History UsefulNotes / TheIndoPakistanConflict

This was technically the first time that the ''militaries'' of both nations clashed. The conflict arose when the military dictator of Pakistan General Ayub Khan decided to implement '''Operation Gibraltar''' - the plan to swiftly invade and seize control of Kashmir. The operation was conceived over a perceived weakness in the Indian Armed Forces, following a humiliating loss to China three years earlier, in which the Indian Army had to withdraw from several positions they occupied and cede territory to China. An uncontested occupation of some areas of the marshy Rann of Kutch by Pakistani forces, further reinforced the thought that the Indian military was weak. Some amount of wishful thinking and a belief of their own propaganda of how Pakistanis were comprised primarily of [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy martial races]], while Indians as a rule weren't, led to a perceived belief that "one Pakistani soldier was equivalent to ten Indian soldiers", may have further contributed to a belief that the invasion would be successful.

The plan was to airdrop multiple commando teams of the recently formed Green Beret trained Pakistani Special Services Group. They would link up with what the Pakistanis anticipated was a local Muslim population sympathetic to their cause and eager to rise up in rebellion. The initial plan failed when the local population ''didn't'' rise up, and instead tipped off local authorities to the presence of the SSG commandos. In order to prevent the Indian army from mobilizing in Kashmir and rolling up the commandos, the Pakistanis launched "Operation Grand Slam" - a conventional invasion of the Akhnoor region of Kashmir. India rushed conventional forces to that sector quickly and halted the invasion, but then opened a second front in the Punjab and Rajasthan border to relieve the pressure on the Kashmir front. This second front comprised of [[TankGoodness armor]] did advance forward, consolidating on a major victory at the Tank Battle at Phillora. The Pakistanis attempted a counterattack in the Khem Karan sector, but was on the receiving end of a CurbStompBattle at the Battle of Assal Uttar. Bolstered by their victories at Phillora and Assal Uttar, the Indian armor pushed forward in the Sialkot sector with the intent of capturing the major city of Lahore, but spirited resistance allowed the Pakistanis to HoldTheLine at the Battle of Chawinda and stall the Indian advance. This event forced the UN to broker a ceasefire.

Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee traveled to Pakistan on an inaugural bus route to celebrate the reopening of road, rail, cultural and sporting links between the countries after a nine year embargo. This had given the elected government in Pakistan under Prime Minister Navaaz Sharif a boost to its own credibility, which the Pakistani military felt was undermining their influence on Pakistani society. The Generals felt that they needed to do something [[WereStillRelevantDammit to gain public approval]] before their military budget and political power dried up. There was also a perception among the Pakistani army that a nuclearized India was already growing complacent under its nuclear umbrella and would therefore be disinclined to start or escalate a conventional war. While India had (and still has) a "no first use" nuclear policy, the Pakistanis had refused to enact the same and [[GodzillaThreshold reserved the right to escalate a conventional conflict to a nuclear one if Indian numerical superiority was starting to get overwhelming]]. They were confident that a limited, low intensity conflict would not balloon into a full scale conventional war, as their own nuclear weapons would deter India from retaliating too strongly.

The Indian Air Force first struck at PAF airfields, taking them out of the fight and upon achieving total air supremacy they started hitting Pakistani infrastructure. One of the targets hit during these airfield raids was a Beech 100 aircraft belonging to Brig Gen UsefulNotes/ChuckYeager who was advising the Pakistani Air Force at that time. The Indian pilot who struck that aircraft was a naval aviator, Lieutenant Arun Prakash - the only naval aviator to become Chief of Naval Staff. The Indian Navy struck the port city of Karachi with an entire missile boat squadron. This attack destroyed many fuel stores, sank or damaged a lot of ships in harbor and effectively took the Pakistani Navy out of the fight. A Pakistani submarine retaliated by sinking the Indian frigate INS Khukri, but this only caused the Indian Navy to [[HereWeGoAgain attack Karachi again]]. This time all remaining fuel stores were destroyed and while the Pakistani Air Force attempted to respond to this attack, [[EpicFail their reliance on poorly executed reconnaissance by airline pilots resulted in them sinking the Pakistani Navy frigate Zulfiqaar with all hands]]. Then the Pakistani submarine PNS Ghazi was sent to try to sink the Indian carrier Vikrant, but [[EpicFail sank under mysterious circumstances]]. The air war in Pakistan saw the first ever supersonic dogfight in South Asia, when an Indian [=MiG=]-21 downed a Pakistani F-104 Starfighter.

The Indian victory in this war created a high possibility that Pakistan might just be ''annexed'' and reunited with India. Most countries were ambivalent about this reunification. Barely three decades ago all of that territory was part of British India anyway. And there hadn't been much of a reaction to India annexing Goa back from the Portuguese a decade earlier. But Nixon and Kissinger are watching Indira Gandhi roll over the Pakistanis, and they start freaking out. If the Nixon administration's secret plan to reach out to China for cooperation in the Cold War is to succeed, Pakistan has to exist to conduct the negotiations. Nixon's plan was to take advantage of the Sino-Soviet split and [[EnemyMine edge China closer to the US, to coordinate action against the Soviets]]. The US had refused to recognize Mao's government in Beijing so they had no embassy or any diplomatic presence in China- and setting one up would be a huge red flag to the Soviets about what the plan was, so Nixon was going through Pakistani intermediaries to make contact with the Chinese government.[[note]]Pakistan and China had already deepened their ties over a mutual enmity with India[[/note]] If Pakistan ceased to exist, Nixon's plan would come undone. Moreover, India had grown dangerously closer to the Soviet Union. The Soviets were the only country that sold weapons to India after most other countries had slapped arms trade embargoes on both India and Pakistan after the '65 war,[[note]] Pakistan bought their weapons from China[[/note]] and now Indira had signed a defensive pact with the USSR in the lead-up to war. There was real worry of Soviet influence spreading further into the Middle East and South East Asia, using reunified India as a springboard. To prevent this, Nixon decided to take action.

