India–Pakistan war of 1971

{{Short description|Military confrontation between India and Pakistan alongside the Bangladesh Liberation War}} {{see also|Bangladesh Liberation War}} {{pp-extended|small=yes}} {{protection padlock|small=yes}}

{{Use British English|date=December 2013}} {{Use dmy dates|date=November 2020}} {{Infobox military conflict | conflict = Indo-Pakistani war of 1971 | partof = the Indo-Pakistani wars and conflicts, Cold War, and Bangladesh Liberation War | campaign = | image = 1971 Instrument of Surrender.jpg | image_size = 300px | caption = {{small|First row: Lt-Gen. A.A.K. Niazi, the Cdr. of Pakistani Eastern Comnd., signing the documented Instrument of Surrender in Dacca in the presence of Lt. Gen. Jagjit Singh Aurora (GOC-in-C of Indian Eastern Comnd.). Surojit Sen of All India Radio is seen holding a microphone on the right. Second row (left to right): Vice Adm. N. Krishnan (FOC-in-C Eastern Naval Comnd.), Air Mshl. H.C. Dewan, (AOC-in-C Eastern Air Comnd.), Lt Gen. Sagat Singh (Cdr. IV Corps), Maj Gen. JFR Jacob (COS Eastern Comnd.) and Flt Lt Krishnamurthy (peering over Jacob's shoulder).}} | date = 3–16 December 1971 ({{Age in years, months, weeks and days|month1=12|day1=3|year1=1971|month2=12|day2=16|year2=1971}}) | place = * India–East Pakistan border * India–West Pakistan border * Line of Control * Indian Ocean * Arabian Sea * Bay of Bengal | result = '''Indian victory'''<ref name=Lyon>{{cite book|last=Lyon|first=Peter|title=Conflict between India and Pakistan: An Encyclopedia|url=https://archive.org/details/conflictbetweeni00lyon|url-access=limited|year=2008|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-1-57607-712-2|page=[https://archive.org/details/conflictbetweeni00lyon/page/n182 166]|quote=India's decisive victory over Pakistan in the 1971 war and emergence of independent Bangladesh dramatically transformed the power balance of South Asia}}</ref><ref name=Kemp>{{cite book|last=Kemp|first=Geoffrey|title=The East Moves West India, China, and Asia's Growing Presence in the Middle East|url=https://archive.org/details/eastmoveswestind00kemp|url-access=limited|year=2010|publisher=Brookings Institution Press|isbn=978-0-8157-0388-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/eastmoveswestind00kemp/page/n60 52]|quote=However, India's decisive victory over Pakistan in 1971 led the Shah to pursue closer relations with India}}</ref><ref name=Byman>{{cite book|last=Byman|first=Daniel|title=Deadly connections: States that Sponsor Terrorism|url=https://archive.org/details/deadlyconnection00byma_576|url-access=limited|year=2005|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-83973-0|page=[https://archive.org/details/deadlyconnection00byma_576/page/n170 159]|quote=India's decisive victory in 1971 led to the signing of the Simla Agreement in 1972}}</ref> Eastern front: Surrender of East Pakistan military command Western front: Unilateral ceasefire<ref>Faruki, Kemal A. "THE INDO-PAKISTAN WAR, 1971, AND THE UNITED NATIONS." Pakistan Horizon, vol. 25, no. 1, 1972, pp. 10–20. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/41393109. Accessed 21 Jan. 2024. "On the next day, Dacca surrendered, President Yahya Khan talked of 'war until victory', India made a unilateral declaration of ceasefire in the West and the Security Council chose to adjourn having accumulated in its possession, by that time, six draft resolutions from various member States of the Security Council."</ref><ref>Burke, S. M. "The Postwar Diplomacy of the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971." Asian Survey, vol. 13, no. 11, 1973, pp. 1036–49. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/2642858. Accessed 21 Jan. 2024. "In Kashmir they agreed to respect 'the line of control resulting from the ceasefire of December 17, 1971...without prejudice to the recognized position of either side.'"</ref><ref>Siniver A. The India-Pakistan War, December 1971. In: Nixon, Kissinger, and US Foreign Policy Making: The Machinery of Crisis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2008:148-184. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511511660.008 "The fall of Dacca and the unconditional surrender of the outnumbered Pakistani forces in the East were followed the next day by a mutual declaration of cease-fire along the Western border."</ref> | territory = Eastern Front: * East Pakistan secedes from Pakistan as Bangladesh Western Front: * Indian forces captured around {{convert|5795|sqmi|km2|order=flip|abbr=on}} of land in the West but returned it in the 1972 Simla Agreement as a gesture of goodwill.<ref name="Nawaz2008" /><ref name="Chitkara1996" /><ref name="Schofield2003" /> * India retained {{convert|341.1|sqmi|km2|order=flip|abbr=on}} of the gained territory in Jammu and Kashmir while Pakistan retained {{convert|59|sqmi|km2|order=flip|abbr=on}} territory<ref name="p756">{{cite book | title=Pakistan Horizon | publisher=Pakistan Institute of International Affairs. | issue=v. 26 | year=1973 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=635CAAAAYAAJ | language=eo | access-date=2025-11-19 | page=107}}</ref><ref name="Warikoo 2009" /> | combatant1 = {{Plainlist}} * {{flag|India}} * {{flag|Provisional Government of Bangladesh}} {{Endplainlist}} | combatant2 = {{Plainlist}} * {{flag|Pakistan}} {{Endplainlist}} | commander1 = {{flagicon|IND}} Indira Gandhi {{flagicon|IND}} Swaran Singh {{flagicon image|Flag of Indian Army.svg}} Sam Manekshaw {{flagicon image|Flag of Indian Army.svg}} J.S. Arora {{flagicon image|Flag of Indian Army.svg}} G.G. Bewoor {{flagicon image|Flag of Indian Army.svg}} Sagat Singh {{flagicon image|Flag of Indian Army.svg}} J. F. R. Jacob {{flagicon image|Admiral ensign of Indian Navy.svg}} S. M. Nanda {{flagicon image|Admiral ensign of Indian Navy.svg}} S. N. Kohli {{flagicon image|Vice Admiral ensign of Indian Navy.svg}} Nilakanta Krishnan {{flagicon image|Flag of Air vice marshal (India).svg}} Pratap C. Lal {{flagicon image|Flag of Air vice marshal (India).svg}} H. C. Dewan ---- {{flagicon|Bangladesh|1971}} Sheikh Mujibur Rahman {{flag icon|Provisional Government of Bangladesh|military}} M. A. G. Osmani ---- | commander2 = {{flagicon|PAK}} Yahya Khan {{flagicon image|Flag of the Pakistani Army.svg}} A.A.K. Niazi{{Surrendered}} {{flagicon image|Flag of the Pakistani Army.svg}} Rao Farman {{flagicon image|Flag of the Pakistani Army.svg}} Tikka Khan {{flagicon image|Flag of the Pakistani Army.svg}} Iftikhar Janjua {{KIA}} {{flagicon image|Naval Jack of Pakistan.svg}} Muzaffar Hassan {{flagicon image|Naval Jack of Pakistan.svg}} Rashid Ahmed {{flagicon image|Naval Jack of Pakistan.svg}} Md Shariff {{Surrendered}} {{flagicon image|Naval Jack of Pakistan.svg}} M.A.K. Lodhi {{flagicon image|Naval Jack of Pakistan.svg}} Leslie Norman {{flagicon image|Pakistani Air Force Ensign.svg}} Abdul Rahim Khan {{flagicon image|Pakistani Air Force Ensign.svg}} Inamul Haq{{Surrendered}} {{flagicon image|Pakistani Air Force Ensign.svg}} Z.A. Khan{{Surrendered}} {{flagicon|PAK}} Abdul Motaleb Malik {{Surrendered}} | strength1 = Indian Armed Forces: 825,000<ref>{{Cite book|last=Palit|first=Maj Gen DK|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PKvmgfHewHcC|title=The Lightning Campaign: The Indo-Pakistan War, 1971|date=1998|publisher=Lancer Publishers|isbn=978-1-897829-37-0|page=44|language=en|access-date=24 December 2016|archive-date=15 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201015115321/https://books.google.com/books?id=PKvmgfHewHcC|url-status=live}}</ref> – 860,000<ref name=":Cloughley">{{Cite book|last=Cloughley|first=Brian|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3SqCDwAAQBAJ&q=indian+army+vs+pakistan+army+strength+comparision+1971+war&pg=PT130|title=A History of the Pakistan Army: Wars and Insurrections|date=2016-01-05|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=978-1-63144-039-7|language=en|access-date=12 November 2020|archive-date=14 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414025759/https://books.google.com/books?id=3SqCDwAAQBAJ&q=indian+army+vs+pakistan+army+strength+comparision+1971+war&pg=PT130|url-status=live}}</ref> Mukti Bahini: 180,000<ref>{{cite journal |last=Rashiduzzaman |first=M. |date=March 1972 |title=Leadership, Organization, Strategies and Tactics of the Bangla Desh Movement |journal=Asian Survey |volume=12 |issue=3 |page=191 |doi=10.2307/2642872 |jstor=2642872 |quote=The Pakistan Government, however, claimed [in June 1971] that the combined fighting strength of the 'secessionists' amounted to about 180,000 armed personnel.}}</ref> | strength2 = Pakistan Armed Forces: 350,000<ref name="Dixit">{{cite book |first=J.N. |last=Dixit |author-link=Jyotindra Nath Dixit |title=India-Pakistan in War and Peace |year=2002 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=1-134-40757-2 |page=165 |quote=while the size of the Indian armed forces remained static at one million men and Pakistan's at around 350,000.}}</ref> – 365,000<ref name=":Cloughley" /> Razakars: 35,000<ref name="Leonard2006p806" /> | casualties1 = {{IND}} 2,500<ref name="Leonard2006p806" />–3,843 killed<ref name="injuredsoldiers">{{cite news|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/inside-politics/this-vijay-diwas-remember-the-sacrifices-and-do-good-by-our-disabled-soldiers/|title=This Vijay Diwas, remember the sacrifices and do good by our disabled soldiers|work=The Times of India|quote=About 3,843 Indian soldiers died in this war that resulted in the unilateral surrender of the Pakistan Army and led to the creation of Bangladesh. Among the soldiers who returned home triumphant were also 9,851 injured; many of them disabled.|date=16 December 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181217134312/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/inside-politics/this-vijay-diwas-remember-the-sacrifices-and-do-good-by-our-disabled-soldiers/|archive-date=17 December 2018|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DeeGAwAAQBAJ&q=3843+1971+war+india+deaths&pg=PA11|title=Vulnerable India: A Geographical Study of Disasters|first=Anu|last=Kapur|date=11 March 2010|publisher=SAGE Publications India|isbn=9788132105428|via=Google Books|access-date=12 November 2020|archive-date=14 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414054907/https://books.google.com/books?id=DeeGAwAAQBAJ&q=3843+1971+war+india+deaths&pg=PA11|url-status=live}}</ref> 9,851<ref name="injuredsoldiers"/>–12,000<ref name="Century Air Warfare 1997, pages 384" /> injured * 1 naval aircraft<ref>{{cite web |url=http://indiannavy.nic.in/t2t2e/Trans2Trimph/chapters/10_1971%20wnc1.htm |title=Chapter 10: Naval Operations in the Western Naval Command |website=Indian Navy |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120223133540/http://indiannavy.nic.in/t2t2e/Trans2Trimph/chapters/10_1971%20wnc1.htm |archive-date=23 February 2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://orbat.com/site/cimh/navy/navy_1971_kills.html |title=Damage Assessment– 1971 Indo Pak Naval War |publisher=Orbat.com |access-date=27 July 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120319212243/http://orbat.com/site/cimh/navy/navy_1971_kills.html |archive-date=19 March 2012 }}</ref> * 1 frigate * Okha harbour damaged/fuel tanks destroyed<ref>{{cite book|author=Dr. He Hemant Kumar Pandey & Manish Raj Singh|title=INDIA'S MAJOR MILITARY & RESCUE OPERATIONS|page=117|publisher=Horizon Books ( A Division of Ignited Minds Edutech P Ltd), 2017|date=1 August 2017}}</ref>

Neutral claims<ref name="Leonard2006p806" /> * 45 IAF aircraft * 80 tanks

Indian claims * 45 IAF aircraft<ref name="Combat Kills">{{cite web |url=http://orbat.com/site/cimh/iaf/IAF_1971_kills_rev1.pdf |title=IAF Combat Kills – 1971 Indo-Pak Air War |publisher=orbat.com |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140113013008/http://orbat.com/site/cimh/iaf/IAF_1971_kills_rev1.pdf |archive-date=13 January 2014 |access-date=20 December 2011}}</ref>

Pakistani claims * 130 IAF aircraft<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.paf.gov.pk/history.html|title=Pakistan Air Force – Official website|publisher=Paf.gov.pk|access-date=27 July 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111215075643/http://www.paf.gov.pk/history.html|archive-date=15 December 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> | casualties2 = {{PAK}} 9,000 killed<ref name="Leonard2006p806" /> 25,000 wounded<ref name="Century Air Warfare 1997, pages 384"/> 93,000 captured 2 destroyers<ref>{{cite web|url=http://indiannavy.nic.in/t2t2e/Trans2Trimph/chapters/10_1971%20wnc1.htm |title=Chapter-10 |publisher=Indiannavy.nic.in |access-date=2012-04-25 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120223133540/http://indiannavy.nic.in/t2t2e/Trans2Trimph/chapters/10_1971%20wnc1.htm |archive-date=23 February 2012 }}</ref>{{efn|A Pakistani destroyer, {{ship|PNS|Shah Jahan|DD-962|2}}, was severely damaged and later scrapped as a result.}} 1 Minesweeper<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.navsource.org/archives/11/05138.htm |title=AMS-138 |publisher=Navsource.org |access-date=2012-04-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131030220115/http://www.navsource.org/archives/11/05138.htm |archive-date=2013-10-30 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://shipbuildinghistory.com/history/smallships/minesweepers3.htm |title=Minesweepers MSO MSC MSI MHC MCM Post-War |publisher=Shipbuildinghistory.com |date=2011-12-23 |access-date=2012-04-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120228194133/http://shipbuildinghistory.com/history/smallships/minesweepers3.htm |archive-date=2012-02-28 |url-status=dead }}</ref> 1 Submarine<ref name="BR">{{cite web|url=http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITOR/ISSUE4-2/harry.html |title=The Sinking of the Ghazi |website=Bharat Rakshak Monitor, 4(2) |access-date=20 October 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111128104709/http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/MONITOR/ISSUE4-2/harry.html |archive-date=28 November 2011 }}</ref> 3 Patrol vessels 7 gunboats * Pakistani main port Karachi facilities damaged/fuel tanks destroyed<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.tribuneindia.com/2004/20040111/spectrum/book1.htm|title=How west was won...on the waterfront|newspaper=The Tribune|access-date=24 December 2011|archive-date=30 June 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170630124832/http://www.tribuneindia.com/2004/20040111/spectrum/book1.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> * Pakistani airfields damaged and cratered<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/article_330.shtml|title=India – Pakistan War, 1971; Western Front, Part I|publisher=acig.com|access-date=22 December 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120910064126/http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/article_330.shtml|archive-date=10 September 2012|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Neutral claims<ref name="Leonard2006p806" /> * 75 PAF aircraft * 200 tanks

