Was India very close to carrying out "surgical air strikes" against terror camps in Pakistan and other targets across the border immediately after the 26/11 terror assault in Mumbai?

While defence ministry officials refused "to react to speculative reports", sources said "some steps were indeed taken" to "prime" IAF fighter jets for "offensive action" within a day or two of 26/11, but the final government go-ahead did not come.

"The moment passed and then the US jumped in with assurances of making Pakistan deliver on Indian demands," said a source. This ties in with a report of the American TV channel CNN, which quotes unnamed Pentagon officials as saying that IAF began "preliminary preparations" for "a possible attack" against Pakistan in the immediate aftermath of the Mumbai massacre.

The US promptly urged India to exercise restraint after "concluding" that the "preliminary preparations" would have placed India in a position to launch airstrikes inside Pakistan.

Sources in the government also said there had been some thought of "action" but that after the first few days, international attention on India and pressure on Pakistan diluted the Indian intention.

Incidentally, after Pakistan alleged intrusions by IAF fighters into its territory on Saturday, which were strongly denied by India, "a lot of unusual activity" by Pakistani jets has been detected near the international maritime boundary line, south of Karachi, over the weekend.

The government is also looking at the news report as an "inspired" leak, with several objectives. It could be used to pressure Pakistan further, especially after its becoming clear that Islamabad is not being proactive on banning terror groups.

In many ways India is not unhappy with these news reports because it keeps Pakistan on tenterhooks. The Indian armed forces, of course, are maintaining a high level of alert, which was put in place after the Mumbai attack, but this is now geared more towards a defensive posture rather than an offensive one, as reported by TOI earlier. IAF airbases, especially on the western front, immediately went on alert after 26/11 with both strike as well as air defence fighters ready to scramble at short notice.

For air defence measures, this included boosting the level of the round-the-clock ORPs (operational readiness platforms) at the airbases in the shape of fighters ready to tackle air intrusions. But for offensive action, fighters like multi-role Mirage-2000s, medium-range penetration Jaguars and ground-attack MiG-27MLs would have had to be armed with laser-guided bombs and missiles as well as cluster and thousand-pounder bombs. With the fighters fitted with "litening laser designation pods", the laser-guided bombs have an accuracy of under two metres.

"From there, if the government directive had come with real-time intelligence about the terror camps and other targets, it would have taken a maximum of four hours to actually carry out surgical strikes across the border," said a source.

The IAF, of course, is capable of launching offensive action in a short time even now. It does not even have to move fighters like Mirage-2000s to forward bases like Adampur from their home-base in Gwalior - like it was done during Operation Parakram in 2001-2002 - since the force now has IL-78 mid-air refuellers.

But as of now, IAF has worked more towards boosting air defence measures to thwart any attempt to copycat the al-Qaida’s 9/11 strikes after intelligence inputs held terror could strike through the aerial route after the maritime one. This involves more radars and surface-to-air missile batteries to guard New Delhi.