Several uncomfortable questions have surfaced over the media reporting of the Special Forces’ assault on rebel bases on the India-Myanmar border on June 9. The first of them is why did the government choose to leak the covert operation if it had taken place "deep inside Myanmar" as claimed by junior information minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore.

There is much confusion about the casualties in the rebel ranks  and  the locations of the raids . The assumption, encouraged by ministers and some retired military men, that these raids could be replicated to counter the ‘western disturbances’ meaning Pakistan, also seems out of place.

 The border with Myanmar is open and porous, the one with Pakistan is highly militarized. And unlike Myanmar, which is a friendly nation though they dont often deliver on India's security concern, Pakistan is a hostile country and will treat an Indian Special Force strike as an act of war.

As they say, the east is east and the west is west and the twain shall never meet -- or should we say, the twain shall never be the same.

The army spokesperson ADGMO Maj-Gen Ranbir Singh said in his first press conference that the special forces have ‘inflicted significant casualties’ on the rebels. Later military sources placed the casualties at around 20 , but the media quoting defence and home ministry sources have let its imagination run riot.

Some channels have quoted specific figures like 38, others have placed it between 100 to 150.  The triumphalism was sparked  by junior information minister Rahyavardhan Singh Rathore's claims of "strikes deep inside Myanmar" , which again seems to be totally untenable.

Let’s examine the details emerging from media reports, all sourced to ministries and military officials :

(a)    The strikes were ‘deep inside Myanmar’

(b)   The entire operation was over in 45 minutes

(c)    The commandos were dropped on the border by helicopters

(d)   They trekked ( some reports  say even crawled) to rebel camps before hitting them

Those  aware of ground realities in the jungles of Myanmar’s Sagaing Division  ( where the rebel camps were supposedly attacked ) would know if it is not possible to ‘strike deep inside Myanmar’ on foot and still finish off the operation in 45 minutes. If the camps were located 6 to 7 kms inside Myanmar, it would take any fit commando much more than 45 minutes to simply run up to them and return back, let alone stage the attack.  It would be too much to expect from even the toughest of commandos to make even 2-3 kilometres on the run with heavy weapons like Rocket Propelled Grenades (RPG)  and medium machine guns, hit the camps and de-induct within 45 minutes without suffering any casualties. Even if the special forces  had guides from anti-Khaplang NSCN rebels who have broken off from him, this would be well-nigh impossible.

There hangs a tale. If  helicopters were used to drop commandos on the border , leaving them to trek a few kilometers at the dead of night in poor visibility (it is raining in Sagaing as in much of northeast now) , alert rebel sentries can’t miss  the noise of helicopters. And rebels of NSCN-K and the Meitei groups are well trained and have standard drills to counter an assault --  they would easily get to cover  jungle tracks leading to the base in pre-selected ambush positions to welcome the assault group.   By all indications, the locations of the camps mentioned in media reports ( sourced to ministry sources)  are manned by mixed groups of rebels that include the tough fighters of Khaplang and Meitei groups – it is not left to those of the Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO)  or some such group who man these camps.

Manipur Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) has admitted one of its 'border transit camp' was attacked by Indian troops but insist no damage was caused and the attack was beaten back. The ULFA has backed that claim and the NSCN-K has denied any attack on their camp, suggesting the camp attacked by the Indian commandos was not theirs. 

On the other hand, some journalists have gone to the extent of suggesting Khaplang and his allies are in the process of setting up a government in exile. Much as a special force operation, however limited, is possible in the open and porous border with Myanmar but not possible in Pakistani Kashmir, it is also impossible for Khaplang to do what the Awami league leaders could do in 1971 -- form a provisional government in exile to fight a liberation war that was imposed on them by a brutal Pakistan army. If Phizo failed in forming a credible government in exile at the peak of Naga insurrection , it is preposterous to expect a Burmese Naga leader like Khaplang to do that. 

Be it in mindless panic mongering or in  trumpeted triumphalism, the Myanmar raids have shown up the worst side of Indian media. But it has also shown up the Modi government in poor light . If the purpose of the media leak of a covert operation ,which was best kept secret, was to create some kind of deterrence, the purpose has clearly not been served. 

Former colonel Gurmeet Kanwal who headed a military think tank CLAWS after retirement  has insisted , rather significantly.,  that the commandos were not only dropped at the location by helicopters but also had been "provided firepower support by attack helicopters".  His inside contacts in the military makes his account  more believable . Indian attack helicopters may have gone for a dive and fire attack using  heavy ammunition and the commandos may have slithered down to add to the damage in the confusion only to de-induct quickly before any counter-attack by the rebels. But to hit a small rebel camp in dark from the sky in the thickly forested Sagaing terrain and claim it was a ;'surgical strike' may be as incredible as Rathore's claim of hitting " deep inside Myanmar". In such strikes, there is no real chance to correctly assess casualties because one is not sure of the strength of the rebel camps. And if that is true and if the rebel camps were indeed much inside Myanmar, the issue of aerial and ground violation of the border may be too much for the military to accept.

Tripura’s  Left government used surrendered rebels and Bangladesh  mafiosi to target ATTF and NLFT rebels inside Bangladesh between 2000 and 2005 . Not less than 20 such raids were pulled off by Tripura police and Military intelligence during these five years – these raids broke the back of tribal insurgency in the state . That now gives the state government the confidence to withdraw the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) . But Manik Sarkar neither denies nor owns up these raids. Whenever asked , he tends to give full credit to Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina for helping Tripura tackle insurgency. That is surely true and Hasina's government has addressed India's security concerns as none in the neighborhood has, with the exception of Bhutan. But the Tripura police , operating in tandem with Military Intelligence, had sorted the state's once-violent insurgency much before Hasina came to power. By 2005 end, the ATTF and NLFT were clearly on the run after at least 20 hits on their bases and hideouts inside Bangladesh.  Did that not create deterrence !  It did because the rebels for the first time came to realise that they were not safe in a foreign land . Modi’s ministers in Delhi need to avoid needless triumphalism, unless they are seeking to gain political mileage by using the Myanmar raids to sabre-rattle with Pakistan.

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