Skirmishs at LOC, LAC & International Border

[devhensh]

..SO I'd only say this - lets be optimistic and realistic at the same time but a bit more realistic.

I see your point,and i am painfully aware of all these...but you see, all these were projects undertaken by ADA/HAL/DRDO, where lots of R&D and trails were required.....

All the projects, i talked about (my last post) are where Indian Pvt Sector giants like TATAs, Kalyani Group , Punj Lloyd are building proven platforms under TOT under make in India......These companies have a long record of meeting strict deadlines using best Project Management doctrines......

I am sure, these projects will be success stories !

 

[Tony HMG]

What happened to our response? How is Pakistan going to pay? Pakistan is getting more funds from USA now .Expect more surgical strikes from Pakistan. Asama se gire, khajur pe atke.

 

[Mikesingh]

Massive crowds attend the funeral of Subedar Mohamed Ashraf Mir, J&K Light Infantry (JAK LI), a Kashmiri who was martyred in the cowardly attack by Paki terrorists at Sunjhwan.



This is a slap on the face of the stone pelters and pro Paki elements who glorify terrorists.

 

[devhensh]

What happened to our response? How is Pakistan going to pay? Pakistan is getting more funds from USA now .Expect more surgical strikes from Pakistan. Asama se gire, khajur pe atke.

Revenge is a dish best served cold....I think something big is coming....But i believe our Army is already giving it back in installments !

 

[Mikesingh]

Expect more surgical strikes from Pakistan. Asama se gire, khajur pe atke.

'More surgical strikes'??? When and where was a Paki surgical strike conducted inside Indian territory?

Am I missing something?

 

[indus]

What happened to our response? How is Pakistan going to pay? Pakistan is getting more funds from USA now .Expect more surgical strikes from Pakistan. Asama se gire, khajur pe atke.

Kaun hain ye log. Kahan se aate hain.

 

[Akshay_Fenix]

...................................................................

 

[12arya]

https://theprint.in/2018/02/12/soldier-guard-better-smart-fences-night-vision-cameras-control-rooms/

Indian soldiers will guard garrisons better with smart fences, night vision cameras by Lt Gen DS Hooda (retd)

Security forces' personnel guard at Sunjuwan Military Station during a terrorist attack in Jammu / PTI
Plans have been submitted for improving garrison security. Committee gave its report in 2016, but nothing has moved. This is where the real lethargy exists.

In the early hours of 10 February, terrorists sneaked into the Sunjuwan garrison at Jammu and entered the area where more than 150 families were residing. This is the worst nightmare for a commander. In the Army, wives understand the risks their husbands are taking, but there is a very deliberate organisational attempt to keep families away from the direct horror of violence. As I pen down this piece, five soldiers and one relative have been martyred, and wives, sons and daughters are lying injured in the military hospital.

Reporters asked the usual question: “Has the Army not learned any lessons from past attacks on the garrisons?” As an Army Commander in Jammu and Kashmir at a time when many of our garrisons were breached, this is not an easy question to answer. People doubt our preparedness levels and ask how we can protect the country if we can’t even protect our own bases.

A Court of Inquiry will be ordered to find out the lapses and pinpoint responsibility. The National Intelligence Agency may be called in for a parallel investigation, as has happened in the past at Uri, Handwara and Nagrota. If there was a lapse, army officials responsible for security will be suitably dealt with. This was done at Uri and Nagrota.

But is it fair to pin all the blame of such incidents on officers and men manning the garrison? After the Nagrota attack in 2016, then-defence minister Manohar Parrikar had said: “I think we can definitely improve on it (security). Probably, over a period of time, some sort of lethargy has set in.”

This reflects a poor understanding of how our soldiers are operating at the limits of human endurance.

One of the biggest challenges of a Commanding Officer in Jammu and Kashmir is to try and find ways for his soldier to get a full night’s sleep, at least on every alternate day. In many cases, this is not possible, because men have to be awake at nights manning sentry posts, patrolling or laying ambushes. There has also been extensive discussion on changing the body clock of soldiers to reverse the sleep cycle to daytime. This was a theoretical exercise because daytime activities were equally important – weapons had to be cleaned, batteries charged, rations brought up from the rear, and observation posts manned.

