Kargil

In the first half of spring. After training for high altitude warfare in the thick of winters, an expected size of 200 infiltrators started their campaign in January. Crawling, they reached Kargil heights by March and saw scores of Indian bunkers empty. According to various theories, they had planned to capture 10 odd post, but they found them unoccupied, asked for reinforcements and ended up capturing 140 posts. As NLI soldiers spread over entire region of Mushkoh valley, Dras, Batalik, Tololing, and Kargil area. Initially they started patrolling and recce on the ridge line and peaks and then started basic infra and supply routes for a number of posts on peaks without showing any presence in a silent way. They quickly built bunkers and sangars, and started deploying heavy weapons including shoulder fired surface to air missiles and on basic infra and camouflage required. They made a ammunition dumping and stored rations in good quantity, sufficient for them to flight couple of weeks. They made proper reinforcement and supply route in such a good manner that cutting them at the time of capturing peaks, was a biggest headache for Indian army to cut off or destroy them. The Kargil review committee has attempted a partial reconstruction of Operation BADR based on diaries and notebooks recovered from Pakisani personnel during the operation as well as intercepts. KRC (Kargil review committee) mentioned in its report that “It would appear that reconnaissance parties comprising officers started crossing the LOC in late January/early February 1999. They established a first line of administrative bases within a limited distance across the LOC in February. March saw heavy snowfall and so they could move further forward only in April. At that stage, more men joined them and perhaps the bulk of the intruders entered Indian territory in late April. This sequence of events appears logical as earlier induction of larger numbers would have added to logistic problems and increased the risk of detection. Care was exercised by the intruders to move only in the gaps between the Indian winter posts and to avoid detection by Winter Air Surveillance Operations (WASO). They were equipped for extreme cold and snow conditions. In the initial advance, they used Igloo snow tents and constructed “sangars” of loose rock. Perhaps late in April, they moved up a further two to three kilometres. WASO helicopters and operational reconnaissance flights repeatedly flew over them as is evident from one of the dairies captured in Mushkoh Valley. A combination of factors prevented their detection: camouflage clothing; helicopter vibrations which hampered observation; opportunity for concealment on hearing the sound of approaching helicopters; and peace time safety requirements of maintaining a certain height above the ground and a given distance from the LOC. Since the effort was largely to detect infiltration, most flights flew along valleys and not across the ridges. All these factors made the WASO patrols of negligible value as is also evident from the records of previous years.” Each ridge line was held by approximately 50 NLI soldiers under command of a major or captain level officer. Post were made in such a way that in any case of assault (however they never imagined India will react in such aggressive and intensified way to capture back) another nearby post can give support by corner fire as well as logistically. Each post was provided by heavy, light, medium machine gun, rocket launchers, grenade launchers, mortar and craft guns, stringer and artillery support. In easy words, all together a tough time for Indian army was waiting ahead.