptual underpinning to India’s strategy. As would become clear subsequently, most of these assessments focus on what India has tried to do while treating Pakistan as a passive actor, against whom coercion is and can be used.

For instance, we are told that “Operation Sindoor adds a new approach to India’s strategic toolbox” even as it “offer[s] a powerful lesson in restraint.” In this assessment, “Undue prominence was given to the performance of specific platforms”, instead of seriously analysing “India’s targeting methodology, command intent, or escalation thresholds…”

Pakistan’s quiet operational success “obscures a more consequential truth: despite Pakistani tactical successes, India appears to have largely achieved its stated objectives”, because the Indian Air Force “demonstrated a credible capacity to identify and destroy what New Delhi characterised as terrorist-linked infrastructure in Pakistani territory.” New information tells us the IAF only targeted two sites; other sites were targeted by Indian artillery.

In this view, India showed restraint and managed escalation: it signalled to Pakistan that it was not interested in escalating and was only targeting “terrorist infrastructure.”

This is basically the same line which India’s increasingly flustered foreign minister S. Jaishankar gave in an interview — ‘we told them that we were only targeting terrorist targets and the [Pakistani] military had the option of standing out and not interfering in this process.’ This line of reasoning, as noted above, focuses arbitrarily on India’s strategic objectives and expects, incredulously, that India’s strategic objectives are holier than Pakistan’s.

The quotes above are from an article by Walter Ladwig for the British Royal United Services Institute. Ladwig is a good scholar, which........

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