 Here is an analysis of the new war threats from India and their implications for Pakistan. In 2005 India announced a new military doctrine called Cold Start which mainly targeted Pakistan. In November 2009, the Indian army chief made a statement that there is a possibility of a limited war between Pakistan and India in a nuclear overhang. In December 2009, the Indian army chief announced that India is ready to take on both Pakistan and China in a ‘two-front war' simultaneously. These statements spurred a quick reaction from the Pakistani political leadership and the military high command.
The Indian army chief made the statement at a closed door seminar at the military academy in Shimla, while making a five year review of India's military doctrine and operational preparedness. The general said that India was in a position to move its forces into enemy territory within 96 hours to execute its Cold Start military doctrine and was ready to take on both Pakistan and China in a "two front war" in a nuclear overhang. He said India was going to enhance its "strategic reach and out-of-area capabilities" to protect its interests from the Malacca strait to the Persian Gulf.
Although the Pakistan army has made it clear that it is alive to the threats posed by India, it is important to look deeper into the statements made by the Indian army chief.
There is a critical political turmoil building up in Pakistan, especially after the Supreme Court of Pakistan's verdict on the NRO. The law and order situation in Pakistan went from bad to worse in 2009. The New Year started with a serious situation developing in Karachi city. Militarily, the Pakistan army is stretched from Khyber to Karachi on both the eastern and western borders.
The Pakistan armed forces are undergoing a massive modernization program which will not be completed before 2019. While modernization enhances skills of any force, it also includes a learning curve and time to absorb new technology. The Pakistan air force would get almost a complete overhaul when its entire fleet is replaced by 2019.
On the other hand, the Indian forces have been getting the latest weapon system for some time and are in better position and have clear numerical supremacy over Pakistan. These factors would encourage India, under its Cold Start doctrine, to launch preemptive strikes against the Pakistan armed forces and their infrastructures.
The Indian plan is not new and the Indian military establishment is to take on Pakistan and China in a simultaneous war some five years ago. A careful look at Indian army chief's statement makes it clear that the Indians plan to establish a strong military footprint in the Indian Ocean.
The Cold Start doctrine is not only about capturing Pakistani territory but also about inflicting as much damage as possible to enemy forces and infrastructure within a matter of hours. It is more like a hit and run tactic, giving no time to Pakistan to react.
The Indian military adopted its Cold Start strategy on April 28, 2004 after a 10-month standoff (Operation Parakram) with Pakistan army along the 2500 kilometer Indo-Pak border in 2002. At this time, Indian army strike formations took almost a month to be mobilized. Cold Start emphasizes on quick deployment of forces and synergizing operations of all three services towards destruction of Pakistan army defenses and units in the shortest possible time.
But is all that easily possible? Does the Indian military have inter-services coordination to implement Cold Start in a real war? Some Pakistani analysts believe that India still does not have the capability.
To overcome inter services coordination a separate South-Western Army Command was formed in India in 2005 which deals with military deployment and operations along the Pakistani border. One major reason for raising the new command was to meet the demands of integrated battle groups comprising Indian army and air force units and squadrons. India is working on its preparedness for surgical strikes with these battle groups and the job of fine tuning tactics is assigned to the Army Training Command (ARTRAC) and the Army War College.
Another reason why India intends to adopt Cold Start is to minimize the reaction time available for diplomatic solution of any potential crisis like the one that emerged after the Mumbai attacks in November 2008. The Indian government and forces were under pressure to carry out surgical strikes on the so-called terrorist infrastructure on Pakistani soil. Under Cold Start, the Indian military would make sure that a diplomatic solution came after India had achieved all its objectives.
Use of fourth generation warfare against Pakistan is a more dangerous and disturbing angle of the Indian designs which most defence analysts in Pakistan have overlooked. This paradigm of such warfare revolves around asymmetrical warfare to get a moral victory with minimum nation-state involvement. It is necessary to understand the major difference between various generations of warfare and figuring out which one of these Pakistan is facing now. The first generation revolved around conscription and firearms. Napoleon's wars belonged to this generation. The second generation involved nation-state armies, alignment of warfare resources and raw firepower. WWI was a second generation war. Third generation warfare included armored warfare and maneuvering and the best example was WWII which ended only after use of nuclear weapons in Japan in 1945.
Near the end of the 20th century, Russia invaded Afghanistan and this was the start of a new generation of warfare. Though guerilla warfare is very old but in 1982, after direct involvement of the CIA in the conflict, guerilla warfare gave birth to the fourth generation war (4GW) that works on the principle of less to no nation-state involvement and relies on ad hoc warriors and moral conflicts. Other imperatives of 4GW include adaptation of technology to surprise the enemy and information warfare.
 India has one clear advantage over China in current world geopolitics. There has been an embargo on China for obtaining western high-tech military equipment since the Tiananmen Square incident in 1989. On the other hand, India along with a healthy economy, has no such restrictions on military hardware, despite its bad human rights record, thanks to global hypocrisy and double standards exercised by the West and the U.S.. However, India lacks in many areas concerning military balance vis-à-vis. China.
With its well-established economy and knowledge base, China has crossed many milestones in military hardware production. Apart from U.S. and Russia, China is the only country in the world to run a 5th generation military jet fighter project.
The mention of China in the Indian chief's statement is a mere indication to the West and the U.S. that India is ready to take on the role of a regional power and can be trusted as any ally against communist China. The U.S. is banking on India to compete with China in the economic and military fields but the friendship between Pakistan and China is also a big hurdle. Since India has been eyeing a permanent seat in the UN, the current statement could also be a signal to the U.S. and the West to accept it as a major player in the region. 
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