Pahalgam Response: Why India Must Fight Smart?

The Pahalgam terror attack shook the nation albeit with a next level of violence targeting innocent tourists and attempting to create a communal divide. The terror unleashed by Pakistan and its terrorist module TRF (LeT) was more than an attack on innocent tourists. It was a message—a provocation beyond redlines designed to destabilise the region, test India’s resolve, and drag the country into a familiar cycle of grief, anger, communal divide and conventional retaliation.

But this time, the response narrative must change. The script must be of Chanakya Niti: deception must mask the surface but the silent strike must erase the cause. In this context stretch them out conventionally, play into their predictability syndrome and then hit their sensitivities smartly and unconventionally.

Diplomatic reprisals, including the downgrading of ties, suspension of cross-border trade, and holding in abeyance of the IWT, were quick to follow. Yet the Indian public—and more importantly, its strategic establishment—understands that the old playbook no longer fits today’s battlefield. In an age where terror networks operate through encrypted messages and proxy fighters, India’s response must be smarter, sharper, and more surgical. Served ‘COLD but with HEAT. Pakistan’s cycle of terror and deniability must meet a reciprocity.

That means turning to what modern warfare demands: Technology for Effect: unmanned systems, precision capabilities, and disruptive technologies that enable non-contact, deniable, and decisive effect. Swarms allow you to combine swarms and precision for effect while AI-aided long-range drones can take out specific targets. These must be supplemented by non-kinetic warfare to paralyse the enemy and covert operations to target leadership.

From Tit-for-Tat to Out of the Hat

Ironically India’s previous responses after Uri in 2016 and air strikes on Balakot in 2019 did mark a shift in approach but were transitory in effect. But both came with significant risks of responses and escalation. While they carried symbolism and sent strong political signals, they were limited in scope and effect. They failed to achieve the desired deterrence.

Pahalgam should now mark the point where India fully transitions from retaliatory actions to a technologically enabled deterrence posture—one where precision and timing, not geography and scale, drive outcomes. The use of Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS), cyber operations, and AI-driven surveillance offers India the ability to inflict pain without crossing red lines, deliver punishment without inviting conventional war, and act with precision rather than provocation.

Breaking the Predictability: Innovation and Technology-Driven Responses

In the face of mounting threats, India’s responses must evolve beyond the conventional, predictable operational matrix. The enemy, aware of India’s traditional military moves, often anticipates and counters with equal or asymmetric force. To feint predictability but strike with unpredictability, India must embrace innovation and bold decisions—not just in terms of modern weaponry but in strategic unpredictability. Technologically aided solutions such as advanced unmanned systems, AI-driven intelligence, and precision strike capabilities offer an opportunity to radically alter the terms of engagement. But the biggest threat is human culture and status quo mindsets. By utilizing unconventional warfare tools, India can disrupt enemy predictability, create psychological ascendancy, and force adversaries into reacting on the back foot through strategic dislocation.

UAS as the New Frontline

Drones are no longer futuristic concepts; they are the new frontline. India’s rapidly expanding drone arsenal—including the Heron Mark-II, Indigenous Rustom-II, kamikaze loitering munitions, predator drones MQ-9B etc and emerging swarm technologies—can now be deployed as the first stage in a calibrated, escalatory response to terror attacks to be exploited if required by manned warfare in finely tuned operational strategy.  We must derive the right lessons from recent wars for effect in our operational environment.

These platforms allow India to:

• Strike terror infrastructure without manned attacks or high-risk air raids.
• Eliminate handlers and launchpad operatives before they can be launched.
• Overwhelm Pakistani air defences with coordinated drone swarms, and cyber-attacks allowing for follow-on actions by the Air Force if needed.
• Maintain plausible deniability, giving India strategic room to operate under the threshold of conventional war.

This isn’t about theatrics—it’s about shifting the cost-benefit calculation for Pakistan’s deep state and its proxy terrorists. When they realise that leadership targets, logistical bases, and even digital assets can be silently neutralised, deterrence becomes real.

Israel’s Model: Targeted, Deniable, Effective

India need not reinvent the wheel. Israel has long adopted a doctrine of precise, deniable strikes against high-value terror targets, whether through UAVs, air-dropped smart munitions, BYR missiles or clandestine operations. From Gaza to Damascus, its actions are rarely confirmed yet widely understood and with telling effect.