Life at stations like Sunjuwan, which is a peace station, is equally difficult. The infantryman, the engineer, the signaller, the driver, the clerk is carrying on with his routine duties by day, and manning sentry posts at night. This is his opportunity to spend a couple of years with his family. This is his peace tenure before he moves on to field areas in Ladakh or Arunachal Pradesh and his children relocate to a different school.

We must understand the reality and find ways to empower the soldier to do his duty better. The answer clearly lies in technology — smart fences, ground sensors, night vision cameras, and well equipped control rooms for sensitive garrisons. The need has been understood for many years, but we can’t seem to get the better of our bureaucratic procedures.

Detailed plans have been submitted for improving garrison security. The committee headed by Lt Gen. Philip Campose, instituted by the government, gave its report in 2016, but nothing has moved. This is where the real lethargy exists. And in an obvious attempt to deflect any criticism, on the evening of the Sunjuwan attack, the Ministry of Defence said that Rs 1,487.27 crore had been released for garrison security. We were informed that the progress on this case had been slow because the ministry was apparently “involved in a process of deep consultation with the three services”.

Are any deep consultations required when we are losing our soldiers? 2016 and 2017 have seen the maximum security forces casualties in recent years. Does the responsibility for this lie solely on the Army? Does the government have no role except to order inquiries into every incident? The sentry shivering at the Gurez heights along the Line of Control or the soldier bolting down his dinner with his wife at Sunjuwan before rushing off for night duty, requires support, not doubt about his abilities. This is where the government has to step in with more than mere talk.

The author retired as General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Indian Army’s Northern Command.

 

[12arya]

https://theprint.in/2018/02/13/pakistan-insists-it-was-always-besties-with-china-not-america/

Now, Pakistan insists it was always besties with China and not America
The storytellers of Islamabad hope that Americans, fearful of China, will return hat in hand and accept whatever Pakistan offers.


“That’s my story and I’m sticking to it,” is often used to humourously justify an explanation that one knows not to be true.

But it is one thing for a portly individual to declare “I’m not overweight, just naturally large”. It is quite another for a nation to insist on telling a story and sticking to it even when the rest of the world stops finding any humour in it.

Pakistan’s version of its external relations over the last several decades falls under the category of falsified narratives that would actually be funny if their consequences weren’t so sad.

In an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, former foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar described China as Pakistan’s “only real strategic partner” over the last four decades. China is the only country with whom Pakistan had “a complete alignment of interests,” she said, with a completely straight face, as if Pakistan had never sought (and received) Major Non-NATO Ally Status from the United States or declared it a strategic partner repeatedly.

The new story, aimed at Americans who fret about losing Pakistan as an ally, completely ignores the economic and security assistance of over $45 billion received from the United States since the 1950s; at least $33 billion since 9/11.

But it is just a rewrite of the old story, which told of Pakistan’s exertions on behalf of America during the Cold War, its sufferings resulting from the services it rendered to Uncle Sam, and the insufficient reward the US has given Pakistan for being – in President Eisenhower’s words – “America’s most allied ally in Asia”.

As a SEATO and CENTO ally in the 1950s and 1960s, Pakistan helped the US spy on China and the Soviet Union. During the 1980s, Pakistan was a frontline ally in Afghanistan. Pakistan sought (and got) massive American assistance in the anti-Soviet Afghan jihad, primarily because this helped it achieve its own goals in Afghanistan and furthered the cause of jihadis it had already started supporting.

After a hiatus in the 1990s resulting from the American disapproval of Pakistan’s nuclear programme, intelligence cooperation formed the basis of Pakistan’s frontline ally status in the Global War on Terrorism after 9/11.

Through all these twists and turns, Pakistan’s leaders proclaimed shared interests with the United States, which showered aid in return. At no stage was it part of Pakistan’s mantra that its interests aligned only with China’s. Pakistan maintained close ties with Beijing but its relationship with the United States was more important.