He sent the [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill USS Enterprise's battle group]] into the Indian Ocean to flex military muscle.[[note]]It is unclear if actual military operations would have been conducted- the US armed forces were just starting to disentangle themselves from the mess in Vietnam, and the American people had absolutely no stomach to start another war elsewhere.[[/note]] The Soviets sent a surface warship group to "counter" American military presence there and live up to the joint defense agreement with India, but it was unclear if they would have militarily intervened if the Americans initiated conflict and the ink on their alliance with India was barely dry yet.

The Indian army was able to quickly deal with the Pashtun tribesmen as they advance into the region before winter set in and held off numerous Pakistani counterattacks. The Pakistanis and Pashtun tribesmen encircled Indian loyalists within the Poonch region and tied them down in a siege. Though the Indian forces were able to dispatch several relief columns to the siege, none was strong enough to break the encirclement upon arrival.

As this is going on, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archer_Blood#The_Blood_telegram the head of the American Consulate in Dhaka, Archer Blood, writes an official cable denouncing Nixon and Kissinger for not stepping up and stopping a genocide in progress.]] When he again protests in another official cable, Nixon and Kissinger have Archer Blood recalled and [[ReassignedToAntarctica given a desk job at the State Department's home offices.]] Subsequent declassified documents and the Nixon Tapes revealed that Nixon and Kissinger were aware of what was happening, and they were okay with it. Nixon went so far as to order the American State Department ''not'' go rogue and contradict him by denouncing Searchlight. Pakistan was a U.S. ally in the Cold War and crucial to their plans for exploiting the Sino-Soviet split. Nixon arranges for crucial weapons to be sent to the Pakistani military, supporting the whole operation and reassuring Pakistan that they have a giant in their corner.

Refugees with nowhere else to go [[note]]India is the only country that borders Bangladesh[[/note]] fled in the millions to India. An estimated eighteen million poured in, most hungry or ill and many having been wounded or raped. India at that time, being an impoverished country just starting to emerge from the ravages of centuries long colonialism and the Partition, just couldn't absorb that many refugees and take care of them humanely. So then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi [[note]]No relation to the Mahatma, she was actually Nehru's daughter and married a man who was forced to convert from Islam to Zorastrianism and take the surname Gandhi instead of Khan.[[/note]] started to apply pressure on the Indian military to invade Bangladesh and liberate it from Pakistan.

In the meantime, Indira opted to sign a twenty year defense agreements with the Soviet Union, effectively creating a diplomatic shield against Chinese and American intervention if war was declared. India was the most powerful member of the non-aligned "Third World" at the time and took what was globally seen as a dangerous step toward the Soviet Sphere, giving Moscow a political gift.

On the other side of the border, Pakistani media and diplomats were caught completely unawares as India and the international community are watching a dangerous shooting war break out between nuclear armed neighbors with a history of conflict and religious struggle. As the Army hadn't let the civilian government in on its plan, Pakistani PM Sharif was (allegedly) shocked when PM Vajpayee informed him of the operations the Pakistani army was launching in Kashmir and his civil servants were unsure of how to reign in the Army. This allowed the Indian media to win public opinion to their side. Facing intense pressure internationally, PM Sharif [[DontMakeMeDestroyYou had to secure American help to convince his military to pull their remaining troops back.]] His one-upmanship of the Pakistani Army proved short lived. Sharif was deposed in a bloodless coup d'etat and fled Pakistan into exile.[[note]]Sharif would return to Pakistan in 2008 and run for office again, securing a third term as PM from 2013 to 2017.[[/note]]

The end result was the return of military rule in Pakistan and a reversal of diplomatic gains made with India. Over 2,000 Indian troops were killed or wounded in the fighting. Pakistani numbers are harder to come by, but judging from citations issued the safe number is between 700 and 1,000 Pakistani fighters were killed or wounded. Diplomatic ties would resume once more only in 2003 when Musharraf with a veneer of credibility brought about by cooperating with the US on Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, visited India.

So he [[TookAThirdOption tried to make his own independent nation instead.]] [[note]]It wasn't as crazy an idea as it might sound. Kashmir is a fertile region, has abundant natural resources, populous, and its people were fairly well off even after the British withdrew.[[/note]]

Unfortunately, that idea didn't sit too well with the Pakistani leadership and they began making plans to change the status quo. Operation Gulmarg involved sending roughly 1,000 armed Pashtun tribesmen from Waziristan to conquer Jammu and Kashmir as a [[FalseFlagOperation popular uprising]], prompting a merger with Pakistan. The whole plan was set to go off in late October of 1947 with weapons and radio support to be provided by the Pakistani army.[[note]]We'd probably still debate if it was a legitimate uprising if not for the fact that a dossier on the mission was accidentally handed to an Indian Officer who was finishing up packing his things before crossing the border during the Partition.[[/note]]

As this is going on, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archer_Blood#The_Blood_telegram the American Consulate in Dhaka, Archer Blood, writes back on the official dissent channel denouncing Nixon and Kissinger for not stepping up and stopping a genocide in progress.]] When he again protests in another official cable, Nixon and Kissinger have Archer Blood recalled and [[ReassignedToAntarctica given a desk job at the State Department's home offices.]] Subsequent declassified documents and the Nixon Tapes revealed that Nixon and Kissinger were aware of what was happening, and they were okay with it. Nixon went so far as to order the American State Department ''not'' go rogue and contradict him by denouncing Searchlight. Pakistan was a U.S. ally in the Cold War and crucial to their plans for exploiting the Sino-Soviet split. Nixon arranges for crucial weapons to be sent to the Pakistani military, supporting the whole operation and reassuring Pakistan that they have a giant in their corner.

