Fenix (16 page)

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────

L
t-colonel Kulkarni rubbed his eyes to remove the sand that had blown in. This seemed to happen almost like clockwork. But what surprised him the most was not the conditions of the blistering desert he had just rolled into, but rather the way his body was struggling to acclimatize. Of course, having spent his last three years in the mountains of Ladakh had changed his acclimatization. He found himself much more readily suited now for the mountains than for the desert.

              He was being given a refresher course in desert warfare by the Thar desert which, even in March, felt as though it was somehow closer to the sun than the rest of the planet. He had arrived here a week ago and was
still
struggling to breathe when the afternoon heat began to boil everything around them. Touching the metal of the main-battle-tanks under his command after about two-o-clock in the afternoon was hazardous. Of course, he realized that in the freezing plains of Ladakh, it had been the same with the ice…

              Kulkarni looked up as three Gypsy vehicles drove up to his tents. He saw his commanding-officer and other senior staff sitting in the vehicles. Brigadier Sudarshan smiled as he walked off the parked vehicle and headed for the shade of the tents. He shook Kulkarni’s hand and saw his reddish eyes.

              “The sand getting to you?” He laughed.

              “No complaints, sir.” Kulkarni said with a straight face.

              “Don’t lie to me,” Sudarshan replied with a chuckle. “You are younger to me and all that, but I know how this works. I have been dealing with the desert all my life!”

              Kulkarni waved the officers inside the tent. Sudarshan walked in and surveyed the very-basic interiors of Kulkarni’s command-center out here. The swaying cloth of the tent held down by stumps as well as the howl of the desert winds. The tent was filled with banks of radios and battlefield computers, powered by generators outside. A single map-table created from an overturned wood carton filled the rest of the space. Several younger officers in Kulkarni’s command were inside. Sudarshan turned to Kulkarni:

              “Spartan as they come, eh?”

              Kulkarni closed the cover of the tents. “Only temporary, sir. My
real
command-center is inside my tank.”

              “So,” Sudarshan said as he nodded to his aide. The aide opened the maps on the wooden carton. “We have the plan sorted out for you and your boys.”

              “Punjab sector?”

              Sudarshan shook his head: “Negative. The desert.”

              Kulkarni did his best to keep a straight face, but wasn’t successful. Sudarshan had known his eager tank commander long enough to catch that: “I know the feeling. But the main offensive will be launched by the T-90 units in the Punjab. Not my recommendation, mind you.”

              “Considering what happened in Ladakh…” Kulkarni said and then bit off his sentence. It was not his place to say anything more. Besides, he hardly needed to. Sudarshan was there, wasn’t he? The man had
lost
more men in combat operations against the Chinese than Kulkarni
had
in his
entire
command. Entire mechanized battalions had been lost in the massive battles for the frozen plains of Ladakh during the China war. The mountains there were
still
littered with burnt-out hulks of Indian and Chinese vehicles.

              The deciding factor in those battles had been the arrival of the advanced Arjun tanks of the 43
RD
Armored Regiment in the mountains. Kulkarni’s tanks. The original T-72 force in the sector had been lost in the first day  of combat against masses of Chinese T-99 tanks and other armored vehicles. The Arjun tanks out-gunned and out-matched anything the Chinese had. This thin line of tanks under Kulkarni’s command had allowed India to hold on to that territory despite two weeks of hard combat…

              As overall commander of the mechanized forces in the sector, Sudarshan had been Kulkarni’s operational commander during the war. In the years hence, he had moved on to other commands. But he had not lost sight of Kulkarni and had taken him under his wing. So when Sudarshan had been brought to the plains of Punjab and Rajasthan to coordinate offensive planning, he had brought Kulkarni with him.

              Sudarshan sighed. “It’s not that easy to convince mindsets, Kulkarni. The senior brass wants the T-90s to lead the charge this time around. Based on what I gather, the Arjun tank’s achievements in Ladakh has deeply embarrassed the senior armor brass. Sorry to say this, but your achievements are being dismissed as an outlier to the overall armor doctrine. So the small Arjun force in Ladakh will stay where it is. The rest of your tanks will stay here in the desert. The brass is massing the T-90s for the charge to Lahore.”

“Beg pardon, sir,” Kulkarni said neutrally, “but what the
hell
am I supposed to tell my boys about what we are to do in this war? Are our capabilities to be wasted attacking isolated groups of Pak armor and outposts?”