It is perfectly fine for Pakistanis to assert now that their national interests, as defined by their military-intelligence establishment and endorsed by the civilian elite, converge more with the Chinese than the Americans. But what is the point of insisting on rewriting history?

Pakistani leaders only lose credibility when they resort to intellectual gymnastics to justify convoluted policies. For example, after years of claiming that Pakistan and the United States were partners in efforts to stabilise Afghanistan, Khar seems to have now discovered that the “presence of the United States of America in Afghanistan is not for peace and stability” and instead is causing “chaos”.

During the 1990s, when the US partly turned away from Pakistan after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, Pakistan’s storyline was that ‘the US withdrawal so soon after the Soviet withdrawal was the cause for chaos in Afghanistan’. The Afghan civil war, the rise of the Taliban, and even 9/11 were ascribed in that version of events to America turning away from Pakistan’s north-western neighbour.

It seems that in the Pakistani storytellers’ accounts, other nations are right only when they share the extremist Pakistani view of India being the source of all of South Asia’s problems, and are prepared to confer primacy on Pakistan within its region.

Americans, generally not known for their interest in history, have successively bought the simplified views offered to them of why things in Afghanistan or Pakistan have gone wrong and how the current batch of Pakistani leaders was committed to helping them solve America’s problem in the region.

The harder line taken by Khar about America as the source of chaos in Afghanistan, and of China being Pakistan’s only ally, is directed at the naïve souls who assume that ‘tomorrow is another day’ and that one should focus on building a future without dwelling on the past.

It is a response to President Trump’s tough stance on demanding that Pakistan keep its word to the United States over Afghanistan. Even an astute interviewer such as Christiane Amanpour failed to push back Khar by asking how, if US policies have created chaos, Pakistan’s support for the Taliban since 1994 has contributed to peace-building in Afghanistan?

It would be honest if Khar and others acknowledge the fact that Pakistan’s agenda in Afghanistan has always been very different from America’s. Instead, they still build the argument negatively, by blaming the US and continuing to cite imaginary threats from India.

Pakistan’s desire to install a “pro-Pakistan” regime in Kabul has led to its support of Islamist radicals, including the Taliban, since the 1989 withdrawal of Soviet forces. Its motive for supporting the anti-Soviet Jihad between 1979 and 1988 was also not limited to defeating the Soviets but was motivated by its desire to influence or control Afghanistan through Jihadis.

In his book ‘The Wars of Afghanistan’, US diplomat Peter Tomsen – who served for years as point man on Afghanistan right after the Soviet withdrawal – noted that Americans mistakenly ignored the vision of Pakistan’s generals, formulated by the late General Zia-ul-Haq: “Strategic depth against India, Pakistani hegemony in Afghanistan, and promotion of Islamic holy war in Kashmir and elsewhere.”

Investigative journalist Steve Coll’s new book ‘Directorate S: The CIA and America’s Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan, 2001–2016’ reaches a similar conclusion. According to Coll, “the failure to solve the riddle of the ISI and to stop its covert interference in Afghanistan became, ultimately, the greatest strategic failure of the American war.”

The Taliban, and its associated group the Haqqani network, are currently Pakistan’s principal instruments of influence over Afghanistan. They have demonstrated their capability in insurgency and conducting suicide bombings. They continue to threaten the security of Afghanistan, and from Pakistan’s perspective, that is useful in ensuring Kabul’s compliance with Pakistan’s demand to significantly downgrade its relationship with India.

Pakistan remains a safe haven for the Taliban, even if the ISI no longer fully controls the operations of all Taliban factions. Meanwhile, Afghan leaders remain at a loss to understand what they need to do to please Pakistan and ensure that Pakistan no longer supports the jihadis.

The late Afghan leader, Ahmed Shah Massoud, once said, “The best way for Pakistan would have been to restore peace in Afghanistan. And it would have been in the interest of all, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia. But Pakistanis have greater plans, motives and expectations. Pakistan wants to become the axis of all Islamic countries in the region. But that is something which is beyond the capacity of Pakistan.”

