Surgical Strikes Research Articles

Contested Grounds and Missing Sticks: Assessing the Legality of India’s Surgical Strikes in Pakistan

The article wades into the contested issue of the legality of India’s surgical strikes in Pakistan in the last decade. While legal scholars have deliberated on the legality of India’s actions, international relations (IR) have remained silent, thereby underlining the chasm between IR and international law when it comes to international issues. This article evaluates the competing claims made by legal scholars by engaging with developments in international law pertaining to the use of force as an ‘outsider’ approaching the issue from a fresh vantage point. It finds the argument regarding the weakness of India’s legal position to be more convincing. However,it does not fully subscribe to the reasons attributed for the weakness. Drawing on insights from IR, it highlights the salience of political considerations and incentive structures. The article argues that a comprehensive view that includes legal and political dimensions needs to be taken to appreciate India’s stand regarding the surgical strikes.

India’s use of military power and the sovereignty principle: insights from the neighborhood

ABSTRACT Notwithstanding India’s public stand professing its respect of the sovereignty principle, the imperatives of competitive international relations have necessitated the use of force against its neighbors, thereby undermining their sovereignty. This use of force has been manifested through conventional wars as well as through the sub-conventional use of force such as surgical strikes. This paper examines how India has sought to toe a fine line between pursuing its national interest through the application of military power while being mindful of the broader normative frameworks influencing state behavior since 1947. In doing so, it engages with the interplay of the material and the ideational. Given the time span of the study, it also seeks to shine light on the elements of continuity and change that mark its application of military power through the prism of the sovereignty principle. Furthermore, the paper also pays attention to the recent surgical strikes, features that mark them as being different from previous such actions performed by India, and what this means for India’s understanding of the sovereignty principle.

IDEOLOGICAL CONFLICT IN EDITORIALS ON TERRORISM: A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF PAKISTANI AND INDIAN ENGLISH NEWSPAPERS

Dicourses produced in the print media generally carry implicit ideologies to shape the cognitive make up of its readership. English newspapers in Pakistan and India also use such discourse strategies to adance their own countries’ ideological agenda. This research study, therefore, aimed to explore the discursive strategies that two leading English dailies of the two countries employed to portray ideological conflict in relation to the Indian-claimed surgical strikes (2016) against terrorist hideouts in Pakistani territory. To achieve this aim, editorials from English newspapers of both the countries were purposively selected and analyzed using Ideological Square Model proposed by van Dijk (1996,1998). The results of the study show that discourses of the newspaper editorials of both the countries carry discursive strategies that display the ideological conflict of the two countries in relation to terrorism. Using strategies such as passivisation, positive self-presentation, negative other-presentation, passivisation, personalization, and metonymy, the Indian editorial considers these strikes valid and successful, while Pakistani editorial vehemently denies this, thereby accentuating the Us and Them dicotomy. The findings of the study has implications for general readership as well as political elite of the two countries. Keywords: Critical Discourse Analysis, Ideological Conflict, Media Discourse, Surgical Strikes, Ideological Square.

Flame thrower

SummaryThis poem is part of a special section in honor of Kathleen Stewart. Imagined as a staccato spoken word piece, the short lines with visual semantic and sonic parallelisms flow like an urgent, nonstop process of throwing flames, barbs, disruptions, and unexpected care into anthropological spaces. As such, the poetic layout pays tribute with an itemized list of Katie's interventions: surgical strikes, sharp, powerful presences, and gentle lyric clarity.

