THE STORY OF INDIAN WARFARE | May 5 – July 26, 1999: Kargil - The heights of victory

On 05 May 1999, a five-man patrol led by Capt Saurabh Kalia moved across the rugged mountains of Kaksar, in the Kargil Sector. The patrol was tasked to confirm news of likely Pakistani intrusions in the area and the party was cautious. As they approached the ridgeline adjoining the Line of Control, movement atop caught their eyes, which was followed by volleys of gunfire. The surprised patrol returned fire until they ran out of ammunition. Surrounded by Pakistani soldiers — whose presence they and the rest of the Indian Army were not aware of — they were captured and brutally tortured to death. The first shots of the Kargil War had been fired and had claimed its first casualties.

The ambushing of Capt Kalia’s patrol was the first real indicator of the Pakistani infiltration on the heights adjoining the Indian side of the Line of Control in the Kargil Sector. This 180-kilometre-long sector from Kabal Gali in the West to Chorbatla in the East comprised the Dras (Southwest of Kargil), Kargil, and Batalik (to its Northwest) sub-sectors. Its forbidding heights overlooked National Highway 1D — the critical two-lane road which was the only line of communication from Srinagar to Leh. Pakistani occupation of these heights meant that they could dominate and cut off India’s lifeline to Ladakh and Siachen.

OPERATION BADR, as the Pakistani plan to occupy the Kargil heights was called, was the brainchild of General Pervez Musharraf, the then Army Chief and later President of Pakistan. The plan was not new and had been put up by earlier Chiefs to President Zia and Benazir Bhutto, only to be rejected. Musharraf reactivated the plan when he took over as COAS, perhaps as a way to get back at the Indians for their occupation of Siachen, and to draw attention to the Kashmir issue. He himself had been a Commander of the Special Services Group in Siachen, and the reversals he suffered there must have rankled. Although rehearsals and planning had been going on for over two years, the operation was actually set in motion in November 1998 — ironically at the same time when Prime Ministers Nawaz Sharif and Vajpayee were having their historic meeting at Lahore and talking peace.

The jury is still out as to whether Musharraf consulted his Prime Minister and took him into confidence. As per accounts, he briefed Nawaz Sharif in vague detail around April 1999 when it was already set in motion. From February 1999, troops of the Special Services Group and around seven battalions of the Northern Light Infantry (a paramilitary regiment) began climbing up the heights of the Marpo La Ridgeline in Dras, in Kaksar, near Kargil and Batalik, right up to Turtuk near Siachen. The Indian posts along the LOC heights were unoccupied in winter and their move was undetected. Strict radio silence was observed, and the move to the heights was done in a phased manner to prevent detection. Pakistani troops were dressed in shalwar kameez to give the impression that they were mujahideen, so-called freedom fighters from Kashmir — a stance they maintained until their cover was blown. Even within the armed forces, only a handful of people knew of the plan; even the Air Force and Navy had not been taken into confidence. This secrecy enabled the early success of the operation, but also led to its eventual unravelling.

Detection and eviction

The 180-kilometre-long Kargil Sector was then occupied by the 121 Independent Infantry Brigade with four battalions. The positions had vast gaps, and in many cases, Indian positions along the heights had been vacated in the winter months. Neither RAW nor military intelligence had any indication of the gathering storm until a shepherd passed news of armed men in black uniforms at the Kargil heights on 03 May. Reports had started coming in all along the front of activity being detected on the heights, and the disappearance of Saurabh Kalia’s patrol on 05 May set alarm bells ringing. On 09 May, shelling from the heights destroyed an ammunition dump at Kargil, and Pakistani artillery fire was now targeting traffic on the NH 1D. The scale of the threat now became apparent, and on 15 May, the Indian Army launched OPERATION VIJAY to evict the Pakistani intrusions in the Dras, Kargil, Kaksar, and Mushkoh sectors.

The initial attacks to clear the Pakistani positions were disjointed and unprepared. For a long time, the troops were told that it was just a minor intrusion ‘by a few rats’ who had to be thrown out. It was only when the first attacks went in, to be met with heavy machine gun, mortar, and artillery fire, that it became apparent that this was not a minor intrusion; it was a full-scale offensive.

The army may have slipped up in not detecting the intrusions in time, but when it reacted, it moved efficiently. Fortunately, the Zoji La pass (the only pass on the Srinagar–Leh road), which was blocked by snow all winter, opened a month early that year on 22 April and was usable; by early May, reinforcements began being pumped into the area. Two Infantry Divisions (3 and 8 Divisions) were committed to the Kargil sector and over 250 guns moved in. Yet while military actions began to retake the heights, there was a caveat. The government had laid down that the LOC was not to be crossed, and operations were not to be initiated in other sectors to prevent escalation. The IAF launched air operations and the Navy began aggressive patrolling of the Arabian Sea to choke Pakistan’s maritime routes, if required. Slowly, the wheels of the war machinery were set in motion.

