The drone attack on the Jammu airbase seriously escalates the threat of terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir from Pakistan. Earlier, drones from across the border have been used to drop weapons in Punjab for terrorist purposes. In those cases, the targets were not military. However, in the Jammu drone attack, the target was an Air Force base with the intention no doubt to cause serious material damage.
Even if this objective was not realised, the message that our air bases close to the Pakistan border are now vulnerable has been conveyed.
The drone used in the Jammu Air Force Station attack was a relatively less sophisticated one, but in future more potent drones with greater reach can be used. That will depend on the calculations of the Pakistani elements behind this escalation and how much they think they can get away with, as well as their assessment of the options available to New Delhi.
Because drones fly low, they escape detection by radars and interjection by air defence systems.
Drones have been used with deadly effect, for example, from Yemeni soil against the Saudi oil installations. They have also been used militarily with great success against the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh by Turkey-supported Azerbaijani forces. The Chinese have used drones for aerial surveillance in Ladakh during the current stand-off. The Americans have used armed drones in Afghanistan and in Iraq to eliminate terrorists, and even a high-ranking serving military officer as in the case of the Iranian General Qasem Soleimani.
Drone swarms are now part of the panoply of a country’s military arsenal. India too has acquired armed drones from the US for maritime security.
This new security challenge that has surfaced has to be effectively met. It is not possible for local Kashmiri elements to, without external help, get access to drones and get trained to operate them with explosive charges and target acquisition. An in-depth investigation is needed to determine the trajectory of the drone used in the Jammu Air Force Station attack and the source of the technical support needed for operating it. It can safely be assumed that Pakistani elements are behind this one way or another. It is well to recall the attack on the Pathankot air base in 2016 wherein the Jaish-e-Mohammed was involved. Judging from the manner in which Pakistan treated the Pathankot investigation, there is no doubt that it was carried out with the connivance of Pakistan-based ISI.
Ceasefire: A Win-Win For Both Sides
India has to carefully evaluate its options. According to our Army chief, the ceasefire along the Line of Control (LoC) has been holding well barring a minor infraction. He has acknowledged the absence of attempts by Pakistan to infiltrate terrorists with covering fire. The tenor of statements from the Indian side has been supple lately, suggesting that we see value in preserving the ceasefire, if for nothing else than protecting our civilian population from the firing across the LoC.
A ceasefire on our western border is also helpful in fully concentrating on the military stand-off with China on our northern border. For Pakistan, putting a stop to punishing fire from the Indian side would be a consideration, besides the need to concentrate on the developments on its border with Afghanistan. Pakistan may also be calculating that for it to exit from the Financial Action Task Force or FATF grey list a ceasefire with India and curbing terrorist infiltration would add to its credibility in making the case that it was seriously addressing the FATF concerns.
Pakistan’s Malevolence: A Permanent Feature
On the other hand, the anti-India political rhetoric from Pakistan has not significantly abated. In his recent interview with The New York Times, Imran Khan projected himself as someone who is loved and respected in India, a peace-maker looking for a civilised trade relationship with New Delhi. Durign the interview, he hit hit against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s RSS ideology.
Khan’s condition for a dialogue with India is a reversal of the 5 August, 2019, changes in Jammu and Kashmir. He is living in a fantasy world if he really believes what he says. If Khan thinks that this is the right propagandist line to take with the “liberal” US press, which is antipathetic towards Modi, he is exhibiting his lack of political maturity.
Pakistan’s foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has developed a new concept that the size of a diplomatic mission in a country depends on whether it is a neighbour or not. According to him, India, not being a neighbour of Afghanistan, has a larger presence in Afghanistan than what is necessary. He also alleged that India uses its presence in Afghanistan to promote terrorist activity against Pakistan.
Pakistan National Security Adviser Moeed Yusuf claims that Kashmir has never belonged to India and that after India inevitably reverses its 5 August, 2019, decisions, Pakistan will consider a dialogue with India. Pakistan seems to believe that India’s policy in Kashmir is failing, and that it can leverage opinion in the US administration against Indian actions in Jammu and Kashmir to its advantage. And this, even as its interventionist policy in Afghanistan is succeeding with the US consent.
It is not unlikely that Pakistan may have reasoned that with India embroiled with China in the north, the internal situation in Kashmir still unsettled, the cooperation of the old political class still needed to implement the post 5 August agenda of the Modi government, and the developments in Afghanistan which have compelled India to reach out to the Taliban contrary to long-standing policy ” no doubt to ward off concerns about an externally abetted revival of terrorist activity in Kashmir ” upping the ante on Kashmir was needed to put India on the defensive.
If India retaliated, it would be accused of violating the ceasefire and distracting Pakistan from constructively cooperating with the US to facilitate its withdrawal from Afghanistan. It will argue, as it has always done, that it is wrongly blamed by India for its own failures to control the insurgency in Kashmir.
Pakistan’s malevolence towards India remains a fundamental feature of its foreign policy.
It is most important that the result of India’s meticulous investigation of the drone attack is widely shared domestically and internationally. India could bring the incident to the attention of the Security Council of which it is currently a member. A clear warning should go to Pakistan that India reserves the right to react appropriately to such a dangerous provocation at a time of its own choosing.

