Kanti P. Bajpai

A workmanlike account of a very misty episode in India's military strategy and relations with Pakistan - the massing of troops and armor on the western front during 1986-87 under the guise of a military 'exercise', which is not to be confused with an 'operation'. Naturally this raised alarm bells across the border, and got the Americans to actively intervene and establish communications and a deescalation of tensions. The account provides an eye-opening and somewhat disquieting look into the unmindful ways such strategies are conceived and carried out by the political leadership and the army (Indian in this case, but doubtless parallels can be found in the other camps as well). Especially in the background of the ongoing devastation of Ukraine by the Russian forces, this episode makes it all the more important that clear and continuous communication is maintained between countries at different levels, both civil and military, and that misinformation is weeded out and the limits of each others' tolerance or forbearance are known and appropriate correctives applied in real time, with or without third-party facilitation.… (plus d'informations)