As Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Punjab’s Adampur airbase on Tuesday, one of the images stood out from the rest. It showed him waving at the jawans, with an intact S-400 air defence system clearly visible in the background. The messaging was clear: Pakistan bluffed when it claimed that it has destroyed the defence system. A day earlier, Modi did even better in a strongly-worded message to the nation after pausing Operation Sindoor.
The speech clearly delineated India’s new doctrine against terrorism resting on three key elements: a response on India’s terms; no tolerance for terror that hides under “nuclear blackmail”; and no distinction between the terrorists, their leaders, and a government that sponsors them. The second point is the most significant as the most troubling aspect of the India-Pakistan conflict remains Islamabad’s habitual recourse to nuclear brinkmanship. A state cannot continuously rely on its nuclear arsenal as a shield for sub-conventional warfare and terrorism. The burden of future strategic restraint should not fall on New Delhi alone.
Modi also sought to bring the international community on the same page on countering terrorism by invoking his famous line on “this is not the era of war” to Russian President Vladimir Putin. This was to blunt the criticism of war-mongering by India. “This is certainly not the era of war but this is also not the era of terrorism,” he said. Few would be able to disagree with that point, specially when it comes to a rogue state like Pakistan. The world saw that ugly truth once again when senior Pakistani military officers rushed to bid farewell to slain terrorists. There clearly cannot be any better example of state-sponsored terrorism. The PM did well by drawing the red line — that “terror and talks can’t go hand in hand and terror and trade can’t go together”.
The speech was also a stinging reminder to countries like the US that they need not waste their time by trying to mediate as this is one battle that India is fully equipped to fight alone. President Donald Trump’s almost laughable bid to treat India and Pakistan as equals is puzzling and disconcerting. On his Truth Social platform on Sunday evening, Trump had grandiosely said he is very proud of the strong and unwaveringly powerful leadership of India and Pakistan for having the strength and wisdom to stop the aggression. The US president may be agnostic about the people he is looking to cut deals with, but he needed to be told clearly that there should be some boundaries in everything. His opt-repeated offer to mediate on the Kashmir issue was anyway totally uncalled for as it ignores the long-standing Simla Agreement which mandates bilateral resolution.
While Modi’s address hit all the right notes, there is a note of caution. It’s highly unlikely that the Pakistan army and government will stop nurturing terrorism. Thus, India needs to be alert and continue its work on strengthening its internal security, military capabilities, and intelligence network. After Pahalgam, a lot of questions have been asked about the intelligence failure in both anticipating and responding to an act of terror in a known volatile region. At the same time, India must sustain its diplomatic efforts to isolate Pakistan further and continue raising the cost of the neighbouring country’s support for terrorism. The prime minister has laid out the vision and set the agenda. The time has come for the government agencies to act fast.