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> They were unable to locate the terrorists even after two or three weeks and needed a distraction. This does not make sense. When France attacked Daesh in 201

by enugu 1y ago

> They were unable to locate the terrorists even after two or three weeks and needed a distraction. This does not make sense. When France attacked Daesh in 2015 after the terrorist attacks in Paris or when the US attacked Afghanistan after 9/11, the objective wasn't to target the exact people who carried out the attacks, but the organization behind the attacks. People can always be found as long as the organization remains. The goal of the attacks would be to make any future terrorist attack an expensive option for the Pakistani military as opposed to something which can be done routinely. There was a sharp drop in the terrorist attacks in Kashmir after the 2019 confrontation.

lazide 1y ago
1) Pakistan is a lot less stable right now than 2019 (as is the world). 2) The putative organization is in Pakistan, and likely supported by the military. The biggest threat India is doing (IMO) is threatening the water supply. That is getting everyone in Pakistan’s attention. These strikes are more about managing the local political situation in India, which requires some degree of obvious violent retribution.
- enugu 1y ago
  The incentives of the Pakistani generals to permit organizations like LeT to commit further terrorist attacks is a different domain from whatever the local political situation is like in India. There has been a past regime where Pakistani generals were able to train and send militants regularly to conduct terror attacks in India. Without an effective response from India putting pressure on these generals, that can easily become the new normal again.
  - lazide 1y ago
    Do you think (plausibly) threatening to cut off water to large swathes of Pakistan, or blowing up some random terrorist camps, is the bigger actual threat?
    - enugu 1y ago
      Cutting off water supply is clearly the bigger threat. However, it involves a longer time frame - building infrastructure which one expects not to use in a normal situation. Importantly, even once built, it selects the wrong targets, not terrorists or military bases - but regular people who will be faced with scarcity of water and food, as the crops use Indus water. This would be something highly unethical, and also not something sustainable - once visuals of hunger start reaching screens across the world, the force to restart the supply would be strong.
      - int_19h 1y ago
        What force, though? Israel does something similar, and how much actual pushback (as opposed to sternly worded statements) did it actually get? Even if it were to translate to sanctions, I'm not so sure BJP wouldn't welcome it. "The Fatherland is besieged, let's unite together around Dear Leader and fight back like one" tends to be a very popular take in authoritarian countries for a reason, and it's that much easier to pull off when you can actually point at some way in which your country is targeted.
        enugu 1y ago
        Dont buy your description of India. Elections matter, BJP can and does lose many elections, India is dependent on oil from Gulf countries, it doesn't have US to shield it from actions which it shouldn't even be doing in the first place, there are much better options against Pakistan etc.
        int_19h 1y ago
        I'm not saying that India is full-on authoritarian today. But it's definitely edging in that direction under BJP, and I could see them embracing the war as their ultimate ticket to get there. I mean, if there is a shooting war with Pakistan, and they can credibly blame Pakistan for starting it, what will it do to BJP electoral standing? As far as US, under Trump, I'd actually expect it to back Modi.
        1y ago
- arjun1296 1y ago
  [dead]
- m0llusk 1y ago
  "less stable" === yikes
- rendang 1y ago
  Can India build new aqueducts/pipelines to divert water from the headwaters they control? Dams only have finite capacity after all
  - lazide 1y ago
    Yes, albeit they would be susceptible to being shelled. With, uh, unpredictable but likely bad consequences if they happens.
nindalf 1y ago
> There was a sharp drop in the terrorist attacks in Kashmir after the 2019 confrontation. There were fewer terrorist attacks, certainly. I'm sure the Indian government would like to believe that the 2019 strike had an effect, but far more likely causes are - Money. Pakistan's economy has stagnated and the country has lurched from one IMF bailout to the next (2019, 2023, 2024). It got so bad at one point that politicians were asking people to drink less tea so they could conserve foreign currency. - Covid. Affected everything, but certainly harder to think about waging conflict when such a massive problem is affecting the country. - Internal political instability, especially when Imran Khan took on the military and lost. The military was actually in danger of losing their primacy for the first time in decades. - Conflict with the Taliban and Pakistani Taliban. The ISI had nurtured the Taliban to be tame pets and it turned out not to be the case. Crushing these was the highest priority, not least because it made their policy of nurturing terrorists look idiotic. All of these factors meant Pakistan wasn't and isn't in the best shape to wage war overtly or covertly with India. India's economy has continued to grow, in contrast to Pakistan. The official Indian policy of "benign neglect" towards Pakistan appeared to work well. I'm sure these attacks will be spun as a success in the future. Safe to say a Bollywood movie dramatising the events is already in the works. But Pakistan's own economic and political problems are far more likely to influence its decisions to engage in this sort of behaviour.
- enugu 1y ago
  If you are actually arguing that a country targeted by a terrorist attack does not gain deterrence with a counterstrike relative to letting things go on, then how uniform do you consider this prescription? Should the terror attacks in the US or France not have had a military response? What happens to the incentives of terror groups in response to such a policy? --- The role of money only becomes an issue when conducting a terrorist attack becomes expensive. Missiles and jets consume much more money in comparison to training recruits via an intermediary organization like LeT and sending them across the border to carry out attacks. A regime in which a terror attack leads to a high pressure, expensive situation for the Pakistani military is completely different from regularly scheduled, train and deploy terror attacks from militants which used to happen earlier. In that situation, the military has to respond to economic pressure, pressure from allies and pressure from its own people.
arjun1296 1y ago
[dead]
whatshisface 1y ago
>when the US attacked Afghanistan after 9/11, the objective wasn't to target the exact people who carried out the attacks, but the organization behind the attacks The mission in Afghanistan was very much to find Bin Laden. It was changed after he escaped.
- SauciestGNU 1y ago
  Apropos of this conflict, to where did Bin Laden escape?
  - profsummergig 1y ago
    I hope it wasn't to a military cantonment in Pakistan. That would be wild.
- pwthornton 1y ago
  It was very much to dismantle Al Qaeda and senior leadership. Just killing Bin Laden wouldn’t have done that much.
reverendsteveii 1y ago
We could have gone after the people who actually did 9/11 but that was a bit of a non-starter. Also I think you're equivocating between multiple interpretations of "the terrorists" when most people absolutely wouldn't draw a distinguishing line between, using 9/11 as an example again, the actual hijackers and Osama bin Laden. There's absolutely no question that any time the phrase "the 9/11 terrorists" is used it means both the actual perpetrators and the people who planned and supported the attack.
- enugu 1y ago
  The context was a reply to an assertion that the terrorists in Pahalgam were not found by Indian security. I interpreted this as people who physically did the attack. If by terrorists, we mean the planners of the operation, that trail leads directly to Pakistan. Musharraf, the ex-army chief, is on record saying that the military has funded several militant organizations in Kashmir including LeT. (Osama's haveli in Abbotabad was incidentally also very close to the Pakistan Military Academy). The permission for the operations probably came all the way from the top as the attack came right after a strong statement on Kashmir by the army chief.
  - dmurray 1y ago
    "funding militant organizations" isn't the same as committing acts of terrorism. Nobody would have said the US should have responded to the 9/11 attacks with airstrikes on the CIA headquarters.
    - enugu 1y ago
      We are not talking about re-targeting of training and weapons from Afghanistan to Manhattan, but direct planning of an attack with ability to restrain and release the groups on demand. Contra the truthers, even the CIA wouldn't go that far. Musharraf explicitly mentioned the groups operating in Kashmir. He wasn't talking about fighters in Afghanistan.
      - somenameforme 1y ago