CDS General Bipin Rawat with three armed forces chiefs
The proposed cyber command will marry the individual capabilities of all the three services to protect the military from being vulnerable to cyber-attacks from India’s adversaries.
With the threat of cyber attacks mounting against the Indian armed forces, the Department of Military Affairs (DMA) is planning to send up to 100 personnel to US to train in latest cybersecurity technology and artificial intelligence (AI) for future warfare.
According to South Block officials, the US, under the 2016 Cyber Framework and defence cooperation agreement, has offered to train up to 100 military personnel in Silicon Valley to give them first-hand experience on how to counter cyber warfare and AI role in future defence and warfare.
While India military has a tri-service defence cyber agency under the integrated headquarters, the government is in favour of setting up of a proper cyber command in the hinterlands of Madhya Pradesh to give the fighting edge to the proposed theatre commands. The proposed cyber command will marry the individual capabilities of all the three services to protect the military from being vulnerable to cyber-attacks from India’s adversaries.
The charter of the command will be also to ensure that Indian military communications are secure and systems are not contaminated with any malware by adversaries in the forward formations like the sensitive Siliguri Corps, Tezpur Corps and the Northern Command including the Ladakh Corps facing Tibet. The Siliguri Corps facing Chumbi Valley has in the past decade seen cyber attacks through malware for not only corrupting the software but also leakage of sensitive documentation to the adversary.
With AI, cyber warfare, armed drones and standalone weapon systems now being part of warfare, the cyber military command will have to dump the World War II concepts of strike and defending corps and prepare for a future where war shifts seamlessly from missile to cyberattacks. The cybersecurity is being taken seriously by national security planners as Chinese PLA and the Ministry of State Security have high end capability to target the adversary through new age weapons.

Photo for representation only. File photo

Tribune News Service

Ambala, June 30

The police have booked an Army Havildar after he allegedly hit an on-duty police head constable at the Capitol Chowk in Ambala Cantonment.

The suspect has been identified as Anil Kumar, a resident of Himachal Pradesh. At present, he is posted with 24 Grenadiers in Ambala Cantonment.

As per information, the incident took place on the intervening night of Monday and Tuesday when the suspect had a scuffle with head constables Krishan Kumar and Kuldeep Singh of the Regiment Bazaar police post in Ambala Cantonment.

In his complaint, Krishan Kumar stated that they were at the Capitol Chowk when they observed that an uncontrolled car was coming from the Military Hospital side. The suspect, who was drunk, stopped his car and started abusing them. He hit the head constable on his face and neck, after which he started bleeding.

A case has been registered against Anil Kumar under Sections 186, 332, 353, 427 and 506 of the Indian Penal Code at the Ambala Cantonment police station.