Indian claims * 94 PAF aircraft<ref name="Combat Kills" />

Pakistani claims * 42 PAF aircraft<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/History/1971War/Appendix3.html |title=Aircraft Losses in Pakistan – 1971 War |access-date=24 April 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090501082102/http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/History/1971War/Appendix3.html |archive-date=1 May 2009 }}</ref> }}

{{Campaignbox Indo-Pakistani War of 1971}} {{Campaignbox Bangladesh Liberation War}} {{Campaignbox Indo-Pakistani Wars}}

The '''India–Pakistan war of 1971''', also known as the '''third Indo-Pakistani war''', was a military confrontation between India and Pakistan that occurred during the Bangladesh Liberation War in East Pakistan from 3 December 1971 until the Pakistani capitulation in Dhaka on 16 December 1971. The war began with Pakistan's Operation Chengiz Khan, consisting of preemptive aerial strikes on eight Indian air stations. The strikes led to India declaring war on Pakistan, marking their entry into the war for East Pakistan's independence, on the side of Bengali nationalist forces. India's entry expanded the existing conflict with Indian and Pakistani forces engaging on both the eastern and western fronts.<ref name="time27Dec1971" />

Thirteen days after the war started, India achieved a clear upper hand, and the Eastern Command of the Pakistan military signed the instrument of surrender<ref>{{cite web |url=http://sify.com/news/1971-war-i-will-give-you-30-minutes-news-columns-jmqlV0fcjja.html |title=1971 War: 'I will give you 30 minutes' |website=Sify |access-date=14 April 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101206145925/http://sify.com/news/1971-war-i-will-give-you-30-minutes-news-columns-jmqlV0fcjja.html |archive-date=6 December 2010 |url-status=dead }}</ref> on 16 December 1971 in Dhaka, marking the formation of East Pakistan as the new nation of Bangladesh. Approximately 93,000 Pakistani servicemen were taken prisoner by the Indian Army, which included 79,676 to 81,000 uniformed personnel of the Pakistan Armed Forces, including some Bengali soldiers who had remained loyal to Pakistan.<ref name="Burke1974p216">{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/mainspringsofind00burk/page/n5/mode/2up|url-access=registration|title=Mainsprings of Indian and Pakistani Foreign Policies – S. M. Burke|year=1974|page=216|publisher=University of Minnesota Press|isbn=9780816607204|access-date=27 July 2012|last1=Burke|first1=S. M}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Bose |first=Sarmila |date=November 2011 |title=The question of genocide and the quest for justice in the 1971 war |url=http://www.politics.ox.ac.uk/materials/profile_materials/jgr%20vol%2013%20no%204%202011.pdf |journal=Journal of Genocide Research |volume=13 |issue=4 |page=398 |doi=10.1080/14623528.2011.625750 |s2cid=38668401 |access-date=27 March 2016 |archive-date=10 October 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171010075759/https://www.politics.ox.ac.uk/materials/profile_materials/jgr%20vol%2013%20no%204%202011.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> The remaining 10,324 to 12,500 prisoners were civilians, either family members of the military personnel or collaborators (Razakars).<ref name="The Daily Star">{{cite news |title=Jamaat claims denied by evidence |url=http://www.thedailystar.net/news-detail-25257 |work=THE DAILY STAR |date=28 February 2008 |access-date=10 March 2016 |archive-date=11 August 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170811144217/http://www.thedailystar.net/news-detail-25257 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Haqqani2005p87" /><ref name="Burke1974p216" />

It is estimated that members of the Pakistani military and supporting pro-Pakistani Islamist militias killed between 300,000 and 3,000,000 civilians in Bangladesh.<ref name="Women and Climate Change in Bangladesh">{{cite book |last1=Alston |first1=Margaret |title=Women and Climate Change in Bangladesh |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WMSgBgAAQBAJ&q=3%20million%20bangladeshi%20genocide%201971%20war&pg=PA40 |access-date=2016-03-08 |year=2015 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9781317684862 |page=40 |archive-date=13 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201013134201/https://books.google.com/books?id=WMSgBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA40&q=3%20million%20bangladeshi%20genocide%201971%20war |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Plight and Fate of Women During and Following Genocide">{{cite book |last1=Debnath |first1=Angela |year=2012 |orig-year=First published 2009 |chapter=The Bangladesh Genocide: The Plight of Women |editor-last1=Totten |editor-first1=Samuel |editor-link=Samuel Totten |title=Plight and Fate of Women During and Following Genocide |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=crJ7ai7GJH0C&q=3%20million%20bangladeshi%20genocide%201971%20war&pg=PA55 |access-date=2016-03-08 |publisher=Transaction Publishers |isbn=978-1-4128-4759-9 |page=55 |archive-date=15 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201015061413/https://books.google.com/books?id=crJ7ai7GJH0C&pg=PA55&q=3%20million%20bangladeshi%20genocide%201971%20war |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="usconsulate_cable_march31" /><ref name="kennedy">Kennedy, Senator Edward, "Crisis in South Asia – A report to the Subcommittee investigating the Problem of Refugees and Their Settlement, Submitted to U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee", 1 November 1971, U.S. Govt. Press, page 66. Sen. Kennedy wrote, "Field reports to the U.S. Government, countless eye-witness journalistic accounts, reports of International agencies such as World Bank and additional information available to the subcommittee document the reign of terror which grips East Bengal (East Pakistan). Hardest hit have been members of the Hindu community who have been robbed of their lands and shops, systematically slaughtered, and in some places, painted with yellow patches marked 'H'. All of this has been officially sanctioned, ordered and implemented under martial law from Islamabad."</ref> As a result of the conflict, a further eight to ten million people fled the country to seek refuge in India.<ref name="Rummel-8-2">Rummel, Rudolph J., [http://www.Hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.CHAP8.HTM "Statistics of Democide: Genocide and Mass Murder Since 1900"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160221160013/http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.CHAP8.HTM |date=21 February 2016 }}, {{ISBN|3-8258-4010-7}}, Chapter 8, [http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.TAB8.2.GIF Table 8.2 Pakistan Genocide in Bangladesh Estimates, Sources, and Calculations] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120204060822/http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.TAB8.2.GIF |date=4 February 2012 }}: lowest estimate 2 million claimed by Pakistan (reported by Aziz, Qutubuddin. ''Blood and tears'' Karachi: United Press of Pakistan, 1974. pp. 74, 226), some other sources used by Rummel suggest a figure of between 8 and 10 million with one (Johnson, B. L. C. ''Bangladesh''. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1975. pp. 73, 75) that "could have been" 12 million.</ref>

During the war, members of the Pakistani military and supporting pro-Pakistani Islamist militias called the Razakars raped between 200,000 and 400,000 Bangladeshi women and girls in a systematic campaign of genocidal rape.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Sharlach |first=Lisa |year=2000 |title=Rape as Genocide: Bangladesh, the Former Yugoslavia, and Rwanda |journal=New Political Science |volume=22 |issue=1 |pages=92–93 |doi=10.1080/713687893 |s2cid=144966485}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Sharlach |first=Lisa |editor=Kent Worcester |editor-link=Kent Worcester |editor2=Sally A. Bermanzohn |editor3=Mark Ungar |year=2002 |chapter=State Rape: Sexual Violence as Genocide |title=Violence and Politics: Globalization's Paradox |publisher=Routledge |page=111 |isbn=978-0-415-93111-3}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Sajjad |first=Tazreena |year=2012 |orig-year=First published 2009 |chapter=The Post-Genocidal Period and its Impact on Women |editor1-last=Tottne |editor1-first=Samuel |editor1-link=Samuel Totten |title=Plight and Fate of Women During and Following Genocide |publisher=Transaction Publishers |page=225 |isbn=978-1-4128-4759-9}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Mookherjee |first=Nayanika |year=2012 |chapter=Mass rape and the inscription of gendered and racial domination during the Bangladesh War of 1971 |editor1=Raphaëlle Branche |editor2=Fabrice Virgili |title=Rape in Wartime |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |page=68 |isbn=978-0-230-36399-1}}</ref>

== Background == {{main|Admiral Ahsan Mission|Bangladesh Liberation War|Mukti Bahini|Timeline of Bangladesh Liberation War|1971 Bangladesh genocide}}

The Indo-Pakistani conflict was sparked by the Bangladesh Liberation War, which was a result of the violation of the rights of East Pakistan by the Pakistan Army.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}} The political tensions in East Pakistan had its origin in the creation of Pakistan as a result of the partition of India by the United Kingdom in 1947; the popular language movement in 1950; mass riots in East Bengal in 1964; and the mass protests in 1969. These led to the resignation of President Ayub Khan, who invited army chief General Yahya Khan to take over the central government.<ref name="PublicAffairs, Lieven">{{cite book|last1=Lieven|first1=Anatol|year=2012|title=Pakistan: A Hard Country|publisher=PublicAffairs|isbn=978-1610391627|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=exBKSo-Pf6cC&q=Bengali%20Pakistani%20people%5C&pg=PT77|access-date=23 December 2016|language=en|archive-date=11 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201011182217/https://books.google.com/books?id=exBKSo-Pf6cC&pg=PT77&q=Bengali%20Pakistani%20people%5C|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|xxx}} The geographical distance between the eastern and western wings of Pakistan was vast; East Pakistan lay over {{convert|1000|mi|km|order=flip}} away, which greatly hampered any attempt to integrate the Bengali and the Pakistani cultures.<ref name="Encyclopaedia Britannica, Abbott">{{cite book|last1=Abbott|first1=David|title=Changing World: Pakistan|date=2015|publisher=Encyclopaedia Britannica|location=Minnesota, U.S.|isbn=9781625133212|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KZwLBwAAQBAJ&q=distance%20between%20east%20and%20west%20pakistan%201000%20miles&pg=PA14|access-date=8 January 2017|language=en|archive-date=29 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201029070308/https://books.google.com/books?id=KZwLBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA14&q=distance%20between%20east%20and%20west%20pakistan%201000%20miles|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|13–14}}<ref>{{Cite news|date=2018-12-16|title=1971 war: The story of India's victory, Pak's surrender, Bangladesh freedom|work=Business Standard India|url=https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/vijay-diwas-how-india-ended-pak-s-atrocities-and-ensured-freed-bangladesh-118121600120_1.html|access-date=2020-07-06|archive-date=12 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200712041755/https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/vijay-diwas-how-india-ended-pak-s-atrocities-and-ensured-freed-bangladesh-118121600120_1.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

To overcome the Bengali domination and prevent formation of the central government in Islamabad, the controversial One Unit programme established the two wings of East and West Pakistan. West Pakistanis' opposition to these efforts made it difficult to effectively govern both wings.<ref name="PublicAffairs, Lieven"/>{{rp|xxx}} In 1969, President Yahya Khan announced the first general elections and disestablished the status of West Pakistan as a single province in 1970, in order to restore it to its original heterogeneous status comprising four provinces, as defined at the time of establishment of Pakistan in 1947.<ref name="Nazaria-e-Pakistan Trust, 2003">{{cite web|title=Legal Framework Order 1970|url=http://storyofpakistan.com/legal-framework-order|website=Story of Pakistan|publisher=Nazaria-e-Pakistan Trust, 2003|access-date=23 December 2016|date=1 June 2003|archive-date=3 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161203195522/http://storyofpakistan.com/legal-framework-order|url-status=live}}</ref> In addition, there were religious and racial tensions between Bengalis and the multi-ethnic West Pakistanis, as Bengalis looked different from the dominant West Pakistanis.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Chatterjee |first1=Pranab |year=2010 |title=A Story of Ambivalent Modernization in Bangladesh and West Bengal: The Rise and Fall of Bengali Elitism in South Asia |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lAR1D0Wi2rsC&pg=PA24 |publisher=Peter Lang |page=24 |isbn=978-1-4331-0820-4 |access-date=15 September 2020|quote=Muslims in West Pakistan had developed a culture which bordered on ethnocentrism, since the ideas entertained in West Pakistan were that they, the ethnic "Sindhi," "Punjabi," "Beluchi," "Afghani," and others were "real" Muslims whereas "Bengali" Muslims from East Pakistan were "distant" Muslims.|archive-date=19 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201019173034/https://books.google.com/books?id=lAR1D0Wi2rsC&pg=PA24 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The East Pakistan's Awami League leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman stressed his political position by presenting his Six Points and endorsing the Bengalis' right to govern themselves.<ref name="PublicAffairs, Lieven"/>{{rp|xxx}} The 1970 Pakistani general election, resulted in Awami League gaining 167 out of 169 seats for the East Pakistan Legislative Assembly, and a near-absolute majority in the 313-seat National Assembly, while the vote in West Pakistan was mostly won by the socialist Pakistan Peoples Party.<ref>{{cite book|first1=Dieter|last1=Nohlen|title=Elections in Asia and the Pacific|date=2004|publisher=Oxford Univ. Press|location=Oxford|isbn=978-0-19-924958-9|edition=Reprint}}</ref>{{rp|686–687}} The League's election success caused many West Pakistanis to fear that it would allow the Bengalis to draft the constitution based on the Six Points and liberalism.<ref name="Pan Macmillan, Guha">{{cite book|last1=Guha|first1=Ramachandra|year=2011|title=India After Gandhi: The History of the World's Largest Democracy|publisher=Pan Macmillan|isbn=9780330540209|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8FKepYC6wzwC&q=Awami%20league%20pakistani%20constitution%20fear&pg=PR45|access-date=23 December 2016|language=en|archive-date=14 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201014121048/https://books.google.com/books?id=8FKepYC6wzwC&pg=PR45&q=Awami%20league%20pakistani%20constitution%20fear|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|xlv}}