Metaphor Used by the US as a Lethal Weapon of Mass Destruction against the Other for Pursuing Ulterior Motives

To get access to the resources-rich central Asian states and to nip in the bud the state of Afghanistan, that had proclaimed itself under the Taliban regime to be a state run solely under the ideology and system of Islam- the next threat to The US after the socialism-the US, after the 9/11 incident, took resource to using the linguistic weapon of metaphor before and along the surgical strikes and managed to beset the thoughts of every individual on the globe. It was successfully used as a justification to approve finances from the US Parliament for mongering an uncalled for war, to enlist moral support of its citizens by means of instilling fear in them, to elicit active financial and personnel support of its European allies and to silence the international community from raising its voice against the attack. It is the domain of cognitive linguistic where these conceptual metaphor, or cognitive metaphor, are used to the understanding of one idea, or conceptual domain, in terms of another. This study focused on identifying the conceptual metaphors used in the War on Terror discourse for influencing opinion against the enemy and dehumanizing it. Metaphors are used in the conceptual domain of covering the false ideas of the US and influencing the world to manipulate and pursue their ulterior motives. There actual motive was to get the justified war on terror as legal and the only source of getting away with it. They influenced the world with their justified war on terror policy and gained their motives.

Challenges for the Conventional Deterrence of Pakistan in the Post 2019 Security Situations: Options and Choices

The study aims at discussing the changing dynamics of conventional deterrence in South Asia especially after the Pulwama-Balakot incident of 2019. The study is evaluated through Descriptive, Exploratory and Predictive data analysis approach. For elaborating different aspects of the study, both primary and secondary data was used. The study conducted in-depth interviews of the experts on the strategic and nuclear environment of the South Asian region. The study is divided in to three parts. In first part of the study, India-Pakistan relations since their independence in 1947 have been discussed. It was followed by discussing how Indian military strategic thinking against Pakistan has been changed from being defensive in Sunderji Doctrine (SD) of 1987 to offensive in the Cold Start Doctrine (CSD) of 2004 and then to the Land Warfare Doctrine (LWD) of 2018. The study then continues on discussing how India has crossed the international border line and conducted so-called surgical strikes inside Pakistani territory after a militant attack on the Indian paramilitary troops in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IoK) in 2019 and how Pakistan responded to the Indian aggression with a military operation codenamed “Operation Swift Retort”. The second part of the study is related to the Indian acquisition of modern sophisticated weaponry from the great powers like US, Israel, Russia etc. and the possible impacts of these weapons systems on the strategic stability of Pakistan. How the weapon systems like Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) system, Rafale fighter jets, Anti-Tank Guided Missiles (ATGM), Nuclear Submarine, P8-I Antisubmarine aircraft, Apache attack helicopter, Spy satellites and the armed Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) will pose threats to Pakistan, was main theme of the second part of the study. The possibility of any future war between India and Pakistan was also discussed in this section. Third section of the study was related to the possible options for Pakistan to counter the growing Indian conventional superiority. It was discussed that Pakistan should improve its long-range air defense system, improve the speed, lethality and range of its missiles, acquire or develop nuclear submarine and fifth generation aircrafts, improve Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities along with the acquisition of attack helicopters and enhancing the endurance and range of armed UAVs to counter any future Indian aggression. Overall the Indian military modernization, the acquisition and procurement of modern sophisticated weaponry was discussed in the study. How negatively it will impact Pakistan and what options and choices are available with Pakistan to counter it, was the basic theme of the study. It was also thoroughly examined that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are not for wars, but it’s the guarantor of peace in South Asia. It was also examined that Pakistan will never allow any aggression to disturb its strategic stability and will never hesitate to ensure its strategic stability and the basic sovereignty as a state at any cost, even by using its nuclear weapons as a last resort in case of failure of its conventional weapons.

Design and Development of a Robotic Drone: A Drover.

Abstract: The main aim of this project is to introduce new way of spying to our Indian armed forces and to improvise the spying techniques in all the required fields. This project helps to work beyond and to learn beyond the limitations. Achievement of this project to overcome the major drawback of the spying techniques which is presently existing, and to develop the strength of our Indian armed forces and to increase the revolution of aeronautical. This project will be mainly used during the surgical strikes to analyse the accurate situation at the location. This project will save many soldiers and help to resolve the strike easily by providing the accurate situation record. This can upgrade the Indian defence sectors.

