Book Review: "Operation Sindoor and its Aftermath: Redefining India’s Military Response and Diplomatic Engagement" by Arun Vishwanathan

India launched Operation Sindoor between 6-10 May 2025 in response to the terrorist attack on 22 April 2025 by the Lashkar-e-Taiba proxy (The Resistance Front) at Pahalgam that claimed the lives of 26 civilians.

Needless to say, the Tri-Service operation was by far the deepest and the most extensive military campaign carried out by India since the 1971 Indo-Pak War that resulted in the creation of Bangladesh.

The editors Professor Harsh V Pant and Dr. Sameer Patil as well as the researchers from the Observer Research Foundation (ORF) have done an excellent job of delving into various aspects of Operation Sindoor ranging from the doctrinal & strategic; to operational aspects; to diplomatic angle; to finally the road ahead. Operation Sindoor began with an initial strike by the Indian military on the night of 6-7 May 2025 on nine terrorist infrastructure sites of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Muhamad (JeM)and Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM) in Pakistan and Pakistan occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK) were targeted. The sites were located as far as 100 kms from the International Border and included the LeT and JeM headquarters at Muridke and Bahawalpur respectively.

The Indian government, in a bid to contain escalation, described its action as non-escalatory and stated that it was intended to ‘pre-empt’ and ‘deter’ cross border terrorism. India also pointed out that it did not target any Pakistan military installations. Pakistan however upped the ante with heavy shelling along the regions close to the Line of Control (LoC) resulting in civilian casualties. On the night of May 7-8, 2025, Pakistan followed this up with attacks on several Indian military targets located in J&K, Punjab, Rajasthan and Gujarat – essentially widening the conflict across Northern and Western India.

However, these attacks, were neutralized by the Indian integrated counter UAS Grid and multi-layered Indian Air Defence systems. Between 8 and 9 May 2025 India and Pakistan engaged in a tit-for-tat response by both countries targeting each other’s air defence, radars and military installations. This was clearly an attempt by both parties to degrade each other’s military and air defence systems in the run up to a wider and deeper attack.

On 9 May, India carried out its largest military response since 1971 that struck deep within Pakistani territory and damaged multiple Pak Air Force assets Rawalpindi, Punjab and Sindh.

In addition, media reports also indicate that India used a Brahmos missile to target a Pakistani storage site at Kirana Hills near the Sarghoda airbase which limited Pakistan’s strategic options and forced it to reach out at the DGMO level to cease hostilities. The volume is very useful as it provides a concise yet comprehensive account of the multipronged strategy that India espoused in the Operation Sindoor. While the first prong was the kinetic military action; it was also backed up by non-kinetic prongs like putting the Indus Water Treaty in abeyance, closing airspace from ant to Pakistan, banning imports from Pakistan; and a concerted global diplomatic push by way of all-party delegations to disseminate Indian actions and rationale to the global stage.

The edited volume highlights the real threat of geospatial terrorism. The chapter by Chaitanya Giri points to fact that since January 2025, Pakistan-American entities continuously tasked American, European and Chinese geospatial suppliers for images of Pahalgam possibly to conduct terrain mapping, target analysis and better situational awareness. Thus, pointing to the use of open-sourced geospatial images by Pakistan based terror groups and the need for Indian security planners to take suitable steps in wake of this knowledge.

In the chapter on India’s Cyber Threat Landscape and Operation Sindoor, Dr. Sameer Patil highlights the very real and immediate threat to Indian cyber capabilities by Pakistan and with help from China. Dr. Patil points out that during the operation, over 1.5 million cyber-attacks were recorded on India’s digital infrastructure of which 150 were successful. In addition, the author also points to the use of Remote Access Trojan malware to target Indian government and defence personnel in a bid to harvest sensitive and classified information.Another important aspect covered in the volume is the need for India to put in place and strengthen its capacity and capability to counter Pakistan’s misinformation factory. The chapter by Dr. Soumya Awasthi and Mr. Abhishek Sharma posit important solution for India to strengthen its capability to espouse its discourse/narrative in the cognitive domain using AI-powered disinformation detection tools, creation of a integrated narrative taskforce and digital diplomacy cells in Indian missions abroad.

As the book highlights, Operation Sindoor “discards several longstanding shibboleths in India’s strategic and diplomatic thinking.” An important shift clearly signalled by India was that it will not make any distinction between terrorists and their supporters; India also made it clear that it will consider any future terrorist attack an act of war. The book also highlights the very real threat of the Sino-Pak axis for India.

Kalpit A. Mankikar highlights the growing dependence of Pakistan on Chinese arms with over 60% of Chinese arms exports making their way to Pakistan. The fact that the Indian military could precisely target locations far inside Pakistani territory showed both Indian resolve in responding to terrorist attacks by Pak-sponsored terror groups and also signalled to Pakistan and the world that India would hold the Pakistani state and the military to account for terror attacks in India and would not shy away any longer from multi domain kinetic attacks against even Pakistani military installations.

In addition, Indian precision targeting and public statements by American leaders made it amply clear to Pakistan that it could not continue to carry out terror attacks against India and employ the nuclear bogey to stymie New Delhi’s response. Operation Sindoor made it crystal clear that both New Delhi and Washington have called Islamabad’s nuclear bluff. Professor Arun Vishwanathan is Head, Department of Security Studies, School of National Security Studies, Central University of Gujarat, Vadodara. He can be reached at [email protected] and at @ArunVish_ on X (Formerly Twitter).