To resolve the crisis, the Admiral Ahsan Mission was formed to provide recommendations. Its findings were met with favourable reviews from the political leaders of West Pakistan, with the exception of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party.<ref name="Algora Publishing, Ehtisham">{{cite book|last1=Ehtisham|first1=S. Akhtar|title=A Medical Doctor Examines Life on Three Continents: A Pakistani View|date=1998|publisher=Algora Publishing|isbn=978-0-87586-634-5|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IuseZxgbn8oC&q=admiral%20ahsan%20formula&pg=PA109|access-date=9 December 2016|archive-date=14 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201014114527/https://books.google.com/books?id=IuseZxgbn8oC&pg=PA109&q=admiral%20ahsan%20formula|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|109–110}}

However, the military leadership vetoed the mission's proposal.<ref name="Algora Publishing, Ehtisham" />{{rp|110}} Zulfikar Ali Bhutto endorsed the veto,<ref name="Algora Publishing, Ehtisham" />{{rp|110}} and subsequently refused to yield the premiership of Pakistan to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The Awami League called for general strikes throughout the country. President Yahya Khan postponed the inauguration of the National Assembly, causing disillusionment among the Awami League and their supporters throughout East Pakistan.<ref name="National Book Club, Ghazali">{{cite book |last1=Ghazali |first1=Abdus Sattar |chapter=The Second Martial Law |title=Islamic Pakistan: Illusions and Reality |chapter-url=http://ghazali.net/book1/chapter_5.htm |publisher=National Book Club |access-date=23 December 2016 |archive-date=30 May 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140530143431/http://ghazali.net/book1/chapter_5.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> In reaction, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman called for general strikes that eventually shut down the government, and dissidents in the east began targeting the ethnic Bihari community, which largely supported West Pakistan.<ref name="D'Costa 2011 103">{{Cite book |last=D'Costa |first=Bina |author-link=Bina D'Costa |year=2011 |title=Nationbuilding, Gender and War Crimes in South Asia |publisher=Routledge |page=103 |isbn=978-0-415-56566-0}}</ref>

In early March 1971, approximately 300 Biharis were slaughtered in riots by Bengali mobs in Chittagong alone.<ref name="D'Costa 2011 103" /> The government of Pakistan used the "Bihari massacre" to justify its deployment of the military in East Pakistan on 25 March, when it initiated its military crackdown.<ref name="D'Costa 2011 103" /> President Yahya Khan called on the military—which was overwhelmingly led by West Pakistanis—to suppress dissent in the east, after accepting the resignation of Lieutenant-General Yaqub Ali Khan, the chief of staff of the East Pakistani military.<ref name="Economic and Political Weekly">{{cite journal |last=Bose |first=Sarmila |date=8 October 2005 |title=Anatomy of Violence: Analysis of Civil War in East Pakistan in 1971 |url=http://www.epw.org.in/showArticles.php?root=2005&leaf=10&filename=9223&filetype=html |journal=Economic and Political Weekly |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070301084941/http://www.epw.org.in/showArticles.php?root=2005&leaf=10&filename=9223&filetype=html |archive-date=1 March 2007}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Salik |first=Siddiq |year=1977 |title=Witness To Surrender |publisher=Oxford University Press |pages=63, 228–9 |isbn=978-984-05-1373-4}}</ref>

Mass arrests of dissidents began and, after several days of strikes and non-cooperation, the Pakistani military, led by Lieutenant-General Tikka Khan, cracked down on Dhaka on the night of 25 March 1971. The government outlawed the Awami League, which forced many of its members and sympathisers to seek refuge in Eastern India. Mujib was arrested that night at about 1:30 am (as per Radio Pakistan's news on 29 March) and taken to West Pakistan. Operation Searchlight, followed by Operation Barisal, which attempted to kill the intellectual elite of the east.<ref name="Riedel">{{cite book|last=Riedel|first=Bruce O.|title=Deadly Embrace: Pakistan, America, and the Future of the Global Jihad|url=https://archive.org/details/deadlyembracepak00bruc|url-access=limited|year=2011|publisher=Brookings Institution|isbn=978-0-8157-0557-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/deadlyembracepak00bruc/page/n27 10]}}</ref>

On 26 March 1971, Major Ziaur Rahman of the Pakistan Army declared the independence of Bangladesh on behalf of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aONtAAAAMAAJ&q=announcement|title=Tragedy of Errors: East Pakistan Crisis, 1968–1971|first=Kamal|last=Matinuddin|year=1994|publisher=Wajidalis|isbn=978-969-8031-19-0|access-date=15 November 2015|archive-date=18 May 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160518125906/https://books.google.com/books?id=aONtAAAAMAAJ&q=announcement|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qh4NAAAAIAAJ&q=march+26|title=Pakistan's Crisis in Leadership|first=Fazal Muqueem|last=Khan|year=1973|publisher=National Book Foundation|isbn=978-0-88386-302-2|access-date=15 November 2015|archive-date=11 June 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160611024009/https://books.google.com/books?id=qh4NAAAAIAAJ&q=march+26|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Qureshi">{{cite book|last=Qureshi|first=Hakeem Arshad|title=Through the 1971 Crisis: An Eyewitness Account by a Soldier|year=2003|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-579778-7|page=33}}</ref>

In April, the exiled Awami League leaders formed a government-in-exile in Baidyanathtala of Meherpur. The East Pakistan Rifles and Bengali officers in Pakistan's army, navy, and marines defected to the rebellion after taking refuge in different parts of India. The Bangladesh Force, namely the Mukti Bahini, consisting of a conventional force and a guerilla force, was formed under the retired colonel Mohammad Ataul Gani Osmani.<ref>{{cite book |last=Raja |first=Dewan Mohammad Tasawwar |year=2010 |title=O General My General |publisher=Osmany Memorial Trust |pages=68, 70 |isbn=978-984-8866-18-4}}</ref> There was also a meeting between Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and President Richard Nixon in November 1971, in which the former rejected American advice against intervening in the conflict.<ref name="ABC-CLIO, Heo and Jr.">{{cite book |last1=Shafqat |first1=Sahar |title=Civil wars of the world : major conflicts since World War II |publisher=ABC-CLIO |year=2007 |isbn=978-1-85109-919-1 |editor1-last=DeRouen |editor1-first=Karl Jr. |volume=II |page=596 |chapter=Pakistan (1971) |access-date=24 December 2016 |editor2-last=Heo |editor2-first=Uk |editor2-link=Uk Heo |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nrN077AEgzMC&q=pakistan%20army%201971%20India&pg=PA596 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200819154146/https://books.google.com/books?id=nrN077AEgzMC&pg=PA596&q=pakistan%20army%201971%20India |archive-date=19 August 2020 |url-status=live}}</ref>

=== India's involvement in the Bangladesh Liberation War === {{Main|Bangladesh genocide|Terrorism in Pakistan|Anti-Pakistan sentiment}}

After the resignations of Admiral S.M. Ahsan and Lieutenant-General Yaqub Ali Khan, the press began airing reports of the Pakistani military's widespread genocide against their Bengali citizens,<ref name="uspol">{{cite magazine |title=The U.S.: A Policy in Shambles |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,878970,00.html |url-access=subscription |magazine=Time |date=20 December 1971 |access-date=20 October 2009 |archive-date=30 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130930140438/http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,878970,00.html |url-status=live }}</ref> particularly targeting the minority Bengali Hindus,<ref name="usconsulate_cable_march31">U.S. Consulate (Dacca) Cable, Sitrep: [http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB79/BEBB6.pdf Army Terror Campaign Continues in Dacca; Evidence Military Faces Some Difficulties Elsewhere] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111221082405/http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB79/BEBB6.pdf |date=21 December 2011 }}, 31 March 1971, Confidential, 3 pp.</ref><ref name="time25Oct71">{{cite magazine |title=East Pakistan: Even the Skies Weep |url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,877316,00.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071104001659/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,877316,00.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=4 November 2007 |url-access=subscription |magazine=Time |date=25 October 1971 |access-date=20 October 2009}}</ref><ref name="time27Dec1971">{{cite magazine |date=27 December 1971 |title=India: Easy Victory, Uneasy Peace |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,905593,00.html |url-status=live |magazine=Time |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170613153528/http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,905593,00.html |archive-date=13 June 2017 |access-date=24 April 2016 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> which led to approximately 10 million people seeking refuge in the neighbouring states of Eastern India.<ref name="usconsulate_cable_march31" /><ref name="uspol" /><ref name="MSN Encarta">{{cite encyclopaedia |url=http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761588350_3/Indo-Pakistani_Wars.html# |title=Indo-Pakistani Wars |encyclopaedia=MSN Encarta |access-date=20 October 2009 |archive-url=https://www.webcitation.org/5kwrHv6ph?url=http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761588350_3/Indo-Pakistani_Wars.html |archive-date=1 November 2009 |url-status=dead}}</ref> The Government of India opened the East Pakistan–India border to allow Bengali refugees to find shelter; the governments of West Bengal, Bihar, Assam, Meghalaya and Tripura established refugee camps along the border.<ref name="Rotary International, 1971">{{cite book|last1=International|first1=Rotary|title=The Rotarian|date=1971|publisher=Rotary International|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rTUEAAAAMBAJ&q=east%20pakistan%20refugees%20Bengal%20Assam%20Tripura&pg=PA24|access-date=23 December 2016|language=en|archive-date=13 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201013184357/https://books.google.com/books?id=rTUEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA24&q=east%20pakistan%20refugees%20Bengal%20Assam%20Tripura|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|23–24}} The resulting flood of impoverished East Pakistani refugees strained India's already overburdened economy.<ref name="time25Oct71" />

The Indian Government repeatedly appealed to the international community for assistance, but failed to elicit any response, despite External Affairs Minister Swaran Singh meeting foreign ministers of other countries.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.kashmirlive.com/latest/The-four-IndoPak-wars/73887.html|title=The four Indo-Pak wars|website=Kashmirlive, 14 September 2006|access-date=20 October 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091017021541/http://www.kashmirlive.com/latest/The-four-IndoPak-wars/73887.html|archive-date=17 October 2009|url-status=dead}}</ref> Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on 27 March 1971 concluded that, instead of taking in millions of refugees, it was better to go to war with Pakistan, and expressed the full support of her government for the independence struggle of the people of East Pakistan.<ref name="MSN Encarta" /> On 28 April 1971, the Union cabinet ordered the Chief of the Army Staff General Sam Manekshaw to "Go into East Pakistan".<ref name="Praval">{{cite book |last=Praval |first=K. C. |year=2009 |orig-year=First published 1987 |title=Indian Army After Independence |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DdxDcxj_wn4C&pg=PP415 |location=India |publisher=Lancer Publishers |page=415 |isbn=978-1-935501-61-9 |access-date=18 July 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Bass |first=Gary J. |year=2013 |title=The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a Forgotten Genocide |publisher=Alfred A. Knopf |page=94 |isbn=978-0-307-70020-9}}</ref><ref name="Raghavan">{{citation |last=Raghavan |first=Srinath |title=Soldiers, Statesmen, and India's Security Policy |journal=India Review |volume=11 |issue=2 |pages=116–133 |year=2012 |doi=10.1080/14736489.2012.674829 |s2cid=154213504}}</ref> East Pakistan military officer defectors and elements of the Indian Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) immediately started using the Indian refugee camps for the recruitment and training of Mukti Bahini guerrillas.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://im.rediff.com/news/2006/dec/14jacob.htm|title=I had to find troops for Dhaka|newspaper=Rediff News|date=14 December 2006|access-date=20 October 2009|archive-date=25 August 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090825220726/http://im.rediff.com/news/2006/dec/14jacob.htm|url-status=live}}</ref>

By November 1971, the Indian military fired artillery at Pakistani troops and even made several incursions into Pakistani territory.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Gill |first=John H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m2q6SgAACAAJ |title=An Atlas of the 1971 India - Pakistan War: The Creation of Bangladesh |date=2003 |publisher=National Defense University, Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies |pages=12 |language=en |quote=By November, the Indian Army and paramilitary troops were regularly providing artillery support to the Mukti Bahini and, toward the end of the month, the army had even made small incursions into East Pakistan in several locations. |access-date=21 March 2023 |archive-date=22 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230322122749/https://books.google.com/books?id=m2q6SgAACAAJ |url-status=live}}</ref>

The Indian authorities also attempted to carry on psychological warfare and keep up the morale of comrades in East Pakistan. The Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra (Free Bangladesh Radio Centre), which had broadcast Major Rahman's independence declaration, was relocated from Kalurghat in East Pakistan to India after the transmission building was attacked by Pakistani Sabre jets on 30 March 1971. It resumed broadcasting on 3 April from Tripura, aided by the Indian Border Security Force. The clandestine station was finally shifted to Kolkata, where it was joined by a large number of Bangladeshi radio programmers, newscasters, poets, singers and journalists. Its jurisdiction was transferred to the provisional Bangladesh government-in-exile, and made its first broadcast on 25 May, the anniversary of the birth of poet Kazi Nazrul Islam (who would later be named Bangladesh's national poet). Among the Indian contributors to the radio station's nationalistic programmes was Salil Chowdhury. Akashvani Kolkata also actively took part in this effort.<ref>{{Cite news|date=25 May 2021|title=50 years on, B'desh remembers Kolkata radio station that gave them hope during liberation war|work=The New Indian Express|agency=PTI|url=https://www.newindianexpress.com/world/2021/may/25/50-years-on-bdesh-remembers-kolkata-radio-station-that-gave-them-hope-during-liberation-war-2307457.html|access-date=4 December 2021|archive-date=4 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211204175725/https://www.newindianexpress.com/world/2021/may/25/50-years-on-bdesh-remembers-kolkata-radio-station-that-gave-them-hope-during-liberation-war-2307457.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=Dasgupta|first=Priyanka|date=29 November 2021|title=How a secret radio station broadcast hope in 1971|work=The Times of India|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/how-a-secret-radio-station-broadcast-hope-in-1971/articleshow/87964549.cms|access-date=4 December 2021|archive-date=4 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211204182729/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/how-a-secret-radio-station-broadcast-hope-in-1971/articleshow/87964549.cms|url-status=live}}</ref>

