While all this was planned by the army command and the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), the political leadership went along with it. The published account of retired Air Commodore Kaiser Tufail about the planning of Pakistani operation and the role the Pakistan air force was called upon to play is available (CLAWS Journal, summer issue, 2009, special number on the Kargil war). It is clear that even as Nawaz Sharif was exchanging hugs with Atal Bihari Vajpayee in Lahore he had consented to the Kargil operation which was at that time under implementation. It speaks volumes about the gullibility of our political leadership that they continued to believe in Sharif’s innocence for quite some time thereafter. Our leaders should have heard of the Ribbentrop-Molotov or Matsuoko-Molotov pacts where the signatories, even as they signed the pacts, were aware they were going to break them. This experience has some relevance to today’s situation when Pakistan’s political leadership assures India of its intention to take action against jehadi terrorists.

The Pakistanis, as they had earlier, woefully miscalculated. They failed to take note of the fact that mutual nuclear deterrence deters both the aggressor and aggressed from escalating, but the international community was not likely to consider it an escalation if the victim used superior force to evict the aggression and refrained from entering the aggressor’s territory. For this very correct evaluation of the international opinion credit must be given to Vajpayee and his advisers. After the initial delay the Indian armed forces rapidly mobilised to signal to Pakistan that India was ready to use necessary force to evict the aggression. The use of the air force was critical. Kaiser Tufail’s account reveals that the Pakistani air force was not in a position to confront the Indian air force.

... contd.