[0:03]Good day friends, this is my second video in the series that I am making on Operation Sindoor. Here, I will first give the news and I'll give the perspective after that. Perspective of the adversaries, which is China and Pakistan and then own perspective, so let me start with the news. The news is that on 30th of April, Home Minister Amit Shah, he traveled to Ladakh Union Territory. After notification was issued that the two districts of Ladakh Union Territory will now be made into seven districts. In other words, five new districts will be carved out in the Union Territory of Ladakh. Now, surprisingly, instead of China reacting, it was Pakistan that reacted to this news, which Pakistan had done for the first time, reacting to anything concerning Ladakh. So, it was Pakistan spokesperson who rejected the new districts in Ladakh and said that Ladakh Union Territory is illegal. Since Ladakh is an internationally recognized dispute, it is part of Jammu and Kashmir and the only thing acceptable here is a plebiscite under the United Nations. So, the point that I want to make is this, that Pakistan has expanded its territorial claim from Kashmir to Ladakh. And when a nation makes a territorial claim, it means that the nation is willing to defend, is willing to fight for its claim, and this is a big thing. Pakistan talking about Ladakh, but how has this come about after Operation Sindoor? To understand that, we need to go back to 5th August 2019. Now, this is the day when Amit Shah announced in Parliament the revocation of 370 and 35A from the state of Jammu and Kashmir. The next day, which is 6th of August, Amit Shah said that the state of Jammu and Kashmir will now be bifurcated into two union territories. Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir will have in it, Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, and the Ladakh Union Territory will have in it, Gilgit-Baltistan and Aksai Chin and the new maps will be made accordingly. Now, the reaction from the Chinese on the news of Ladakh Union Territory was immediate. Chinese Foreign Ministry said that China never recognized the so-called Union Territory of Ladakh. And the reaction of China was immediately understood in India. Consequently, on 11th of August itself, External Affairs Minister Jaishankar, he traveled to Beijing. Met up with his counterpart Wang Yi to explain to him that what India had done. By having this Ladakh Union Territory and the new maps, had nothing to do with India's position on the ground, that nothing will change on the ground from India's perspective as far as the Line of Actual Control with China is concerned or even the Line of Control with Pakistan is concerned. But China did not accept this explanation of Jaishankar, Chinese pointed out. That China never had a border between Ladakh and Tibet even when British India was there. But more to the point, we know that in the year 2010, China publicly announced that its border with India was a mere 2,000 kilometers. Whereas when India was asked, India said its border with China is 3488 kilometers. So this discrepancy which is huge, is Ladakh. So, Pakistan, China has never recognized a border with Ladakh, all it has recognized is a military line in Ladakh. And that military line also, we know in April 2020, the PLA through its multi-prong intrusions in East Ladakh, pushed the 1993 military line closer to its 1959 claim line at most places and that is where the PLA sits today and this is permanent, there should be no doubts on this. But coming back to my point, why is Pakistan talking about Ladakh, that is the point. So, let us now understand what happened about the Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory and Pakistan's reaction. Please remember at that time, when India made this announcement, immediately Pakistan's top leadership, Prime Minister Imran Khan, Army Chief General Bajwa and the others, they traveled to China to have confabulations with the top leadership there.
[5:16]And what was totally missed in India is, this was not interaction, a routine interaction between Iron Brothers. China and Pakistan that had been going on for decades, this was something unusual. In these meetings, the two sides decided to strengthen like never before their relations politically, strategically and militarily. And decided that the two sides would consult each other on everything concerning international relations. And the evidence of the decision that they took, it came out very soon. It is only that the Indian side did not see it.