by enugu 1y ago

lazide 1y ago

1) Pakistan is a lot less stable right now than 2019 (as is the world). 2) The putative organization is in Pakistan, and likely supported by the military. The biggest threat India is doing (IMO) is threatening the water supply. That is getting everyone in Pakistan’s attention. These strikes are more about managing the local political situation in India, which requires some degree of obvious violent retribution.

enugu 1y ago
The incentives of the Pakistani generals to permit organizations like LeT to commit further terrorist attacks is a different domain from whatever the local political situation is like in India. There has been a past regime where Pakistani generals were able to train and send militants regularly to conduct terror attacks in India. Without an effective response from India putting pressure on these generals, that can easily become the new normal again.
- lazide 1y ago
  Do you think (plausibly) threatening to cut off water to large swathes of Pakistan, or blowing up some random terrorist camps, is the bigger actual threat?
  - enugu 1y ago
    Cutting off water supply is clearly the bigger threat. However, it involves a longer time frame - building infrastructure which one expects not to use in a normal situation. Importantly, even once built, it selects the wrong targets, not terrorists or military bases - but regular people who will be faced with scarcity of water and food, as the crops use Indus water. This would be something highly unethical, and also not something sustainable - once visuals of hunger start reaching screens across the world, the force to restart the supply would be strong.
    - int_19h 1y ago
      What force, though? Israel does something similar, and how much actual pushback (as opposed to sternly worded statements) did it actually get? Even if it were to translate to sanctions, I'm not so sure BJP wouldn't welcome it. "The Fatherland is besieged, let's unite together around Dear Leader and fight back like one" tends to be a very popular take in authoritarian countries for a reason, and it's that much easier to pull off when you can actually point at some way in which your country is targeted.
      - enugu 1y ago
        Dont buy your description of India. Elections matter, BJP can and does lose many elections, India is dependent on oil from Gulf countries, it doesn't have US to shield it from actions which it shouldn't even be doing in the first place, there are much better options against Pakistan etc.
        int_19h 1y ago
        I'm not saying that India is full-on authoritarian today. But it's definitely edging in that direction under BJP, and I could see them embracing the war as their ultimate ticket to get there. I mean, if there is a shooting war with Pakistan, and they can credibly blame Pakistan for starting it, what will it do to BJP electoral standing? As far as US, under Trump, I'd actually expect it to back Modi.
        1y ago
arjun1296 1y ago
[dead]
m0llusk 1y ago
"less stable" === yikes
rendang 1y ago
Can India build new aqueducts/pipelines to divert water from the headwaters they control? Dams only have finite capacity after all
- lazide 1y ago
  Yes, albeit they would be susceptible to being shelled. With, uh, unpredictable but likely bad consequences if they happens.