Sudarshan motioned Kulkarni to the maps. He took a second to orient himself on the map and then pointed to their current location in the desert. “We are here,” he jabbed a finger on the map. “Twenty-five kilometers east of the border. Further west, we have this strategic highway the Pakistanis call the N-5. Heading northeast to southwest, it passes through Sukkur to the south and Rahim-Yar-Khan to the north before merging into other highways heading to Multan. West of it is the Indus river. We take the highway, and we will sever Rawalpindi’s control of the country in two pieces.
You
will lead the cavalry charge to the N-5.”

Kulkarni saw that the locations mentioned were
deep
inside Pakistan and were no place for light-armor units. The Arjun tanks under his command, however, could take care of themselves out there.

“Enemy strength, sir?”    

              “Hard to say for now,” Sudarshan said. “Definitely units from the enemy
II
-Corps at Multan. They may even bring in support from
XXX
-Corps further northeast.”

              “So we will meet their 1
ST
Armored Division in combat?” Kulkarni asked and got a nod in response so he continued: “good. Who are we taking along with us?”

              “Who are we taking?” Sudarshan looked to his aide as though it were a joke. “
Everybody!
Kulkarni, we are taking
every
tank we can muster between the 43
RD
and the 75
TH
regiments, to the N-5!”

              Pakistani forces south of Multan were formidable. Discounting the tanks left as reserve in Ladakh to deter the Chinese, the total number of Arjun tanks tagged for this effort was slightly greater than one-hundred.

              “Of course,” Sudarshan mused, “…this is all assuming that a war
does
happen. We think it might. Then again, it may not. Keep your powder dry, Kulkarni.”

              “Yes, sir!”

“W
hat’s the
E-T-A
on track start?”

“Uh…approximately thirty seconds. White-hot.”

“Main screen please.” 

Malhotra turned to see Sinha standing next to him with a cup of tea. He took it with a smile and turned to face the large screen in front of them as it flicked into operation with grayscale imagery. One of the
RISAT
satellites had just begun its pass on another stretch of the terrain west of the international border between India and Pakistan. Compared with the vast desolation of Tibet, the view here was different. Villages, mud, concrete roads, trees and bushes. Water and canals.

Obstacles.

Malhotra saw the trap being laid out by the Pakistanis to channel attacking Indian forces into kill zones east of the city of Lahore. The analysis would have to wait but even a superficial view of the imagery showed the immense obstacles to an attacking force from the urbanization of the terrain. Not to mention the presence of jihadists amongst the civilians who were already rallying in the streets of Lahore and other Pakistani cities.

              “This will never work,” Malhotra blurted out. Sinha looked up from the print-out images in his hand and removed his reading glasses.

              “What won’t work?” 

              “The ground offensive we are preparing.”

              “Oh?” The navy man asked. Ground offensives were not his domain. “And why not?”

              “Too many obstacles in the way,” Malhotra turned to Sinha: “too many villages that cannot be avoided, too many civilians to search and impound to weed out the jihadists and too many intertwined kill-zones set up by the Pakis. We will lose men and vehicles by the hundreds for the short trip between the border and the outskirts of Lahore. This is
not
1965!”

              “Army headquarters needs to be able to launch a major offensive against the Pak army if conflict erupts,” Sinha observed neutrally.

“Well, it cannot be in
this
sector. Hopefully they will agree with me when we show them these images.”

“And if they don’t agree?”

“Then it will be a massacre.” Malhotra replied and walked into his office to make some calls.

──── 18
────

“T
ake a seat, Basu.” Ravoof welcomed the
RAW
chief into his office with a smile. Ravoof took his seat after Basu had done the same opposite the desk.

“So I hear Islamabad has withdrawn its officials from its embassy here in Delhi,” Basu noted with a smile.

“They have,” Ravoof replied. “And the war rhetoric is through the roof on the streets in Pakistan. The civilian government in Islamabad is not able to keep it under lids now that the Pak army has been humiliated. If the latter
want
war to restore their honor, there is
nothing
the civilian government can do to stop it. Their power, or lack thereof, has never been more apparent as in the last few days. The line-of-control is burning, jihadists are foaming in their mouths chanting war cries in the streets of Lahore and Karachi and the Pak army is mobilizing.”

“Are we optimistic about staring them down?” Basu asked seriously.

Ravoof shook his head: “I don’t think so. Our attacks on the
LET
commanders has deeply humiliated the
ISI
. And our air-force has crushed the morale of their air-force. The Pakistanis don’t know how to respond to all this. Not least because they never
expected
us to carry out our threats to them. I guess past governments had left them with a sense of complacency.”

“Maybe,” Basu offered, “they thought we would shy away from the threat of war in our weakened state following the China war.”