Unfortunately, the storytellers of Islamabad do not want to recognise that. They are still hoping that Americans, tired of trying to solve the Pakistan riddle and fearful of China’s advantage within Pakistan, will return hat in hand to Islamabad and accept whatever Pakistan offers.

Husain Haqqani, director for South and Central Asia at the Hudson Institute in Washington D.C., was Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States from 2008-11. His forthcoming book is ‘Reimagining Pakistan’.

 

[Mikesingh]

Martyr Subedar Madan Lal's son, Ankush bidding farewell to his hero.

 

[12arya]

For 8 Obama years, US failed to escape ISI trap, or stop it from hurting allies Kabul, India

Former US President Barack Obama and former Afghan President Hamid Karzai| Commons
The US had trapped itself in its alliance with Pakistan. It was unable to find a strategy to persuade Pakistan’s generals to change their calculus toward India.

The 17-year, American-led war in Afghanistan has been undone by many errors and illusions. But none has been more important than Washington’s failure to prevent Pakistan and its Inter-Services Intelligence agency from succouring the Taliban’s revival, particularly after 2005.

America failed to anticipate ISI’s planning. And then, towards the end of the Bush administration, when the National Security Council did realise that the ISI was actively promoting a Taliban, it could not identify a strategy of either friendship or coercion that would persuade it to change course. The struggle to alter Pakistan’s calculus persisted across the entire eight years of the Obama administration.

This failure not only cost American soldiers fighting in Afghanistan their lives, it also thoroughly confused some of Washington’s most important allies in South Asia. One of these was Hamid Karzai, the Afghan President.

Karzai took it for granted that the US, as the world’s supreme military superpower, could force ISI to stop aiding the Taliban if it really wanted to. And since the US did not take this action, it raised the question of why. For many years, Karzai urged virtually every American who met with him in private to do more to pressure Pakistan.

Barack Obama visited Afghanistan for the first time in the summer of 2008, in the midst of his campaign for the presidency. At a meeting with Karzai and his cabinet in Kabul, the Afghans told Obama one by one that ISI was “the source of increasing instability in Afghanistan”.

Karzai’s remedy included “US military operations in Pakistan”.

Obama asked if Pakistan’s civilian leaders could curb the ISI. “Not without the help of the United States,” Karzai said. “The problem is ISI,” he repeated, “which runs the country.”

When, even after the outrage of the Mumbai terrorist attack, as the years passed and still Washington failed to change Pakistan’s calculus, Karzai sunk into conspiracy thinking. He concluded that the US was secretly conspiring with Pakistan to destabilise the region, so as to have a reason to maintain military bases in Afghanistan.

Karzai’s hypothesis frustrated American negotiators, but they could not move him off his conviction.

In 2013, America’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, James Dobbin, met Karzai at Kabul’s Arg Palace. “Mr President, between Edward Snowden and WikiLeaks, you have several million documents to examine – can you find any mention of such designs? Do you really think I would lie to you about this?” Dobbins recalled asking.

“Maybe you don’t know about the plan,” Karzai replied. He referred to there being a “deep state” in America.

“Mr President, there is no deep state,” Dobbins insisted.

The truth was more prosaic. The United States had trapped itself in its alliance with Pakistan. It was too concerned about destabilising the nuclear-armed country to put maximum pressure, and unable to identify a strategy of aid and friendship that would persuade Pakistan’s generals to change their strategic calculus toward India.

President Donald Trump has now suspended US aid to Pakistan, and he has tweeted with hostility about the country. However, Pakistan is now nesting ever deeper in its historical “all-weather” alliance with China, and the record of using economic sanctions to change its conduct is a dismal one.

Steve Coll is the author of the new book titled ‘Directorate S: The C.I.A. and America’s Secret Wars in Afghanistan, 2001-2016’.

 

[Tony HMG]

'More surgical strikes'??? When and where was a Paki surgical strike conducted inside Indian territory?

