Pakistan has deliberately chosen Kargil because the local Shia Muslims are not cooperating with them unlike the Sunni Muslims in other areas of Jammu & Kashmir. They want to pound the people in Kargil.

It is quite clear that Pakistan, which lost three wars with us earlier, can only afford a proxy war. Their strategy is to encourage armed insurrection first and then wage a war with India. Whatever is happening there is not infiltration but intrusion. By now, it is quite clear that a large number of well-trained regulars from the Pakistan army have beenassisting the intruders. We must expose them before the international community by launching a diplomatic offensive.

We would be tempted to focus on the Kargil sector as political and public pressure is too high to clear the area of intruders. But we should not forget our right to hit back at the enemy at a place of our choice. Of course, the current strategy to confine ourselves to Kargil is right.The view that our intelligence agencies have failed in detecting the intrusion in the Kargil sector may not be correct. But there is a complaint from the Army that we are lacking in `actionable intelligence' for somtime.

As told to S Ramakrishna