Dismiss Pak NSA’s comment on Indian contacts with Taliban

Afghan Commando forces are seen at the site of a battlefield where they clash with the Taliban insurgent in Kunduz province, Afghanistan. Reuters file

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, June 30

Pakistan National Security Adviser Moeed Yusuf’s comment that it is “shameless” of India to engage the Afghan Taliban in Qatar has been dismissed by strategic experts.

“I want to ask this: with what standing did this Indian high-level official meet the Taliban there? Did they not feel ashamed?” Yusuf said in a TV programme when asked how Pakistan viewed the India-Taliban meetings.

“They kept having the Taliban killed daily and kept giving funds for operations against them and today they have reached there to have talks,” he added.

“Could not understand his logic why India should not engage with Taliban, except that he appears very upset. Or does he claim proprietary rights and allows only a few to engage with the Taliban? He will be even more upset as the Taliban leadership displays more independence,” commented former Indian ambassador to Afghanistan Amar Sinha.

“India’s outreach to the Taliban is limited and late-in-the-day. But it seems to have upset Pindi enough for them to evoke “shame” with no sense of irony whatsoever. I guess the message from the Taliban to India isn’t all that bad after all,” observed Avinash Paliwal, strategic expert and the author of a well-received book on India’s role in Afghanistan in the 80s.

The Ministry of External Affairs has dismissed speculation that EAM S. Jaishankar had met top Taliban leaders during his recent visits to Qatar. But Qatar’s Special Envoy for Counterterrorism Mutlaq bin Majed Al Qahtani said at a webinar that, “there has been a quiet visit by Indian officials to speak to the Taliban”.

Claims attempts being made to provoke them for several days

Vibha Sharma
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, June 30

The Samyukt Kisan Morcha on Wednesday condemned the “provocative behaviour of BJP-RSS goons to instigate protesting farmers at Ghazipur border and disrupt their peaceful protests”, claiming attempts being made to provoke them for several days.

The BJP in turn blamed the agitating farmers for the ruckus in Ghazipur on the Delhi-Uttar Pradesh border and damaging vehicles belonging to party supporters. 

Though, as per a statement issued by the SKM, “for several days now, BJP-RSS goons have been trying to instigate and provoke protesting farmers at Ghazipur border. On the pretext of welcoming a BJP leader, Amit Valmiki, several BJP-RSS workers and supporters came into the Ghazipur border UP Gate protest site today and went close to the morcha stage.

“They also raised slogans against the farmers’ movement. They raised slogans against protesting farmers calling them ‘gaddar’, anti-national, ‘khalistanis’ and terrorists and indulged in stone-pelting on the morcha stage”.

Stating that there was “absolutely no justification to welcoming the BJP leader at this location”, Morcha leaders claimed it was done only to “instigate a clash with the protesting farmers, police in tow, in a time-testing BJP-RSS tactic”.

“When they moved aggressively towards the stage, threatened to cross over the divider, farmers objected and confronted them with black flags. They insisted that BJP workers should leave the place. Police remained mute spectators throughout. In the ensuing clash, at least 5 farmers were injured,” they claimed, accusing the BJP of “trying to bring in discord and disturbance and dividing people into caste and religion lines”.

Demanding to know who allowed “welcoming of the BJP leader” hardly 50 metres from the SKM stage, they termed the “allegations of weapons being found and vehicles being damaged as political diversionary tactics”. 

A complaint has been lodged by the protesting farmers at the local police station, they also said.https://1768d7b2d138d241b8f7ed6f9af53e1b.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

The ruckus took place when BJP workers were carrying out a procession on a flyway where farm law protesters, mainly supporters of the Rakesh Tikait-led BKU have been camping for the past several months now.

According to the eyewitness accounts, as the two sides came near each other on the Delhi-Meerut Expressway around noon, a scuffle broke out.

Videos and pictures surfaced on social media, purportedly showing some damaged vehicles which were part of a cavalcade of Valmiki, for whose welcome the procession was being held.

Meanwhile, agitating farmers observed ‘Hool Kranti Diwas’ at protest sites today to remember resistance and sacrifice of Adivasis in India’s independence struggle, and for a just and equitable land tenure system.https://1768d7b2d138d241b8f7ed6f9af53e1b.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

Several Adivasi farmers from Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh were part of the morchas today, the SKM said. 