The 121 Independent Brigade, in whose area this sector fell, was tasked to contain the intrusions while additional troops were pumped in to clear them. The major priority was the Pakistani positions at Tiger Hill and the Tololing Heights, which overlooked the NH 1D. Those nameless heights — known only by numbers such as Point 5140, Point 5432, Point 4100, etc. (which depicted their height above sea level) — saw the bitterest fighting of the war as Indian officers and men fought and died to recapture them one by one.

The first success came with the securing of Tololing on 13 June. This feature set the stage for the recapture of other positions on the ridgeline. On 4 July, Tiger Hill fell after an 11-hour-long battle. All along the front, from Yaldor, Batalik, Kaksar, Kargil, and Dras, Indian attacks intensified as they closed in and regained the occupied positions. The news streamed into Indian homes via television, and names like Captain Vikram Batra, Major Rajesh Adhikari, Lieutenant Manoj Pandey, Grenadier Yogendra Singh Yadav, Major Vivek Gupta, and Lieutenant Hanifuddin became household names. Battalions that participated in these assaults — 2 RAJ RIF, 18 GRENADIERS, 13 JAK RIF, 1/11 GORKHA RIFLES, 17 JAT, 8 SIKH, and a host of others — became more than numbers. Images of their men standing victoriously with the national flag atop a captured peak imprinted themselves on the national psyche.

The IAF too came into the fray. It suffered an initial setback on 27 May when a MiG-27 suffered a flame-out after a rocket attack (apparently, gas fumes from the firing of its rockets were sucked into the engine, causing it to stall). Its pilot, Flight Lieutenant Nachiketa, bailed out and was taken as a Prisoner of War. Squadron Leader Ajay Ahuja, flying a MiG-21 fighter on an escort mission, flew low to detect where Nachiketa had parachuted, and his aircraft was hit by a Stinger missile. Ahuja bailed out but was killed in cold blood by his captors, and his mutilated body was returned much later.

A day later, on 28 May, a Mi-17 helicopter (often misidentified as a Mi-8) flown by Squadron Leader Rajeev Pundir on a rocket attack mission over the Tololing Heights was hit by a Stinger missile, killing all four crew members. The IAF maintained high-altitude attacks thereafter, using Mirage 2000s with laser-guided bombs for attacks on Pakistani positions. ‘Dumb’ bombs were modified for precision bombing, but identifying and engaging targets at those heights was virtually impossible. The IAF too faced the strict injunction that they could not cross the LOC, which in many ways restricted the efficacy of air operations.

Pakistani withdrawal

By 4 July, the situation was getting critical for Pakistan. The Indian Army was on the offensive and remorselessly recapturing its lost areas, peak by bloody peak. Its artillery, especially the Bofors guns, was taking a terrible toll. Although the Indians did not cross the LOC, they had interdicted all supplies to the forward troops, who were now running out of rations and ammunition. Casualties were mounting by the day, and the Pakistani higher command even refused to take back their dead bodies, as it would amount to admitting their involvement. Yet, the wounded were pouring into the Skardu Base hospital and news was leaking out of the debacle taking place at these heights.

On 4 July, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif flew to Washington for a meeting with US President Bill Clinton, seeking help, only to be bluntly told: "Withdraw your troops." By then, the Indian Army had already recaptured most of the positions in Kargil and Dras and was pushing forward in Batalik and Turtuk as well. Faced with an ignoble defeat, the Pakistanis started retreating, harassed by artillery fire along the way, leaving their dead behind. The Indian Army continued moving forward and by 26 July 1999 — a day marked as Kargil Vijay Diwas — the peaks were back in Indian hands.

Castigated for its failure in what has been called ‘Pakistan’s greatest blunder’ and ‘a disaster bigger than East Pakistan’, the Pakistani Army came under increasing criticism. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif laid the onus of the defeat entirely on the Army, and relations between him and General Musharraf broke down completely. On 12 October, Musharraf staged a coup, ousting Sharif, and another period of military rule began in Pakistan.

Yet, the story did not end there. Just two months later, an Indian MiG-21 shot down a Pakistani Atlantique reconnaissance aircraft which had intruded into Indian territory in the Rann of Kutch. Two years later, in December 2001, the two nations again came to the verge of war after the attack on the Indian Parliament by Pakistani-sponsored terrorists. The eternal story of Indo-Pak enmity continued, as it would for years thereafter.

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