“Indeed!” Ravoof leaned back in his seat. “But in their strike on Mumbai, they
under
-estimated our response. God knows what their endgame scenario was.”

“
Is
,” Basu corrected Ravoof.

The latter nodded his agreement to the correction and then leaned forward: “which brings me to a more sensitive matter. How did things go, um, up north?”

Basu kept a neutral expression for several seconds. The room went silent as both men stared at each other. Finally, Basu relented and offered a slight smile, but said nothing.

“Well,” Ravoof leaned back into his chair yet again, “we will need to establish links to the
ISI
for the strike on Mumbai
before
we can take it to the prime-minister. We need to
prove
that the
ISI
gave him the bomb.”

“Does it matter anymore?” Basu asked. “The Pakistanis are acting like rabid dogs looking for war. Maybe the war will start today, maybe tomorrow, or maybe next week. What difference does
one
man’s confession make now? Shouldn’t we be focusing on the larger picture instead?”

“Don’t you
get
it, Basu?” Ravoof asked sharply. “Don’t you
see
that the
war
will not achieve
anything
substantial? The power-players in Islamabad will escape unharmed. So will most of the Generals in Rawalpindi who carried out the dirty strike on Mumbai. The
war
will cost Pakistan the lives of tens of thousands. But to the ones in power, what is the loss of tens of thousands in a land of three-hundred million poor and destitute? The strike on Mumbai, however, will hurt us. It is already doing so. You have seen the economic projections. This strike will send us back by a decade. In exchange the war will cost Pakistan its economy entirely. But the country is a basket-case ready to be toppled over at any time. So I ask you: is that a fair exchange? The people in power in Rawalpindi and Islamabad will retain their power after the war. No. If this has to have
any
meaning, we
must
set an example!”

“What
are
you suggesting exactly?” Basu was curious. His position demanded clarity. Diplomacy and riddles was not his game.

“I am
suggesting
,” Ravoof said forcefully, “that we make the real perpetrators of the strike on Mumbai
pay
for what they have done.”

              “Ramp up the strikes further against the last remaining
LET
commanders?”

Ravoof shook his head: “I mean the
real
perpetrators. not their proxies.”

              “Rawalpindi?” Basu cocked an eyebrow and leaned forward: “Are you
insane
? How would we even do that? The place is a fortress!”

              “You used the limited strikes on the terror camps in Kashmir as cover and almost wiped out the entire senior terrorist leadership, did you not?”

              “So?” Basu pressed.

              “So, just imagine what you more
could
accomplish if you had the cover of an ongoing war and the resources of the military…” Ravoof observed.

              After several seconds of silence, Basu smiled and got up from his chair: “I will call on you later.”

P
athanya jumped off the back of the truck and looked up as a massive C-17 roared into the bright blue noon sky above the airfield. He saw the rest of the pathfinders jumping off the truck and grabbing their backpacks and making their way to the open ramp of the nearby C-130J. Kamidalla was the last to get off and he grabbed both his backpack as well as Pathanya’s before making his way to the edge of the truck.

“Where to now?” He said as he tossed Pathanya his backpack and jumped off. Both men walked towards the parked aircraft.

“No airbase north of here, so I assume we are going south.” Pathanya said after a few seconds.

“They didn’t tell you?” Kamidalla asked in surprise. Pathanya laughed: “You know the deal. They
never
tell us anything. But we will probably find out soon enough.”

“Well, I hope it is someplace warm!” Kamidalla noted as he walked into the rear cabin of the aircraft and tossed his backpack to the side of a seat. The loadmaster on this flight walked past the two officers and put up four fingers.

Four minutes.

“We are one short on the team,” Kamidalla noted as Pathanya took his seat. Pathanya nodded. He knew. They had had one casualty during the operation to nab Muzammil. It could have been worse, Pathanya thought. But while his team member would recover and live to fight another day, it had left the pathfinders one man short.

“Ansari asked me about that,” Pathanya replied. The aircraft engines began spooling up and the loadmaster began raising the rear cargo door. 

“And?” Kamidalla asked as the blue interior lights of the cabin activated and left everything inside awash with shades of white and steel-blue.

“And I told him I know just the man to fill that position,” Pathanya continued. He noticed his pathfinders beginning to doze off as the aircraft rolled to the runway.

“Know the man?” Kamidalla stowed his rifle safely behind the backpack. Pathanya removed his battlefield computer from the backpack and powered it on. “Former spear team member. Used to be in the position
you
occupy now when we were in deep shit inside Bhutan.”

“Aha.” Kamidalla noted with a smile. “Part of the Thimpu shield trio!”

