India
The Uri and Pathankot attacks were carried out by Fidayeen attackers, who came from across the border. In the case of Pulwama attack, it is the recruitment and participation of locals that are worrisome, say defence experts.
Pulwama: Cursed with petulant neighbour Pakistan, India continues to bleed, losing several of its brave-hearts continuously, the latest being the Pulwama attack in Jammu and Kashmir on Thursday. But in the last 2-3 years, two terrorist attacks stand out, due to their utter disdainful nature. They are the Uri and Pathankot attacks in the year 2016. Though the casualties were high in all the three attacks (Pulwama, Uri and Pathankot), let’s try to understand the key differences.
In the Uri and Pathankot attacks, militants targeted the army camp at the Line of Control and the air force station in Punjab respectively. The attackers were militants, who were heavily armed and they came from across the border.
But what happened in Pulwama was not carried out by militants armed, but by a youth, who drove an SUV into a truck, exploding it in a matter of seconds.
And the key difference between Uri and Pathankot (armed militants) and Pulwama attack (car-driven) is a crucial one to note, with the home-grown angle coming in.
Retired Major General Nanjapppa said, “In the Pathankot and Uri attacks, the Fidayeen attackers came from across the border. But in the case of Pulwama, a local youth, who may have got directions from Pakistan was in action.”
However, one should note that irrespective of the nature of attacks, it is our men who have been martyred. In the Uri attack, 17 were killed and 30 injured, while in Pathankot attack, India lost 2 members of its security forces.
Coming back to the Pulwama attack, it is not just horrifying, but also worrisome as to how a local youth was coerced into taking up arms. It is needless to say that without the cooperation of the locals, it would not have not been a cinch and sinecure for a youngster to have driven an SUV, loaded with 300-350 kg of explosives into a highly sanitised zone of the sensitive Indian geography of Pulwama.
We only hope that our Kashmiri youths refrain from taking up arms. Instead, we pray they take up pens and rewrite the bloody history of Kashmir with a bright and prosperous one.
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