Regional Security Perspectives in South Asia: Indo-Pakistan Rivalry

Inter-state and intra-state conflicts emerged with political, social, and economic factors which increasingly contributed to security dilemmas at global and regional levels. This study investigates the regional security issues which have emerged through the Indo-Pakistani conflict in South Asia. In order to obtain the data for this study, secondary qualitative data and information based on an archival research methodology were used. Books, journal articles, research papers, official websites, and e-Newspapers were incorporated into this archival research. According to this study, the first and second Kashmir wars, the 1971 conflict, the Kargil conflict, the attack on the Indian Parliament, the 2002 Military Standoff, the Mumbai Terror attack, and the Surgical Strikes carried out by India have all contributed to the gradual development of the Indo-Pakistan war, which has led to current concerns about regional security. Interstate strife and tension, hostility between nations, mutual mistrust and animosity posed by terrorism, religious extremism, nuclearization, and economic and political instability have all intensified due to security concerns posed by the Indo-Pakistan rivalry. Finally, as an effort to address these security issues related to the Indo-Pakistani wars, this study has proposed the establishment of a ‘South Asian Regional Security Cooperation’. This proposed Cooperation will be treated under four basic regional security corporation models: alliances, collective security, security regimes, and security communities to reinforce regional security in South Asia.

Non-State Actors, Sub-Conventional Warfare, and India-Pakistan Nuclear Crisis Stability/Instability

In South Asia, India-Pakistan nuclear equation faces an intricate stability/instability paradox under the shadow of pervasive non-state actors. These actors are exploited by the bellicose nuclear rivals and used as proxies to bleed each other. The terrorist incidents may lead to a crisis that could escalate to the nuclear level. The ambitious belligerents—India and Pakistan—are embroiled in a vicious nuclear and conventional arms race. In conjunction, both lack any effective conflict resolution mechanism. Though, past strategic crises were managed beneath the panic of nuclear escalation and intervention by the international community. What if such a crisis develops again if a spectacular terrorist attack occurs, especially in mainland India. Indian decision-makers could castigate Pakistan by contemplating so-called surgical strikes under the impression that Pakistan has launched terrorists against India. This research paper critically analyzes how non-state actors and their use in sub-conventional warfare pose severe repercussions for nuclear deterrence stability in the absence of credible nuclear escalation control measures between India and Pakistan.

Surgical Strikes on Host Defenses: Role of the Viral Protease Activity in Innate Immune Antagonism.

As a frontline defense mechanism against viral infections, the innate immune system is the primary target of viral antagonism. A number of virulence factors encoded by viruses play roles in circumventing host defenses and augmenting viral replication. Among these factors are viral proteases, which are primarily responsible for maturation of viral proteins, but in addition cause proteolytic cleavage of cellular proteins involved in innate immune signaling. The study of these viral protease-mediated host cleavages has illuminated the intricacies of innate immune networks and yielded valuable insights into viral pathogenesis. In this review, we will provide a brief summary of how proteases of positive-strand RNA viruses, mainly from the Picornaviridae, Flaviviridae and Coronaviridae families, proteolytically process innate immune components and blunt their functions.

Analyzing the State of Digital Information Warfare Between India and Pakistan on Twittersphere

In this study, we analyze the state of information warfare on Twittersphere between India and Pakistan in the wake of Pulwama attack in Kashmir region and the subsequent surgical strikes by Indian forces inside Pakistan. We selected two leading Twitter hashtags on the conflict from the two countries each. A total of 20,000 tweets were manually analyzed. Contrary to the existing scholarship on digital information warfare, we found citizens from both countries produced most of the content. Among the citizens, those Twitter handles that showed affiliations with the heads of governments that we consider as trolls were the leading contributors. Moreover, the study found that contributors from the two countries mainly posted on their own hashtags and did not engage in counter-arguments with the contributors from other country. This resulted in overwhelming support for the two countries in their own assorted hashtags and outright criticism in the hashtags originating from the other country.

India's Quest to Establish Surgical Strikes as a New-Normal against Nuclear Pakistan: A Self- Deception or New-Reality?