== Objective == By the end of April 1971, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had asked the Indian Chief of Army Staff Gen Sam Manekshaw if he was ready to go to war with Pakistan.<ref name="The Hindu, Sandeep">{{cite news |last1=Dikshit |first1=Sandeep |date=28 June 2008 |title=How he and his men won those wars |url=http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/How-he-and-his-men-won-those-wars/article15250477.ece |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224100708/http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/How-he-and-his-men-won-those-wars/article15250477.ece |archive-date=24 December 2016 |access-date=24 December 2016 |work=The Hindu}}</ref><ref name="The Economist, 2008">{{cite magazine |date=3 July 2008 |title=Sam Manekshaw: Sam Manekshaw, soldier, died on 27 June, aged 94 |url=https://www.economist.com/obituary/2008/07/03/sam-manekshaw |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170412013035/http://www.economist.com/node/11661408 |archive-date=12 April 2017 |access-date=7 July 2008 |magazine=The Economist |page=107}}</ref> According to Manekshaw's own personal account, he refused, citing the onset of monsoon season in East Pakistan and also the fact that the army tanks were being refitted.<ref name="The Economist, 2008" /> He offered his resignation, which Gandhi declined.<ref name="The Economist, 2008" /> He then said he could guarantee victory if she would allow him to prepare for the conflict on his terms, and set a date for it; Gandhi accepted his conditions.<ref name="The Economist, 2008" /><ref name="Manekshaw">Manekshaw, SHFJ. (11 November 1998). "Lecture at Defence Services Staff College on Leadership and Discipline" (Appendix V) in Singh (2002)''Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw, M.C. – Soldiering with Dignity''.</ref> In reality, Gandhi was well aware of the difficulties of a hasty military action, but she needed to get the military's views to satisfy her hawkish colleagues and the public opinion, which were critical of India's restraint.<ref name="Raghavan" />

By mid July, India had settled on a plan of attack. The ground in the East would be drier by mid November, which would make a rapid offensive easier. By early to mid December, the Himalayan passes would be closed by snow, limiting China's ability to intervene.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sisson |first1=Richard |author-link1=John Richard Sisson |title=War and secession: Pakistan, India, and the creation of Bangladesh |last2=Rose |first2=Leo E. |publisher=University of California Press |year=1990 |isbn=0-520-07665-6 |pages=208}}</ref>

The news media's mood in Pakistan had turned increasingly jingoistic and militaristic against East Pakistan and India when the Pakistani news media reported the complexity of the situation in the East, though the reactions from Pakistan's news media pundits were mixed.<ref name="The Express Tribune, Ahmad">{{cite news |last1=Ahmad |first1=Dawood |date=16 December 2011 |title=Rethinking the big lies from 1971 |url=http://tribune.com.pk/story/307145/rethinking-the-big-lies-from-1971/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224094829/http://tribune.com.pk/story/307145/rethinking-the-big-lies-from-1971/ |archive-date=24 December 2016 |access-date=23 December 2016 |work=The Express Tribune}}</ref><ref name="Indian Express, 1971">{{cite news |last1=Ahmed |first1=Khalid |date=26 December 2013 |title=Pakistan,1971 |url=http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/pakistan-1971-2/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224100228/http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/pakistan-1971-2/ |archive-date=24 December 2016 |access-date=23 December 2016 |work=The Indian Express}}</ref> By the end of September 1971, a propaganda campaign, possibly orchestrated by elements within the government of Pakistan, resulted in stickers endorsing "''Crush India''" becoming a standard feature on the rear windows of vehicles in Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Lahore; this soon spread to the rest of West Pakistan.<ref name="Dawn newspaper, 2014">{{cite news |date=16 December 2014 |title=1971 'Jihad': Print ads from West Pakistan |url=https://www.dawn.com/news/1151200 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224164127/http://www.dawn.com/news/1151200 |archive-date=24 December 2016 |access-date=23 December 2016 |work=Dawn |type=Editorial}}</ref> By October, other stickers proclaimed ''Hang the Traitor'' in an apparent reference to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.<ref name="usdos-embassycable">{{cite web |date=26 October 1971 |title=New Twist In 'Crush India' Propaganda Campaign |url=http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/pakistan/farland26oct1971.htm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111102141747/http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/pakistan/farland26oct1971.htm |archive-date=2 November 2011 |access-date=29 September 2011 |publisher=US Department of State Telegram}}</ref>

From mid October to 20 November, the Indian army conducted multiple incursions into East Pakistani territory,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sisson |first1=Richard |author-link1=John Richard Sisson |title=War and secession: Pakistan, India, and the creation of Bangladesh |last2=Rose |first2=Leo E. |publisher=University of California Press |year=1990 |isbn=0-520-07665-6 |pages=212}}</ref> generally withdrawing to India after completing their mission. From 21 November, however, Indian forces with Mukti Bahini support entered East Pakistan and remained there in preparation for a formal war that India expected to launch on 6 December.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sisson |first1=Richard |author-link1=John Richard Sisson |title=War and secession: Pakistan, India, and the creation of Bangladesh |last2=Rose |first2=Leo E. |publisher=University of California Press |year=1990 |isbn=0-520-07665-6 |pages=213}}</ref>

An Indian-Pakistani war seemed inevitable. The Soviet Union reportedly warned Pakistan against the war, which they termed as "suicidal course for Pakistan's unity."<ref name="Monitoring Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation" />{{rp|part-3}} Despite this warning, in November 1971, thousands of people led by conservative Pakistani politicians marched in Lahore and across Pakistan, calling for Pakistan to "crush India".<ref name="dos-crushindiamarch">{{cite web |date=9 November 1971 |title=Anti-India Demonstration and Procession |url=http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/pakistan/lahore9nov1971.jpg |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120402202644/http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/pakistan/lahore9nov1971.jpg |archive-date=2 April 2012 |access-date=29 September 2011 |publisher=US Department of State Telegram}}</ref><ref name="po-crushindia">{{cite news |date=30 November 1971 |title=Crush India |url=http://www.docstrangelove.com/uploads/1971/po/19711130_po_crush_india.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120511040537/http://www.docstrangelove.com/uploads/1971/po/19711130_po_crush_india.pdf |archive-date=11 May 2012 |access-date=29 September 2011 |work=Pakistan Observer}}</ref> On 23 November, President Yahya Khan declared a national state of emergency and told the country to prepare for war.<ref name="WarChat">{{cite web |title=Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 |url=http://www.warchat.org/history-asia/indo-pakistani-war-of-1971.html |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090823055450/http://www.warchat.org/history-asia/indo-pakistani-war-of-1971.html |archive-date=23 August 2009 |access-date=20 October 2009}}</ref> By the first week of December, the conservative print media outlets in the country had published ''jihad'' related materials to boost the recruitment in the military.<ref name="Dawn newspaper, 2014" />

== Overview ==

=== Initiation === On the evening of 3 December, at about 17:35, the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) launched surprise pre-emptive strikes on eight Indian airfields,<ref name="Bloomsbury Publishing, Davies">{{cite book |last1=Davies |first1=Peter E. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NFebCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA83 |title=F-104 Starfighter Units in Combat |publisher=Osprey Publishing |year=2014 |isbn=978-1-78096-314-3 |page=83 |language=en |access-date=4 December 2023}}</ref> including Agra, which was {{convert|300|mi|km|order=flip}} from the border. At the time of the attack, the Taj Mahal had been camouflaged with lots of twigs and leaves and draped with burlap, because its marble glowed prominently in the moonlight.<ref name="time20Dec71">{{cite magazine |date=20 December 1971 |title=Bangladesh: Out of War, a Nation Is Born |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,878969,00.html |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130928044711/http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,878969,00.html |archive-date=28 September 2013 |access-date=20 October 2009 |magazine=Time}}</ref> These pre-emptive strikes, known as Operation Chengiz Khan, were inspired by the success of Israeli Operation Focus in the Arab–Israeli Six-Day War. Unlike the Israeli attack on Arab airbases in 1967, which involved a large number of Israeli planes, Pakistan flew too few planes to inflict significant damage.<ref name="Bloomsbury Publishing, Davies" /><ref>"Trying to catch the Indian Air Force napping, Yahya Khan, launched a Pakistani version of Israel's 1967 air blitz in hopes that one rapid attack would cripple India's far superior air power. But India was alert, Pakistani pilots were inept, and Yahya's strategy of scattering his thin air force over a dozen air fields was a bust!", p. 34, ''Newsweek'', 20 December 1971</ref>

In an address to the nation on radio that same evening, Prime Minister Gandhi held that the air strikes were a declaration of war against India<ref name="time13Dec1971">{{cite magazine |date=13 December 1971 |title=India and Pakistan: Over the Edge |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,910155,00.html |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131008221847/http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,910155,00.html |archive-date=8 October 2013 |access-date=20 October 2009 |magazine=Time}}</ref><ref name="bbc">{{cite news |date=3 December 1971 |title=1971: Pakistan intensifies air raids on India |url=https://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/december/3/newsid_2519000/2519133.stm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181030212616/http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/december/3/newsid_2519000/2519133.stm |archive-date=30 October 2018 |access-date=20 October 2009 |work=BBC News}}</ref> and the Indian Air Force (IAF) responded with initial air strikes the same night. These expanded to massive retaliatory air strikes the next morning.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}}

This air action marked the start of all-out war; Gandhi ordered the mobilisation of troops and launched a full-scale invasion of East Pakistan. This involved Indian forces in coordinated air, sea and land assaults. The main Indian objective on the eastern front was to capture Dacca, and on the western front to contain Pakistani forces.<ref>{{cite book |last=Makeig |first=Douglas C. |url=https://www.loc.gov/item/89600298/ |title=Bangladesh: A Country Study |publisher=Federal Research Division, Library of Congress |year=1989 |editor1-last=Heitzman |editor1-first=James |series=Library of Congress Country Studies |location=Washington, D.C. |page=210 |chapter=National Security |oclc=49223313 |access-date=17 April 2023 |editor2-last=Worden |editor2-first=Robert |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230404171656/http://www.loc.gov/item/89600298/ |archive-date=4 April 2023 |url-status=live}} {{PD-notice}}</ref>

=== Ground operations === The Indian army was better equipped than the Pakistanis and enjoyed significant numerical superiority over them.<ref name="ABC-CLIO, Heo and Jr." />

Pakistan launched a ground offensive on the western front.<ref name="ABC-CLIO, Heo and Jr." /> Major ground attacks were concentrated on the western border by the Pakistan Army but the Indian Army was successful in penetrating into Pakistani soil. It eventually made some quick and initial gains, including the capture of around {{convert|5795|sqmi|km2|order=flip|abbr=on}}<ref name="Nawaz2008">{{cite book |last=Nawaz |first=Shuja |title=Crossed Swords: Pakistan, Its Army, and the Wars Within |year=2008 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-547697-2 |page=329}}</ref><ref name="Chitkara1996">{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/benazirprofile0000chit1|url-access=registration|title=Benazir, a Profile|access-date=27 July 2012|page=81|isbn=9788170247524|last1=Chitkara|first1=M. G|year=1996|publisher=APH}}</ref> of Pakistani territory;<ref name="Schofield2003">{{cite book |last1=Schofield |first1=Victoria |author-link=Victoria Schofield |title=Kashmir in Conflict: India, Pakistan and the Unending Ward|url=https://archive.org/details/00book584554548 |year=2003 |publisher=I.B. Tauris |isbn=978-1-86064-898-4 |page=117}}</ref> this land gained by India in Azad Kashmir, Punjab and Sindh sectors was later ceded in the Simla Agreement of 1972, as a gesture of goodwill.

Casualties inflicted to Pakistan Army's I Corps, II Corps, and Pakistan Marines' Punjab detachment were very high, and many soldiers and marines perished due to lack of operational planning and lack of coordination within the marine-army formations against Indian Army's Southern and Western Commands.<ref name="Lancer Publishers, Palit">{{cite book |last1=Palit |first1=DK |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PKvmgfHewHcC&pg=PA83 |title=The Lightning Campaign: The Indo-Pakistan War, 1971 |date=2012-10-10 |publisher=Lancer Publishers |isbn=9781897829370 |language=en |access-date=24 December 2016}}</ref>{{rp|82–93}} By the time the war came to end, the army soldiers and marines were highly demoralised– both emotionally and psychologically– on the western front and had no will to put up a defensive fight against the approaching Indian Army soldiers.<ref name="ABC-CLIO, Hasn't">{{cite book |last1=Hasnat |first1=Syed Farooq |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yeqwIs_NoTEC&q=pakistan%20army%20demoralized%201971&pg=PA2 |title=Pakistan |publisher=ABC-CLIO |year=2011 |isbn=9780313346972 |language=en |access-date=24 December 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201016102601/https://books.google.com/books?id=yeqwIs_NoTEC&pg=PA2&q=pakistan%20army%20demoralized%201971 |archive-date=16 October 2020 |url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|1–2}}

==== Western Front ==== Pakistans head of the army and the military operations during the war,<ref>{{cite web |last1=Smith|first1=Robert |title=Old Friend of President |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1971/12/09/archives/old-friend-of-president.html |website=The New York Times|date=9 December 1971 |access-date=10 January 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Kazi |first1=Dr. GN. |title=Pakistan's Smallest Cabinet |url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/pimu/2510812824/ |website=Flickr |date=21 May 2008 |access-date=10 January 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Hughes |first1=Thomas L. |title=Pakistan : Martial Law "Who's Who" |url=http://www.profile-bengal.com/0326_69_intelligence_note.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080923072142/http://www.profile-bengal.com/0326_69_intelligence_note.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=2008-09-23 |website=Wayback Machine |publisher=The American Papers - Secret and Confidential India.Pakistan.Bangladesh Documents 1965-1973, March 26, 1969 |access-date=10 January 2025}}</ref> General Abdul Hamid Khan played a central role in directing Pakistan's Western front campaigns.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Ahmad |first1=Riaz |title=The General's General: The Life and Times of General Abdul Hamid Khan |date=1993 |publisher=Oxford University Press}}</ref> He oversaw the launch of Operation Chengiz Khan,<ref>{{cite web|last1=Guttman|first1=Jon|title=Lessons Learned from Operation Chenghiz Khan |url=https://www.historynet.com/lessons-learned-from-operation-chenghiz-khan/?r |website=HistoryNet |date=9 October 2021 |publisher=stories |access-date=10 January 2025}}</ref> a preemptive strike on Indian airbases, aimed at crippling Indian airpower and initiating hostilities. Despite extensive planning, the operation inflicted only limited damage. On the Western front, General Hamid Khan commanded key offensives, including the assault towards Ferozepur and ordered the offensive in Chhamb under Major General Iftikhar Janjua, which resulted in territorial gains. He also directed the attempted advance towards Longewala, though this effort was ultimately repelled by Indian forces.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Cohen |first1=Stephen P. |title=The Pakistan Army |date=2004 |publisher=Oxford University Press}}</ref> Hamid Khan oversaw the II Corps offensive into the Indian state of Punjab. The plan involved advancing from Bahawalnagar towards Bhatinda and Ludhiana. Under his directive, major elements of the 1st Armored Division began mobilization on December 15, 1971. Small advancements were made by Pakistani troops. However, due to subsequent orders to halt movements, the offensive was delayed and ultimately did not proceed before the ceasefire on December 17, 1971.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Riza |first1=Maj Gen Shaukat |title=The Pakistan Army 1966-71 |date=1990 |publisher=Services Book Club |location=Rawalpindi}}</ref> His leadership during the conflict, while marked by bold initiatives, has been subject to scrutiny in post-war analyses.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Mohan|first1=Vijay |title=First day of 1971 War|url=https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/anniversary/first-day-of-1971-war |website=Tribuneindia |publisher=The Tribune |access-date=10 January 2025}}</ref>