Am I missing something?

What will you call the continued attacks on our military camps? They have been utterly successful in this. Useless inbred pakis killing our soldiers and their families,what should we call this?

 

[Mikesingh]

What will you call the continued attacks on our military camps? They have been utterly successful in this. Useless inbred pakis killing our soldiers and their families,what should we call this?

These are called fidayeen attacks, not surgical strikes. There's a world of a difference between the two.

 

[indus]

These are called fidayeen attacks, not surgical strikes. There's a world of a difference between the two.

Whom are you trying to explain.

 

[12arya]

GOOD NEWS

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com...ons-for-armed-forces/articleshow/62903986.cms
Defence ministry clears mega purchase of weapons for armed forces

NEW DELHI: The defence ministry on Tuesday gave initial approvals to several acquisition proposals, including the one for 7.4 lakh new assault rifles and 16,500 light machine guns, collectively worth an estimated Rs 15,935 crore to bolster firepower of infantry soldiers a few days after the terror attack on the Sunjuwan+ Army camp in Jammu.

The defence acquisition council (DAC), chaired by defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman, accorded acceptance of necessity (AON) to the proposals, for which formal tenders will now be floated to invite technical and commercial bids from armament companies. The entire process, including field trials, can take quite a few years before the contracts are actually inked and the production begins.

The DAC, however, approved the "fast track procedure (FTP)" for the 16,500 light machine guns (LMGs) to be acquired from the global market at a cost of Rs 1,819 crore to ensure the project is wrapped up within a year.

Though the Army, Navy and IAF together require 43,732 new LMGs, the initial acquisition of 16,500 will meet the operational requirements of the troops deployed on the borders with Pakistan and China. "A concurrent proposal is being processed for the remaining LMGs under the Buy and Make (Indian) categorisation through a tie-up between an Indian vendor and a foreign armament company," said an official.

The DAC last month had similarly approved+ the FTP for 72,400 new-generation assault rifles and 93,895 close-quarter battle (CQB) carbines for Rs 3,547 crore from the global market. On Tuesday, it also accorded approval to acquisition of an additional 7.4 lakh 7.62x51mm assault rifles under the "Make in India" production policy for the three services.

"These rifles will be made under the Buy and Make (Indian) categorisation, through both the Ordnance Factory Board and the private industry at an estimated cost of Rs 12,280 crore," said the official. Similarly, the shortfall in the overall requirement for 3.76 lakh 5.56 x 45mm CQB carbines will be met by a Make in India project at a later stage.
The DAC on Tuesday also approved the procurement of 5,719 sniper rifles for the Army and IAF at an estimated cost of Rs 982 crore from the global market. "While these high-precision weapons will be bought under the 'Buy Global' categorisation, the ammunition for these will be initially procured and subsequently manufactured in India," said the official.

In order to enhance the anti-submarine warfare capabilities of Indian warships, the DAC also accorded approval for the procurement of the indigenous "Mareech" advanced torpedo decoy systems (ATDS), which has successfully completed extensive trials after being developed by the DRDO. "The 'Mareech' systems will be produced by Bharat Electronics Limited, Bengaluru at an estimated cost of Rs 850 crore," he added.

As earlier reported by TOI, the Army had first asked for new assault rifles and CQB carbines way back in 2005 to replace the existing glitch-prone 5.56mm INSAS (Indian small arms system) rifles and the obsolete 9mm sub-machine carbines. But the projects were repeatedly scrapped due to graft allegations or unrealistic technical parameters as well as the lack of indigenous options for well over a decade.

The new 8.6mm sniper rifles, with an effective kill range of 1,200-metre, will in turn replace the Army's old 7.62mm Dragunov sniper rifles (800-metre range) acquired from Russia in 1990. The Dragunov rifles are not equipped with modern magnification and sight systems as well as bipod stands, while their ammunition is also quite expensive.