This study aims to understand the rationale behind India's recent offensive approach against Pakistan. With the advent of new technologies, the conflict transformed were major wars converted minor war and sub-conventional warfare. Nevertheless, India introduced a new set of war fighting strategies to establish itself as a major military power in the South Asian region. The study concluded that,in line with its ambitious plans, India conducted a surgical strike deep inside Pakistan's territory in February2019 and tried to establish a new pattern of strategic engagement where sovereignty breach of nuclear-capable Pakistan will be a 'New-Normal' in India-Pakistan conflictual relations. Interestingly, India taking inspiration from the US and Israel, not only tried to introduce 'New-Normal' in order to alter the norms of sovereignty in South Asia but also went dangerously ahead of them and negated the entire logic of 'nuclear-deterrence' without considering the fact that no one including the US has ever tried to create 'New-Normal'in the situation of actual nuclear deterrence. Lastly and importantly, it is either 'Normal' to accept the logic of nuclear deterrence or 'Abnormal' to reject or negate it. Pakistan's befitting response made it clear that there is no space for the establishment of 'New-Normal' under a nuclear overhang.

Bacteria make surgical strikes on host ubiquitin signaling.

Bacteria make surgical strikes on host ubiquitin signaling.

Discourse, medical metaphor and the East Asian medicine approach to conflict resolution

This article analyses how threats and dangers have been understood through biomedical metaphors in international relations (IR) and US security discourse, suggesting an alternative to such understandings based on an East Asian medicine (EAM) approach to world politics. By conducting a genealogical study of US security discourse, I argue that medical and disease metaphors, such as communism as a disease in the Cold War era and terrorism as a cancer in the post-Cold War period, were broadly utilised by US policymaking elites in the discursive formation of foreign and security policies. This delineated how the specific issues should be understood by ordinary people; it also suggested measures, such as containment, targeted killings, and surgical strikes, to tackle security threats. As real-world policy practices have demonstrated, the Westphalian understanding of security and conflict resolution, characterised by the utilisation of medical analogies and the necessity of coercive responses, may be inherently flawed. To address the security threats and maintain stability in a specific region, the EAM approach to world politics and conflict resolution is proposed, which is defined by non-coercive actions (wuwei); furthermore, transformability should be operated from within, and the yin–yang theory of harmonious relations could contribute to long-term peace.

Impaction technique influences implant stability in low-density bone model.

AimsCementless acetabular components rely on press-fit fixation for initial stability. In certain cases, initial stability is more difficult to obtain (such as during revision). No current study evaluates how a surgeon’s impaction technique (mallet mass, mallet velocity, and number of strikes) may affect component fixation. This study seeks to answer the following research questions: 1) how does impaction technique affect a) bone strain generation and deterioration (and hence implant stability) and b) seating in different density bones?; and 2) can an impaction technique be recommended to minimize risk of implant loosening while ensuring seating of the acetabular component?MethodsA custom drop tower was used to simulate surgical strikes seating acetabular components into synthetic bone. Strike velocity and drop mass were varied. Synthetic bone strain was measured using strain gauges and stability was assessed via push-out tests. Polar gap was measured using optical trackers.ResultsA phenomenon of strain deterioration was identified if an excessive number of strikes was used to seat a component. This effect was most pronounced in low-density bone at high strike velocities. Polar gap was reduced with increasing strike mass and velocity.ConclusionA high mallet mass with low strike velocity resulted in satisfactory implant stability and polar gap, while minimizing the risk of losing stability due to over-striking. Extreme caution not to over-strike must be exercised when using high velocity strikes in low-density bone for any mallet mass.Cite this article: Bone Joint Res 2020;9(7):386–393.

India’s Pakistan policy: from 2016 ‘surgical strike’ to 2019 Balakot ‘airstrike’

ABSTRACT Pakistan has always been an important factor in India’s domestic politics and foreign policy – a position that flows as much from historical disputes as from Pakistan’s continued support for terror activities against India. This importance has increased further under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership. This article argues that the September 2016 ‘surgical strikes’ by Indian special forces inside Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and the February 2019 ‘airstrikes’ by Indian Air Force against terrorist training camps at Balakot inside Pakistan’s Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province were defining moments in India’s Pakistan policy. India’s actions stemmed from its desire to change the status-quo in India–Pakistan relations by punishing Pakistan for its continued use of terrorism. But this is ‘work in progress’ since there are certain limitations to India’s ability to compel Pakistan to alter its revisionist behaviour.

