India should adopt a pro-active strategy on Pakistan -- catalysing, facilitating and making room for a change in its anti-India posture.
Air Vice Marshal Arjun Subramaniam lists the major operational takeaways from the 1971 War in his new book 'India's Wars, A Military History, 1947-1971'.
The Indian Army, placing traditional weapons above high-technology, says that equipping the army's 800-plus combat units with a Battlefield Management System would cost an unaffordable Rs 500 billion to Rs 600 billion, reveals Ajai Shukla.
Officers responsible for preparing budgets say their detailed costing projections are mostly ignored. The defence ministry simply takes the previous year's budgetary allocations for each service and adds a small percentage to those.
'If this were to happen, it won't exactly be a game changer because Pakistan is known for treating arrested terrorists as 'political prisoners', who are generally given VIP treatment,' says Rajeev Sharma.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi led the nation in paying tributes to the valour and sacrifices of Bangladeshi freedom fighters and Indian armed forces on the 50th anniversary of the occasion 'Vijay Diwas'.
Air Commodore Nitin Sathe discovers how the IAF trained Pakistani air force pilots, during the 1971 War, which led to the birth of the Bangladesh air force.
Hostilities at the border escalated on Saturday with fresh ceasefire violations by Pakistan in Rajouri and Poonch sectors on Eid.
Even as Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif headed to the United States for the 70th session of the UNGA and for bilateral meetings to be held on the sidelines of the multilateral summit, back home all that is expected of him is to internationalise the Kashmir issue, or as Pakistan puts it, the 'Kashmir dispute'.
'Both India and Pakistan are now, for the first time in history, very closely allied and connected with the US -- economically and politically.'
'Once accession to Pakistan appeared unlikely, the British instituted Operations Gulmarg and Datta Khel respectively to foil possible accession to India.'
"India should share the fruits of future development by shelving the anti-Pakistan activities and subversion," Lieutenant General Aamir Riaz said.
'A resurgent Jaish could be a reflection of the Pakistani security establishment's view that with the region moving ever closer to a post-US Afghanistan, it is time to redirect attention to Kashmir.'
Kumar also said in the last three years, the Jaish-e-Mohammed has been "wiped out" in the Kashmir Valley. Only seven to eight terrorists are active now, he said.
Lt Gen Bakshi announced 'full support' to the new chief and made it clear that he won't resign.
The blast occurred in the mosque in the Police Lines area around 1.40 pm when a suicide bomber present in the front row during the Zuhr (afternoon) prayers blew himself up, security officials said.
Lt Gen Rizwan Akhtar, considered a close confidante of army chief Gen Raheel Sharif, was appointed on Monday as the new head of Pakistan's powerful spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence.
Lieutenant General J F R Jacob, Chief of Staff, Eastern Army Command during the 1971 war, reveals how, armed with only a draft surrender document and an aide, he made the Pakistani army led by Lieutenant General A A K Niazi surrender.
The incident took place when the terrorists launched a 'fidayeen' (suicide) attack on 46 Rashtriya Rifles army camp in Baramulla district of north Kashmir. The camp is located on the outskirts of Baramulla city, 54 kilometre from Srinagar.
'I told them I am a Muslim, you are Sikh, you are Hindu, but we have one country to save.'
'The Indian response in confining our action to our side of the LoC set a dangerous precedent,' argues Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Nearly a fortnight after the army operations were called off in Keran sector, questions have cropped up over what happened during the long intrusion by infiltrators from Pakistan believed to be from its special forces.
For the first time in the history of Pakistan, the government has established its writ in the scenic Tirah Valley in the troubled Khyber agency that had become a haven for Taliban militants.
The creation of a CDS has got the head right. Issues that were not talked about for years are now being discussed, points out Ajai Shukla.
The opposition party also said that it would like to remind the BJP that Hindu Mahasabha president Syama Prasad Mookerjee aligned with Jinnah's Muslim League to form the government in Bengal during the British rule.
Army's Northern Command has issued a global tender for procuring latest miniature unmanned aerial vehicles for gathering intelligence and carry out reconnaissance of areas along Line of Control with Pakistan and Sino-India border.
A quintessential military commander, Gen Bipin Rawat possessed an uncanny understanding of geopolitical upheavals, calibrated a tri-services military doctrine to make India face myriad security challenges, and is largely credited with bringing down militancy in the Northeast and Jammu and Kashmir.
'Instead of joining us in celebrating the strikes, the MoD has stabbed us in the back,' says a top general.
Through its early days to the 1980s, Pakistan sought to expand its sphere of Islamic influence through Afghanistan to Central Asia and got Pakistani citizens recruited in the Afghan government institutions in the 1990s when the Taliban were power. Now, it is looking eastward through India to Bangladesh and Myanmar to establish an imaginary caliphate.
'But India, increasingly, is not that far behind, which is a story I never expected to tell.'
Pakistan's top military commanders have discussed the likely implications of the leaked report of the Abbottabad Commission which has made a series of stinging remarks against the country's powerful security establishment.
'Whether Kashmir or anywhere else, whether in peace or in war, pay commissions or no pay commissions, hollowness and shortages notwithstanding, the Indian Army -- and Sekin Fif -- will always be there to keep India together.'
'We will have to wait till the snows melt in June/July 2016 before we can get a clearer idea of whether Pakistan intends to get serious about ending support for cross-border terrorism,' says G Parthasarathy, India's former high commissioner to Pakistan.
Kashmir zone inspector general of police Vijay Kumar also urged the protesters to be patient and 'not get carried away by political parties.'
Army sources indicate the first Integrated Battle Groups would come up in the plains of Jammu, Punjab, and Rajasthan, providing New Delhi instruments of retaliation in the event of grave provocation by Pakistan, such as a 26/11-style terrorist attack.
The 1971 war reaffirmed the importance of inspirational senior leadership in battle and heralded the emergence of a new fighting class amongst officers and men of India's armed forces.
Through the past 18-month period, peace has prevailed in the disputed border regions, which was immensely helpful in the difficult situation that the country was passing through, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'When we want to, we will be able to breach it, go across and strike when we need. This was the message we wanted to convey and we did'
The founder of the dreaded terrorist group Jaish-e-Mohammed undergoes regular dialysis at an army hospital in Rawalpindi in Pakistan.
We would like that people come directly to us rather than resorting to the social media or other means, Gen Rawat said.
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