[6:01]For example, whenever the Chinese leaders after that, starting from the President and all of them, when they spoke of Pakistan. They always said that China supports Pakistan's sovereignty and territorial integrity. And on the military side, because that is what you need to support Pakistan sovereignty and territorial integrity. Unprecedented things started happening. For example, the two air forces, the PLA and the Pakistan Air Force, which had been doing exercises called Shaheen series since 2012, suddenly these exercises became very advanced. Because the PLA decided to bring in their virtual domain capabilities in this exercises. And in the form of their strategic support force ground elements. Which comprised of space capabilities, electronic warfare and cyber capabilities, as well as their EAWACS like K J 500. So, these were advanced exercises, which brought in the virtual domains of war. Which I have always maintained are the war winning factor in a modern war. Not only that, the PLA decided that all these advanced capabilities, it will help the Pakistan Air Force indigenize. And therefore, in August 2020, when the chief of the Pakistan Air Force was Air Chief Marshal Mujahid Khan. With the help from PLA under under the Pakistan Air Force, an institution was created called Sent AIC. Center for Artificial Intelligence and Computing, whose objective was to bring Artificial Intelligence in Pakistan Air Force's operational domains. This is a big thing. Which is bring in artificial intelligence and electronic warfare, which is what we call cognitive electronic warfare and AI in cyber. So all this was going on and we saw all that unfold in Operation Sindoor in the performance of the Pakistan Air Force. But this was happening on the technology side. Much was happening on the feminization side where the Pakistan military was invited to be familiarized with the Ladakh theater. And here, news came in October 2021 that the Pakistani officers, military officers, they were getting posted in the Xinjiang military, sorry, Xinjiang Military District, which is responsible for Ladakh. As well as the Western Theater Command responsible for war with India and to top it all, which was completely unbelievable. News came that the Pakistanis were given access to the highest military headquarters or operational headquarters of the PLA, which is called Joint Staff Department. Which works directly under the Commander-in-Chief Xi Jinping. Joint Staff Department is that organization which prepares nuclear and conventional war planning for the PLA. And where it has all the elements, the officers who are there are from all the four services, which is army, air force, navy and rocket force. So, getting access or giving access to the Pakistani military officers was certainly unusual. Not only that, news also came that the new equipment which was getting inducted in the Western Theater Command, it was not first being given to the Tibet Military Command, which is responsible for Arunachal Pradesh. But to the Xinjiang Military Division responsible for Ladakh, things like the light tanks like the T-15, the state of the art howitzers, the infantry fighting vehicles and so on. And then also news came that Pakistani military officers, they were getting posted in their embassy in China whose sole job was to ensure regular war supplies from China to Pakistan because after all 81% of the equipment with the Pakistan military is of Chinese origin. And then we also know that in March 2022, the PLA gave the Pakistan Air Force the the J-10 C's and the PL-15 BVRs beyond visual range missiles, the integration of which we saw and their performance we saw in Operation Sindoor. Then, as far as the two special forces were concerned, they had been doing a warrior exercises since 2013. Suddenly these exercises also became advanced in the high altitude area stretching from Kashmir to Ladakh, so the point to make is this whole thing had already become one theater. It is only that for the first time the Pakistan foreign spokesperson has reacted to the news in Ladakh. And the evidence of that comes now from the Indian side, the Indian perspective. Please remember that after Operation Sindoor, talking about the lessons of Operation Sindoor, the Deputy Chief of the Army, Indian Army, Lieutenant General Rahul Singh. He said that what India faced in Operation Sindoor was one border, two adversaries. Now, this one border has been stretched from Kashmir to Ladakh. And what he said was absolutely correct, one border, two adversaries, this is precisely what I had been saying and for warning, right since August 2019. That what India faces is not Pakistan, but a one-front reinforced war there. Because what the PLA was helping the Pakistan military is not only with hardware, software and training that went on between the two air forces and the special forces, but also with its non-kinetic capabilities. I have spoken about this in my videos, won't go in the details now here, but to make a very important point. And that important point is, in my last video and so many of my earlier videos, I have made this point. That please remember in all the full-scale wars between India and Pakistan, the military line which was established in the first war of Kashmir, it still remains on the ground. In other words, Pakistan when it we talk of conventional war capabilities, is a peer competitor of India. And this was when it was one border, one adversary. Now as Rahul Singh says it is one border two adversaries, which means that today Pakistan has that capability with full support from the PLA to actually fight in both the theaters of Kashmir as well as Ladakh and this point needs to be understood very clearly. If