 

[ezsasa]

GOOD NEWS

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com...ons-for-armed-forces/articleshow/62903986.cms
Defence ministry clears mega purchase of weapons for armed forces

NEW DELHI: The defence ministry on Tuesday gave initial approvals to several acquisition proposals, including the one for 7.4 lakh new assault rifles and 16,500 light machine guns, collectively worth an estimated Rs 15,935 crore to bolster firepower of infantry soldiers a few days after the terror attack on the Sunjuwan+ Army camp in Jammu.

The defence acquisition council (DAC), chaired by defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman, accorded acceptance of necessity (AON) to the proposals, for which formal tenders will now be floated to invite technical and commercial bids from armament companies. The entire process, including field trials, can take quite a few years before the contracts are actually inked and the production begins.

The DAC, however, approved the "fast track procedure (FTP)" for the 16,500 light machine guns (LMGs) to be acquired from the global market at a cost of Rs 1,819 crore to ensure the project is wrapped up within a year.

Though the Army, Navy and IAF together require 43,732 new LMGs, the initial acquisition of 16,500 will meet the operational requirements of the troops deployed on the borders with Pakistan and China. "A concurrent proposal is being processed for the remaining LMGs under the Buy and Make (Indian) categorisation through a tie-up between an Indian vendor and a foreign armament company," said an official.

The DAC last month had similarly approved+ the FTP for 72,400 new-generation assault rifles and 93,895 close-quarter battle (CQB) carbines for Rs 3,547 crore from the global market. On Tuesday, it also accorded approval to acquisition of an additional 7.4 lakh 7.62x51mm assault rifles under the "Make in India" production policy for the three services.

"These rifles will be made under the Buy and Make (Indian) categorisation, through both the Ordnance Factory Board and the private industry at an estimated cost of Rs 12,280 crore," said the official. Similarly, the shortfall in the overall requirement for 3.76 lakh 5.56 x 45mm CQB carbines will be met by a Make in India project at a later stage.
The DAC on Tuesday also approved the procurement of 5,719 sniper rifles for the Army and IAF at an estimated cost of Rs 982 crore from the global market. "While these high-precision weapons will be bought under the 'Buy Global' categorisation, the ammunition for these will be initially procured and subsequently manufactured in India," said the official.

In order to enhance the anti-submarine warfare capabilities of Indian warships, the DAC also accorded approval for the procurement of the indigenous "Mareech" advanced torpedo decoy systems (ATDS), which has successfully completed extensive trials after being developed by the DRDO. "The 'Mareech' systems will be produced by Bharat Electronics Limited, Bengaluru at an estimated cost of Rs 850 crore," he added.

As earlier reported by TOI, the Army had first asked for new assault rifles and CQB carbines way back in 2005 to replace the existing glitch-prone 5.56mm INSAS (Indian small arms system) rifles and the obsolete 9mm sub-machine carbines. But the projects were repeatedly scrapped due to graft allegations or unrealistic technical parameters as well as the lack of indigenous options for well over a decade.

The new 8.6mm sniper rifles, with an effective kill range of 1,200-metre, will in turn replace the Army's old 7.62mm Dragunov sniper rifles (800-metre range) acquired from Russia in 1990. The Dragunov rifles are not equipped with modern magnification and sight systems as well as bipod stands, while their ammunition is also quite expensive.

How come TOI is saying assault rifle procurement is for 762 NATO?

So far no such info from official sources...

I think this is just conjecture...

 

[Kazah]

????????????????????
____________________

 

[COLDHEARTED AVIATOR]

Its incredible how our soldiers fought bare hands with the terrorists saving their families.

All the casualties are of soldiers who were with their family and not armed.

No casualty of any soldier who was involved in flushing them out.

Main objective of killing soldier families like Kaluchak averted.

Overall,i would not call it a failure.

Obviously would have and could have been done but it doesnt always work like that.

 

[patriots]

????????????????????
____________________

paki and their English

bdw Pakistan expecting the revenge from India.............

 

[COLDHEARTED AVIATOR]

paki and their English

bdw Pakistan expecting the revenge from India.............

G phat gayi he inki!

And they talk like they are gonna destroy India.