The message is psychological as much as physical: leadership is never safe. Every move is watched. Every signal is intercepted. Every safehouse is temporary.

India must adopt this mindset. The deep state in Rawalpindi has long insulated itself from consequences, outsourcing aggression to non-state actors. It is time this equation was reversed. Drone/ missile strikes, cyber disruption, and coordinated covert actions should target not just militants but the broader support architecture: arms suppliers, intelligence nodes, digital recruiters, and financial networks.

Disruptive Technologies: Force Multipliers for a New Age

India’s advantage doesn’t stop with drones. A convergence of disruptive technologies is now within reach. These include:

• AI-based surveillance and threat prediction to identify infiltration patterns before they materialise.
• Cyber warfare tools to dismantle the digital command-and-control networks used by terror outfits.
• Electronic warfare systems jam incoming drones, scramble communications, and neutralise GPS-guided strikes.
• Satellite-enabled reconnaissance for real-time terrain mapping, giving Indian forces unmatched visibility in hostile topography.

When used in concert, these tools allow for non-contact warfare—a doctrine that maximises strategic effect while minimising political and human costs. And they ensure that India can strike not just back, but forward—pre-emptively and proportionately.

Covert Operations: A Necessary Complement

While UAS and cyber capabilities are critical, they cannot entirely replace covert special operations. India’s elite forces, working with intelligence agencies, must maintain the capacity for high-value, time-sensitive missions—whether to eliminate a key planner, disrupt a bomb-making cell, or interdict smuggled weaponry. Covert operations must exploit the Pakistan faultlines in Baluchistan and Pakhtoonistan / TTP to take out high-value leadership targets both military and nonmilitary who abet this proxy war.

What changes, however, is the way these operations are planned and targeted. With AI-fed surveillance, biometric intelligence, and advanced communications intercepts, these missions can be surgical, swift, and far less risky than in the past.

Again, deniability is key. India must not seek headline-generating responses. It must seek strategic silence with tactical violence—a policy of punishment without proclamation.

Securing the Home Front with Technology

The Pahalgam attack also highlighted an uncomfortable truth: the terror threat is not just imported—it is embedded.

India must use the same technologies outwardly deployed to also secure its cities, borders, and infrastructure. This includes:

• Drone patrols over sensitive zones and border areas.
• Real-time behavioural analysis to flag potential radicalisation.
• Facial recognition and biometrics at transit points, helping to intercept handlers or repeat offenders.
• Data-driven profiling of social media and financial transactions, ensuring early detection of networks.

This is not about mass surveillance. It is about smart, lawful, and targeted security protocols that outmatch the technological sophistication of the enemy.

The Road Ahead: Policy, Production, and Posture

For India to fully adopt this doctrine, three things must be addressed – Capability, Credibility and Strategic Communication for multidomain deterrence. Thus the focus must be:

1. Doctrine Clarity – A formal escalation framework that integrates UAS, cyber tools, and special ops into a single, cohesive counter-terror policy.
2. Domestic Capability – Scaling indigenous drone production and AI-based ISR tools through Make in India and DRDO–private partnerships.
3. Political Will – The courage to strike when needed, not for optics, but for results—quiet, effective, and unrelenting.

India’s enemies rely on ambiguity, terrain, and predictability. Our response must be unambiguous, terrain-agnostic, and unflinching. It’s an era of multidomain operations where non-kinetic and kinetic/ manned and unmanned instruments of war must blend as a symphony.

Be Prepared for the Counter-Strike Response

Pakistan possesses a range of unmanned armed systems courtesy of Turkey and China. Some identified are Chinese-made Wing Loong drones and Turkish TB2 Bayraktars. These pose a serious threat to India’s forward posts, radar installations, and vulnerable civilian infrastructure. Therefore, our strategy must include not just offensive unmanned capability but also robust cyber resilience, electronic warfare, and counter-drone defences. Anti-drone systems, jamming technologies, and integrated air surveillance grids must be operational across border zones and critical infrastructure sites. In this new arms race of unmanned systems, survivability and resilience will be just as important as firepower.

Smart War Is Not a Luxury. It’s a Necessity.

The world of counter-terror is changing. The terrain no longer dictates strategy—technology does. The ends need to be redefined and the ways and means must be smart. The Pahalgam response must be remembered as the moment when the country turned decisively toward smart war—a war of intelligence, invisibility, and innovation. After all the RM and the Defence forces have been talking of technology and transformation. We need to walk the talk NOW.