Individual and Ideological Immunity? The Resilience of Indian Foreign Policy

Individual and Ideological Immunity?The Resilience of Indian Foreign Policy Constantino Xavier (bio) Following his victory in the 2014 Indian general election, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was quick to promise revisions to foreign policy. His government proclaimed the arrival of a new India that would be a "leading power," suggesting that the country's past policies had been too passive and defensive. Within South Asia, Modi spoke of a "neighborhood first" approach, alluding to regional neglect by his predecessors. In Southeast Asia, the Look East policy was renamed Act East, with a new focus on the wider Indo-Pacific and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Meanwhile, internally, members of Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accused the country's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and his Indian National Congress (INC) party of having sacrificed national security to appease Pakistan and China since the 1950s. Going beyond this noise, Ian Hall's Modi and the Reinvention of Indian Foreign Policy offers a deep and dispassionate assessment of these many promises and accusations to conclude that, in practice, Modi's foreign policy has been mostly marked by continuity with the past. Except for "some deviations" (p. 39), Hall observes that the individual role of the popular prime minister and the ideological role of Hindu nationalism promoted by the BJP have failed to reinvent India's external engagements: the "continuities in policy and implementation from earlier governments were clearer than the changes" (p. 125). Hall's conclusion departs from an important assumption, especially for international observers who had expected Modi's charismatic populism and his party's cultural conservativism to break with nonalignment and other cardinal principles. Did Modi not order unprecedented surgical strikes in Kashmir to punish Pakistan beyond the disputed Line of Control? Did he not welcome U.S. president Barack Obama and Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe while playing tough with China during Beijing's military incursion into neighboring Bhutan? Did he not deepen Indo-Pacific partnerships and revive the quadrilateral dialogue with Japan, Australia, [End Page 179] and the United States? Did he not announce the first ever chief of defense staff to increase India's military preparedness and interservice coordination? On all these and many other accounts, however, a closer look reveals that nothing was truly novel: many of these actions had been either initiated or promised before Modi's premiership, with some dating back to the turn of the new century. Some observers may flesh out nuances to argue that there have been occasional departures and changes in emphasis—such as in reaching out to the Indian diaspora, normalizing relations with the European Union, or building new power-projection capabilities in the Indian Ocean—but one or two adjustments do not a revolution make, Hall argues. In fact, the book suggests that a radical reinvention of Indian foreign policy was never really even attempted in the first place, but rather was a rhetorical and tactical move focused on consolidating Modi's domestic support base. Many may disagree with this cynical reading, but Hall touches a deeper nerve in Indian foreign policy analysis. The scholarly debate about how domestic factors such as individual leaders or party ideologies shape foreign policy in democratic India goes back several decades and is impossible to settle.1 In recent years, given new archival sources and a closer examination of specific cases, however, the pendulum has swung in favor of continuity and reduced the agency attributed to specific leaders, including even Nehru.2 This line of research has also deflated the alleged foreign policy differences between political parties, especially the INC and the BJP.3 For those interested in deeper debates about India's external engagements since 1947, Hall's book thus confirms that individuals and ideology are overrated. Mostly immune to Modi and the BJP, India's grand quest for strategic autonomy, coupled with institutional deficiencies in foreign policymaking, has once again prevailed to dictate continuity. Hall's book departs from the popular narratives about the new Modi doctrine and BJP ideology that allegedly transformed India's external relations, whether with the diaspora, the United States, or [End Page 180] India's neighbors.4 His close examination of economic liberalization...