nindalf 1y ago

> There was a sharp drop in the terrorist attacks in Kashmir after the 2019 confrontation. There were fewer terrorist attacks, certainly. I'm sure the Indian government would like to believe that the 2019 strike had an effect, but far more likely causes are - Money. Pakistan's economy has stagnated and the country has lurched from one IMF bailout to the next (2019, 2023, 2024). It got so bad at one point that politicians were asking people to drink less tea so they could conserve foreign currency. - Covid. Affected everything, but certainly harder to think about waging conflict when such a massive problem is affecting the country. - Internal political instability, especially when Imran Khan took on the military and lost. The military was actually in danger of losing their primacy for the first time in decades. - Conflict with the Taliban and Pakistani Taliban. The ISI had nurtured the Taliban to be tame pets and it turned out not to be the case. Crushing these was the highest priority, not least because it made their policy of nurturing terrorists look idiotic. All of these factors meant Pakistan wasn't and isn't in the best shape to wage war overtly or covertly with India. India's economy has continued to grow, in contrast to Pakistan. The official Indian policy of "benign neglect" towards Pakistan appeared to work well. I'm sure these attacks will be spun as a success in the future. Safe to say a Bollywood movie dramatising the events is already in the works. But Pakistan's own economic and political problems are far more likely to influence its decisions to engage in this sort of behaviour.

enugu 1y ago
If you are actually arguing that a country targeted by a terrorist attack does not gain deterrence with a counterstrike relative to letting things go on, then how uniform do you consider this prescription? Should the terror attacks in the US or France not have had a military response? What happens to the incentives of terror groups in response to such a policy? --- The role of money only becomes an issue when conducting a terrorist attack becomes expensive. Missiles and jets consume much more money in comparison to training recruits via an intermediary organization like LeT and sending them across the border to carry out attacks. A regime in which a terror attack leads to a high pressure, expensive situation for the Pakistani military is completely different from regularly scheduled, train and deploy terror attacks from militants which used to happen earlier. In that situation, the military has to respond to economic pressure, pressure from allies and pressure from its own people.

arjun1296 1y ago

[dead]

whatshisface 1y ago

>when the US attacked Afghanistan after 9/11, the objective wasn't to target the exact people who carried out the attacks, but the organization behind the attacks The mission in Afghanistan was very much to find Bin Laden. It was changed after he escaped.

SauciestGNU 1y ago
Apropos of this conflict, to where did Bin Laden escape?
- profsummergig 1y ago
  I hope it wasn't to a military cantonment in Pakistan. That would be wild.
pwthornton 1y ago
It was very much to dismantle Al Qaeda and senior leadership. Just killing Bin Laden wouldn’t have done that much.

reverendsteveii 1y ago

We could have gone after the people who actually did 9/11 but that was a bit of a non-starter. Also I think you're equivocating between multiple interpretations of "the terrorists" when most people absolutely wouldn't draw a distinguishing line between, using 9/11 as an example again, the actual hijackers and Osama bin Laden. There's absolutely no question that any time the phrase "the 9/11 terrorists" is used it means both the actual perpetrators and the people who planned and supported the attack.

enugu 1y ago
The context was a reply to an assertion that the terrorists in Pahalgam were not found by Indian security. I interpreted this as people who physically did the attack. If by terrorists, we mean the planners of the operation, that trail leads directly to Pakistan. Musharraf, the ex-army chief, is on record saying that the military has funded several militant organizations in Kashmir including LeT. (Osama's haveli in Abbotabad was incidentally also very close to the Pakistan Military Academy). The permission for the operations probably came all the way from the top as the attack came right after a strong statement on Kashmir by the army chief.
- dmurray 1y ago
  "funding militant organizations" isn't the same as committing acts of terrorism. Nobody would have said the US should have responded to the 9/11 attacks with airstrikes on the CIA headquarters.
  - enugu 1y ago
    We are not talking about re-targeting of training and weapons from Afghanistan to Manhattan, but direct planning of an attack with ability to restrain and release the groups on demand. Contra the truthers, even the CIA wouldn't go that far. Musharraf explicitly mentioned the groups operating in Kashmir. He wasn't talking about fighters in Afghanistan.
    - somenameforme 1y ago