That “Pakistan does not matter” was more of an insult for Islamabad in more ways than one.
Pakistan has been rocked by political instability, increased terror attacks and economic disarray; on the other hand India has grown both in global stature and on economic spectrum. New Delhi's military prowess too has grown in the years since 2016.
But desperation in Pakistan is expected. Pakistan is more internally divided than ever. Probably it is worse than Pakistan was in 1971. Its western borders with Afghanistan restive.
India's overall national power - in constrast - has grown manifold.
India’s GDP at $4 trillion, for example, is 10 times larger than Pakistan’s.
Delhi’s global diplomatic influence now overshadows Islamabad’s.
Even traditional friends of Pakistan are now neutral if not tilted towards India.
The Modi Govt has successfully pushed the US to “de-hyphenate” its relations with India and Pakistan. US Vice President J D Vance visited India, with Pakistan being nowhere on his itinerary is proof of this fact.
For India, managing the military escalation ladder, knowing when and how to terminate the escalation, leveraging the international community, sharpening the internal contradictions in Pakistan will be the key to its effective use of force against the entrenched terror infrastructure across the border
Bharat/India has also improved its ties with other Islamic countries in the Gulf leaving Pakistan little more than a silent spectator. It is noteworthy that the attack in Pahalgam took place while Prime Minister Narendra Modi was on an official visit to Saudi Arabia, a country which had been a steadfast ally to Pakistan during its wars with India, especially in 1971.
Gen Munir, Pak army chief, has been also nervous because his support base was shaken. Pakistanis have changed and in recent months common people and Imran Kahn supporters protested the authority of the army. The perception that it is the Pak army that owns the country called Pakistan was also being challenged.
Moreover, the US has almost left it to fate or in the virtual lurch. India also befriended and Narendra Modi has been honoured by a number of Muslim-stronghold Gulf nations.
Hence Pak army chief played up a risky calculation. He made controversial and almost unwarranted remarks on Kashmir and two nation theory and Hndu-Muslim differences.
“Our religions are different, our customs are different, our traditions are different, our thoughts are different," Gen Munir had said.
"General Munir can't even take a train through parts of Pakistan without getting hit and bombed. That is why he has decided to play the Kashmir card," explained defence expert and a retired official Colonel Rohit Dev.
Shyam Saran, a retired diplomat points out :
"The Gulf states too have refused to open up their coffers. There is fatigue among the Gulf states about having to repeatedly bail Pakistan out, and a sense that Islamabad has not given them much in return for doing so over the years.
Even China has seemingly grown impatient with Pakistan. Beijing has poured in billions of dollars to develop infrastructure in Pakistan as a part of its flagship Belt and Road Initiative. But many of China’s projects in Pakistan remain stalled today."
Thus the argument goes - Pakistan is almost compelled to take a "desperate step".
The terror attack in Pahalgam is essentially an attempt by Pakistan to assert that it is still a regional power which cannot simply be ignored or cast away as a non-factor.
The military has been the most-respected organisation in Pakistan and people have rallied behind it. Recent protests and attacks on people in uniform reveal the extent of fury against them now.
Though the military is all-powerful in Pakistan and runs the country, General Munir cannot ignore popular sentiment for too long.
The attack seemed well-planned and timed even as tourism received a major boost, with the overall security scenario in Jammu and Kashmir improving in recent years.
Though Islamabad is denying its link to the massacre, it is a given that no terror attack of this scale in Jammu and Kashmir would have been carried out without the support of Pakistan's military establishment. Experts aren't debating that.
"This has been unleashed by the Pakistan army. SSG commandos of Pakistan are posing as terrorists and carrying out these attacks," SP Vaid, former DGP of Jammu and Kashmir, said.
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