Maverick's World

"Taking POK" - a discussion of some technical aspects - II

As seen in the earlier post, "Taking POK" is possible in a limited sense (even though I don't think it is a good idea) and there are reasons why India might choose to take such an approach but there is a lot of technical aspects that could strongly affect the ability to actually do this.

The tactical picture of fighting in the mountains favors whoever holds the heights but the strategic picture of fighting in the mountains favors whoever can keep their supply lines clear. Higher is better in most warfare, but in paradoxically in mountain warfare - higher is harder to resupply.

If the Pakistan Army holds heights above key roads in the region, it can direct plunging fire to disrupt movement on those roads*.  Similarly if the Indian Army takes Skardu Airport, the Pakistani Army will seize nearby heights and direct fire at the airport runway preventing India from turning it into a logistical hub**. This sort of counter-intuitive tactical picture will continue to present in the event of any Indian action in the region.

That said - all those Pakistani Army positions will have to be resupplied in some way, otherwise they will run out of food and weapons and eventually be taken out by Indian forces. So here we see a very crucial aspect of mountain warfare - that the fighting is only sustainable as long as key positions (OP/LPs) can be re-supplied***. All resupply operations revolve around the availability of enough POL so it all basically boils down to logistics. And if the cost of Pakistani jerrycan of petrol in the theater of conflict is higher(lower) than the cost of an Indian jerrycan of petrol then India wins (loses).

While it is easy in a discussion about "Taking POK" to get drawn into parallels with Manstein's plan for the Maginot Line (yes there are some similarities there but many differences). It is important to note that window for operations is very short in the "POK" theater. For example - the best case time for

1) Skardu to Skardu Mor (R. Gilgit meets R Indus) along S-1 is 5 Hrs.
2) Kaksar to Jn of Astore Valley Road and KKH is 5 Hrs.
3) Khrool to Skardu (Along the Shingo River Road) is 4 Hrs.
4) Uri to Muzzarfarabad (along the S-3) is 2 Hrs.
5) Titwal to Muzzafarabad (assuming you cross R Jhelum somehow) is 2 Hrs.
6) Poonch to Rawalakot is about 2 Hrs
7) Baghsar to Mangla Dam is about 3 Hrs.

Assuming a constant inflation factor to account for all possible vagaries - we are looking at a window of ONE DAY here. This is a reasonable amount of time in the context of modern military logistics but it does form a critical boundary of sorts on what can be reasonably expected out of a modern military expedition.

Then there are Pakistani redlines to consider. Critical Pakistani resources like the Mangla Dam lie in southern parts of Pakistani Kashmir. Any Indian invasion force that comes too close to those will end up raising the possibility of a nuclear escalation.

So we can see a natural contour for operations emerging from such thinking.

The proposed operation will have to work within a limited time window (including allowances for Pakistani counter-actions and natural obstacles).  It will have to steer clear anything too far south as that will invite a nuclear escalation. So basically it has to remain north of Rawalakot and west of Skardu.

As far the first objective of ending the "Azad Kashmiri" will to fight goes, the Muzaffarabad area is the relevant center of gravity. It is a large population center and "investing" (i.e. with stand off weapons) in it will paralyze the region as refugees fleeing the Indian Army advance will clog all roads leading west.There are two ways to get to Muzaffarabad from the Indian side, one from the Tangdhar side and one from the Uri side, both offer some challenges by way building a bridge or two across fast moving waters but nothing that seems impossible on the face of it. It is likely that in the event that India makes a move towards Muzaffarabad, it will effectively pin the Pakistani Army Reserve North (ARN/ 1st Strike Corps) to a position between Muzaffarabad and the Mangla reservoir. The ARN will want to refrain from getting in the middle and instead remain in reserve should Indian eyes wander towards Mangla or the Kahuta area.

As regards the second objective of permanently snapping the KKH, again we see two options. First goes from Khrool area in India, up the Shingo River Road to Skardu and then along the S-1 to Skardu Morr (north of Jaglot) where the R Indus and R Gilgit meet. The second goes from Kaksar to junction of the Astore Valley Road and the KKH at the point where the R Indus and R Thelichi meet near the base of Nanga Parbat. At a simple analysis - the latter seems preferable to the former (as the former has a longer window of action and meets more Pakistani Army formations). Either ways breaking the KKH at Skardu Morr or at the sangam of the Thelichi and the Indus will force the Chinese and Pakistanis to build out a highly unstable bypass through the Gilgit River valley north from Gahkuch to Chitral.

In the next blog post, I will focus on the battle of the logistics accompanying this sort of thing and how the price of petrol at the forward edge of battle plays into the notion of sustainable operations in this context. I will leave the discussion of the order of battle and other similar details as an exercise to the reader or to other commentators who may be in a position to offer insight****. I will also leave details of positions of known dispersal areas for POL dumps to other OSINT experts.

*They already demonstrated the ability to do this in Kargil in 1999 in case some of you have forgotten. They nearly shut the 1-Alpha down.
** They keep trying to do this with Jihadi proxies in Indian Kashmir. It is a major pain to keep the zone around the airports sanitized.
*** Something the Pakistani Army didn't do well in the Kargil War or on the Saltoro Ridge.
**** I no longer trust the OrBat data and Corps Commanders lists I have. I haven't bothered to update them so I am reluctant to base a discussion off them.

posted by maverick @ 6:36 AM