[***What'd, in all probability, keep ringing all across the length and breadth of the land is: <<“As evidence, we have received the bodies of our jawans after Pulwama attack, but there is no such evidence of the air strikes in Pakistan,” she (widow of a CRPF jawan slain by the Pulwama suicide blast) said.>>*** (Ref.: Sl. no. III. below.)
And, it adds further salience to the earlier telling observation made by veteran analyst Mukul Kesavan: <<Given that the one documented casualty was suffered by IAF (which, in turn, allowed the Pakistan military’s favoured client, Imran Khan, to act like a magnanimous statesman), it’s hard to know what the prime minister has to show for his vaunted boldness. A lost plane and a returned PoW seem to be the verifiable answers.>> (Ref.: < https://www.telegraphindia.com/opinion/reporting-balakot-the-truth-of-a-pantomime-war-after-the-pulwama-terror-attack/cid/1686059 >.) For an earlier scan of the satellite images of the targeted site: 'Surgical Strike in Pakistan a Botched Operation? Indian jets carried out a strike against JEM targets inside Pakistani territory, to questionable effect' at < https://medium.com/dfrlab/surgical-strike-in-pakistan-a-botched-operation-7f6cda834b24 > And, for an informed analysis of the claims and counterclaims on the Balakot strike by a panel of experts, on the NDTV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6zhQHTLH6M&fbclid=IwAR1PI5EHNy1VxdRzeBgDK6tFDd9ER2Nv2T7ySJh3AES0nwQFRw6HJbtkcuQ >. An earlier report from the ground by the Reuters, confirming the same conclusion: < https://in.reuters.com/article/india-kashmir-village/pakistani-village-asks-where-are-bodies-of-militants-india-says-it-bombed-idINKCN1QH29B >. <<Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Project at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, who has 15 years’ experience in analyzing satellite images of weapons sites and systems, confirmed that the high-resolution satellite picture showed the structures in question. “The high-resolution images don’t show any evidence of bomb damage,” he said. Lewis viewed three other high-resolution Planet Labs pictures of the site taken within hours of the image provided to Reuters. ... Lewis and Dave Schmerler, a senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation studies who also analyses satellite images, said weapons that large would have caused obvious damage to the structures visible in the picture. “If the strike had been successful, given the information we have about what kind of munitions were used, I would expect to see signs that the buildings had been damaged,” Lewis added. “I just don’t see that here.”>> (Excerpted from sl. no. I. below.) <<"The foreign secretary gave the statement; that is the figure," Ms Sitharaman said, referring to the briefing by Vijay Gokhale the day the air strikes took place. The foreign secretary, however, had not given any figure. The ministry statement said: "In this operation, a very large number of JeM terrorists, trainers, senior commanders and groups of jihadis who were being trained for fidayeen action were eliminated." Even the Air Force has not given any casualty figure. Air Chief Marshal BS Dhanoa on Monday said the Air Force doesn't count the number of casualties. "Air Force is not in a position to clarify how many people were inside. We don't count human casualties. We count what targets we have hit or not hit," he told reporters. But yesterday, BJP chief Amit Shah claimed over 250 terrorists were killed in last week's air strike. As the opposition rushed to question his claim, Union Minister VK Singh today said it was not a confirmed figure but an estimate.>> (Excerpted from sl. no. II. below.)] I/III. (Pls. click on the link below to visit the original site for the (vital) visuals.) https://www.reuters.com/article/us-india-kashmir-pakistan-airstrike-insi/satellite-images-show-madrasa-buildings-still-standing-at-scene-of-indian-bombing-idUSKCN1QN00V?fbclid=IwAR2vqhJhxSSEX_BeykMZxwWetYsa6-y8_W4i3wItuNMaoZbfjIpU9_7Wqoo Satellite images show madrasa buildings still standing at scene of Indian bombing Martin Howell, Gerry Doyle, Simon Scarr 7 MIN READ NEW DELHI/SINGAPORE (Reuters) - High-resolution satellite images reviewed by Reuters show that a religious school run by Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) in northeastern Pakistan appears to be still standing days after India claimed its warplanes had hit the Islamist group’s training camp on the site and killed a large number of militants. A cropped version of a satellite image shows a close-up of a madrasa near Balakot, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Pakistan, March 4, 2019. Picture taken March 4, 2019. Mandatory credit: Planet Labs Inc./Handout via REUTERS The images produced by Planet Labs Inc, a San Francisco-based private satellite operator, show at least six buildings on the madrasa site on March 4, six days after the airstrike. Until now, no high-resolution satellite images were publicly available. But the images from Planet Labs, which show details as small as 72 cm (28 inches), offer a clearer look at the structures the Indian government said it attacked. The image is virtually unchanged from an April 2018 satellite photo of the facility. There are no discernible holes in the roofs of buildings, no signs of scorching, blown-out walls, displaced trees around the madrasa or other signs of an aerial attack. The images cast further doubt on statements made over the last eight days by the Indian government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi that the raids, early on Feb. 26, had hit all the intended targets at the madrasa site near Jaba village and the town of Balakot in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. India’s foreign and defense ministries did not reply to emailed questions sent in the past few days seeking comment on what is shown in the satellite images and whether they undermine its official statements on the airstrikes. MISSED THE TARGET? Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Project at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, who has 15 years’ experience in analyzing satellite images of weapons sites and systems, confirmed that the high-resolution satellite picture showed the structures in question. “The high-resolution images don’t show any evidence of bomb damage,” he said. Lewis viewed three other high-resolution Planet Labs pictures of the site taken within hours of the image provided to Reuters. The Indian government has not publicly disclosed what weapons were used in the strike. Government sources told Reuters last week that 12 Mirage 2000 jets carrying 1,000 kg (2,200 lbs) bombs carried out the attack. On Tuesday, a defense official said the aircraft used the 2,000-lb Israeli-made SPICE 2000 glide bomb in the strike. A warhead of that size is meant to destroy hardened targets such as concrete shelters. Lewis and Dave Schmerler, a senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation studies who also analyses satellite images, said weapons that large would have caused obvious damage to the structures visible in the picture. “If the strike had been successful, given the information we have about what kind of munitions were used, I would expect to see signs that the buildings had been damaged,” Lewis added. “I just don’t see that here.” Pakistan has disputed India’s account, saying the operation was a failure that saw Indian jets, under pressure from Pakistani planes, drop their bombs on a largely empty hillside. “There has been no damage to any infrastructure or human life as a result of Indian incursion,” Major General Asif Ghafoor, the director general of the Pakistan military’s press wing, in a statement to Reuters. “This has been vindicated by both domestic and international media after visiting the site.” BOMB CRATERS In two visits to the Balakot area in Pakistan by Reuters reporters last Tuesday and Thursday, and extensive interviews with people in the surrounding area, there was no evidence found of a destroyed camp or of anyone being killed. [here] A satellite image shows a madrasa near Balakot, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Pakistan, March 4, 2019. Picture taken March 4, 2019. Mandatory credit: Planet Labs Inc./Handout via REUTERS Villagers said there had been a series of huge explosions but the bombs appeared to have landed among trees. On the wooded slopes above Jaba, they pointed to four craters and some splintered pine trees, but noted little other impact from the blasts that jolted them awake about 3 a.m. on Feb. 26. “It shook everything,” said Abdur Rasheed, a van driver who works in the area. He said there weren’t any human casualties: “No one died. Only some pine trees died, they were cut down. A crow also died.” Mohammad Saddique from Jaba Basic Health Unit and Zia Ul Haq, senior medical officer at Tehsil Headquarters Hospital in Balakot said they had seen no casualties. POLITICAL FIRE India must hold a general election by May, and pollsters say Modi and his Hindu nationalist party stand to benefit from his aggressive response to a suicide bomb attack that killed 40 Indian paramilitary police in the disputed Kashmir region on Feb. 14. India’s Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale said on the day of the strike that “a very large number of Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorists, trainers, senior commanders, and groups of jihadis who were being trained for Fidayeen action were eliminated” in the attack. Fidayeen is a term used to describe Islamist militants on suicide missions. Another senior government official told reporters on the same day that about 300 militants had been killed. On Sunday the president of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Amit Shah, put the number killed at more than 250. The Indian government has not produced evidence that a camp was destroyed or that any militants were killed in the raid. That has prompted some opposition politicians to push for more details. “We want to know how many people actually died,” said Mamata Banerjee, the firebrand chief minister of West Bengal state, in a video published by her All India Trinamool Congress party in a tweet on Feb. 28. “Where did the bombs fall? Did they actually fall in the right place?” Banerjee, who is seen as a potential prime ministerial candidate, said that she stood behind the Indian Armed Forces, but that they should be given a chance to speak the truth. “We don’t want a war for political reasons, to win an election,” she said. Modi has accused the opposition Congress party, and other opponents such as Banerjee, of helping India’s enemies by demanding evidence of the attacks. “At a time when our army is engaged in crushing terrorism, inside the country and outside, there are some people within the country who are trying to break their morale, which is cheering our enemy,” Modi said at an election rally on Sunday. Additional reporting by Abu Arqam Naqash in BALAKOT; Asif Shahzad and James Mackenzie in ISLAMABAD; Devjyot Ghoshal in New Delhi; Editing by Alex Richardson II/III. https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/defence-minister-nirmala-sitharaman-breaks-silence-on-casualties-in-air-strike-on-jaish-e-mohammed-c-2002951?amp=1&fbclid=IwAR2RkAeMTb0BoxSGB-PA4hZqD2W5V4faylz6wjQq_jNXZna_LkLxoa8qTEI Defence Minister Breaks Silence On