'''The Enterprise'''

The Indian victory in this war created a high possibility that Pakistan might be ''annexed'' and reunited with India. Most countries were ambivalent about this reunification, as just three decades ago all of that territory was part of India anyway. After all, there hadn't been much of a reaction to India annexing Goa back from the Portuguese a decade earlier. However the United States was deeply concerned about this possibility because of the Nixon administration's secret plan to reach out to China for cooperation in the Cold War. Nixon's plan was to take advantage of the Sino-Soviet split and [[EnemyMine edge China closer to the US, to coordinate action against the Soviets]]. However, since the US had refused to recognize Mao's government in Beijing they had no embassy or any diplomatic presence in China, so Nixon was going through Pakistani intermediaries to make contact with the Chinese government.[[note]] Pakistan and China had deepened ties over a mutual enmity with India[[/note]] If Pakistan ceased to exist, Nixon's plan would come undone. Moreover, India had grown closer to the Soviet Union because they were the only country that sold weapons to India after most other countries had slapped arms trade embargoes on both India and Pakistan after the '65 war,[[note]] Pakistan bought their weapons from China [[/note]] so there was also the worry of Soviet influence spreading further into the Middle East and South East Asia, using reunified India as a springboard. To prevent this, Nixon resolved to take action.

That action was to send the [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill USS Enterprise's battle group]] into the Indian Ocean to flex military muscle.[[note]] it is unclear if actual military operations would have been conducted, as the US armed forces were just starting to disentangle themselves from the mess in Vietnam, and the American people had no stomach to start another war elsewhere.[[/note]] The Soviets sent a surface warship group into the same region to "counter" American military presence there, but it is unclear if they would have militarily intervened if the Americans initiated conflict. The spectacle of possibly going to war with the US alarmed Indira Gandhi's government in India, who didn't realize that Nixon was probably just bluffing and saber rattling. Instead of calling his bluff she apparently caved and invited Pakistani officials to Shimla in India to talk peace. The Shimla Agreement hammered out a few months later offered quite generous terms to the Pakistanis - they would have to recognize Bangladesh as an independent nation, but all their captured territory would be returned to them, none of the Pakistani soldiers captured in Bangladesh would be tried for war crimes, and Pakistan committed to bilaterally resolve the Kashmir issue via diplomacy with India.[[note]] This was a missed opportunity to end the Kashmir conflict once and for all by forcing Pakistan to renounce all claims to it.[[/note]] However, this “Enterprise Incident” forced Indian strategic planners to work on developing a nuclear deterrent so no superpower would ever push them around like that again. This resulted in the development of UsefulNotes/TheThirdEyeOfBharat. In response to this, Pakistan began work on [[UsefulNotes/PakAttack its own nuclear program]].

Historians estimate between 300,000 and 3,000,000 Bengali civilians were killed as a result of Operation Searchlight.[[note]]Since the Bengalis didn't take Operation Searchlight lying down, the primary disagreement over the number of civilian dead comes from who was an innocent civilian and who was a member of the Mukhti Bahimi. Regardless, only Pakistan disputes the fact that they went beyond the killing of enemy combatants and unleashed a terror campaign against civilians. A number were also killed by loyalist Muslim sects like the Biharis that [[TheQuisling chose to help]] the Pakistanis and settle old grudges.[[/note]] Between 200,000 and 400,000 Bengali women were raped and many were kept inside Pakistani army camps as [[SexSlave comfort women]].[[note]]Religious leaders in Pakistan issued a ''fatwa'' declaring that all Muslim women in Bangladesh were secretly Hindu, and therefore fair game for rape.[[/note]] The army took special care to execute Bengali intellectuals with almost a thousand of their leading teachers, lawyers, doctors and journalists being killed before the war's end. And while Awami Muslims were not spared, the army had full freedom to persecute and kill non-Muslim religious groups.

Operation Searchlight rounded up a lot of separatist Awami League members and temporarily weakened the movement, but it also convinced Sheikh Mujibur Rehman that political activism wasn't going to cut it anymore. He turned the Awami League into an insurgency called the ''Mukhti Bahimi'' and did the unthinkable - [[EnemyMine he reached out to India for support]] India wasn't prepared to do more than provide cursory help via its external intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing. The Mukhti Bahimi started prosecuting a true War of Independence against the Pakistani military's Eastern Command. A few Bengali officers posted in West Pakistan deserted and defected, or they died trying. The Pakistani military's response to declaration of Bengali Independence was swift and brutal - resulting in [[RapePillageAndBurn numerous atrocities including mass killings, mass rape and a mass displacement of populations not seen since the Partition]].

As this is going on, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archer_Blood#The_Blood_telegram President Nixon and Henry Kissinger]] are aware of what's happening- and they're okay with it. Official communications use the word "genocide" to describe what's going on. Pakistan is a U.S. ally in the Cold War and crucial to their plans for exploiting the Sino-Soviet split. Nixon arranges for crucial weapons to be sent to the Pakistani military, supporting the whole operation and reassuring Pakistan that they have a giant in their corner.

The Indian Army launched an invasion of East Pakistan with full air superiority and the navy enforcing a blockade. Opposing them were about ninety thousand troops under Pakistani general A A K Niazi. Unlike the ‘65 war which was mostly set piece battles and armored slugfests, this invasion saw the Indian Army use blitzkreig tactics to try to [[AttackItsWeakPoint bypass Pakistani strong points and strike directly at places like Dhaka and Chittagong]]. Fighters from the aircraft carrier INS Vikrant struck vital targets in Dhaka and Chittagong including the port area known as Cole’s bazaar.

