Overtly or covertly, we have to act

Apr 15, 2014

Shankar Roychowdhury

The key to preventing such attacks lies in timely acquisition of actionable intelligence followed by proactive offensive action to eliminate terrorist networks. Current efforts by India’s intelligence and security agencies are obviously inadequate.

Atrans-border fidayeen style raid on March 28 on an Indian Army camp in Dyala Chak belt of Jammu and Kashmir's Kathua district, within almost hailing distance of the Indo-Pak border, resulted in closing down of National Highway 1A (NH1A) for over 10 hours. NH1A is the main surface link between Jammu and Kashmir and the rest of the country and the attack was another reminder of its vulnerability. It was also a warning that the apparent calm along the Jammu-west Punjab stretch of the international border is, in reality, fragile and superficial, and that the security environment with respect to Pakistan is as brittle as ever.
NH1A remains as vulnerable to interdiction today as it was in 1947, when Indian Army troops first moved into the Jammu region over what was then a kachcha track to beat back mobs of armed irregulars intruding from Pakistan.

On its part, Pakistan has often proclaimed that it considers the Jammu-Pakistan stretch of the international border as a “working boundary” whose ultimate alignment is yet to be finalised and linked it with settlement of the “Kashmir issue” to Pakistan’s satisfaction. In effect, Pakistan treats the Jammu-Pakistan border as an extension of the Line of Control which can be violated at will without inviting serious repercussions from India. This places the Jammu-Pakistan border almost at par with the Line of Control as a hotspot in Indo-Pak relations.

In Pakistan, behind the recently erected façade of “civilianisation”, the Army continues to be the ultimate authority. It controls strategic policy against India. It has chosen the politico-military ideology of jihad to launch a long war against India by incorporating Lashkar-e-Tayyaba and Jaish-e-Mohammad. It is likely that members of these organisations were involved in the Dyala Chak attack.

Though the Indo-Pak international border in this sector is fenced and guarded by the Border Security Force and internally policed by J&K police, the Pathankot-Jammu stretch of NH1A — India’s “Western Chicken’s Neck” — will continue to be as vulnerable as always to small determined groups of suicide attackers from across the border. Recall the attacks in Kaluchak in 2008 and Samba in 2013.

The key to preventing such attacks lies, as always, in timely acquisition of actionable intelligence followed by proactive offensive action to eliminate terrorist networks. Current efforts by India’s intelligence and security agencies are obviously inadequate. India’s border security and counter-terrorism networks remain on the back foot often due to lack of intelligence and early warning.
Such a situation is unacceptable and has to be fixed to the satisfaction of both governments. Joint efforts between India and Pakistan to curb terrorism, cross-border or otherwise, should be encouraged even though prospects of any dramatic breakthrough do not look bright at present. Simultaneously, a more proactive policy of pre-emptive, clandestine action against known terrorists and bases within India and even outside should also be considered.

Dyala Chak is merely the latest demonstration of how armed infiltrators can transgress Indian borders and reach deep into the Indian territory. Is there a possibility that the Dyala Chak terrorists — or at least some of them — might not have come from across the border, but were from sleeper cells within the country? Such a possibility, though not supported by concrete evidence at present, would raise a chain of sensitive and disturbing corollaries about the possible presence of local sympathisers — a fairly common situation in all the border states in the country, especially J&K. The issue of local support for trans-border infiltrators is pure political napalm. It is a minefield which investigative agencies have to negotiate very carefully to find their way forward.

Too much has already been conjured up by vicious and unsubstantiated innuendoes and insinuations in the highly inflammable pre-election climate. Nevertheless, national security demands preparation for a counter strategy to forestall trans-border fidayeen attacks, which, if nothing else, show up the country as an inefficient, ineffective, bumbling banana republic.
The building blocks and tools to implement such a counter strategy in terms of personnel, experience, equipment, as well as legal provisions are already available, albeit strewn around haphazardly in government pigeonholes in myriad departments. Additional policies may have to be developed as necessary, but will require, money and political will.

No doubt it is a difficult strategy, as it requires treading a fine and almost invisible line in realpolitik. Also, diplomatically it is indefensible and bad in the eyes of international law. But so are fidayeen raids across international borders, even when done the cloak of plausible deniability, as Pakistan has been doing with brazen impunity.

So in the final analysis, can India invoke self-defence to justify covert action targeting terrorists outside the country's borders? Or are our principles, based on international law and Nehruvian Panchsheel ideology, in conflict with the compulsions of state? India has to take a call, because time is running out, fast.

The writer is a former Chief of Army Staff and a former member of Parliament.