In Maharashtra, SKM leaders and All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee met with the chief minister, demanding an assembly resolution in the upcoming session on July 5 “on the Centre repealing the 3 black acts and bring a statute on MSP guarantee for farmers”.

Amid reports of the Centre bringing in a Bill to convert the Delhi air pollution-related ordinance into a central law in the upcoming Parliament session, the SKM also asked the “government to not bring covert and sly provisions of penalising farmers for straw burning in this legislation”.

“The government had orally assured the protesting farmers that penalty provisions will not be applicable to farmers, during the talks between SKM leaders and the government, in late December 2020,” they said.

According to the SKM, more farmers are reaching the protest sites at Singhu border and Tikri border.

Says entire Pakistan stands by their Kashmiri brothers and sisters

Imran Khan. Reuters file

Islamabad, June 30

Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Wednesday that Pakistan would not restore diplomatic ties with India until New Delhi revokes its decision of scrapping the special status of Jammu and Kashmir.

India abrogated the special status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 on August 5, 2019 and bifurcated it into two Union territories.

“I want to make it clear that diplomatic relations will not be restored with India until it rescinds the illegal steps of 5th August 2019,” Khan said while addressing the National Assembly.

Khan said that “entire Pakistan stands by their Kashmiri brothers and sisters”.

His statement comes amid reports of back-channel contacts between the two sides which led to a ceasefire on the Line of Control in February but no further movement has been reported to normalise the ties.

Pakistan had downgraded ties with India and suspended trade after the Indian government revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir.

India has maintained that the issue related to Article 370 of the Indian Constitution was entirely an internal matter of the country.

India has also made it clear to Pakistan that it desires normal neighbourly relations with Islamabad in an environment free of terror, hostility and violence.

Meanwhile, the Foreign Office on Wednesday categorically rejected a reported statement of Union Minister of State for Home Affairs G Kishan Reddy regarding the recent drone attack in Jammu and Kashmir.

Two explosives-laden drones crashed into the IAF station at Jammu airport in the early hours of Sunday, perhaps the first time that suspected Pakistan-based terrorists have used unmanned aerial vehicles in an attack.

Reddy had reportedly said that Pakistan’s role in the attack cannot be denied. PTI

• Photo Source: ANIIndian Air Chief becomes first foreign service head to review Bangladesh Air Force passing out paradeNew Delhi [India], June 29, 2021 (ANI): Signifying the strong bonds between India and Bangladesh, Indian Air Force chief RKS Bhadauria reviewed the Passing Out Parade and Commissioning Ceremony at Bangladesh Air Force Academy (BAFA) at Jashore in Bangladesh.This was the first instance when any foreign chief was invited to review the Parade as the Chief Guest, the Indian Air Force said. Bhadauria was invited by his Bangladeshi counterpart Air Marshal Shaikh Abdul Hannan to review the Passing Out Parade and Commissioning Ceremony at Bangladesh Air Force Academy (BAFA).The event was held in Jashore on Monday. The two-day visit was highly significant in view of the Golden Jubilee of the historic victory in 1971 War for Liberation of Bangladesh. While addressing the graduating trainees on parade, CAS complimented them for an excellent parade and noted the rapid progress being made in all aspects of military-level interactions, with bilateral defence cooperation having become an important pillar in the deep historical and fraternal ties between India and Bangladesh.The Indian air chief described this event as a reflection of the excellent state of professional relationship between the two Air Forces based on mutual trust and understanding. He expressed confidence that his presence in BAFA during this historic 50th year of Liberation War would reinforce the already strong and multi-dimensional partnership between the two Nations.During his stay in Bangladesh, the CAS held discussions with his host, the Chief of Air Staff Bangladesh Air Force as well as the Chief of Army Staff and Principal Staff Officer, Armed Forces Division, wherein matters of mutual interest and avenues to further strengthen the all-encompassing defence cooperation were discussed. He also interacted with the High Commissioner of India, Vikram K Doraiswami during his stay in Dhaka. (ANI) 

