For decades, Pakistan has survived by playing the role of an international blackmailer—harbouring terrorists, peddling drugs, and offering its territory as a playground for great power games. But the recent hard-hitting statements from India’s top security leadership make one thing abundantly clear: Islamabad may finally be scripting its own extinction. On Friday, both Indian Army Chief General Upendra Dwivedi and Chief of Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal AP Singh, spoke in one voice, issuing unmistakable warnings to Pakistan. Their message was not the usual diplomatic caution but blunt and brutal: if Pakistan dares another misadventure—whether through terrorism, infiltration, or provocation along the border—the consequences will not be limited skirmishes but a decisive blow that could erase Pakistan from the subcontinental map. This is no idle rhetoric. This is the language of resolve, delivered by men who command the world’s fourth-largest military and are backed by political will. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, never one to mince words, sharpened this warning further. His blunt caution to Pakistan against opening another front through the sea route near Kutch carried weight, particularly as intelligence inputs confirm suspicious Pakistani military movements near the desert stretches adjoining the Arabian Sea. Whether those movements are meant to push in terrorists, drug consignments, or Chinese-supplied arms, India’s patience has run out. The era of tolerance for “plausible deniability” is over. The timing is not accidental. Reports have surfaced of Pakistan’s army chief and prime minister hobnobbing with U.S. President Donald Trump, in a now-viral video showing them carrying rare mineral samples. India is not blind to such theatrics. But unlike in the past, when Washington’s embrace of Pakistan forced New Delhi into caution, the tables have turned. Trump’s own provocative statements about possibly taking over an airbase in Afghanistan through force have thrown Islamabad into a panic. In that chaos, Pakistan has resorted to the only tactic it knows—turning its guns on civilians, not only in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir but also in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
India, meanwhile, has showcased in action what its chiefs are now declaring in words. Operation Sindoor, executed with ruthless precision in just four days, demonstrated the technological and strategic superiority of Indian forces. Pakistan’s so-called “protective radars” of Chinese make were reduced to scrap. Turkish drones were swatted out of the sky. More damningly, India destroyed close to a dozen of Pakistan’s prized F-16s and other aircraft of Chinese make, achievements that Pakistan scrambled to conceal. For three months, India deliberately stayed silent, allowing Pakistan’s propaganda mills to churn lies, only for the Air Chief to reveal the truth at a time of his choosing. Even the U.S. President chose to peddle the falsehood that no American-supplied F-16s were lost, exposing Washington’s duplicity. Facts, however, are stubborn, and India has them all. What is striking this time is the absence of restraint. Both the Army and the Air Force have made it clear: the next confrontation will not be a limited “surgical strike” or “Sindoor-1.0” style operation. Sindoor 2.0 will be a far stronger, non-contact war, powered by indigenous technological tools developed over years of self-reliance. In other words, India has outgrown the old playbook of waiting for a provocation and then stopping at token retaliation. The new doctrine is one of complete decimation if provoked. Pakistan, in its desperation, may think it can provoke India and then hide behind nuclear threats or international mediation. But that card has lost its sting. The world has seen through Islamabad’s duplicity—its double games in Afghanistan, its persecution of minorities, its economic bankruptcy, and its addiction to Chinese handouts. Pakistan is now a country with collapsing institutions, a disgruntled population, and a military elite clinging to power by stoking anti-India hysteria. If it chooses to gamble yet again by pushing terror across the border, it may very well be its last move. India’s message is clear: the subcontinent has no space left for a terror factory masquerading as a state. The patience of the past has expired. The resolve of the present is unshakeable. Should Pakistan tempt fate again, it will not just bleed—it will vanish.
