Terrorists massacred 26 tourists who were relaxing in the Baisaran Valley meadow near Pahalgam in the Indian state of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K). They specifically targeted Hindus, checking the victims’ IDs and even asking them to pull down their pants to see whether they were circumcised. The terrorists were from “The Resistance Front”, which is an Indian-designated terrorist group associated with the Pakistani-based Lashkar-e-Taiba, itself designated as a terrorist group by India, Russia, the US, and several others.
One of India’s responses has been to hold the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty in abeyance, which prompted Pakistan to threaten that any curtailment of water to it will be considered an act of war. Pakistan also suspended the 1972 Simla Agreement that ended the third Indo-Pakistani War. Observers now expect that the 2021 ceasefire will soon be annulled. Surgical strikes by India against Pakistan might soon follow after Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed to “pursue [the terrorists] to the ends of the Earth.”
Amidst the uncertainty over what might come next and whether it could set into motion a possibly uncontrollable escalation that ultimately leads to a nuclear exchange, it’s arguably the case that Pakistani Chief of Army Staff Asim Munir has the most to gain and lose from the latest tensions. Beginning with how he might benefit, the most obvious way is by trying to rally the entire nation behind him, especially in the event of tit-for-tat strikes or worse with India.
The de facto military junta that he leads is very unpopular after many Pakistanis believe that it approved April 2022’s post-modern coup against former Prime Minister Imran Khan, which led to political, economic, and security crises, the latter with regard to the upsurge in Afghan-based terrorism. The last point segues into the other way that Munir could benefit and that’s by tacitly portraying the Pahalgam terrorist attack as a “plausibly deniable” response to last month’s Jaffar Express terrorist attack.
The terrorist-designated “Baloch Liberation Army”, which has a history of specifically targeting Punjabis, was responsible. Pakistan blamed India for backing them, which it has traditionally done every time the group carries out an attack, but India denied the allegation as always. Nevertheless, many Pakistanis might still truly believe that India was involved, hence why Munir could have media outlets and influencers on his establishment’s payroll present Pahalgam as a “tit-for-tat” Hybrid War response.
And finally, Munir might also have calculated that this latest terrorist attack would catalyze a chain reaction in J&K that could lead to another wave of unrest there that in turn destabilizes India. Complementarily, the aforesaid as well as what he could be wagering would be controlled tit-for-tat strikes might be manipulated by anti-Indian media across the world to undermine its perception as a rising Great Power, not to mention to fearmonger about it being an unsafe place for foreign investments.
On the other hand, Pahalgam could also tremendously backfire against Munir, most obviously in the reputational sense if India is able to rally a lot of the world against Pakistan. Its close Chinese and Saudi partners already condemned Pahalgam though they might not participate in any Indian attempt to isolate Pakistan. Putin and the Trump pledged full support for India, however, so their countries might tangibly distance themselves from Pakistan in some way or another out of solidarity with India.
The second way in which Munir might lose out in the aftermath of this attack is if the reported US deep state differences over Pakistan, in which the CIA allegedly backs him while the State Department and the Pentagon supposedly want civilian-led democratic rule, lead to the US more robustly seeking his ouster. After all, the attack happened while Vance was visiting India, which US officials might not believe was a coincidence. It’s accordingly possible that already strained Pakistani-US ties might soon further worsen.
Lastly, the preceding prediction could come to pass if Trump proposes formalizing the Line of Control as the international border as a means of sustainably averting nuclear war amidst possibly escalating tit-for-tat strikes, which Munir would be loath to do. That’s because keeping the Kashmir Conflict unresolved serves to legitimize the military’s de facto rule over Pakistan. Munir’s expected defiance of Trump might thus serve as the pretext for trying to remove him or at least applying more US pressure on Pakistan.
It’s anyone’s guess what might soon happen and how the latest Indo-Pakistani crisis will end, but observers shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that it was sparked by the Pahalgam terrorist attack, which was one of the worst in years. It was especially atrocious that the terrorists specifically targeted Hindu tourists too in a clear attempt to provoke retaliatory attacks against Muslims that could plunge all of India into a vicious cycle of violence if that happens.
From India’s perspective, the Pahalgam terrorist attack therefore has Pakistan’s fingerprints all over it, hence why it’s considering at least one surgical strike across the border. Any kinetic action will likely result in at least a symmetrical reaction from Pakistan, if not an escalatory one that could also manifest itself unconventionally, such as if aligned groups stage another terrorist attack. The best-case scenario for world peace is a round or two of controllable tit-for-tat strikes but that can’t be taken for granted.