Speaking at the ‘Global scourge of terrorism: assessment of current threats and emerging trends for the new decade’, V S K Kaumudi said, ‘another add-on’ to ‘existing worries’ is the use of drones.
India called on the world to remain united against tendencies of labelling terrorism based on terrorist motivations especially those based on religion, and political ideologies.
The possibility of the use of weaponised drones for terrorist activities against strategic and commercial assets calls for serious attention by the global community, India has told the UN General Assembly, a day after two explosives-laden drones crashed into the Indian Air Force (IAF) station at Jammu airport.
A fresh attempt to attack a military installation with the help of drones was foiled by alert Army sentries at the Ratnuchak-Kaluchak station who fired at the unmanned aerial vehicles that flew away, an incident that came hours after an IAF station saw the first terror attack using quadcopters.
The first drone was spotted at around 11.45 pm on Sunday followed by another at 2.40 am over the military station, which witnessed a terror attack in 2002 in which 31 people were killed, including 10 children. The IAF attack is the first instance of suspected Pakistan-based terrorists deploying drones to strike at the country’s vital installations.
“Today, misuse of information and communication technology such as internet and social media for terrorist propaganda, radicalisation and recruitment of cadre; misuse of new payment methods and crowdfunding platforms for financing of terrorism; and misuse of emerging technologies for terrorist purposes have emerged as the most serious threats of terrorism and will decide the counter-terrorism paradigm going forward,” Special Secretary (Internal Security), Ministry of Home Affairs in the Government of India, VSK Kaumudi said.
Speaking at the ‘Global scourge of terrorism: assessment of current threats and emerging trends for the new decade’, he said, ‘another add-on’ to ‘existing worries’ is the use of drones.
“Being a low-cost option and easily available, utilisation of these aerial/sub-surface platforms for sinister purposes by terrorist groups such as intelligence collection, weapon/explosives delivery and targeted attacks have become an imminent danger and challenge for security agencies worldwide,” he said at the 2nd High Level Conference of the Head of Counter-Terrorism Agencies of the Member States in the General Assembly.
“The possibility of the use of weaponised drones for terrorist purposes against strategic and commercial assets calls for serious attention by the member states. We have witnessed terrorists using UAS to smuggle weapons across borders,” Kaumudi said, according to his statement issued by the Permanent Mission of India to the UN.
Kaumudi said the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent isolation have further accentuated the impact of the internet on people making them vulnerable to radicalisation and recruitment by terrorist groups.
Spreading terrorist propaganda through the use of “indulging video games” is another strategy that was deployed by terrorist groups during the pandemic, he said.
“It is imperative for countries to adopt a multi-pronged approach to tackle the global threats emanating out of misuse of new technologies particularly aiming towards terrorism and violent extremism conducive to terrorism,” he said.
India called on the world to remain united against tendencies of labelling terrorism based on terrorist motivations especially those based on religion, and political ideologies.
“This will certainly divide us and weaken our fight against terrorism,” Kaumudi said.
He said the trans border nature of this threat calls for collective and unified action by the international community, without any excuse or exceptions, ensuring that those countries which provide safe havens to terrorists should be called out and held accountable.
India noted with concern that internet and social media platforms have turned into indispensable resources in the toolkit of global terrorist groups for spreading terrorist propaganda and conspiracy theories aimed at spreading hatred among societies and communities and offer additional radicalisation opportunities which may proliferate globally.
“The increased use of closed group communications adds to the concern,” he said.
Kaumudi told the General Assembly that continuing advancements in evolving technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence, robotics, “deep fakes”, blockchain, dark web are fraught with the risk of being abused by terrorists. “Already, cryptocurrencies, virtual assets, crowdfunding platforms are helping terror financing, owing to anonymity and un-traceability of these technologies,” he said.
India has put in place an elaborate counter-terrorism and security architecture, besides introducing a series of measures in the cyber-space encapsulating counter-radicalisation and de-radicalisation strategies.

