Let's cut the crap on the India-Pakistan border tension

Let's cut through the bullshit. If that's even possible at a time like this.

The only thing that's more confounding than the fog of war is the fog of near war. As 81 millimeter mortar shells whizz and bang across the international border in both directions; as television brings us images of petrified civilians bolting in the dark as the skies over the "chicken's neck" sector of Akhnoor are lit up by the arcs of incoming fire; as the ever eloquent conversation on social media is propelled by such subtlety as #BuzdilPakistan and #CowardModi – this is as old as the conflict itself.

The tantalising fog of fighting presents the delectable opportunity to obfuscate, muddy, divert. To transform what's grey into black and white.

To make what's not entirely clear, absolute. Who fired first? Who escalated a par-for-the-course exchange of festival fire? Has Pakistan learnt a lesson?

All questions that present a sumptuous opportunity for spiralling debate, conspiracy theories and a handful of sentiments masquerading as patriotic nationalism. But to even presume, to be able to cut through the bullshit, would need a clinical assessment of India's retaliation, unsullied by the swaying forces of sentimentalism and politics.

You've heard numbers all week on the news. Eight dead. 30 injured. 60 border posts targeted. 81 millimeter. 16,000 evacuated. 15 temporary camps.

Here are four reasons why the current exchange on the border is unprecedented in the steadily tenuous 11-year history of the India-Pak ceasefire.

1) As the lead story in today's Mail Today reports, the Pakistan establishment, fattened for years on the impression that an Indian retaliation will be token and result in no real damage, was shaken by the swiftness and intensity of the response. Nobody will confirm this for you officially, but every Pakistani shell that landed in Jammu triggered ten Indian shells smashing into Pakistan. Fire included the use of rocket-propelled grenades. 

2) The Indian forces operating on the international border and along the LoC, to the south of Pir Panjal, specifically targeted permanent fortifications, bunkers and defences built by the Pakistan Army and other agencies primarily as border outposts, but also to facilitate infiltration of terrorists. Again, you'll never have an official confirmation but the political leadership has been briefed by the Army about severe damage to the bunkers in several locations.

3) Beyond the public statements - or lack thereof - from the political establishment, there was no political diffidence within the security command structure. The message to the forces on the ground was clear. There was no hesitation. In public, the message was that Pakistan could forget about talks until its guns fell silent. On the phone and in operations rooms, it was less ambiguous: do what's necessary to make those guns fall silent; the message has to be unmistakable. As anyone will tell you, a commander on the ground values clarity from the civilian leadership as much, if not more than the trust of his forces. The BSF and Army had a sharp brief: graduate your responses, but shake the Pakistanis off their gun positions.

4) There was clarity in the government's own public voice too. It was simple: everybody wants peace. India wants peace and isn't an aggressor, but let there be no mistaking that for weakness. It is precisely the opposite -- a distinct lack of clarity, of political purpose, of Delhi's approach in the past that has emboldened the impunity with which Pakistan provoked in 2013. Pakistan has in the past, been allowed to exploit the confounding and dangerous interference of Delhi's political impulse for peace with the more immediate need for the resolution of a tactical situation on the border. This time there was no interference. The message was clear: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today backhanded the clamour for him to speak about the border tension by saying our guns were doing the talking. Defence minister Arun Jaitley's statement was less of a cowboy quip, but said it clearer: "Pakistan, in these attacks, has clearly been the aggressor. But it must realise that our deterrence will be credible. If Pakistan persists with this adventurism our forces will make the cost of this adventurism unaffordable."

What's happening, and hopefully winding down now, at the border has everything to do with matters as specific as the free hand -- or lack thereof -- our security forces have when dealing tactically with Pakistan, to the larger question of whether this could be the beginning of a turning point in Pakistan's own predilection for provocation, the reasons for which go beyond the scope of this column and have everything to do with Pakistan's political own situation, the upcoming elections in Jammu & Kashmir and a combination of other apparent factors.

But there's no black and white. Ever.