I may digress to make one more point here is that even in the war in West Asia that is going on where Iran is fighting with Israel and America combined. Iran is fully supported by the PLA, which is why China has repeatedly said in reference to Iran that China supports Iran's territorial integrity and sovereignty. This is how the PLA fights the war but more on this aspect, I will talk in a separate video, but to come back to our subject that I was talking about, having spoken of Rahul Singh. Now, I want to talk about the Air Force, Indian Air Force, because as I will explain in my perhaps next video. That the Air Forces between India and Pakistan will play a very important role whenever the operation the pause of the Operation Sindoor is lifted, and I hope it is not lifted, it ends here Operation Sindoor. But coming to the point, I want to draw the attention of this book to the viewers. It's written by a three-star retired army officer and the uniqueness of this book is that this was written. It was written, it got the clearance from the Army headquarters or the defense headquarters, it got printed also, everything happened in a span of five months only. And the actual official version is all here. This is the importance of this book, and what this book talks about is very clearly. It says that the CCS before Operation Sindoor, it met several times. CCS is the Cabinet Committee on Security, which is headed by the Prime Minister Modi. In other words, it was Prime Minister Modi who was taking the call, and this says that in these meetings, what came out was a final plan, which was approved by the CCS with very clear directions. And one of the directions mentioned here is that the the the Indian side will only target terrorist and terrorist infrastructure. And as far as the Indian Air Force is concerned, this very clearly says that the Indian Air Force will conduct strikes in Pakistani Punjab employing Rafael jets equipped with scalp missiles and hammer bombs, period. Now, this is interesting, Scalp is a cruise missile, air launch cruise missile. That means what we are talking about is air to ground targets. And Hammer is once again a bomb which is delivered from the air. So, ideally what would happen is that if Rafael was to be used by the Indian Air Force, then Scalp would not be used on the terrorist or the terrorist or their infrastructure. Scalp would be used to take out the enemy air defense from a safe distance. And Hammer bombs would be used to destroy the individual missile launchers on the battlefield, but for this to happen, it was important that the Indian Air Force or the Rafael also have as part of its weapons the Meteor BVR. The Meteor beyond visual range missile for the air to air combat and it finds no mention at all in this Operation Sindoor book. The book does not mention Meteor at all. So, the point is, was Meteor not taken? Because after all, India's naval advisor in Indonesia, a officer called Captain Shiv Kumar in one of the one of the seminars there, he mentioned that yes, India had some losses of fighter jets on the first night. Something that has also been hinted by the Chief of Defense Staff as well as Air Marshal Bharti of the Air Headquarters in his own briefings. And he said Shiv Kumar said, but the Indian Air Force was working under constraints because it was not supposed to target the military infrastructure, implying the air defense of Pakistan. But having said all that, we also heard the Air Force Chief himself, Air Chief Marshal AP Singh, when he was delivering a lecture five months later in August 2025, he was giving a lecture at this LM Kothari Memorial lecture in Bangalore. Where he said that the objective, that means his objective of the Air Force was to teach terrorists a lesson that they know what price they will pay. Now, the Air Chief had had enough service to know that we've been trying to teach the lesson to the terrorists right from 1990 onwards, but they are the wrong people to teach the lesson. The lesson has to be taught to the Pakistan military and not to the terrorist because the terrorist supplies un-ending. But that besides, let us accept that this is his objective, after that he says that no constraints were put from the top on him. And all the all the things or the constraints if they were there, they were self-imposed, he says. In other word, the Air Chief now gives a clean chit to the CCS and the Prime Minister that they did not put any constraints and it is he himself who decided he decided that this is the weapon package that the Rafales will carry and he will only target the the terrorist and their infrastructure. Now, let's take this discussion forward after what he has said. Now, my point is that as a Air Chief, did he know, did he have the ISR. Did he know, did he have the capability or or or the or the surveillance capability. Did he know that how many of the Pakistani fighter jets which were there, because if he had that idea, then certainly he would have done something else. For example, we know that after the first night air attack, the Pakistan Air Force, they gave a briefing to the international media, where they said that we had electronic identification of all the fighter jets of the Indian Air Force. So, the point that I want to make is it doesn't matter what the Air Chief says, whether he wants to take the blame himself or put the blame there, that is immaterial. What has happened in Sindoor, everybody understands, but here is my bottom line. Please understand that after Operation Sindoor, the threat has increased manifold. And India's preparedness is not keeping pace with it. And now in my next video, I will talk about the lessons of Operation Sindoor. Thank you so much.
