Summary
Tim Roemer, the US ambassador to India, examines the country’s so-called Cold Start strategy, a plan to attack Pakistan, which he describes as a ‘mixture of myth and reality’. He says it is unlikely that India would implement the strategy, and questionable whether it would succeed if it did.
Text
The Indian Army’s “Cold Start Doctrine” is a mixture of myth and reality. It has never been and may never be put to use on a battlefield because of substantial and serious resource constraints, but it is a developed operational attack plan announced in 2004 and intended to be taken off the shelf and implemented within a 72-hour period during a crisis.
Cold Start is not a plan for a comprehensive invasion and occupation of Pakistan. Instead, it calls for a rapid, time- and distance-limited penetration into Pakistani territory with the goal of quickly punishing Pakistan, possibly in response to a Pakistan-linked terrorist attack in India, without threatening the survival of the Pakistani state or provoking a nuclear response.
It was announced by the BJP-led government in 2004, but the government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has not publicly embraced Cold Start and GOI (government of India) uncertainty over Pakistani nuclear restraint may inhibit future implementation by any government. If the GOI were to implement Cold Start given present Indian military capabilities, it is the collective judgment of the Mission that India would encounter mixed results. The GOI failed to implement Cold Start in the wake of the audacious November 2008 Pakistan-linked terror attack in Mumbai, which calls into question the willingness of the GOI to implement Cold Start in any form and thus roll the nuclear dice.
At the same time, the existence of the plan reassures the Indian public and may provide some limited deterrent effect on Pakistan. Taken together, these factors underline that the value of the doctrine to the GOI may lie more in the plan’s existence than in any real world application.
2. (S/NF) As we understand it, Cold Start is an operational plan devised by the Indian Army and designed to make a rapid and limited penetration into Pakistani territory with the goal of quickly punishing Pakistan over some event, such as a Pakistan-linked terrorist attack in India, without threatening the survival of the Pakistani state or provoking a nuclear response. Cold Start is not a plan for the comprehensive invasion or occupation of Pakistan. Cold Start is said to have been formulated after the Indian Army’s slow and drawn-out 2002 mobilization in response to the fatal 2001 Pakistan-linked terror attack on the Indian Parliament. The lengthy process of mobilization, lack of strategic and operational flexibility, and the resulting lack of any element of surprise drew criticism from Indian politicians and opinion leaders, which prompted Indian Army planners to devise Cold Start.
3. (S/NF) In order to avoid the Indian Army’s slow and lumbering military mobilisation process and preserve the element of surprise in attack, Cold Start attacks could begin within 72 hours after the attack order has been given, and would be led by armored spearheads launched from prepared forward positions in Punjab and Rajasthan.
As described, the plan emphasises speed and overwhelming firepower: armored formations and accompanying infantry would advance into eastern Pakistan with limited goals in terms of distance and in terms of duration. Although the plan reportedly has a significant air support component, it is unclear to us how much joint versus parallel planning has taken place. We have not heard of a major operational role for the Indian Navy or parallel sea-launched attacks.
4. (S/NF) A positive attribute of Cold Start from the Indian perspective is that the short 72-hour time period between decision and attack could shield the GOI from international pressure to refrain from taking military action against Pakistan. India’s prolonged 2002 mobilization period gave the international community notice of Indian troop movements and allowed plenty of time for a series of Western interlocutors to lobby GOI leaders. Even if the plan is never actually implemented -- and there is considerable question as to GOI intent to ever implement it -- news of Cold Start’s existence has already paid dividends to Indian policymakers by providing reassurance to the Indian public that the GOI has the means to punish Pakistan for attacks on Indian soil without triggering potential mutually-assured nuclear destruction. From the Indian perspective, the unimplemented plan has the added virtue of accentuating Pakistani discomfiture and angst, which in theory may have some deterrent value. ROEMER
Dear visitor, the comments section is undergoing an overhaul and will return soon.