The Kashmir Crisis

Both sides have an interest in de-escalating but even if they do the underlying conflict remains unresolved.

An Indian solider patrols the Line of Control in North Kashmir (Photo by Nasir Kachroo/NurPhoto via Getty Images).

Watching two nuclear powers fight each other is not good for the nerves and inevitably leads to fears of a cataclysm. The best reason to stay calm is that the situation is not unprecedented. Since India and Pakistan both confirmed their nuclear status with tests in 1998 there have been many bouts of fighting between the two that have stayed relatively contained in both time and space without turning into major war.

There is a pattern, which so far the current crisis appears to be following. It begins with provocations in the contested territory of Kashmir, blamed by India on Pakistan but denied by Pakistan. This is followed by a flurry of military activity which achieves little. Eventually both sides return to how they were.

This is what is most likely to happen this time, not least because neither side seems prepared for anything more. The Pakistanis in particular can ill afford a prolonged crisis as their economy is already on the edge, and this may be decisive as they assess their next steps. There is always the risk that once two countries get into tit-for-tat exchanges neither will be willing to let the other have the last word but that can be fudged. More problematic is that the political context, both in terms of the situation in Kashmir and the state of Indo-Pakistani relations, has deteriorated.

Introducing nuclear weapons into a long-stranding adversarial relationship creates what has been described as the ‘stability-instability paradox’. The basic idea is that the prospect of mutual destruction can bring a sort of stability to inter-state relations at the highest level. It creates incentives to avoid all-out war. At the same time this evident reluctance to escalate allows for more instability at the lower levels. One side may feel it can take more risks on the assumption that the other will not want to turn a manageable conflict, even if quite violent, into something larger and more dangerous. Up to now India and Pakistan have provided a compelling example of this phenomenon at work.

Unfortunately the problem at the heart of this conflict – over the status of Kashmir - has not gone away and has become progressively more difficult as India has tightened its grip over the part of the territory it controls, which has added to local unrest. Moreover, while it may seem relatively low-cost to mount limited military operations they do not significantly change the security situation and so little is resolved. In this way each episode leaves a frustrating legacy.

History

The origins of this dispute go back to 1947 when Britain ended colonial rule in India and left with the country partitioned into India, secular and multi-national although with a strong Hindu majority, and the breakaway Pakistan, an avowedly Muslim state. The independent territory of Jammu and Kashmir (normally referred to just as Kashmir) had a majority Muslim population but a Hindu Maharajah. He agreed to join India on condition he was given support against Pakistani militias operating in his territory. This led to the first Indo-Pakistan War. The fighting ended with India controlling twice as much of the territory as Pakistan. (A small slice is occupied by China). Under UN auspices the front line was turned into a permanent ceasefire line.

The underlying dispute remained. In 1965 Pakistan attempted to foment an insurgency against Indian rule in its part of Kashmir. India responded by launching an attack on West Pakistan. The war lasted for a couple of weeks and involved large-scale tank battles and substantial casualties before a diplomatic effort by the Soviet Union and the US led to yet another ceasefire, at a time when India was in a relatively strong position.

Another agreement the next year had both sides promising to resolve their differences through peaceful means. This lasted until 1971 when East Pakistan sought independence from the more dominant western part of the country. West Pakistan responded with vicious repression, so that many refugees fled into India. By December 1971 war between the two seemed inevitable.

They attacked each other at about the same time. India’s campaign was far more successful. The war concluded with the surrender of Pakistani forces in the East and the creation of the new state of Bangladesh. India emerged from this conflict as far more powerful than Pakistan. It was, however, at this point that India decided that it needed its own nuclear capability, having been concerned at one point that the US might intervene on Pakistan’s side. Following India’s ‘peaceful’ nuclear test of 1974 Pakistan decided it had to follow the same path.

The 1971 war was followed by another attempt to improve relations. In the July 1972 Simla Agreement, the two countries agreed to:

‘put an end to the conflict and confrontation that have hitherto marred their relations and work for the promotion of a friendly and harmonious relationship and the establishment of durable peace in the sub-continent.’

Kashmir was still left divided. The major change was that the previous ceasefire line became known as the ‘Line of Control’ (LOC).

This lasted until the late 1980s when the character of the conflict began to change. Prompted by complaints about supposedly rigged local elections in 1987 an insurgency developed inside Indian-controlled Kashmir. Pakistan saw an opportunity to undermine India’s position and so encouraged the rebellion. There was a decade of internal violence, involving regular confrontations with Indian troops plus bombings and abductions. Despite an apparent breakthrough at an Indo-Pakistan summit in February 1999, when the two sides committed to normalising relations, fighting broke out again when infiltrators from Pakistan – claimed by India to be Pakistani soldiers - seized positions in the Kargil District of the Indian-administered part of Kashmir.

