NEW DELHI: Former Chief of Defence Staff Anil Chauhan on Tuesday said India may have hit Pakistan’s Kirana Hills during Operation Sindoor last year, but the strike was unintentional.Speaking at the ‘VIMARSH’ event on Operation Sindoor and its aftermath at the Vivekanand International Foundation, Chauhan said Indian loitering missions sent to search for radars around Sargodha ran out of fuel and ended up hitting Kirana Hills — a site associated with Pakistan’s nuclear facilities.“At occasions, it’s been asked whether Kirana Hills were hit or not, which is where their (Pakistan’s) nuclear facilities are… Before those strikes, we had sent in a lot of loitering missions at Sargodha and Kirana Hills is about 10 kilometers north of Sargodha,” Chauhan said.“So the loitering mission is looking for radars which are in and around Sargodha, and it has a lifetime, which means it will loiter for about 2 hours and once it does not find a target, it comes down and hits somewhere. It must have come and hit one of those hills. So that could be one of the reasons as to what people asked, because Pakistani media also showed some kind of images in which there was smoke coming out from Kirana Hills,” he added.Chauhan also revealed details of another episode during the operation, saying the Air Chief sought his approval to strike Sargodha after Pakistan requested talks. However the target was changed to Bholari due to bad weather.“Once the Pakistanis had picked up the phone and said they wanted to talk at about 10 AM. The Air Chief asked me whether he should strike Sargodha, I said, Go ahead. I said, could you please identify two more targets, so one of the targets he identified was Skardu,” Chauhan said.
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“We gave a yes, but after some time, the weather was bad over it and they had to change over to Bholari,” he added.During his address, Chauhan also stressed that military decisions involve varying levels of risk and must be assessed against the political objectives they are intended to achieve.“Each option has a certain kind of risk involved in it, and also it will satisfy the political need for which it was to be used. So, it’s an interplay between risk and attainment of political objectives,” he said.Chauhan said the operation remains relevant nearly 15 months after its major active phase ended. He said its assessment should take into account deficiencies identified during the operation, measures taken to address them and the changing nature of warfare.He added that these factors, along with wider global uncertainties, are creating new challenges for military planners.