Balakot Death Count Amid Questions IAF Balakot air strike: "The foreign secretary gave the statement; that is the figure," Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said All India | Edited by Debanish Achom | Updated: March 05, 2019 16:19 IST IAF Balakot air strike: Twelve Mirage 2000 bombed a Jaish-e-Mohammed camp last week NEW DELHI: Union minister Nirmala Sitharaman today weighed in on the debate over the casualty figure in the February 26 air strikes at Pakistan's Balakot. Amid opposition demands for an account of the impact of the air strikes, conflicting remarks have come from the Air Force, the BJP and the government, triggering a controversy. "The foreign secretary gave the statement; that is the figure," Ms Sitharaman said, referring to the briefing by Vijay Gokhale the day the air strikes took place. The foreign secretary, however, had not given any figure. The ministry statement said: "In this operation, a very large number of JeM terrorists, trainers, senior commanders and groups of jihadis who were being trained for fidayeen action were eliminated." Even the Air Force has not given any casualty figure. Air Chief Marshal BS Dhanoa on Monday said the Air Force doesn't count the number of casualties. "Air Force is not in a position to clarify how many people were inside. We don't count human casualties. We count what targets we have hit or not hit," he told reporters. But yesterday, BJP chief Amit Shah claimed over 250 terrorists were killed in last week's air strike. As the opposition rushed to question his claim, Union Minister VK Singh today said it was not a confirmed figure but an estimate. 5pcsk6d The IAF's Mirage 2000 fighter jets used laser-guided bombs to hit the Jaish-e-Mohammed's camp in Balakot, inside Pakistan The opposition has been battering the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi of politicising the air strike. Ms Sitharaman also sought to silence speculations on the air strike coming in an election year. "There is no relationship between the air strike and elections. It was based on intelligence inputs on terrorist activities in Pakistan, to be unleashed against India. It was not a military action," she said. The Defence Minister's comment that the government's position has been communicated by the Foreign Secretary is likely to give more ammo to the opposition, after Amit Shah's claims on the casualty figures. At a public meeting in Ahmedabad on Monday, Amit Shah had said, "After Uri, our forces went into Pakistan and carried out surgical strikes. They avenged the death of our soldiers. After Pulwama, everyone thought there could be no surgical strikes, what will happen? But under (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi's leadership, the government carried out an air strike after the 13th day and killed more than 250 terrorists." Two days ago, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath gave a large portion of his speech on the Balakot air strike at a BJP rally in Amethi - Congress chief Rahul Gandhi's constituency - where PM Modi and Ms Sitharaman announced a "defence corridor" to manufacture a modern derivative of the AK-47 assault rifle in collaboration with a Russian firm. III. https://m.timesofindia.com/india/now-wife-of-another-martyr-seeks-proof-of-balakot-casualties/amp_articleshow/68278302.cms Now, wife of another martyr seeks proof of Balakot casualties Anuja Jaiswal | TNN | Updated: Mar 6, 2019, 03:02 IST TNN We received bodies of our jawans, but there is no such proof of the air strike, said Geeta Devi (in pic), wife of Ram Vakeel. HIGHLIGHTS A week after the wife of a CRPF martyr from Shamli demanded proof of IAF’s air strike in Pakistan’s Balakot, widow of another Pulwama martyr cast aspersions on the exact number of casualties among Pakistanis. “As evidence, we have received the bodies of our jawans after Pulwama attack, but there is no such evidence of the air strikes in Pakistan,” she said. AGRA: A week after the wife of a CRPF martyr from Shamli demanded proof of IAF’s air strike in Pakistan’s Balakot, widow of another Pulwama martyr cast aspersions on the exact number of casualties among Pakistanis. Geeta Devi, widow of Pulwama terror attack martyr Ram Vakeel who was one of the 40 CRPF jawans killed in the February 14 blast, said the government should give some proof of Pakistani casualties in the air strike. “As evidence, we have received the bodies of our jawans after Pulwama attack, but there is no such evidence of the air strikes in Pakistan,” she said. Vakeel’s sister Ramraksha also said that people need to know what exactly happened there. “If there are claims that over 300 people were killed, then some evidence should be provided. How do we believe that the strike occurred and terrorists died?” she questioned, adding that these claims could be “false” too. “If government claims that they have avenged the martyred soldiers, then they should provide the proof of it,” said Amitshree, Ram Vakeel’s mother. Ram Vakeel, 45, is survived by his wife and three sons, Rahul (12), Sahil (10) and Ansh (4). He had returned to Kashmir on February 11 after spending a month-long vacation with his family in his hometown, Mainpuri. Geeta told TOI that he had promised her to come back home next month and begin the construction of their house in Etawah. She said that it is painful for the entire family and now she has to take care of her minor children on her own. Last Wednesday, Shamli’s Sarmishtha Devi, 37-year-old wife of slain CRPF jawan Pradeep Kumar, had said that they were not satisfied with the government’s claims on Balakot air strikes on terror camps. -- Peace Is Doable -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