'''The 16 day war'''

On the other side of the border, Pakistani media and diplomats were caught completely unawares as India and the international community are watching a dangerous shooting war break out between nuclear armed neighbors with a history of conflict and religious struggle. As the Army hadn't let the civilian government in on its plan, Pakistani PM Sharif was (allegedly) shocked when PM Vajpayee informed him of the operations the Pakistani army was launching in Kashmir and his civil servants were unsure of how to reign in the Army. This allowed the Indian media to win public opinion to their side. Facing intense pressure internationally, PM Sharif [[DontMakeMeDestroyYou had to secure American help to convince his military to pull their remaining troops back.]] His one-upmanship of the Pakistani Army proved short lived. Sharif was deposed in a bloodless coup d'etat and fled Pakistan into exile.[[note]]Sharif would return to Pakistan in 2008 and run for office again, securing a third term as PM from 2013 to 2017.[[/note]] The end result was the return of military rule in Pakistan and a reversal of diplomatic gains made with India. Diplomatic ties would resume once more only in 2003 when Musharraf with a veneer of credibility brought about by cooperating with the US on Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, visited India.

Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee traveled to Pakistan on an inaugural bus route to celebrate the reopening of road, rail, cultural and sporting links between the countries after a nine year embargo. This had given the elected government in Pakistan under Prime Minister Navaaz Sharif a boost to its own credibility, which the Pakistani military felt was undermining their influence on Pakistani society. The Generals felt that they needed to do something [[WereStillRelevantDammit to gain public approval]]. There was also a perception among the Pakistani army that a nuclearized India was already growing complacent under its nuclear umbrella and would therefore be disinclined to start or escalate a conventional war. While India had (and still has) a "no first use" nuclear policy, the Pakistanis had refused to enact the same and [[GodzillaThreshold reserved the right to escalate a conventional conflict to a nuclear one if Indian numerical superiority was starting to get overwhelming]]. They were confident that a limited, low intensity conflict would not balloon into a full scale conventional war, as their own nuclear weapons would deter India from retaliating too strongly.

over the mountain summits in the Kargill, Drass, Batalik and Mushkoh Valley sectors in Indian controlled Kashmir. These mountain summits overlooked the strategically important highway NH-1 that served as an artery between the capital Srinagar and the important Leh Airfield. From their positions on the mountain tops, these infiltrator's were well positioned to call in artillery strikes over any military convoys running supplies between Srinagar and Leh. With this supply route severed, Pakistani paratroopers were positioned to assault and seize Leh Airfield, which would be used as a staging area for an assault on Srinagar. The assault would be bolstered by the fact that NH-1 would fall completely under Pakistani artillery cover. The capture of Srinagar would be used to instigate a full scale rebellion by a Kashmiri Muslim insurgency that Pakistani intelligence was cultivating for nearly a decade.

On the other hand, Pakistani media and diplomats were caught completely unawares, as the Army hadn't let the civilian government in on its plan- Pakistani PM Sharif was (allegedly) shocked when PM Vajpayee informed him of the operations the Pakistani army was launching in Kashmir. This allowed the Indian media to win public opinion to their side. Facing intense pressure internationally, PM Sharif had to secure American help to convince his military to pull their remaining troops back. His one-upmanship of the Pakistani army proved short lived. Sharif was deposed in a bloodless coup d'etat and fled Pakistan into exile.[[note]]Sharif would return to Pakistan in 2008 and run for office again, securing a third term as PM from 2013 to 2017.[[/note]] The end result was the return of military rule in Pakistan and a reversal of diplomatic gains made with India. Diplomatic ties would resume once more only in 2003 when Musharraf with a veneer of credibility brought about by cooperating with the US on Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, visited India.

!The Indo-Pakistan War of 1947-48 (also known as the First Kashmir War)

!The Indo-Pakistan War of 1965 (also known as the Second Kashmir War)

* The Kargil conflict served as a fascinating study of mountain warfare tactics, nuclear deterrence strategy and the winning of an information/propaganda war. The impetus for the conflict was the recent nuclearization of India and Pakistan, and the thaw in diplomatic relations between the two. Just recently, Indian Prime Minister A B Vajpayee had travelled to Pakistan on an inaugural bus route, and had reopened road, rail, cultural and sporting links between the countries, after a nine year embargo. This had given the elected government in Pakistan under Prime Minister Navaaz Sharif a boost to credibility, which the Pakistani military felt was undermining their influence on Pakistani society. They felt that they needed to do something [[WereStillRelevantDammit to gain approval]]. There was also a perception that a recently nuclearized India was already complacent under its nuclear umbrella and would therefore be disinclined to start or escalate a conventional war. While India had and still has a "no first use" nuclear policy, the Pakistanis had refused to enact the same, [[GodzillaThreshold reserving the right to escalate a conventional conflict to a nuclear one, if Indian numerical superiority was starting to get overwhelming]]. They were therefore confident that a limited low intensity conflict would not balloon into a full scale conventional war, as their own nuclear weapons would deter India from retaliating too strongly.
* The instigating event was an audacious plan hatched by former SSG commando and current Army Chief Pervez Musharraf. The ploy was to sneak in a bunch of irregular "mujaheddin fighters" with some regular army and paramilitary personnel embedded with them, over to various mountain summits in the Kargill, Drass, Batalik and Mushkoh Valley sectors in Indian controlled Kashmir. These mountain summits overlooked the strategically important highway NH-1 that served as an artery between the capital Srinagar and the important Leh Airfield. From their positions on the mountain tops, these infiltrator's were well positioned to call in artillery strikes over any military convoys running supplies between Srinagar and Leh. With this supply route severed, Pakistani paratroopers were positioned to assault and seize Leh Airfield, which would be used as a staging area for an assault on Srinagar. The assault would be bolstered by the fact that NH-1 would fall completely under Pakistani artillery cover. The capture of Srinagar would be used to instigate a full scale rebellion by a Kashmiri Muslim insurgency that Pakistani intelligence was cultivating for nearly a decade. The planners were looking to hamstring the response of Indian forces by threatening to escalate a conventional war into a nuclear one, and thus preventing Indian forces from doing two things that would have compelled the infiltrators to retreat. Due to the terrain of the mountains occupied, the only prudent option was to launch pincers into Pakistan controlled Kashmir, cut off the infiltrators' supply routes and encircle them. Another option was to open a front in the Punjab and Rajasthan border, forcing Pakistan to reallocate forces there. Threats of nuclear escalation had rendered these options untenable. What the Pakistani infiltrators didn't anticipate was India taking [[TakeAThirdOption the least prudent conventional military action - launching frontal assaults on the mountain observation posts]].
* The Indian response was initially uncoordinated and haphazard, losing quite a few senior officers in the process. However, these initial assaults were just keeping the infiltrators occupied, while elements of the Gurkha and Kumaon Regiments were being acclimated to high altitude warfare. Already famous for their mountain warfare prowess, these elements would, with artillery and air support attempt to directly assault the Pakistani posts and reclaim them. To do this, they had to scale steep mountain rock faces while taking enemy fire. This made these assaults into slow painstaking grinds, as each hill was bitterly contested. However, the Indians eventually started to win fight after fight, owing to air superiority, the excellent performance of Bofors "shoot and scoot" artillery and terrain. As more hills fell, Indian forces also captured sufficient intelligence to make a convincing case to the international media of the Pakistani Army's complicity in the infiltrations. On the other hand, Pakistani media and diplomats were caught completely unawares, as the Army hadn't let the civilian government in on its plan. This allowed the Indian media to win public opinion to their side. Facing intense pressure internationally, Pakistani PM Sharif had to secure American help in convincing his military to pull their remaining troops back. His one-upmanship of the Pakistani army proved short lived, as Sharif was deposed in a bloodless coup d'etat and fled Pakistan to go into exile. The end result was the return of military rule in Pakistan and a reversal of diplomatic gains made with India. Diplomatic ties would resume once more only in 2003 when Musharraf with a veneer of credibility brought about by cooperating with the US on Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, visited India.