After two months of conflict the infiltrators were pushed out of most of the positions they had taken. As this was the year after the two sides had come out as nuclear powers there was a major push by the international community, and in particular the US, to end the conflict. Pakistan was put under pressure to withdraw its remaining forces from Indian territory. They were struggling in the fighting and had suffered high casualties (as many as 4,000 troops may have been killed). So the defeated Pakistanis withdrew and the ceasefire was restored.

Rather than risk more direct confrontations, Pakistani activity against India came to rely more on Islamist groups based in Pakistan and backed by the country’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). Not long after the attacks of 9/11 on the United States by al Qaeda, which had its own ISI links, there was a terrorist attack on the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly on 1 October 2001, causing 38 deaths, and then on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi on 13 December 2001, during which twelve people were killed, including the five terrorists who attacked the building.

India built up forces on its side of the Line of Control as it prepared to launch an attack to take out terrorist training camps on the other side of the border. Pakistani troops moved to their side of the LoC. Again intensive international diplomacy got the two sides to pull back. The US by this time was recruiting Pakistan into its campaign against al Qaeda and the Taliban in neighbouring Afghanistan.

The next major crisis came in November 2008, when for four days ten members of the Pakistan-based Islamist group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) laid siege to Mumbai, attacking a range of sites including hotels and a synagogue, resulting in 166 deaths along with nine of the terrorists. This crisis was defused when the two governments cooperated to bring the perpetrators to justice.

After this efforts were made to improve relations but every time there was a sign of progress there was a disruptive incident. In September 2016, an Indian army base was attacked close to the Line of Control, leaving 18 dead. This time Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), another group with alleged ties to ISI, was blamed. India responded with strikes against terrorist camps inside Pakistani-administered Kashmir. Oddly Pakistan denied that the strikes had taken place. One way of managing these clashes is for one side to say that it taken appropriate and severe action, which satisfies its people, while the other side denies that much has happened, which calms its people.

Regular fighting continued across the Line of ontrol, with thousands of cross-border strikes, leading to many deaths and civilians having to move from their homes. Eventually in the summer of 2018 the two countries agreed to reinstate the ceasefire but this did not last long. In February 2019 a convoy of Indian paramilitary forces was attacked, leaving 40 soldiers dead, with JeM claiming responsibility. There were more air strikes against terrorist training camps within Pakistani territory, although this time Pakistan responded with air strikes on Indian-administered Kashmir.

There was a twist in the situation when two Indian military aircraft were shot down and an Indian pilot was captured. The crisis again had elements of rumour and counter-rumour, with India claiming to have killed many militants and Pakistan denying this. For example, India contended that it had destroyed a madrassa, killing at least 300 people, yet there was no damage to the building, and Pakistan claimed no one had been killed in the strike. The crisis wound down with the release of the pilot, which Pakistan claimed was a goodwill gesture. India said it was a response to threats of missile strikes if he was not released.

After this latest bout of fighting was resolved, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a Hindu nationalist, decided that more drastic measures were needed to get a grip on the situation. He rolled back Kashmir’s privileged status, as enshrined in the Indian constitution, so that the territory could be run from New Delhi. Thousands of troops were sent into the territory to crack down on opposition. It was effectively shut down, with only spasmodic phone and internet services, the suppression of independent media, and a large numbers of Kashmiris imprisoned. Despite regular attacks on civilians and evident discontent Modi believed that order was being restored as the number of attacks went down.

It was perhaps confidence/complacency on this score that meant a tour group of largely Indian civilians was travelling in Pahalgam in Kashmir on 22 April.

The Current Crisis

The attack on this group that day led to 26 civilians being killed and another 20 injured. A group known as the Resistance Front (TRF) claimed responsibility online. This is an offshoot of LeT, formed after the 2019 crackdown in Kashmir. As with LeT it appears to operate from Pakistan. Pakistan immediately insisted that it had nothing to do with this attack, expressed its condolences and said that it would cooperate with an international inquiry into the incident. None of this impressed India, which was convinced of Pakistan’s culpability and demanded that it ceased support for ‘cross border terrorism’.

Inside Kashmir, Indian forces launched a major operation to find those responsible, leading to up to 2,000 people being detained and questioned, and homes of suspected militants demolished.

With India taking the initiative, both sides moved their relationship to an effective divorce, with visa-free travel and bilateral trade suspended, air space closed to each other’s aircraft, and reductions in diplomatic staff from already low levels. Communications between the two now appear to be largely through public statements with no evidence of any direct conversations. Most seriously, India suspended the Indus Waters Treaty, which has been in place for 65 years, leading Pakistan to warn that altering Pakistan’s Indus River flows could adversely affect its irrigation system and would be considered ‘an act of war.’

