Uri, The Movie

Uri Surgical Strike was unique for few reasons, they are-

 - It was first deep inside action across LOC. I am sure, regular behind enemy line actions must be happening regularly but deep inside action on a guarded border during peacetime must be the first one.

- While similar action was carried out in North East deep inside Burmese Territory, that strike was (probably) with consent from the Burmese government.

A senior defence correspondent and Analysist, Nitin Gokhale has covered this and other security-related events of last 5 years of  Modi government in his book titled, "Securing India The Modi Way: Pathankot, Surgical Strikes and More" where curious people can find additional details.

Coming back to the movie, the first thing that comes to the mind is, it is a gripping movie. There are no dull moments. Secondly, while the director has taken many artistic liberties, this move is very realistic in its plot eg the rank badges of Army people (actors) and the medals and ribbons are close to reality, the terminology used in talking is a copy of "Fauji" terminology.

The narration is also of a different style with each event being narrated is called a chapter. The movie opens with the attack that happened on an Army convoy in the northeast and the retaliatory commando strike carried out inside Myanmar (with tacit understanding with Myanmar government). 

The narration further builds up slowly to the attack by terrorists on pathankot IAF Base and then on to the surgical strikes carried out by Special Forces deep inside POK.

The actors have been chosen carefully to fit into the role of commando officers and men. Both the actresses have a very small role but their roles seem to contribute to the theme of the movie.

Does that mean everything has been depicted correctly? No, because its a movie meant to entertain the people. But the movie is as close as it could get to reality. This movie has not made a joke out of the Army people, their rank badges, mannerism, etc

My recommendation is, go out to a theatre and watch this movie. You will enjoy it.

Is it a Right Time to De-escalate for Short Time on our Western Side?

The western neighbour's national scenario is extremely heated at the moment. The government in civilian cloths seems to have followed the brief of Big Brother in uniform (de facto government) on all platforms, international or national, to internationalise Kashmir and discredit India,with no visible or demonstrable results.

In fact the Civilian Gove seems like a person stuck in quick sand, more it tries to come out, more it sinks. More the Civilian govt followed the Big Brother, more rapid and wide spread isolation of the nation happened (except our northern - eastern neighbour, in whose interest, supporting this nation suits).

Their government looked perturbed but not the Big Brother. Big Brother was sitting pretty with the knowledge that what has not happened after 1971 is not likely to happen at all ever after any event that they engineer in India with their stooges. In his thinking, their eastern neighbour is a "Baniya Country" incapable of doing any thing unless it is a full scale war. With his position fully secured in this belief, Big Brother had no worries about international isolation of the civilian  government and the nation. For him, as long as his bidding was done, why bother about nation, even if it happens to be his own.

It all changed with the surgical Strike of 29 Sept. The "Strike that wasn't" as far as the Big Brother and his HMV (His Master's Voice, the Civilian Govt) were concerned. To their glee, Surgical strike had not happened for some of the worthy (really?) Indian politicians too . Strike or no strike (depends on which side of the border or which political affiliation  (in India) one belonged), the result of those strikes are all over to see.

The Big brother is shaken up to the core. His proteges the LeT etc are just trying to come to some Army camp in Kashmir, fire some bullets and pretend that "well we are alive and kicking" to not to accept that the unthinkable has happened. The Indians have responded very strongly and reduced their cadres in one swift operation which can as well be repeated. Their government response and utterances are all confused, if they accept, Big Brother would be angry and if they don't the world would laugh on them..

At this time the news comes of a showdown between civilian government and the Big Brother (http://www.dawn.com/news/1288350/exclusive-act-against-militants-or-face-international-isolation-civilians-tell-military). The danger? Every time this happens in that nation, the big brother feels offended, "how come the non faujis have guts to question us"  and a military coup happens. This time under American recently passed law of "no aid if Military coup happens there", there may not be explicit coup but the PM of Pak  and his government may get replaced by some other civilian government.

Has the time come  that we take a pause, de-escalate for short time and then go full speed ahead. At least the civilian government of the day will be saved from a replacement and the big brother may loose some clout. The rest of the clout of the Big Brother within that nation can be cut in installment after the small phase of de-escalation, resulting in slow tilting of balance of power in favour of civilian government in that country.

That will be aided also by existing power struggle (as reported) between PM Sharif, Senior (COAS) Sharif who seems eager for extension of service and Junior Sharif (another general who eyes COAS post, if and only if, senior Sharif retires on time). The Punjab CM Sharif also may be a wild card in this struggle. Good for us.

Will that be in our interest? That is for our strategists to think but de-escalation may a step, whose time has come, mostly for short time, in days to come.

Also read my previous related posts here
http://harshad-datar.blogspot.in/2016/09/post-18-sept-i-said-sometimes-ago-wait.html

http://harshad-datar.blogspot.in/2016/09/rabble-rousing-is-national-hobby-but.html

Post 18 Sept I said sometimes ago, Wait and Watch - Now The Measures of India are Unfolding

It was exactly 5 days ago when I had said that we the armchair pundits (and warriors) should hold our horses and let the government, who has many options, do thrir job (http://harshad-datar.blogspot.com/2016/09/rabble-rousing-is-national-hobby-but.html). It did predict that many soft options would be used by the government against or westernly neighbours.

 I must concede though that I did not expect hard measure of surgical strike will be unfolded by the government at this speed. Uri Attack happened on 18 Sept and today in exactly 11th day from the attack government used the measure of Surgical Strike in such a short span. In fact, such a measure surely would need at least a week's preparation, a wild guess though and if that is correct guess, the decision was made by the government even before I wrote my last blog on this issue on 24 Sept suggesting to leave the action against the rough neighbour to the government.

In these last 11 days, there has been a blitzkrieg of measures by the government, diplomatic ones (UN and SAARC, Demarches to Pak High commissioner, etc), political ones (Indus Water Treaty) and may be Quasi military (Heightened security). Surgical Strike was always a option but looked unlikely given record of this nation, of being patient (a nice word to disguise the soft approach) for many decades.

This time there were many dots. Some I could join like Pak suddenly cancelling PIA flights to Pak Stolen (why call this part of Kashmir "occupied" when it is actually stolen by them at the height of confusion during partition) Kashmir with increased PAF activity in that area.

Another dot was the PM''s statement that perpetrators of Uri would not go unpunished. Yet another one was DGMOs  public statement that we have capability of surgical strike and we would use it at our time and place of choosing. Frequent meetings of senior ministers with PM and PMs meetings with service chiefs though the reasons were always something else. Something was brewing but I could not join the dots (well I am not a astrologer but just a student of Strategy).

The cat though was out of the bag little earlier than the DGMO press brief. When CCS meeting clippings were shown on TV when DGMO and Army Chief were shown as part of the meeting, it looked that something big has happened. What has happened, could not predict.

Now that Surgical Strike has happened, the game has increased in tempo. Many things can happen, more strikes, escalation or may be deescalation (high hopes!), cooling down and many such things. But normalcy is unlikely for immediate future as our neighbour is unlikely to forget the insult (they think they are martial race and Indians are not) despite they being "so called" ready.

Best that is being done and continued to be done is to make sure that their forces remain on high alert thereby suffering mass movement from western border to this area, fatigue (and there are already signs, in public domain, of their Airforce already in that state) and loss of will. Even it does not happen, the economic cost can not be borne by them.

Let the events unfold but as a nation we should prepare for losses and still maintain unity and not start berating the government.