So he [[TookAThirdOption tried to make his own independent nation instead.]]

Unfortunately, that idea didn't sit too well with the Pakistani leadership and they began making plans to change the status quo. Operation Gulmarg involved sending roughly 1,000 armed Pashtun tribesmen from Waziristan to conquer Jammu and Kashmir as a [[FalseFlagOperation popular uprising]], prompting a merger with Pakistan. The whole plan was set to go off in late October of 1947 with weapons and radio support to be provided by the Pakistani army.

The areas of what comprised Pakistan during the partition of India, were derived from areas that the British colonial overlords had designated as "Majority Muslim". All areas except Eastern Bengal had sizeable Muslim populations owing to proximity to the Middle East. Eastern Bengal on the other hand was majority Muslim only due to a controversial administrative act of Viceroy Lord Curzon. Lord Curzon had ordered the Bengal province to be split into Hindu and Muslim halves, ostensibly for ease of administration purposes, but people there saw it as intentionally stoking religious division to fracture an otherwise United protest movement against British colonial presence. Therefore, Eastern Bengal wasn't very enthusiastic about the idea of Pakistan to begin with. The area was even subdued during partition, in comparison to the violence that erupted between Hindu refugees fleeing Western Pakistan, and Muslim refugees fleeing towards Western Pakistan. This further added to a feeling by West Pakistanis, that the Bengali contingent of their new country hadn't paid their dues. Eastern Bengal being geographically isolated from the rest of Pakistan meant that there were even linguistic and cultural differences that a common faith couldn't gloss over. This led to a feeling of marginalization by Bengalis in Pakistan. That marginalization was exacerbated by the fact that even though the legislative assembly in Pakistan allocated a disproportionate number of seats for that province in comparison to its size and population, this legislative assembly was toothless, with the Army holding de facto power. And the Army was under-represented by Bengalis, especially among the generals. This was due to a prevailing doctrine that "the defense of the East lies in the West." Basically, this meant that should Indian forces invade East Pakistan, a strong offensive in the west would capture sufficient Indian territory to negotiate back East Pakistan.

Following the failure of Operation Grand Slam to liberate all of Kashmir in 1965, the once strong and robust Pakistani economy nosedived. Eastern Bengal was and still is highly dependent on agriculture, and thereby were hit hardest by the Pakistani economic recession. Having faced cultural, political, social and now economic marginalization, the Bengalis decided they had had enough. And decided to organize into a political party to fight for secession.

When elections were held in all of Pakistan in 1969, the newly formed Awami League that was advocating for the secession of East Pakistan, won a simple majority of seats in the legislature. This was because the voters in East Pakistan were united in their support of the Awami League, while those in the western provinces were fractured into multiple ideologies. The spectacle of [[RunningBothSides a secessionist potentially ruling the country]], alarmed the Army. Instead of trying to negotiate a political compromise, the army used a massacre of 300 ethnic Bihari minorities in Bengal as a pretext to declare martial law. The Pakistani Army Chief General Yahya Khan appointed his friend Lt. General Tikka Khan to oversee the implementation of martial law in East Pakistan and suppressing the Awami League. He was given multiple infantry divisions, aircraft, and naval missile boats to prosecute the crackdown.

Historians estimate between 300,000 and 3,000,000 Bengali civilians were killed as a result of Operation Searchlight.[[note]]Since the Bengalis didn't take Operation Searchlight lying down, the primary disagreement over the number of civilian dead comes from who was an innocent civilian and who was a member of the Mukhti Bahimi. Regardless, only Pakistan disputes the fact that they went beyond the killing of enemy combatants and unleashed a terror campaign against civilians.[[/note]] Between 200,000 and 400,000 Bengali women were raped and many were kept inside Pakistani army camps as [[SexSlave comfort women]]. The army took special care to execute Bengali intellectuals with teachers, lawyers, doctors and journalists being killed before the war's end. And while Muslims were not spared, the army had freedom to persecute and kill non-Muslim religious groups.