There was never much doubt that there would be military action. Almost immediately after the attack there were exchanges of fire across the LOC. There have been tests of short and medium-range Pakistani ballistic missiles and Indian civil defence drills. Pakistan warned on 28 April that an Indian attack was ‘imminent.’ Information Minister Attaullah Tarar observed that India would target terrorist facilities, ‘to symbolically demonstrate strength and avoid any major Pakistani retaliation—but this can hardly be guaranteed.’ The Chief of the Pakistani army, General Syed Asim Munir told troops during an exercise:

‘Let there be no ambiguity. Any military misadventure by India will be met with a swift, resolute and notch-up response.’

On 30 April Prime Minister Modi reportedly gave his military ‘complete operational freedom to decide on the mode, targets and timing of our response to the terror attack.’ The attacks came on the evening of 6 May. India said it targeted nine sites that were ‘terrorist infrastructure’ (distinguishing them carefully from Pakistani military assets) in what it described as a ‘focused, measured and non-escalatory’ manner. The targets were deep into Punjab province, which appeared to surprise Pakistani, as well as in Pakistan-administered Kashmir.

Pakistan confirmed that six sites had been hit and they do appear to be connected with JeM and LeT. Pakistan warned that it reserved the right to respond to the loss of civilian lives and the violation of its sovereignty ‘at a time, place and manner of its choosing.’ It also stated that its responses would be ‘measured’. It was already shelling Indian sites across the border. Most importantly it claimed that five Indian aircraft had been shot down. The Prime Minister Sheba’s Sharif (who is probably far less keen on a fight with India than his military command) has suggested that this constituted Pakistan's ‘reply’, that this might be sufficient retaliation in itself. While there has yet to be confirmation of five aircraft losses, there is of at least two and possibly three Indian aircraft, possibly a consequence of flying into the Punjab. In previous episodes of this conflict, as noted, a bit of exaggeration about military successes has helped with de-escalation.

What next?

A number of observations can be made:

First, whatever direct evidence India can come up with to link Pakistan with the attack of 22 April, there is no reason to doubt Pakistan’s sympathy with the insurgents’ cause in Indian-controlled Kashmir. The head of the Pakistani army, General Munir, is a former head of ISI and takes a hard line on Kashmir. He told an international audience in Islamabad six days before the attack that Kashmir is the country’s ‘jugular vein.’ He stated that: ‘We will not leave our Kashmiri brethren in their heroic struggle that they are waging against Indian occupation.’

Second, Pakistan is not in a great position should the fighting move to a more substantial level. India has the larger military - spending nine times more than Pakistan on its defence. It has some 1.5 million personnel in its armed forces, more than twice as many as Pakistan. It has superiority in tanks and artillery pieces. India’s Navy is large and Pakistan’s by comparison is small. India has the numerical advantage in aircraft. Both have some fourth-generation multi-role aircraft, with India having French Rafale and Pakistan the Chinese J-10s.

Third, because of its conventional disadvantages Pakistan is assumed to be more dependent on its nuclear forces than India. It has been vague about the point at which it would respond with its nuclear forces in the event of a full-scale Indian invasion. Should the conflict approach this point there will be concerns about whether India would attempt a pre-emptive strike. As this is a scary prospect it is important to be clear that we are currently far from such a situation and the language used by both sides indicates that they want to keep the fighting contained.

Fourth, Pakistan’s economy is recovering from a debt crisis and will feel the effects of a prolonged conflict. India’s economy is stronger and will suffer less. The importance of the Indus Water Treaty as an aggravating factor should not be underestimated. There are strong incentives on the Pakistani side to get this over and done with quickly.

Fifth, in the end the problem for India is that military action is unlikely to solve the political and security problems it faces in Kashmir. These have been exacerbated by its move to direct rule from New Delhi and a harsh crackdown on dissent. We have had decades now of governments trying to snuff out insurgencies by finding militants to kill and infrastructure to destroy without much success.

Sixth, there have been numerous expressions of regret and concern but there has been no concerted international effort to address this conflict, unsurprising given that international relations generally are in a mess. In the past one would have expected the US to take a leading role but that has not happened this time. President Trump pronounced the conflict a ‘shame’, and seemed to be hoping that the two sides would sort out their differences on their own. He has now indicated a readiness to help although no initiatives have been taken.

The need is to get beyond another ceasefire, of which there have been many since the conflict first erupted in 1947. The bigger challenge is to revive Indo-Pakistan relations from the dire state they have reached. This bout of fighting, as with previous bouts, has demonstrated that there is no automaticity when it comes to escalation and that the nuclear threshold between these two states may be quite high so long as their objectives stay limited. The problem with the sort of military exchanges we have just seen is not that they threaten a wider and more dangerous conflict so much as they achieve so little. It may be premature to assume that there will be no more substantial strikes and for now cross-border fire continues. There may be divisions in Islamabad about whether they need to do more to respond to the Indian strikes and the civilian deaths they caused. But if both India and Pakistan can satisfy themselves that they have done enough then there may be less need for outside actors to rush in to secure a ceasefire. But there is still much work to be done to get these two neighbours to talk sensibly and productively with each other.