“The man saved my life out there. I would have bled to death on that god-forsaken ridge near Barshong if he hadn’t gotten me out.” The two men held on as the aircraft rumbled down the runway and lifted into the skies above Ladakh.

“Then why didn’t you bring him in for our previous joyride into enemy territory?” Kamidalla asked out of curiosity. He noted that he was perhaps asking one too many questions. But it might be a long flight and there was not much for him to do to pass the time…

Pathanya didn’t look away from his laptop: “
SOCOM
had him assigned to some other task force.”

“So what changed?”

Pathanya stopped what he was doing and faced Kamidalla: “this war is about to start soon. Our missions is no longer to nab a terrorist leader or some other piece of shit. This is going to get
real
messy
real
fast. I want pathfinder reinforced with experienced men before the army’s demand for men begins to start sapping resources at
SOCOM
.”

“Like last time?” Kamidalla asked.

“Yeah. Like last time.”

“I
n here, sir.” Ansari strained his eyes as he followed the soldier into the darkened corridor. He looked around and saw the source of the bleak neon lighting overhead. Closed doors on either side had numbers on them. The one at the very end was guarded by two military-police guards on either side, heavily-armed for the fact that they were inside a secure military facility. Ansari noticed the holstered pistols on their belts. The two guards snapped to attention as Ansari walked up to the door.

The doors and rooms here were supposed to be soundproof. Yet Ansari could hear the muffled guttural screaming of a man inside. He turned to his escort: “What the hell is going on in here?”

The major from military-intelligence kept a neutral face and unlocked the door, motioning to Ansari to enter. Ansari hesitated. Did he
want
to know what was happening here? At some level he knew what to expect. The counter-insurgency personnel at military-intelligence were not known for kid-gloved methods. Especially when it came to the hardcore members of the Islamic jihad waging war in the valley against Indian forces.

So
why
was he here to begin with? Surely he could have waited for the disseminated intel to come though? No. Basu had “advised” him to go see for himself the
determination
with which his service was pursuing the Mumbai attackers. Basu was known to come across as a mild mannered, balding old man with white hair. Almost like a school headmaster. But there had been something deeply menacing in his words to Ansari. And
that
had gotten Ansari’s interest.       

Ansari exhaled and gently opened the door.

The large room behind the door was lit up in the same bluish ceiling neon lights as the corridor outside. Cameras on every ceiling corner focused on the center of the room. Ansari saw a badly bruised and bleeding Muzammil on the floor, laying to the side of his chair, which had also fallen on its side. His spilled blood showed up as bluish-black in the lighting. An army captain in fatigues was on one knee, punching the man on his face with bare knuckles. Four other soldiers stood nearby, their batons and pistol holsters visible. Ansari looked to the side to see some of Basu’s men also in the room, checking their notes. Nobody seemed to be particularly concerned about their source receiving savage blows to the face…

“Okay, captain. That’s
enough
for now, I think.” Ansari’s escort said as he walked in behind Ansari and closed the door to the room. The army officer on his knee turned around to face the senior officers in the room and got to his feet. On the floor, Muzammil began to crawl away desperately, using nothing but his fingers to pull himself.

Ansari felt disgusted. His face showed it. He turned to the guards standing near the crawling terrorist: “
You!
Get that man up!
Now!
”

The soldiers hesitated and looked to the major, who nodded. They moved to pick the man up by his shoulders and put the chair upright. They then placed Muzammil on the chair. It seemed like he would simply fall off it again.

Ansari walked up to Muzammil and stood two feet away, observing the wretched mass of flesh and bones now left in front of him. It took him some time to associate this man with the pictures he had seen of him just days before. This same man had been shouting at the top of his voice for jihad against India. The mastermind of the attempted nuclear strike on Mumbai.

The murderer of thousands of civilians.

“Did you ever think,” Ansari said as he brought Muzammil’s head up with his left hand, “that you would
ever
see the inside of an Indian prison?”

Muzammil looked at Ansari, his eyes sore and red. But he said nothing.

“No, you didn’t, did you?” Ansari continued. “You must have thought that you would send thousands of your young boys to die by our bullets, but never face captivity. Didn’t you?” Ansari then jerked the man’s head back to its slump state. “Did you think we would just let you get away after what you did?”

Muzammil mumbled something unintelligible, so Ansari turned to his captors: “at
least
leave the man able enough to
speak!
Good god!
”

“What do you know about
god
?” Muzammil said finally, barely speaking the words. Ansari turned around and looked at the man, who still staring at the floor. “So. He
does
speak! I was beginning to have doubts!”