NEW DELHI/ISLAMABAD, 23 May — India yesterday ordered its warships in the Bay of Bengal to reinforce its naval fleet in the Arabian Sea as Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee told troops it was time for a “decisive fight” with Pakistan.
“We have moved five front-line ships of the eastern fleet to be cross-deployed to the western seaboard to augment the force levels,” Naval spokesman Commander Rahul Gupta said. Highly placed naval sources said four of the vessels are armed with missiles but the spokesman declined to elaborate on the redeployment.
“A Russian-built destroyer, an indigenous frigate and three corvettes are steaming into the Arabian Sea from the Bay of Bengal,” the source said, adding the destroyer, the frigate and two of the corvettes are capable of launching missiles.
The Indian Navy has already brought the country’s merchant navy under its flag and kept its only aircraft carrier on a state of alert in the Bay of Bengal.
The Indian Air Force, the world’s fourth largest, also went on alert as India’s mobilization gained momentum. “We are still not at the stage where we scramble jets but we are now on a state of alert,” a senior officer from the Western Air Command said.
He said the air force has also cleared some 80 grounded MiG-21s for operational duty. “We are also redeploying our Mirage-2000 and Jaguars to forward locations from their mother bases,” the official said of the fleet of French- and British-built warplanes which adds teeth to India’s mainly Russian-built air force.
Addressing front-line troops in Kashmir, Vajpayee said: “Be prepared for sacrifices. But our aim should be victory. Because it’s now time for a decisive fight.” His speech was broadcast live across the nation by state television.
In its first significant response to an onslaught of Indian threats after militants attacked an Indian Army camp last week, Pakistan renewed a pledge to crack down on guerrilla violence. “...the government will not allow the territory of Pakistan or any territory whose defense is the responsibility of Pakistan to be used for any terrorist activity anywhere in the world,” Pakistan’s military government said in a statement.
The statement, made after a joint meeting of President Pervez Musharraf’s Cabinet and the policy-making National Security Council (NSC), however, said Pakistan would continue its “moral, political and diplomatic support” for the Kashmiri struggle for self-determination.
Islamabad also vowed to use “full force” if attacked. “The Indian leadership should desist from such blatant war-mongering and instead focus on addressing their internal problems as well as resolving peacefully their many disputes with their neighbors,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement later. “Pakistan has the ability to defend itself against any war imposed by India. Any misadventure by India will be met with full force,” it said.
As soldiers of the two countries exchanged heavy mortar fire, at least four civilians were killed. Three villagers, including a young girl, were killed on the Pakistani side of the border in Kashmir while an Indian civilian was killed and five others were wounded.
Police said an Indian village was engulfed in flames after it was struck by shells fired by Pakistani troops. The shells sparked a fire which burned out at least 60 houses in Manyari village in Kashmir’s Kathua sector, some 82 km (50 miles) south of the state winter capital Jammu. “The powerful shelling started yesterday afternoon and several houses caught fire as the shells landed squarely on them,” a police officer said.
World pressure on the nuclear-armed rivals mounted to defuse the situation. The European Union called on India to cool the rhetoric and said President Musharraf must act on promises to rein in terrorists. “The European Union and India have common interests in fighting terrorism, but at the same time we do not consider that escalating the rhetoric is the most appropriate mechanism for fighting terrorism,” a senior EU diplomat said.
With the exception of Britain, the 15-nation EU has never played a prominent diplomatic role in South Asia.
