• Thursday, March 28, 2024

HEADLINE STORY

Pakistan military had role in drone attacks: India security sources

Representational Image (iStock Image)

By: Shubham Ghosh

SECURITY sources in India have said the ‘pressure fuse’ used in the bombs that were dropped on the Indian Air Force base at the Jammu airport through drones last month indicates that terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) received help from the Pakistan army or the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in fabricating the explosives.

The improvised explosive device (IED) which damaged the roof of one of the buildings at the base carried less than one kilogram of RDX and a cocktail of other chemicals. The other bomb which was dropped on the ground contained a little over a kilogram of deadly explosives, along with some ball bearings, the sources added.

The attacks that took place early on June 27 and left two airmen with minor injuries were a first-of-its-kind attack on an Indian military installation. More possible drone attacks were foiled by alert Indian soldiers in the days that followed.

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The sources added that the IED used in the attacks on the Indian Air Force base “definitely” used the technical expertise of the Pakistani military. The ‘pressure fuse’ used in the bombs is similar to the ones used by the Pakistani army.

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A ‘pressure fuse’ is generally used in minefields, anti-tank mines and those dropped by the air force in the fuselage between the explosive and main detonator of a shell or an IED, agencies reported.

The explosive devices are activated by the pressure of either falling on the surface with force or some individual or vehicle passing over it. In these sophisticated IEDs, the ‘pressure fuse’ had been deployed at the nose of the bombs so that they trigger with a force after hitting the ground, the sources added.

Most of the artillery shells and mortal bombs have this type of fuse and hence they do not explode in the air but only when there is an impact, they added.

Jammu and Kashmir Police director general Dilbag Singh had earlier said that Pakistan-based terrorists of the LeT were suspected to be behind the June 27 attacks and the drones used in them might have come from across the border.

It might be mentioned here that Pakistan has been procuring armed drones from its ally states China and Turkey of late. According to the sources, the drones can fly up to three hours and can be monitored and manoeuvred remotely through the global positioning system technology. The aerial distance of Jammu airport from the international border is 14 kilometres.

In September 2020, five Lok Sabha members from YSR Congress, the ruling part of Andhra Pradesh, had asked the Narendra Modi government whether it had issued any guidelines in light of the possible drone attacks being used as weapons of attack on high-security installations.

Six months prior to that, four members of the same house and a leader of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party had asked whether the government had formulated a comprehensive policy to prevent attacks by unmanned aerial vehicles on vital security installations.

The then minister of state for civil aviation Hardeep Singh Puri had said the government had issued a standard operating procedure to prevent drone attacks on key installations.

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