On 3 December, after the air strike carried out by the PAF, the 106 Infantry Brigade of the Pakistani forces under the command of Brig Mohammad Mumtaz Khan advanced towards the village of Hussainiwala with 2000 troops and artillery support. The Indian side had deployed one battalion, 15 Punjab, under the command of Lt Col Shastry comprising 900 soldiers with support from the IAF. The 15 Punjab could not hold the village and had to retreat on 4 December towards the fortress called Kaiser-i-Hind outside Hussainiwala. The Indian forces were eventually pushed from the fortress a well.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Ahmad |first=Nadeem |date=7 August 2022 |title=The Battle of Hussainiwala |url=https://www.bolnews.com/newspaper/national-nerve/2022/08/the-battle-of-hussainiwala/ |access-date=25 November 2023 |website=Bol News}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=2020-12-09 |title=1971 War: The Battle of Hussainiwala |url=http://www.indiandefencereview.com/interviews/1971-war-the-battle-of-hussainiwala/ |access-date=2023-11-25 |website=Indian Defence Review |language=en-US}}</ref><ref name="Saikia2017">{{Cite journal |last=Saikia |first=Yasmin |date=2017-07-03 |title=The Battle of Hussainiwala and Qaiser-i-Hind: The 1971 War |url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=123687824&site=eds-live&scope=site |journal=Journal of Military History |volume=81 |issue=3 |pages=932–934}}</ref> The Indian side suffered 125 casualties while the Pakistani forces lost 67 men.

Simultaneously, Pakistani forces began an offensive on Chhamb, similar to the offensive carried out during the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965. The Pakistani 23 Armoured Division under Maj Gen Iftikhar Janjua pushed through the region held by the Indian 10 Division with superior equipment commanded by Maj Gen Jaswant Singh.<ref>{{cite book |author=Lt. Col. Muhammad Usman Hassan |title=Soldiers Speak, Selected Articles from Pakistan Army Journal 1956–1981 |publisher=Army Education Press, GHQ, Rawalpindi |chapter=Battle Lore – On Breakthrough in Chamb |chapter-url=http://pakdef.org/battle-lore-on-breakthrough-in-chamb/ |archive-date=27 December 2015 |access-date=28 May 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151227133213/http://pakdef.org/battle-lore-on-breakthrough-in-chamb/ |url-status=dead }}</ref> Till 9 December, the Pakistani commander Maj Gen Janjua perished but the Pakistani forces were able to force the Indian units to retreat by 11 December. Pakistan retained the territory won in this battle after the Simla Agreement.<ref name="Saikia2017" /><ref>{{Cite web |title=Agreement between the Government of India and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan on Bilateral Relations (Simla Agreement) {{!}} UN Peacemaker |url=https://peacemaker.un.org/indiapakistan-simlaagreement72 |access-date=2023-12-12 |website=peacemaker.un.org}}</ref>

On 4 December, a Pakistani unit from the 18 Infantry Division commanded by Maj Gen B. M. Mustafa headed by Brig. Tariq Mir and Brig Jahanzeb Abab advanced towards the Rajasthan town of Longewala. The town was held by an outnumbered Infantry Company under Major K. S. Chandapuri and few border guards but had heavy IAF support.<ref name="TI2">{{cite news |title=The Tribune – Windows – Featured story |url=http://www.tribuneindia.com/2000/20001216/windows/main2.htm |access-date=2 August 2016 |work=The Tribune}}</ref> This company held several anti-tank guns, cannons and howitzers. The initial Pakistani armored advance was stalled by the Indian Anti-tank and Anti-Mech defenses from high ground and the Pakistani sappers were also pushed back by Indian small arm and artillery cannon fire.<ref name="p.42, Sharma">p. 42, Sharma</ref> The IAF 122 squadron under the command of Wing Cdr D. M. Conquest equipped with Hawker Hunter and HAL HF-24 Marut also bombed the Pakistani units.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Service Record for Group Captain Donald Melvyn Conquest 4692 GD(P) at Bharat Rakshak.com |url=http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/Database/4692 |access-date=2024-05-28 |website=Bharat Rakshak |language=en-gb}}</ref> By 7 December the Battle of Longewala was decisively won by India.

Pakistani I Corps attempted to cut Indian transport lines between Punjab and Jammu by advancing on the Shakargarh sector on 6 December. Lt Gen Irshad Ahmed Khan commanded two infantry and one armored division into battle.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Higgins |first=David R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kKanCwAAQBAJ&q=%2231st+Cavalry%22+Pakistan&pg=PT134 |title=M48 Patton vs Centurion: Indo-Pakistani War 1965 |date=2016-01-20 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=9781472810946 |language=en}}</ref> The region was heavily reinforced by the Indian I Corps commanded by Lt Gen Khem Karan Singh holding three infantry divisions, two independent armored brigades and two artillery brigades.<ref>National Defense University, [http://www.ndu.edu/nesa/docs/Gill%20Atlas%20Final%20Version.pdf#search=%22%22Indian%20I%20Corps%22%22 Indian I Corps] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081029150607/http://www.ndu.edu/nesa/docs/Gill%20Atlas%20Final%20Version.pdf|date=2008-10-29}}</ref> The resultant battle raged till the end of the war on 16 December and recorded heavy losses on both sides. Despite being numerically superior than the Indian side, Pakistan failed at capturing the region and the Indian units pushed back and threatened Sialkot. The Battle of Basantar was deemed an Indian victory.{{citation needed|date=July 2024}}

Between 8 and 14 December, India captured an 800 km2 stretch of the Karakoram range in the Northern region of Ladakh in the Battle of Turtuk under the command of Col Udai Singh.<ref>{{cite news |date=22 December 2011 |title=Rinchen's second victory of the day |url=https://www.rediff.com/news/slide-show/slide-show-1-the-hero-of-nubra/20111222.htm#4 |newspaper=Rediff News}}</ref>

==== Eastern Front ====

===== Pre-war operations ===== thumb|250px|An illustration showing military units and troop movements during operations in the Eastern sector of the war.Before the official declaration of war between the two countries, Indian army had already been attacking the territory along the border with East Pakistan. This served the purpose of confusing Lt Gen Amir Niazi, the Martial Law Administrator of East Pakistan. These battles fought before the official declaration of war included the Battle of Dhalai, Garibpur, Boyra and Hilli.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=Subramaniam (retd) |first=AVM Arjun |date=2018-11-22 |title=Even before 1971 war started with Pakistan, India had won the battle |url=https://theprint.in/opinion/even-before-1971-war-started-with-pakistan-india-had-won-the-battle/152975/ |access-date=2025-04-18 |website=ThePrint |language=en-US}}</ref><ref name="Pustak Mahal, Nair">{{cite book |last1=Nair |first1=Sreekumar |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9gdHmR_6K0AC&q=1965%20war%20which%20had%20emphasised%20set-piece%20battles&pg=PA156 |title=Interpretation |date=2010-03-01 |publisher=Pustak Mahal |isbn=9788122311112 |language=en |access-date=24 December 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414055132/https://books.google.com/books?id=9gdHmR_6K0AC&q=1965%20war%20which%20had%20emphasised%20set-piece%20battles&pg=PA156 |archive-date=14 April 2021 |url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|156}}

On 28 October, Lt Gen Sagat Singh, commander of the IV Corps ordered the advance of Indian forces into the region of Dhalai near Tripura. Three battalions from the Corps fought against the battalion sized deployment of the 12th Frontier Force of Pakistan. The six day battle resulted in an Indian victory and provided for a launch pad for IAF reconnaissance mission into East Pakistan.<ref name=":0" />

On 20 November, 14 Tanks and a Battalion from the Punjab Regiment under the command of Lt Col R. K. Singh launched another attack on the border with East Pakistan. The city of Garibpur was targeted. Defended by a larger force of three battalions under the 107 Infantry brigade commanded by Brig Mohammad Hayat, the two day battle resulted in heavy Pakistani casualties and an Indian victory. The following day, 4 Canadair Sabre of the PAF attempted to attack Indian positions in the region and were confronted by 4 IAF Folland Gnats. This aerial battle resulted in 2 PAF Sabre's being shot down, one damaged and 2 pilots captured.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2021-11-23 |title=India marks 50 years of battle of Garibpur before 1971 war with Pakistan |url=https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/india-marks-50-years-of-battle-of-garibpur-before-1971-war-with-pakistan-101637608668870.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250126042501/https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/india-marks-50-years-of-battle-of-garibpur-before-1971-war-with-pakistan-101637608668870.html |archive-date=26 January 2025 |access-date=2025-04-18 |work=Hindustan Times |language=en-us |url-status=live }}</ref>

On 22 November, 8 Grenadiers under the command of Lt Col Shamsher Singh advanced on the mountain position of Hilli. For this objective, the town of Morapara was attacked. In the fierce battle, heavy losses were incurred by the Indian side but by 24 November, a huge portion of Morapara was captured.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2023-03-28 |title=India's November Campaign Part 1: The First Battle of Hilli, 22nd-24th November, 1971 |url=https://easy-history.com/2023/03/28/indias-november-campaign-part-1-the-first-battle-of-hilli-22nd-24th-november-1971/ |access-date=2025-04-18 |website=Easy History |language=en}}</ref>

===== After the declaration of war ===== Contrary to the 1965 war, which had emphasised set-piece battles and slow advances, this time the strategy adopted was a swift, three-pronged assault of nine infantry divisions with attached armoured units and close air support that rapidly converged on Dacca, the capital of East Pakistan.<ref name="Pustak Mahal, Nair" />{{rp|156}} Lieutenant General Jagjit Singh Aurora, the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Indian Army's Eastern Command, led the full Indian thrust into East Pakistan. As the Indian Eastern Command attacked the Pakistan Eastern Command, IAF rapidly destroyed the small air contingent in East Pakistan and put the Dacca airfield out of commission.<ref name="Pustak Mahal, Nair" />{{rp|156}} In the meantime, the Indian Navy effectively blockaded East Pakistan.<ref name="Pustak Mahal, Nair" />{{rp|156}}

Indian 95 Brigade under the command of H. S. Kler and Mukti Bahini forces had laid siege to a border post in the town of Kamalpur since November defended by a platoon of Pakistani paramilitary commandos, but after the declaration of war, with the support of IAF which bombed the town from 3 to 4 December, Brig Kler was able to extract a surrender and Kamalpur was captured.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2021-10-10 |title=On The Art Of War And Writing Letters To The Enemy: Gallantry At The Battle Of Jamalpur |url=https://thefridaytimes.com/10-Oct-2021/on-the-art-of-war-and-writing-letters-to-the-enemy-gallantry-at-the-battle-of-jamalpur |access-date=2025-04-20 |website=The Friday Times |language=en}}</ref>

On 4 December, 5 Gorkha rifles of the 59 Mountain brigade was tasked with capturing the Gazipur tea factory bungalow overlooking the important city of Sylhet. In the late night operation carried out by Major Shyam Kelkar, India was able to force Pakistani forces to retreat despite heavy casualties including Maj Kelkar.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Pradhan |first=S. D. |title=Deception during 1971 War: Case of a brigade that was not there |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/ChanakyaCode/deception-during-1971-war-case-of-a-brigade-that-was-not-there/ |access-date=2025-04-20 |work=The Times of India |issn=0971-8257}}</ref>

On 7 December, after a major buildup of forces around the city of Sylhet, Lt Gen Sagat Singh ordered the 4/5th battalion of the Gorkha regiment to carry out a heliborne operation under the command of Lt Col A. B. Harolikar. The first wave of attacks was carried out on the same day with a hundred soldiers landed into the city, followed by more after 12 hours. The Indian forces expected the city to have been abandoned by the Pakistani commanders. Contrary to their beliefs, the city was defended by 2 brigades which responded with heavy firing towards the attacking Indian forces. This also caused an interruption in the heliborne operations and limited the access to the Indian forces. These attacks were followed by IAF Hunter air strikes on 11 December. The Pakistani forces under Brig S. A. Hassan raised the white flag on 15 December.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2007-08-10 |title=Defenceindia : Special Feature : Battle of Sylhet |url=http://www.defenceindia.com/defenceind/battle_sylhet.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070810211600/http://www.defenceindia.com/defenceind/battle_sylhet.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=2007-08-10 |access-date=2025-04-21 }}</ref>

On 9 December, the Indian forces under the 57 Mountain division were tasked with crossing the Meghna river through the Coronation bridge between the town of Ashuganj and Bairab Bazaar. Ashuganj was heavy defended by the Pakistani forces and the following battle resulted in heavy casualties on both sides. The Pakistani 14 Division ordered the destruction of the bridge, allowing for the Pakistani troops to ferry across the Meghna rivier and strengthen the defense of Bhairab Bazaar. The Indian forces were able to cross the Meghna river with the help of local fishing boats and 14 Mil Mi-4 helicopters. By 12 December, the Indian forces had secured the crossing points on the Meghna and had located several battalions across the river. Indian units had also come within artillery range of Dacca.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2022-01-25 |title=4 GUARDS CROSSES THE MEGHNA {{!}} Salute |url=https://salute.co.in/4-guards-crosses-the-meghna/ |access-date=2025-04-22 |language=en-US}}</ref>

On 11 December, the 2nd Para regiment battalion carried out the Tangail Airdrop and engaged with the ill-trained Razakars to enable the 1 Maratha light infantry to secure the Poongli bridge over the Jamuna river. This battle was an Indian victory and helped Indian forces close on Dhaka by 12 December. On 13 December, Indian and Mukti Bahini forces attacked the city of Shiromoni. The Indian forces suffered heavy losses at the Badamtola ambush. The battle continued till after the singing of the Instrument of Surrender by the commander of Pakistani forces in East Pakistan, Lt Gen A. A. K. Niazi on 16 December, since the commander of forces in Shiromoni, Brig Hayat Khan insisted on continuing the battle. Brig Khan surrendered to the Indian forces a day later on 17 December.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2023-12-16 |title=The text-book battle that freed Khulna on 17 December |url=https://www.tbsnews.net/supplement/text-book-battle-freed-khulna-17-december-758282 |access-date=2025-04-28 |website=The Business Standard |language=en}}</ref>