Refugees with nowhere else to go [[note]]India is the only country that borders Bangladesh[[/note]], fled in the millions to India. An estimated eighteen million poured in, with three million having been killed, maimed or raped. India at that time being an impoverished country just starting to emerge from the ravages of centuries long colonialism and the Partition just couldn't absorb that many refugees and take care of them humanely. So, then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi [[note]]No relation to the Mahatma, she was actually Nehru's daughter and married a man who was forced to convert from Islam to Zorastrianism and take the surname Gandhi instead of Khan [[/note]] started to apply pressure on the Indian military to invade Bangladesh and liberate it from Pakistan.

At this time, India's army was headed by General Sam Hormus Jamshed Fram Manekshaw, who realized that the monsoon season would soon be upon Bangladesh, turning the terrain into an impassible quagmire of bogs and marshes, rendering the large amount of logistics required for an invasion, untenable. Manekshaw knew that area in general after having served in the China-India-Burma theater in World War II and having been decorated for valor there. He advised Ms Gandhi that the best time for them to invade would be early winter when rains would be nonexistent and the river basin that comprises most of Bangladesh would be relatively dry, making it easy for vehicles to traverse the roads. Until then, arms and equipment were the only assistance India could provide the Mukhti Bahimi.

In the meantime, Indira opted to sign a twenty year defense agreements with the Soviet Union, effectively creating a diplomatic shield against Chinese or American intervention if war was declared. India was the most powerful member of the non-aligned "Third World" at the time and took what was globally seen as a dangerous step toward the Soviet Sphere.

The suppression of secessionist sentiment didn't go easy. Minority religious groups such as Bengali Hindus, Christians, etc. were rounded up along with Muslim Awami League members, academics, journalists and other intelligentsia. Local Bengali police were disarmed, as were Bengali soldiers within the Pakistani Armed Forces. Telephone switchboards and radio communications were seized, university dormitories were stormed with non-Muslims being summarily executed and Muslims with Awami sympathies being arrested.

Operation Searchlight rounded up a lot of separatist Awami League members, but also convinced Sheikh Mujibur Rehman that political activism wasn't going to cut it anymore. He turned the Awami League into an insurgency called Mukhti Bahimi and did the unthinkable - [[EnemyMine he reached out to India for support, which provided cursory help via its external intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing.]] The Mukhti Bahimi started prosecuting a War of Independence against the Pakistani military's Eastern Command. A few Bengali officers posted to the western part of Pakistan deserted and defected, or died trying. The Pakistani military's response was swift and brutal - resulting in [[RapePillageAndBurn numerous atrocities including mass killings, mass rape and a mass displacement of populations which hadn't been seen since the Partition]].

Refugees with nowhere else to go [[note]]India is the only country that borders Bangladesh [[/note]], fled in the millions to India. An estimated eighteen million poured in, with three million having been killed, maimed or raped. India at that time being an impoverished country just starting to emerge from the ravages of centuries long colonialism and the Partition just couldn't absorb that many refugees and take care of them humanely. So, then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi [[note]]No relation to the Mahatma, she was actually Nehru's daughter and married a man who was forced to convert from Islam to Zorastrianism and take the surname Gandhi instead of Khan [[/note]] started to apply pressure on the Indian military to invade Bangladesh and liberate it from Pakistan.

In the meantime, Indira opted to sign a twenty year defense agreements with the Soviet Union, effectively creating a diplomatic shield against Chinese or American intervention if war was declared.

By this time, the Pakistanis knew that India was the source of the Mukhti Bahimi's weapons and weren't going to take the insurgency lying down. Not only that, but they realized there was a significant buildup of forces happening to the East, and that the Soviet treaty could only mean that India was preparing for a major operation and didn't want to be stopped by outside interference. The Pakistanis decided their only hope of winning was to hit first, and hit hard. The first blows in this war came in the form of air raids on Indian airfields, dubbed ''Operation [[UsefulNotes/GenghisKhan Chengiz Khan]]''. The Pakistani Air Force was [[FollowTheLeader attempting to emulate]] the success of the [[UsefulNotes/ArabIsraeliConflict Israeli Air Force dawn raid on Egyptian airfields]]. However, Indian intelligence anticipated the attacks and the Indian Air Force moved its aircraft to safety before the bombs ever fell. As a result, the raids only cratered a few runways which could be repaired in four hours, and the IAF was free to retaliate.

Historians estimate between 300,000 and 3,000,000 Bengali civilians were killed as a result of Operation Searchlight.[[note]]Since the Bengalis didn't take Operation Searchlight lying down, the primary disagreement over the number of civilian dead comes from who was an innocent civilian and who was a member of the Mukhti Bahimi. Regardless, only Pakistan disputes the fact that they went beyond the killing of enemy combatants and unleashed a terror campaign against civilians.[[/note]]

Historians estimate between 300,000 and 3,000,000 Bengali civilians were killed as a result of Operation Searchlight.[[note]]Since the Bengali's didn't take Operation Searchlight lying down, the primary disagreement over the number of dead comes from who was an innocent civilian, and who was a member of the Mukhti Bahimi. Regardless, only Pakistan disputes the fact that they went beyond the killing of enemy combatants and unleashed a terror campaign against civilians.[[/note]]

When elections were held in all of Pakistan in 1969, the newly formed Awami League that was advocating for the secession of East Pakistan, won a simple majority of seats in the legislature. This was because the voters in East Pakistan were united in their support of the Awami League, while those in the western provinces were fractured into multiple ideologies. The spectacle of [[RunningBothSides a secessionist potentially ruling the country]], alarmed the Army. Instead of trying to negotiate a political compromise, the army created a pretext of ethnic Bihari minorities in Bengal being persecuted and declared martial law. The Pakistani Army Chief General Yahya Khan appointed his friend Lt. General Tikka Khan to oversee the implementation of martial law in East Pakistan and suppressing the Awami League.

The suppression of secessionist sentiment didn't go easy. Minority religious groups such as Bengali Hindus, Christians, etc. were rounded up along with Muslim Awami League members, academics, journalists and other intelligentsia.