An Indian Air Force Sukhoi Su-30MKI jet flies in the backdrop of Himalayan mountain ranges
The lack of “jointness”, integrated planning and synergy between the three armed forces, has been a distinctive feature of the Indian military
by C Uday Bhaskar
India is all set to create four new theatre commands and, in all likelihood, this will be announced by Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi from the Red Fort on August 15. These new commands will be raised and operationalised over a two-year period and will be viable by August 2023.
The new commands will include the integrated maritime theatre command (IMTC) and the integrated air-defence command (IADC), which had been earlier described as a low-hanging fruit in the radical rewiring of India’s higher defence management, a policy initiative that has been in stasis since the 1999 Kargil War. The other two commands will be China- and Pakistan-specific.
PM Modi announced the creation of the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) in his August 2019 Independence Day address. The first incumbent, General Bipin Rawat, assumed office on January 1, 2020, and this was welcomed as a much-needed but long-delayed first step in the reorganisation of India’s higher defence management (HDM).
The lack of “jointness”, integrated planning and synergy between the three armed forces, has been a distinctive feature of the Indian military. In particular, there here has been less-than-satisfactory utilisation of airpower, perhaps due to a degree of diffidence and lack of clarity in the use of trans-border military capability embedded in Indian strategic culture. India did not use its modest-but-credible airpower in October 1962 when China chose to teach Jawaharlal Nehru a lesson in realpolitik.
And for the record, there was no reference to airpower in Galwan of 2020. Similarly, the 1999 Kargil War and the 1987 Indian Peace Keeping Force operation in Sri Lanka saw less than optimal integration of airpower in the military effort.
Thus the need for more effective jointness/synergy among India’s three armed forces was acknowledged post-Kargil and the report of the Group of Ministers (2000) recommended the creation of the post of a CDS and a VCDS as the “first major step in establishing synergy and ‘jointness’ among the Armed Forces”. Very soon, the first integrated, tri-service command was established in Port Blair as the Andaman and Nicobar Command (ANC), with then Vice-Admiral Arun Prakash as the first Commander-in-Chief. It was expected that, progressively, greater jointness/synergy would be nurtured and that India would move towards setting up such tri-service commands, wherein the sum of their individual assets under a single commander would be more effective than that of their individual verticals that were disparately located.
However the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, at the time, was unable to pursue these initiatives with the requisite resolve and this went into the back-burner for over a decade. To his credit, PM Modi, after an indifferent scorecard in his first term in the domain of defence management, accorded this high priority in his second term, and hit the ground running.
In August 2019, CDS was announced. In August, the new commands are on the anvil and the directive is that these commands should become operational in August 2023. This taut timeline and the visible political direction is commendable, but this long-delayed reform towards enabling greater jointness in India’s HDM will call for making haste slowly, and only after objective deliberation among the principal stakeholders.
Recent media reports refer to a degree of dissonance within the military and the Indian Air Force has been painted as the dog-in-the-manger in the creation of the new commands. This is unfortunate and undesirable, whatever be the truth behind such aspersions.
India’s integrated tri-service commands (one is hesitant to use the word theatre) can become truly effective only when all the interlocutors are brought onto the same page consensually and by persuasion. The reforms in HDM and related military command structure cannot be effectively realised by political diktat. Compliance can be ensured, albeit in a sullen manner, for, in a democracy, the political direction must be obeyed by the military but giving all the three forces a robust sense of ownership would lay stronger foundations.
Thirty years after economic reforms, there are lessons for India as it embarks on the next phase of reforms in the defence domain. A combination of political leadership, technocratic talent, and willingness to build on work left behind by previous governments helped steer through the reforms. PM Modi has given the necessary direction and priority to reforming India’s defence management. Defence minister Rajnath Singh has an onerous responsibility and, given his political experience both as former party president and home minister, he would be able to provide the necessary political leadership and heft. But the rigorous staff work and internal deliberations within the government will have to be undertaken objectively and without any rancour and in a non-partisan manner. Effective and enhanced jointness to prevent another Galwan/Pulwama must be the objective.