The Indian campaign's "''blitzkrieg''" techniques exploited weaknesses in the Pakistani positions and bypassed opposition; this resulted in a swift victory.<ref name="Oxford University Press, Paret">{{cite book |last=Paret |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F0N59g93EBYC |title=Makers of Modern Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age |author2=Gordon A. Craig |author3=Felix Gilbert |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1986 |isbn=978-0-19-820097-0 |access-date=15 September 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201017135342/https://books.google.com/books?id=F0N59g93EBYC |archive-date=17 October 2020 |url-status=live}}, pp802</ref>{{rp|802}} Faced with insurmountable losses, the Pakistani military capitulated in less than a fortnight and psychological panic spread in the Eastern Command's military leadership.<ref name="Oxford University Press, Paret" />{{rp|802}} Subsequently, the Indian Army encircled Dacca and issued an ultimatum to surrender in "30-minutes" time window on 16 December 1971.<ref name="Sify, Sengupta">{{cite web |last1=Sengupta |first1=Ramananda |title=1971 War: 'I will give you 30 minutes' |url=http://www.sify.com/news/1971-war-i-will-give-you-30-minutes-news-columns-jmqlV0fcjjasi.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224234459/http://www.sify.com/news/1971-war-i-will-give-you-30-minutes-news-columns-jmqlV0fcjjasi.html |archive-date=24 December 2016 |access-date=24 December 2016 |website=Sify}}</ref> Upon hearing the ultimatum, the East-Pakistan government collapsed when the Lt-Gen. A.A.K. Niazi (Cdr. of Eastern Command) and his deputy, V-Adm. M.S. Khan, surrendered without offering any resistance.<ref name="Pustak Mahal, Nair" /> On 16 December 1971, Pakistan ultimately called for unilateral ceasefire and surrendered its entire four-tier military to the Indian Army – hence ending the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971.<ref name="Pustak Mahal, Nair" />

According to CIA estimates, more than 3,500 Indian soldiers and about 5,000 Pakistani soldiers lost their lives, with tens of thousands wounded in total.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2025-05-21 |title=1971 India-Pakistan War {{!}} History, Bangladesh, Details, Outcome, United States, Russia, & Timeline {{!}} Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/event/1971-India-Pakistan-War |access-date=2025-05-25 |website=www.britannica.com |language=en}}</ref> Another source states that Pakistan suffered around 8,000 killed and 25,000 wounded, while India had 3,000 dead and 12,000 wounded.<ref name="Century Air Warfare 1997, pages 384">''The Encyclopedia of 20th Century Air Warfare'', edited by Chris Bishop (Amber publishing 1997, republished 2004 pages 384–387 {{ISBN|1-904687-26-1}})</ref> The loss of armoured vehicles was similarly imbalanced and this finally represented a defeat for Pakistan.<ref name="Century Air Warfare 1997, pages 384" />

The Indian Army's improved performance following its defeat in the Sino-Indian War in 1962 boosted its morale and prestige.<ref name="Hindustan Times, 2008">{{cite news |last1=Singh |first1=Dipender |date=27 June 2008 |title=Sam gave dignity to Army in 1971, after 1962 debacle |url=http://www.hindustantimes.com/delhi/sam-gave-dignity-to-army-in-1971-after-1962-debacle/story-s3usXYBVqUlgYGYqbFrSIO.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161226221029/http://www.hindustantimes.com/delhi/sam-gave-dignity-to-army-in-1971-after-1962-debacle/story-s3usXYBVqUlgYGYqbFrSIO.html |archive-date=26 December 2016 |access-date=26 December 2016 |work=Hindustan Times}}</ref>

=== Naval operations === {{main|Indo-Pakistani Naval War of 1971}}

[[File:Ussdiablo.jpg|thumb|250px|Pakistan's {{ship|PNS|Ghazi}} sank off the fairway buoy of Visakhapatnam near the eastern coast of India, making it the first submarine casualty in the waters around the Indian subcontinent. ]] [[File:1971 Indian Aero-Naval Operations.png|left|thumb|Indian navy had blockaded Pakistan's trade and supply lines in Bay of Bengal in Eastern theatre; Airforce bombed and raided several towns and some cities in East Pakistan.]] Navy NHQ staffers and commanders of the Pakistan Navy knew very well that unlike the 1965 war, the Navy was ill-prepared for the naval conflict with India.<ref name="Lancer's Publications and Distributors">{{cite book|last=Goldrick|first=James|title=No Easy Answers|year=1997|publisher=Lancer's Publications and Distributors|location=New Delhi|isbn=978-1-897829-02-8|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6XW7kKHQeQoC&pg=PA45|access-date=15 September 2020|archive-date=18 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201018170459/https://books.google.com/books?id=6XW7kKHQeQoC&pg=PA45|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|65}} The Pakistan Navy was in no condition to fight an offensive war in deep water against the Indian Navy, and neither was it in a condition to mount a serious defence against Indian Navy's seaborne encroachment.<ref name="Sona Printers, India">{{cite book|url=http://www.navy.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/PIAMA02.pdf|title=No Easy Answers|last1=Goldrick|first1=James|date=1997|publisher=Sona Printers, India|isbn=1-897829-02-7|location=New Delhi, India|access-date=24 December 2016|archive-date=24 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224095145/http://www.navy.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/PIAMA02.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|75–76}}

In the western theatre of the war, the Indian Navy's Western Naval Command, under Vice admiral S.N. Kohli, successfully launched a surprise attack on the port of Karachi on the night of 4/5 December 1971 under the codename ''Trident''.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}} The naval attack involving the Soviet-built Osa-class missile boats sank the Pakistan Navy's destroyer {{ship|PNS|Khaibar|1956|6}} and minesweeper {{ship|PNS|Muhafiz}} while {{ship|PNS|Shah Jahan|DD-962|6}} was also badly damaged.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}} Pakistani naval sources reported that about 720 Pakistani sailors were killed or wounded, and Pakistan lost reserve fuel and many commercial ships, thus crippling the Pakistan Navy's further involvement in the conflict.<ref name="Sona Printers, India" />{{rp|85–87}} Seeking to retaliate, the Pakistan Navy submarines hunted for the major Indian warships.<ref>{{cite book |last=Till |first=Geoffrey |author-link=Geoffrey Till |title=Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century |year=2004 |publisher=Frank Cass |page=179 |isbn=0-7146-5542-2}}</ref> On 9 December 1971, {{ship|PNS|Hangor|S131|2}} sank {{INS|Khukri|F149|6}}, inflicting 194 Indian casualties, and this attack was the first submarine kill since World War II.<ref name="Seaforth Publishing, Branfill-Cook">{{cite book|last1=Branfill-Cook|first1=Roger|title=Torpedo: The Complete History of the World's Most Revolutionary Naval Weapon|publisher=Seaforth Publishing|isbn=9781848322158|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9lquBQAAQBAJ&q=ins%20khukri%20world%20war%20II%20This%20was%20the%20first%20submarine%20kill%20since%20%5B%5BWorld%20War%20II%5D%5D&pg=PA229|access-date=24 December 2016|language=en|year=2014|archive-date=22 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201022161948/https://books.google.com/books?id=9lquBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA229&q=ins%20khukri%20world%20war%20II%20This%20was%20the%20first%20submarine%20kill%20since%20%5B%5BWorld%20War%20II%5D%5D|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|229}}<ref name="bharat">{{cite web|url=http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/NAVY/History/1971War/44-Attacks-On-Karachi.html |title=Trident, Grandslam and Python: Attacks on Karachi |website=Bharat Rakshak |access-date=20 October 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090926174134/http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/NAVY/History/1971War/44-Attacks-On-Karachi.html |archive-date=26 September 2009 }}</ref>

The sinking of INS ''Khukri'' was followed by another Indian attack on the port of Karachi on the night of 8/9 December 1971 under the codename ''Python''.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}} A squadron of Indian Navy's Osa missile boats approached the Karachi port and launched a series of Soviet-acquired Styx missiles, that resulted in further destruction of reserve fuel tanks and the sinking of three Pakistani merchant ships, as well as foreign ships docked in Karachi.<ref name="Pakistan Defence, Usman">{{cite web|last1=Shabir|first1=Usman|title=The Second Missile Attack " PakDef Military Consortium|url=http://pakdef.org/the-second-missile-attack/|website=pakdef.org|publisher=Pakistan Defence, Usman|access-date=24 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224095638/http://pakdef.org/the-second-missile-attack/|archive-date=24 December 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref> The PAF did not attack the Indian Navy ships, and confusion remained the next day when the civilian pilots of Pakistan International, acting as reconnaissance war pilots, misidentified {{ship|PNS|Zulfiqar|K265|6}} and the air force attacked its own warship, inflicting major damages and killing several officers on board.<ref name="defencejournal.com">{{cite web|url=http://defencejournal.com/may98/fightergap2.htm |title=Defence Notes |publisher=defencejournal.com |access-date=25 April 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120101020717/http://www.defencejournal.com/may98/fightergap2.htm |archive-date=1 January 2012 }}</ref>

In the eastern theatre of the war, the Indian Eastern Naval Command, under Vice Admiral Nilakanta Krishnan, completely isolated East Pakistan by a naval blockade in the Bay of Bengal, trapping the Eastern Pakistan Navy and eight foreign merchant ships in their ports.<ref name="Sona Printers, India" />{{rp|82–83}} From 4 December onwards, the aircraft carrier {{INS|Vikrant|1961|6}} was deployed, and its Sea Hawk fighter-bombers attacked many coastal towns in East Pakistan, including Chittagong and Cox's Bazar.<ref name="Olsen">{{cite book|last=Olsen|first=John Andreas|title=Global Air Power|year=2011|publisher=Potomac Books|isbn=978-1-59797-680-0|page=237}}</ref> India also launched an amphibious assault, ''Operation Beaver'', near Cox's Bazar on 14 December 1971 due to unfounded fears of a Pakistani retreat into Burma, Led by "Romeo Force" with 1/3 Gorkha Rifles, the landing failed–only 12 Indian troops managing to disembark out of a battalion, the area was held by Pakistani regular troops.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Gill |first=John H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m2q6SgAACAAJ |title=An Atlas of the 1971 India - Pakistan War: The Creation of Bangladesh |date=2003 |publisher=National Defense University, Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies |pages=32 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Niazi |first=Amir Abdullah Khan |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6remQgAACAAJ |title=The Betrayal of East Pakistan |date=1998 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-577727-7 |pages=144 |language=en}}</ref> Pakistan countered the threat by sending the submarine {{ship|PNS|Ghazi}}, which sank off the coast of Visakhapatnam, due to an internal explosion, though whether this was triggered by Indian depth charges, diving to avoid them or some other reason has never been established.<ref>{{cite news| url=http://www.hindu.com/mp/2006/12/02/stories/2006120202090100.htm| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121107165657/http://www.hindu.com/mp/2006/12/02/stories/2006120202090100.htm| url-status=dead| archive-date=7 November 2012|location=Chennai, India | work=The Hindu|title=Remembering our war heroes|date=2 December 2006}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Does the US want war with India? |url=http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/jan/22inter.htm |work=Rediff.com |date=31 December 2004 |access-date=14 April 2011 |archive-date=25 October 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101025190541/http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/jan/22inter.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>

Due to a high number of defections, the Navy relied on deploying the Pakistan Marines, led by Rear Admiral Leslie Mungavin, where they had to conduct riverine operations against the Indian Army, but they too suffered major losses, mainly due to their lack of understanding of expeditionary warfare and the wet terrain of East Pakistan.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}}

[[File:INS Vikrant (R11) launches an Alize aircraft during Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.jpg|thumbnail|Indian aircraft carrier {{INS|Vikrant|1961|6}} launches an Alize aircraft]] The damage inflicted on the Pakistan Navy stood at 7 gunboats, 1 minesweeper, 1 submarine, 2 destroyers, 3 patrol crafts belonging to the Pakistan Coast Guard, 18 cargo, supply and communication vessels; and large-scale damage inflicted on the naval base and docks in the coastal town of Karachi. Three merchant navy ships – ''Anwarbaksh'', ''Pasni'' and ''Madhumathi'' –<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.irfc-nausena.nic.in/irfc/ezine/Trans2Trimph/chapters/39_transfer%20of%20ships1.htm |title=Utilisation of Pakistan merchant ships seized during the 1971 war |publisher=Irfc-nausena.nic.in |access-date=27 July 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120301204938/http://www.irfc-nausena.nic.in/irfc/ezine/Trans2Trimph/chapters/39_transfer%20of%20ships1.htm |archive-date=1 March 2012}}</ref> and ten smaller vessels were captured.<ref name="Orbat">{{cite web|title=Damage {{sic|Asse|sment|nolink=y}} – 1971 Indo-Pak Naval War |website=B. Harry |url=http://www.orbat.com/site/cimh/navy/kills(1971)-2.pdf |access-date=20 June 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100508210258/http://orbat.com/site/cimh/navy/kills%281971%29-2.pdf |archive-date=8 May 2010}}</ref> Around 1900 personnel were lost, while 1413 servicemen were captured by Indian forces in Dacca.<ref name="losses">{{cite web|title=Military Losses in the 1971 Indo-Pakistani War |website=Venik |url=http://www.aeronautics.ru/archive/vif2_project/indo_pak_war_1971.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20020225045411/http://www.aeronautics.ru/archive/vif2_project/indo_pak_war_1971.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=25 February 2002 |access-date=30 May 2005}}</ref> According to one Pakistani scholar, Tariq Ali, Pakistan lost half its navy in the war.<ref name="Ali1983">{{cite book |author=Tariq Ali |author-link=Tariq Ali |year=1983 |title=Can Pakistan Survive? The Death of a State |publisher=Penguin Books |page=95 |isbn=978-0-14-022401-6 |quote=In a two-week war, Pakistan lost half its navy, a quarter of its air force and a third of its army.}}</ref>

