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OPERATION PARAKRAM: The War Unfinished. By Lt. Gm. (Retd) V.K. Sood and Pravin Sawhney. New Delhi, Thousand Oaks, London: Sage Publications. 2003. 204pp. (Maps.) US$42.95, paper. ISBN 0-7619-9793-8.
This book offers a timely analysis of the factors that led to the military mobilization by India from January through November 2002. Code-named "Operation Parakram" (Valour), this 10-month-long mobilization along the border with Pakistan generated high levels of tensions in the relations between the two South Asian neighbours, and raised the prospects of a major war. This was the first time since the 1971 Bangladesh War that India mobilized on such a large scale, especially by re-deploying troops normally stationed on the India-China frontier to the India-Pakistan border. The authors, one a military official and the other a reputed journalist, offer a good account of the background of the operation, and the reasons why it did not accomplish the short- term goals set by the Indian leadership.
The operation was a major effort in coercive diplomacy by New Delhi, in the wake of the terrorist attacks on the Indian Parliament in...