Two weeks after the Pahalgam terror attack, India finally retaliated by launching air attacks against 9 targets. Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri, in his press statement, emphasised India choosing non-military targets linked to Pakistan’s terror machine.

Since India’s 2019 Balakot attack, after the Pulwama suicide bombing of Indian paramilitary personnel, Delhi assumed that Pakistan had been finally deterred from sponsoring terrorism. The abrogation of Article 370 and the division and downgrading of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories, followed by an extended President’s rule, fanned Indian complacency that terrorism stood defeated.

These smug conclusions rested on two flawed presumptions. One, the conclusion that an economically beleaguered Pakistan was preoccupied with domestic political instability and terrorism emanating from Balochistan and Afghanistan; and two, that a weakening Pakistani state meant its army was also handicapped. However, that was never so, as China props up Pakistan as a counterweight to India in South Asia. Pakistan, if anything, has upgraded its air force and army. With India allocating resources to counter China across the Line of Actual Control, its residual military resources do not greatly outweigh those of Pakistan, except in the naval domain.

Before Pahalgam, multiple warning signs were aflutter that some mischief........

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