Operation Searchlight rounded up a lot of separatist Awami League members, but also convinced Sheikh Mujibur Rehman that political activism wasn't going to cut it anymore. He turned the Awami League into an insurgency called Mukhti Bahimi and did the unthinkable - [[EnemyMine he reached out to India for support, which provided cursory help via its external intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing.]] The Mukhti Bahimi started prosecuting a War of Independence against the Pakistani military's Eastern Command. A few Bengali officers posted to the western part of Pakistan deserted and defected, or died trying. The Pakistani military's response was swift and brutal - resulting in [[RapePillageAndBurn numerous atrocities including mass killings, mass rape and a mass displacement of populations which hadn't been seen since the Partition]]. Refugees with nowhere else to go [[note]]India is the only country that borders Bangladesh [[/note]], fled in the millions to India. An estimated eighteen million poured in, with three million having been killed, maimed or raped. India at that time being an impoverished country just starting to emerge from the ravages of centuries long colonialism and the Partition just couldn't absorb that many refugees and take care of them humanely. So, then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi [[note]]No relation to the Mahatma, she was actually Nehru's daughter and married a man who was forced to convert from Islam to Zorastrianism and take the surname Gandhi instead of Khan [[/note]] started to apply pressure on the Indian military to invade Bangladesh and liberate it from Pakistan.

After the partition of India was ordered and with a timetable for the withdrawal of the British established, individual states that were held mixtures of Hindu and Muslim citizens were faced with a difficult choice especially when they were bordered by both countries. The individual princes of the states and their civil governments faced a no-win choice in many cases- but none was as difficult as that faced by Maharaja Hari Singh of Jammu and Kashmir. Hari Singh was personally a Hindu, but his nation was predominantly Muslim, and was bordered by both India and Pakistan. If he followed his personal convictions and joined India, the Muslim population would potentially overthrow him or could face significant discrimination by Hindu-majority India. If he opted to join Pakistan, Hari Singh would no doubt be deposed by the Muslim government and the Hindu-minority in Kashmir would face similar discrimination.

Unfortunately, that didn't sit too well with Pakistan. During the chaos of the Partition, '''Operation Gulmarg''' (their plan to forcefully integrate Kashmir) was leaked to a member of the Indian Army that hadn't finished packing up and crossing the border from Pakistan to India. Operation Gulmarg involved roughly 1,000 armed Pashtun tribesmen from Waziristan being sent to conquer Jammu and Kashmir as a FalseFlagOperation popular uprising, prompting a merger into Pakistan. The whole plan was set to go off in late October of 1947 with weapons and radio support to be provided by the Pakistani army.

As this plan was being set up, an ''unplanned'' uprising takes place in the far western region of Kashmir called Poonch. The Muslim majority district had seen high taxation, high unemployment, and a wave of soldiers returning from fighting for the British in the Second World War. [[FromBadToWorse Soldiers that had been sent home with their rifles in hand.]] What exactly followed differs depending on which side you ask: Either the local Muslims launched a spontaneous protest in response to unpopular government agendas, were fired on by Hari Singh's Hindu troops who then launched a widespread terror campaign against Muslim villages, and were forced to respond with an armed uprising and a request for Pakistani intervention, '''OR''' the whole thing was a locally planned Muslim coup that proceeded with the tacit approval of Pakistan to aid in Operation Gulmarg, so we shall simply say that no matter what happened, this uprising ended with a Pakistani intervention, the overstretching of Hari Singh's troops to their breaking point, and the incorporation of that particular region of Kashmir into Pakistan.

When Operation Gulmarg was kicked off and Kashmir's security forces were completely overwhelmed, Maharaja Hari Singh felt he had no other options at this point and requested Indian intervention to protect himself and the Hindu minority citizens. He formally declared Kashmir part of India and Indian troops soon crossed the border to defend what they now saw as their new territory. On paper, the region is now India's. But Pakistan controls it with their Poonch and Pashtun troops. Both armies still have British officers in their ranks that haven't formally left the Indian/Pakistani Armies, so they're tangled in the mess too.

The Indian army is able to quickly deal with the Pashtun tribesmen as they advance into the region before winter set in and held off numerous Pakistani counterattacks. The Pakistanis and Pashtun tribesmen encircled Indian loyalists within the Poonch region and tied them down in a siege. Though the Indian forces were able to dispatch several relief columns to the siege, none was strong enough to break it upon arrival.

After spring arrived, the Indian forces launched a renewed offensive in the Kashmir valley, driving into the heart of the region and reached Poonch, relieving its Hindu population after it had suffered through a nearly year-long siege.

* This was technically the first time that the ''militaries'' of both nations clashed. The conflict arose when the military dictator of Pakistan General Ayub Khan decided to implement '''Operation Gibraltar''' - the plan to swiftly invade and seize control of Kashmir. The operation was conceived over a perceived weakness in the Indian Armed Forces, following a humiliating loss to China three years earlier, in which the Indian Army had to withdraw from several positions they occupied and cede territory to China. An uncontested occupation of some areas of the marshy Rann of Kutch by Pakistani forces, further reinforced the thought that the Indian military was weak. Some amount of wishful thinking and a belief of their own propaganda of how Pakistanis were comprised primarily of [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy martial races]], while Indians as a rule weren't, led to a perceived belief that "one Pakistani soldier was equivalent to ten Indian soldiers", may have further contributed to a belief that the invasion would be successful.
* The plan was to airdrop multiple commando teams of the recently formed Green Beret trained Pakistani Special Services Group. They would link up with what the Pakistanis anticipated was a local Muslim population sympathetic to their cause and eager to rise up in rebellion. The initial plan failed when the local population ''didn't'' rise up, and instead tipped off local authorities to the presence of the SSG commandos. In order to prevent the Indian army from mobilizing in Kashmir and rolling up the commandos, the Pakistanis launched "Operation Grand Slam" - a conventional invasion of the Akhnoor region of Kashmir. India rushed conventional forces to that sector quickly and halted the invasion, but then opened a second front in the Punjab and Rajasthan border to relieve the pressure on the Kashmir front. This second front comprised of [[TankGoodness armor]] did advance forward, consolidating on a major victory at the Tank Battle at Phillora. The Pakistanis attempted a counterattack in the Khem Karan sector, but was on the receiving end of a CurbStompBattle at the Battle of Assal Uttar. Bolstered by their victories at Phillora and Assal Uttar, the Indian armor pushed forward in the Sialkot sector with the intent of capturing the major city of Lahore, but spirited resistance allowed the Pakistanis to HoldTheLine at the Battle of Chawinda and stall the Indian advance. This event forced the UN to broker a ceasefire.
* The war was concluded by the Tashkent Agreement negotiated by Indian Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri and Pakistani Field Marshall Ayub Khan in a conference at Tashkent. They agreed to withdraw their forces and go back to the older [[StatusQuoIsGod pre war boundaries]].

