India's tactics worked in conflict with Pakistan

SINGAPORE, June 2 ------ India switched tactics after suffering losses in the air on the first day of conflict with Pakistan earlier this month and established a decisive advantage before the neighbors announced a ceasefire three days later, India's highest ranking general said. Indian jets bombed what New Delhi called "terrorist infrastructure" sites across the border. Pakistan has said it downed six Indian planes, including at least three Rafale fighters, in the initial clashes.

General Anil Chauhan, India's chief of defense staff, said in an interview that India suffered initial losses in the air, but declined to give details. "What was important is, why did these losses occur, and what we'll do after that," he told Reuters on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue security forum in Singapore, referring to the Pakistani claim of downing jets. "So, we rectified tactics and then went back on the seventh, eighth and 10th in large numbers to hit air bases deep inside Pakistan, penetrated all their air defenses with impunity, carried out precision strikes."

The Indian air force "flew all types of aircraft with all types of ordinances on the 10th," he said. India has previously said its missiles and drones struck at least eight Pakistani air bases across the country that day, including one near the capital Islamabad. The Pakistan military says that India did not fly its fighter jets again in the conflict after suffering losses on May 7. India's director general of air operations, Air Marshal A.K. Bharti, had told a press conference earlier in the month that "losses are a part of combat" and that India had downed some Pakistani jets. Islamabad has denied it suffered any losses of planes but has acknowledged its air bases suffered some hits although losses were minimal.

No nuclear worries

Some of the attacks were on bases near Pakistan's nuclear facilities, but they themselves were not targeted, media reports have said. "Most of the strikes were delivered with pinpoint accuracy, some even to a meter, to whatever was our selected mean point of impact," Chauhan said.

Chauhan, and Pakistan's chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Gen. Sahir Shamshad Mirza, have both said there was no danger at any time during the conflict that nuclear weapons were considered. "I think there's a lot of space before that nuclear threshold is crossed, a lot of signaling before that, I think nothing like that happened," Chauhan said. "It's my personal view that the most rational people are people in uniform when conflict takes place," he added. Chauhan also said that although Pakistan is closely allied with China, which borders India in the north and east, there was no sign of any actual help from Beijing during the conflict.

Asked whether China may have provided any satellite imagery or other real-time intelligence to Pakistan during the conflict, Chauhan said such imagery was commercially available and could have been procured from China as well as other sources.

Source: manilatimes.net