=== Air operations === {{main|East Pakistan Air Operations, 1971}}

[[File:Mig21 pair during 1971 war.jpg|thumb|Indian Air Force MiG-21s during the war.]] After the attempted pre-emptive attack, the PAF adopted a defensive stance in response to the Indian retaliation. As the war progressed, the IAF continued to battle the PAF over conflict zones, but the number of sorties flown by the PAF decreased day–by–day.<ref>Jon Lake, "Air Power Analysis: Indian Airpower", ''World Air Power Journal'', Volume 12</ref><ref>Group Captain M. Kaiser Tufail, "Great Battles of the Pakistan Airforce" and "Pakistan Air Force Combat Heritage" (pafcombat) et al., Feroze sons, {{ISBN|969-0-01892-2}}</ref> The IAF flew 4,000 sorties while the PAF offered little in retaliation, partly because of the paucity of non-Bengali technical personnel.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}}

This lack of retaliation has also been attributed to the deliberate decision of the PAF's AHQ to cut its losses, as it had already incurred huge losses in the conflict in the liberation war in the East.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd%2Fcstdy%3A%40field%28DOCID+in0189%29|title=Indo-Pakistani conflict|work=Library of Congress Country Studies|access-date=20 October 2009|archive-date=19 October 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151019084136/http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd%2Fcstdy%3A%40field%28DOCID+in0189%29|url-status=live}}</ref> The PAF avoided making contacts with the Indian Navy after the latter raided the port of Karachi twice, but the PAF did retaliate by bombing Okha harbour, destroying the fuel tanks used by the boats that had attacked.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.paffalcons.com/gallery/aviation-art/syed-hussaini/trauma-and-reconstruction.php|title=Picture Gallery – Aviation Art by Group Captain Syed Masood Akhtar Hussaini|publisher=PAF Falcons|access-date=27 July 2012|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110830105254/http://www.paffalcons.com/gallery/aviation-art/syed-hussaini/trauma-and-reconstruction.php|archive-date=30 August 2011}}</ref>

In the east, No. 14 Squadron "Tail Choppers" was destroyed and its CO, Squadron Leader PQ Mehdi, was taken POW, putting Pakistan's air command in Dhaka out of commission. India thereby achieved total air superiority on the eastern front.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}}

At the end of the war, PAF pilots made successful escapes from East Pakistan to neighbouring Burma; many PAF personnel had already left the East for Burma on their own before Dacca was overrun by the Indian military in December 1971.<ref name="Defence Journal, 2001">{{cite web|last1=Khan|first1=Sher|title=Last Flight from East Pakistan|url=http://www.defencejournal.com/2001/feb/last-flight.htm|website=defencejournal.com|access-date=24 December 2016|archive-date=3 March 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303202521/http://www.defencejournal.com/2001/feb/last-flight.htm|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Indian attacks on Pakistan=== thumb|A destroyed aircraft hangar at Dacca airfield after an Indian air attack. As the Indian Army tightened its grip in East Pakistan, the IAF continued with its attacks against Pakistan as the campaign developed into a series of daylight anti-airfield, anti-radar, and close-support attacks by fighter jets, with night attacks against airfields and strategic targets by Canberras and An-12s, while Pakistan responded with similar night attacks with its B-57s and C-130s.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman">{{cite book|last1=Bowman|first1=Martin|title=Cold War Jet Combat: Air-to-Air Jet Fighter Operations 1950–1972|publisher=Pen and Sword|isbn=9781473874633|url=https://archive.org/details/cold-war-jet-combat-air-to-air-jet-fighter-operations-1950-1972|url-access=registration|access-date=24 December 2016|language=en|year=2016}}</ref>{{rp|107–108}}

The PAF deployed its F-6s mainly on defensive combat air patrol missions over their own bases, leaving the PAF unable to conduct effective offensive operations.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107}} The IAF's raids damaged one USAF and one UN aircraft in Dacca, while a RCAF DHC-4 Caribou was destroyed in Islamabad, along with the USAF's Beech U-8 owned by the US military's liaison chief Brigadier-General Chuck Yeager.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107}}<ref name="Russia & India Report">{{cite web|last1=Simha|first1=Rakesh Krishnan|title=How India brought down the US' supersonic man|url=https://www.rbth.com/articles/2012/01/17/how_india_brought_down_the_us_supersonic_man_14208|website=Russia & India Report|access-date=24 December 2016|date=17 January 2012|archive-date=10 October 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171010083536/https://www.rbth.com/articles/2012/01/17/how_india_brought_down_the_us_supersonic_man_14208|url-status=live}}</ref> Sporadic raids by the IAF continued against PAF forward air bases in Pakistan until the end of the war, and interdiction and close-support operations were maintained.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107–108}}

One of the most successful air raids by India into West Pakistan happened on 8 December 1971, when Indian Hunter aircraft from the Pathankot-based 20 Squadron, attacked the Pakistani base in Murid and destroyed 5 F-86 aircraft on the ground. This was confirmed by Pakistan's military historian, Air Commodore M Kaiser Tufail, in his book ''In The Ring and on Its Feet: Pakistan Air Force in the 1971 Indo-Pak War''.<ref>{{cite news |author1=Vishnu Som|title=Exclusive Details of How Air Force Raided A Pak Air Base|url=https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/exclusive-details-of-how-air-force-raided-a-pak-air-base-destroyed-jets-1803601|publisher=NDTV|access-date=25 January 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180125034821/https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/exclusive-details-of-how-air-force-raided-a-pak-air-base-destroyed-jets-1803601|archive-date=25 January 2018}}</ref>

The PAF played a more limited role in the operations. They were reinforced by Mirages from an unidentified Middle Eastern ally (whose identity remains unknown).<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107}} According to author Martin Bowman, "Libyan F-5s were reportedly deployed to Sargodha AFB, perhaps as a potential training unit to prepare Pakistani pilots for an influx of more F-5s from Saudi Arabia."<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|112}} The IAF was able to conduct a wide range of missions – troop support; air combat; deep penetration strikes; para-dropping behind enemy lines; feints to draw enemy fighters away from the actual target; bombing and reconnaissance.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107}} The PAF, which was solely focused on air combat, was blown out of the subcontinent's skies within the first week of the war.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107}} Those PAF aircraft that survived took refuge at Iranian air bases or in concrete bunkers, refusing to offer a fight.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.rbth.com/blogs/2015/06/04/why_the_indian_air_force_has_a_high_crash_rate_43501|title=Why the Indian Air Force has a high crash rate|first=Rakesh Krishnan|last=Simha|date=4 June 2015|website=Russia Beyond|access-date=27 October 2020|archive-date=10 October 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171010083539/https://www.rbth.com/blogs/2015/06/04/why_the_indian_air_force_has_a_high_crash_rate_43501|url-status=live}}</ref>

India flew 1,978 sorties in the East and about 4,000 in Pakistan, while the PAF flew about 30 and 2,840 at the respective fronts.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107}} By the end of the war, India had lost 45–65 aircraft while Pakistan lost 75.<ref name="Leonard2006p806">{{cite encyclopedia |last=Boewe |first=Charles |editor-last=Leonard |editor-first=Thomas M. |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of the Developing World |title=Indian-Pakistani Wars |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gc2NAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA806 |access-date=8 December 2023 |year=2006 |publisher=Routledge |volume=2 |isbn=978-0-415-97663-3 |page=806}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Bishop |first=Chris |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kya8AAAACAAJ |title=The Encyclopedia of 20th Century Air Warfare |date=2001 |publisher=Amber Books Limited |isbn=978-1-904687-26-9 |page='p' 387 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="Gill2003">{{Cite book |last=Gill |first=John H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m2q6SgAACAAJ |title=An Atlas of the 1971 India - Pakistan War: The Creation of Bangladesh |date=2003 |publisher=National Defense University, Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies |page=55 |language=en}}</ref>

[[File:Historical Pakistan.gif|thumb|left|250px|The map shows Pakistan and East Pakistan; between them was {{convert|1000|mi|km|order=flip|abbr=on}} of Indian territory.]] [[File:T-55 tanks in the Bangladesh Liberation War.jpg|thumb|250px|The Indian T-55 tanks penetrating the Indo-East Pakistan border towards Dacca.]]

[[File:WLUS (20).jpg|thumb|105 mm Jonga-mounted RCL gun which destroyed most of the tanks during the Battle of Longewala]]

=== Surrender of Pakistan Eastern Command === {{main|Instrument of Surrender (1971)|East Pakistan Military Command}}

The Instrument of Surrender of Pakistan Eastern Command stationed in East Pakistan was signed between Lieutenant General Jagjit Singh Aurora, the GOC-in-C of Indian Eastern Command, and Lieutenant-General A.A.K. Niazi, the Commander of the Pakistan Eastern Command, at the Ramna Race Course in Dacca at 16:31Hrs IST on 16 December 1971.{{citation needed|date=February 2020}} There was a problem over who would represent the Bangladesh government, as the three Bangladeshi battalion commanders - Lt Cols Shafiullah, Khaled Musharraf and Ziaur Rahman - were located too far away to be airlifted on time. The responsibility fell on the only armed forces officer available, Gp Capt AK Khondkar, chief of the newly formed BAF.<ref name="LM">{{Cite news|date=15 December 1971|title=1971 war: When Indian officers rescued Pakistan general from a lynch mob|work=The Times of India|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bengaluru/when-indian-officers-rescued-pakistan-general-from-a-lynch-mob/articleshow/88291018.cms|access-date=22 December 2021|archive-date=22 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211222172914/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bengaluru/when-indian-officers-rescued-pakistan-general-from-a-lynch-mob/articleshow/88291018.cms|url-status=live}}</ref> As the surrender was accepted silently by Lieutenant-General Aurora, the surrounding crowds on the race course started shouting anti-Pakistan slogans, and there were reports of abuses aimed at the surrendering commanders of Pakistani military.<ref>{{cite news|last=Nayar |first=Kuldip |date=3 February 1998 |title=Of betrayal and bungling |url=http://www.indianexpress.com/res/web/pIe/ie/daily/19980203/03450744.html |newspaper=The Indian Express |access-date=20 October 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090823045047/http://www.indianexpress.com/res/web/pIe/ie/daily/19980203/03450744.html |archive-date=23 August 2009}}</ref> Indian officers and an Indian diplomat, MEA joint secretary for Pakistan AK Ray, had to form a human chain around Lt Gen Niazi to protect him from being lynched.<ref name="LM" />

Hostilities officially ended at 14:30 GMT on 17 December, after the surrender on 16 December, and India claimed large gains of territory in Pakistan (although pre-war boundaries were recognised after the war). The war confirmed the independence of Bangladesh.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman" />{{rp|107}}

Following the surrender, the Indian Army took approximately 90,000 Pakistani servicemen and their Bengali supporters as POWs, making it the largest surrender since World War II.<ref>{{cite news|title=Vijay Diwas: All you need to know about 1971 war with Pakistan |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/vijay-diwas-all-you-need-to-know-about-1971-war-with-pakistan/articleshow/79751734.cms|access-date=2021-11-26|work=The Times of India|language=en|archive-date=26 November 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211126052521/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/vijay-diwas-all-you-need-to-know-about-1971-war-with-pakistan/articleshow/79751734.cms|url-status=live}}</ref> Initial counts recorded that approximately 79,676 war prisoners were uniformed personnel, and the overwhelming majority of the war prisoners were officers – most of them from the army and navy, while relatively small numbers were from the air force and marines; others in larger number were serving in paramilitary units.<ref name="Skyhorse Publishing, Inc. Cloughley">{{cite book|last1=Cloughley|first1=Brian|title=A History of the Pakistan Army: Wars and Insurrections|date=2016|publisher=Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.|isbn=9781631440397|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JE1kCwAAQBAJ&q=Pakistani%20Prisoners%20of%20War%20%20Indian%20army&pg=PT280|access-date=8 August 2017|language=en|archive-date=28 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201028070901/https://books.google.com/books?id=JE1kCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT280&q=Pakistani%20Prisoners%20of%20War%20%20Indian%20army|url-status=live}}</ref>

The remaining prisoners were civilians who were either family members of the military personnel or volunteers (razakars). The Hamoodur Rahman Commission and the POW Investigation Commission reports instituted by Pakistan lists the Pakistani POWs as given in the table below. Apart from soldiers, it was estimated that 15,000 Bengali civilians were also made prisoners of war.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nuYcwYCcjpIC&q=many%20pakistani%20women%20prisoners%20of%20war%20in%201971&pg=PA216|title=Mainsprings of Indian and Pakistani Foreign Policies|access-date=27 July 2012|isbn=9780816607204|last1=Burke|first1=S. M.|date=1974|publisher=University of Minnesota Press |archive-date=15 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201015010543/https://books.google.com/books?id=nuYcwYCcjpIC&pg=PA216&q=many%20pakistani%20women%20prisoners%20of%20war%20in%201971|url-status=live}}</ref>

{|class="wikitable" |- ! Inter-service branch !! Number of captured Pakistani POWs !! Officer commanding |- | {{army|PAK}} || 54,154 || Lieutenant-General Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi |- | 20px Pakistan Navy/Pakistan Marines || 1,381 || Rear-Admiral Mohammad Shariff |- | {{Air force|PAK}} || 833 || Air Commodore Inamul Haq |- |Paramilitary (East Pakistan Rifles/Police) || 22,000 || Major-General Rao Farman Ali |- |Civil government personnel || 12,000 || Governor Abdul Motaleb Malik |- | Total: || 90,368 || ~ |}

== Foreign reaction and involvement ==

=== United States and Soviet Union === [[File:Blood telegram.png|The Blood Telegram|thumb]] The Soviet Union sympathised with the East Pakistanis, and supported the Indian Army and Mukti Bahini's incursion against Pakistan during the war, in a broader view of recognising that the secession of East Pakistan as Independent Bangladesh would weaken the position of its rivals— the United States and China. The Soviet Union gave assurances to India that if a confrontation with the United States or China developed, it would take counter-measures. This assurance was enshrined in the Indo-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation signed in August 1971.{{citation needed|date=August 2023}}