From Burhan Wani to Abhi Nandan: A Comparative Analysis of India and Pakistan’s Newspaper coverage of Kashmir Conflict


 
 
 This paper compares the coverage of Kashmir Conflict in four English language dailies: two from Pakistan; DAWN and The Nation, and two from India; ‘The HINDU’ and ‘Times of India’ by employing Galtung’s Model of Peace Journalism (Galtung, 1986; 1998) and Lynch & McGoldrick’s (2005) Two-Sided Conflict Model. The study pursues two research questions; is the coverage of these newspaper war or peace- oriented, and do they report Kashmir Conflict through Two-Party (Pak-India) or Multi- Party lenses. For data sources, seven major recent events; Burhan Wani’s killing (2016), Uri Attack, Indian Surgical Strikes, Pulwama Attack, Balakot Airstrike, and Abhi Nandan’s Capture and Release (2019) were chosen. A total of 56 stories, one lead story and one editorial from each newspaper about every event, were collected. Each story was evaluated according to Galtung’s 19 indicators; nine War, nine Peace and one Neutral, and accordingly categorized. The analysis revealed that DAWN had the highest (46.15%) peace-oriented coverage while The HINDU was second with only 23% peace content. In the war category, The Nation scored the highest (100%) while the Times of India was found second (92.85%). No story could qualify for the neutral category. Overall, the coverage of these newspapers was found grossly (81.13%) war- oriented. Moreover, in the coverage of the Kashmir Conflict, the media succumb to the Two-Sided Model, projecting Pakistani and Indian states as the only legitimate parties while Kashmiris are portrayed as mere passive victims. These newspapers also focus only on visible effects and heavily rely on elite positions. The purpose of this study was to examine how much Peace Journalism–being reasonably advocated throughout the last decade in the Subcontinent–has changed the attitude of our media towards peace reporting.
 
 

India’s Surgical Strikes: Response to Strategic Imperatives

ABSTRACTIn September 2016, militants who were allegedly backed by Pakistan attacked an Indian Army camp in Uri. The government in New Delhi was facing important regional elections. It faced intense public pressure to muster a military response. Such a response, however, ran the risk of triggering a nuclear exchange. Ten days after the Uri attack, India reported that it had carried out ‘surgical strikes’ on terrorist training camps in Pakistan-controlled territory. The paper examines this specific episode in India–Pakistan deterrence dynamics, focusing on the nomenclature ‘surgical strikes’. The paper argues that the choice of the term itself is new and worthy of investigation. Using qualitative content analysis of the official announcement of the operation, it identifies specific rhetorical moves by the Indian government that framed the response as a surgical strike. The paper also considers other statements in the media by high-ranking political and military leaders regarding the strikes, and the reception of these statements by the Indian audience, by Pakistan, and by the international community. The concluding section sounds a note of caution about future iterations of so-called surgical strikes. While the term ‘surgical strike’ can be useful in some circumstances, it produces destabilising outcomes in others.

Editorial Treatment of Burhan Wani Killing: A Comparative Analysis of Pakistan and India Press

This study examines coverage patterns of the killing of Burhan Muzaffar Wani in two leading English dailies of Pakistan and India from July 2016 to December 2016. The killing of Wani, a commander of Hizbul Mujahideen, in an encounter by the Indian security forces on July 8, 2016, led to large-scale protests in the Indian-held Kashmir and military confrontations over the line of control between the two nuclear-armed South Asian neighbors and claims of surgical strikes against Pakistan by India. The theoretical framework for this research was determined by framing theory, while the sample was selected by applying census sampling. The findings, based on a quantitative content analysis of selected editorials of The Times of India and The News International, show that the two newspapers did not present the ground reality as it is, but reconstructed it according to their agendas and represented it by framing events. The patriotic and hostile attitude of the media of both countries results in the obstruction of peace process and endorses a wave of tension, which often leads to heightened tension and war hysteria between the two countries. Consistent with the existing scholarship on peace journalism, the findings of this study also show how the news media surrender impartiality and cover the events in view of their country’s national interests and foreign policy. Keywords: Framing, conflict communication, Kashmir dispute, Burhan Wani, Kashmir freedom movement, crisis communication.