When elections were held in all of Pakistan in 1969, the newly formed Awami League that was advocating for the secession of East Pakistan, won a simple majority of seats in the legislature. This was because the voters in East Pakistan were united in their support of the Awami League, while those in the western provinces were fractured into multiple ideologies. The spectacle of [[RunningBothSides a secessionist potentially ruling the country]], alarmed the Army. Instead of trying to negotiate a political compromise, the army created a pretext of ethnic Bihari minorities in Bengal being persecuted and declared martial law. The Pakistani Army Chief Gen Yahya Khan appointed his friend Lt Gen Tikka Khan to oversee martial law in East Pakistan and suppress the Awami League.

The suppression of secessionist sentiment didn't go easy. Minority religious groups such as Bengali Hindus, Christians, etc. were rounded up along with Awami League members, academics, journalists and other intelligentsia.

Operation Searchlight rounded up a lot of separatist Awami League members, but also convinced Sheikh Mujibur Rehman that political activism wasn't going to cut it anymore. He turned the Awami League into an insurgency called Mukhti Bahimi and did the unthinkable - [[EnemyMine reach out to India, which provided cursory support via its external intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing.]] The Mukhti Bahimi started prosecuting a war against the Pakistani military's Eastern Command. A few Bengali officers posted to the western part of Pakistan deserted and defected, or died trying. The Pakistani military's response was swift and brutal - resulting in [[RapePillageAndBurn numerous atrocities including mass killings, mass rape and mass displacement of populations]]. Refugees with nowhere else to go [[note]] India is the only country that borders Bangladesh [[/note]], fled in the millions to India. An estimated eighteen million poured in, with three million having been killed, maimed or raped. India at that time, being an impoverished country, just starting to emerge from the ravages of centuries long colonialism, just couldn't absorb that many refugees and take care of them. So, then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi [[note]] not related to the Mahatma, she was actually Nehru's daughter, and married a man who was forced to convert from Islam to Zorastrianism and take the surname Gandhi instead of Khan [[/note]] started to apply pressure on the Indian military to invade Bangladesh and liberate it from Pakistan. At this time, India's army was headed by General Sam Hormus Jamshed Fram Manekshaw, who realized that the monsoon season would soon be upon Bangladesh, turning the terrain into an impassible quagmire of bogs and marshes, rendering the large amount of logistics required for an invasion, untenable. Manekshaw knew that area in general, having served in the China-India-Burma theatre in World War II and having been decorated for valor there. He advised Ms Gandhi that the best time for them to invade would be early winter when rains would be nonexistent and the river basin that comprises most of Bangladesh would be relatively dry, making it easy for vehicles to traverse the roads. Until then, arms and equipment were the only assistance India could provide the Mukhti Bahimi.

The first blows in this war were struck by Pakistan in the form of air raids on Indian airfields, dubbed ''Operation [[UsefulNotes/GenghisKhan Chengiz Khan]]''. The Pakistani Air Force was [[FollowTheLeader attempting to emulate]] the success of the [[UsefulNotes/ArabIsraeliConflict Israeli Air Force dawn raid on Egyptian airfields]]. However, Indian intelligence anticipated the attacks and the Air Force moved its aircraft to safety. As a result, the raids only cratered a few runways, which were repaired in four hours, and the IAF was free to retaliate.

Unfortunately, that didn't sit too well with Pakistan. During the chaos of the Partition, their plan to forcefully integrate Kashmir was leaked to a member of the Indian Army that hadn't finished packing up and crossing the border. Operation Gulmarg involved roughly 1000 armed Pashtun tribesmen being sent to conquer Jammu and Kashmir as a FalseFlag popular uprising and prompt their merger into Pakistan. The whole plan was set to go off in late October of 1947.

As this plan is being set up, an unplanned uprising takes place in the north-west region of Kashmir called Poonch. The Muslim majority district had seen high taxation, low employment, and also a glut of soldiers returning from fighting for the British in the Second World War. [[FromBadToWorse Soldiers who had been sent home with their rifles in hand.]] What exactly followed differs depending on which side you ask: either the Muslims launched a spontaneous protest in response to unpopular government agendas, were fired on by Hari Singh's troops who then launched a widespread terror campaign against Muslim villages, and were forced to respond with an armed uprising and a request for Pakistani intervention in response, OR the whole thing was a planned Muslim coup that proceeded with the tacit approval of Pakistan to aid in Operation Gulmarg, so we shall use caution and simply say that no matter what happened, this uprising ended with a Pakistani intervention and the incorporation of the region into Pakistan.

When Operation Gulmarg was kicked off and Kashmir's security forces were overwhelmed, Maharaja Hari Singh felt he had no other options at this point and requested Indian intervention to protect himself and the Hindu minority citizens. He formally declared Kashmir part of India and Indian troops soon crossed the border to defend what they now saw as their new territory. On paper, the region is now India's. But Pakistan controls it with their Poonch and Pashtun troops. Both armies still have British officers in their ranks that haven't formally left the Indian/Pakistani Armies, so they're tangled in the mess too.