The Soviet Union accepted the Indian position that any resolution to the crisis in East Pakistan would have to be on terms acceptable to India and the Awami League, but the Indo-Soviet treaty did not mean a total commitment to the Indian stance, according to author Robert Jackson. The Soviet Union continued economic aid to Pakistan and made sympathetic gestures to Pakistan until mid-October 1971.<ref name="Jackson1975">{{cite book |last1=Jackson |first1=Robert |author-link=Robert Jackson (Wantage MP) |year=1975 |title=South Asian Crisis: India — Pakistan — Bangla Desh |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tb6vCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA72 |publisher=Chatto & Windus |pages=72–73 |isbn=978-1-349-04163-3 |access-date=2 October 2021 |archive-date=1 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211001234759/https://books.google.com/books?id=tb6vCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA72 |url-status=live }}</ref> By November 1971, the Soviet ambassador to Pakistan Alexei Rodionov directed a secretive message (''Rodionov message'') that ultimately warned Pakistan that "it will be embarking on a suicidal course if it escalates tensions in the subcontinent".<ref name="Monitoring Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation">{{cite book|title=Summary of World Broadcasts: Far East|date=1971|publisher=Monitoring Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation|location=London, UK|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0ETRAAAAMAAJ&q=rodionov|access-date=22 December 2016|language=en|archive-date=16 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201016211437/https://books.google.com/books?id=0ETRAAAAMAAJ&q=rodionov|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|part-3}}

The United States stood with Pakistan by supporting it morally, politically, economically and materially when U.S. President Richard Nixon and his Secretary of State Henry Kissinger refused to use rhetoric in a hopeless attempt to intervene in a large civil war. The U.S. establishment had the impression that the Soviets were in an informal alliance with India, and the US therefore needed Pakistan to help to limit Soviet influence in South Asia.<ref name="Lancer Publishers, Cheema"/>{{rp|281}} During the Cold War, Pakistan was a close formal ally of the United States and also had close relations with the People's Republic of China, with whom Nixon had been negotiating a ''rapprochement'' and where he intended to visit in February 1972.<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Saunders |first=Harold H. |author-link=Harold H. Saunders |date=July–August 2014 |title=What Really Happened in Bangladesh |url=https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/bangladesh/2014-06-16/what-really-happened-bangladesh |magazine=Foreign Affairs}}</ref> Nixon feared that an Indian invasion of Pakistan would mean total Soviet domination of the region, and that it would seriously undermine the global position of the United States and the regional position of America's new tactical ally, China.<ref name="Lancer Publishers, Cheema">{{cite book|last1=Cheema|first1=Amar|title=The Crimson Chinar: The Kashmir Conflict: A Politico Military Perspective|publisher=Lancer Publishers|year=2014|isbn=978-81-7062-301-4|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Qc25BwAAQBAJ&q=Nixon%20encourage%20iran%20%201971%20war%20pakistan&pg=PA282|access-date=27 December 2016|language=en|archive-date=7 February 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230207220942/https://books.google.com/books?id=Qc25BwAAQBAJ&q=Nixon%20encourage%20iran%20%201971%20war%20pakistan&pg=PA282|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|281–282}} Nixon encouraged Iran to send military supplies to Pakistan.<ref name="Oxford University Press, Alvandi">{{cite book|last1=Alvandi|first1=Roham|year=2016|title=Nixon, Kissinger, and the Shah: The United States and Iran in the Cold War|publisher=Oxford University Press|page=61|isbn=978-0-19-061068-5|url=https://archive.org/details/nixonkissingersh0000alva/page/n5/mode/2up|url-access=registration}}</ref> The Nixon administration also ignored reports it received of the "genocidal" activities of the Pakistani military in East Pakistan, most notably the Blood telegram, and this prompted widespread criticism and condemnation – both by the United States Congress and in the international press.<ref name="uspol" /><ref>{{cite book|last=Hanhimäki|first=Jussi|title=The flawed architect: Henry Kissinger and American foreign policy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pPjrpGUe7CEC|year=2004|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-517221-8|access-date=15 September 2020|archive-date=15 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201015002403/https://books.google.com/books?id=pPjrpGUe7CEC|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="lewisnyt">{{cite news |last=Lewis |first=John P. |date=9 December 1971 |title=Mr. Nixon and South Asia |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1971/12/09/archives/mr-nixon-and-south-asia.html |newspaper=The New York Times |quote=The Nixon Administration's South Asia policy... is beyond redemption |access-date=23 July 2018 |archive-date=23 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180723064707/https://www.nytimes.com/1971/12/09/archives/mr-nixon-and-south-asia.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Nixon himself stated, "Biafra stirred up a few Catholics. But you know, I think Biafra stirred people up more than Pakistan, because Pakistan they're just a bunch of brown goddamn Moslems."<ref>{{Cite news |last=Mishra |first=Pankaj |date=2013-09-16 |title=Unholy Alliances |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/09/23/unholy-alliances-3 |access-date=2025-08-07 |work=The New Yorker |language=en-US |issn=0028-792X}}</ref>

Then U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, George H. W. Bush, introduced a resolution in the UN Security Council calling for a cease-fire and the withdrawal of armed forces by India and Pakistan.<ref>{{cite web |title=President Richard Nixon and the Presidents|url=https://www.nixontapes.org/presidents.html|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220409154628/https://www.nixontapes.org/presidents.html|archive-date=9 April 2022|access-date=30 March 2020|website=nixontapes.org|quote=WHT 016-048 12/08/1971 11:06 – 11:14 am P, GHWB}}[https://www.nixontapes.org/ghwb/016-048.pdf] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220409154631/https://www.nixontapes.org/ghwb/016-048.pdf|date=9 April 2022}}</ref> However, it was vetoed by the Soviet Union, and the following days witnessed the use of great pressure on the Soviets from the Nixon-Kissinger duo to get India to withdraw, but to no avail.<ref>{{cite news |date=26 December 2006 |title=1971 War: How the US tried to corner India |url=http://www.rediff.com/news/2006/dec/26claude.htm |work=Rediff.com |access-date=14 April 2011 |archive-date=28 August 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130828172624/http://www.rediff.com/news/2006/dec/26claude.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>

On 10 December, Nixon ordered Task Force 74, led by the aircraft carrier {{USS|Enterprise|CVN-65|6}}, to the Bay of Bengal. ''Enterprise'' and its escort ships arrived on station on 15 December 1971.<ref name="Routledge, Mishra">{{cite book |last1=Rajagopalan |first1=Rajesh |last2=Mishra |first2=Atul |year=2015 |title=Nuclear South Asia: Keywords and Concepts |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=p8BcCgAAQBAJ&pg=PT207 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-317-32475-1 |page=268 |access-date=18 September 2018 |archive-date=7 February 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230207220943/https://books.google.com/books?id=p8BcCgAAQBAJ&pg=PT207 |url-status=live}}</ref> According to a Russian documentary, the United Kingdom also deployed a carrier battle group led by the aircraft carrier {{HMS|Eagle|R05|6}} to the Bay,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.frontierindia.net/british-aircraft-carrier-hms-eagle-tried-to-intervene-in-1971-india-pakistan-war |title=British aircraft carrier 'HMS Eagle' tried to intervene in 1971 India – Pakistan war |website=Frontier India |date=18 December 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160110154941/http://frontierindia.net/british-aircraft-carrier-hms-eagle-tried-to-intervene-in-1971-india-pakistan-war/ |archive-date=10 January 2016 |access-date=27 July 2012}}</ref>{{Better source needed|reason=citations are to a blog (Frontier India) repeating some guy's translation of a Russian-language video, there must be a scholarly history book or contemporary news report for this|date=April 2016}} on her final deployment.

On 6 and 13 December, the Soviet Navy dispatched two groups of cruisers and destroyers from Vladivostok;{{citation needed|date=August 2023}} they trailed US Task Force 74 into the Indian Ocean from 18 December 1971 until 7 January 1972. The Soviets also had a nuclear submarine to help ward off the threat posed by the USS ''Enterprise'' task force in the Indian Ocean.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/NAVY/History/1971War/Games.html |title=Cold war games |website=Bharat Rakshak |access-date=20 October 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110609180906/http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/NAVY/History/1971War/Games.html |archive-date=9 June 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=11 December 2009 |title=Birth of a nation |url=http://www.indianexpress.com/news/birth-of-a-nation/552795/3 |newspaper=The Indian Express |access-date=14 April 2011 |archive-date=5 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200605140439/http://archive.indianexpress.com/news/birth-of-a-nation/552795/3 |url-status=live}}</ref>

As the war progressed, it became apparent to the United States that India was going to invade and disintegrate Pakistan in a matter of weeks, therefore President Nixon spoke with the USSR General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev on a hotline on 10 December, where Nixon reportedly urged Brezhnev to restrain India as he quoted: "in the strongest possible terms to restrain India with which ... you [Brezhnev] have great influence and for whose actions you must share responsibility."<ref name="George Washington University press">{{cite web|title=Nixon/Kissinger Saw India as "Soviet Stooge" in 1971 South Asia Crisis|url=http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/news/20050629/|website=nsarchive.gwu.edu|publisher=George Washington University press|access-date=24 December 2016|archive-date=24 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161224173316/http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/news/20050629/|url-status=live}}</ref>

After the war, the United States accepted the new balance of power and recognised India as a dominant player in South Asia; the US immediately engaged in strengthening bilateral relations between the two countries in the successive years.<ref name="Springer, Watering">{{cite book |last1=Wetering |first1=Carina |year=2016 |title=Changing US Foreign Policy toward India |publisher=Springer |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iYtjDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA69 |page=69 |isbn=9781137548627 |access-date=15 September 2020 |archive-date=9 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201009221550/https://books.google.com/books?id=iYtjDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA69 |url-status=live }}</ref> In June 1972, Soviet Ambassador Rodionov said, "the Soviet Union had always stood and would stand for the unity and territorial integrity of Pakistan". The USSR aided Pakistan economically on several technical and industrial projects.<ref>{{cite magazine |title=Soviet aid for Pak projects |date=June 1972 |magazine=News Review on South Asia |pages=15–16}}</ref>{{better source needed|date=May 2024|reason=This is a news summary of a story in The Times of India quoting a Radio Pakistan broadcast - a snapshot at one point in time. By now there must be a scholarly source analyzing post-war Soviet-Pakistan bilateral relations.}}

A 2019 study argues "that Nixon and Kissinger routinely demonstrated psychological biases that led them to overestimate the likelihood of West Pakistani victory" in the war, and that they overestimated "the importance of the crisis to broader U.S. policy. The evidence fails to support Nixon and Kissinger's own framing of the 1971 crisis as a contest between cool-headed realpolitik and idealistic humanitarianism, and instead shows that Kissinger and Nixon's policy decisions harmed their stated goals because of repeated decision-making errors."<ref>{{Cite journal|title=Tilting at windmills: The flawed U.S. policy toward the 1971 Indo-Pakistani war|journal = Journal of Strategic Studies|volume = 42|issue = 5|pages = 677–700|last=Clary|first=Christopher|year=2019|doi=10.1080/01402390.2019.1570143|s2cid = 159267611}}</ref>

===China===

During the course of the war, China harshly criticised India for its involvement in the East Pakistan crises, and accused India of having imperialistic designs in South Asia.<ref name="Atlantic Publishers & Dist, Jayapalan">{{cite book|last1=Jayapalan|first1=N.|title=India and Her Neighbours|publisher=Atlantic Publishers & Dist|isbn=9788171569120|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sQVkYiFCrVoC&q=china%201971%20indo%20pak%20war&pg=PA19|access-date=25 December 2016|language=en|year=2000|archive-date=16 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201016063529/https://books.google.com/books?id=sQVkYiFCrVoC&pg=PA19&q=china%201971%20indo%20pak%20war|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|19}} Before the war started, Chinese leaders and officials had long been philosophically advising the Pakistan government to make peaceful political settlements with the East Pakistani leaders, as China feared that India was secretly supporting, infiltrating, and arming the Bengali rebels against the East Pakistani government.<ref name="Manohar, Singh">{{cite book |editor-last1=Singh |editor-first1=Swaran |year=2007 |title=China-Pakistan strategic cooperation : Indian perspectives |publisher=Manohar |location=New Delhi |page=61 |isbn=978-8173047619}}</ref><ref name="Columbia University Press, Jaffrelot">{{cite book |last1=Jaffrelot |first1=Christophe |year=2016 |title=Pakistan at the Crossroads: Domestic Dynamics and External Pressures |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A791CwAAQBAJ&pg=PA285 |publisher=Columbia University Press |page=285 |isbn=9780231540254 |access-date=15 September 2020 |archive-date=11 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201011104009/https://books.google.com/books?id=A791CwAAQBAJ&pg=PA285 |url-status=live }}</ref> China was also critical of the Government of East Pakistan, led by its governor Lieutenant-General Tikka Khan, which used ruthless measures to deal with the Bengali opposition, and did not endorse the Pakistani position on that issue.<ref name="Columbia University Press, Jaffrelot"/>

When the war started, China reproached India for its direct involvement and infiltration in East Pakistan.<ref name="Columbia University Press, Jaffrelot" /> It disagreed with Pakistani President Yahya Khan's consideration of military options, and criticised East Pakistan Awami League politicians' ties with India.<ref name="Columbia University Press, Jaffrelot" /> China reacted with great alarm when the prospects of Indian invasion of Pakistan and integration of Pakistan-administered Kashmir into their side of Kashmir, became imminent.<ref name="time13Dec1971" /> US President Nixon encouraged China to mobilise its armed forces along its border with India to discourage the Indian assault, but the Chinese did not respond to this encouragement since the Indian Army's Northern Command was well prepared to guard the Line of Actual Control, and was already engaging and making advances against the Pakistan Army's X Corps in the Line of Control.{{citation needed|date=February 2020}}

China did not welcome the break-up of Pakistan's unity by the East Pakistani politicians, and effectively vetoed the membership of Bangladesh when it applied to the United Nations in 1972.<ref name="oxnard">{{cite news|title=China Recognizes Bangladesh|agency=Associated Press|location=Oxnard, California, USA|date=1 September 1975|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=rnVKAAAAIBAJ&pg=4237,20391|access-date=15 September 2020|archive-date=28 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201028213206/https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=rnVKAAAAIBAJ&pg=4237,20391|url-status=live}}</ref> China objected to admitting Bangladesh on the grounds that two UN resolutions concerning Bangladesh, requiring the repatriation of Pakistani POWs and civilians, had not yet been implemented.<ref>{{cite news|title=China Veto Downs Bangladesh UN Entry|agency=United Press International|date=26 August 1972|location=Montreal, Quebec, Canada|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=GQsyAAAAIBAJ&pg=4712,6055847|access-date=15 September 2020|archive-date=14 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414025755/https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=GQsyAAAAIBAJ&pg=4712,6055847|url-status=live}}</ref> Furthermore, China refused to recognise the independence of Bangladesh until 31 August 1975.<ref name="oxnard" /><ref name="ABC-CLIO, Chau">{{cite book |last1=Samaranayake |first1=Nilanthi |editor1-last=Chau |editor1-first=Donovan C. |editor2-last=Kane |editor2-first=Thomas M. |year=2014 |chapter=China's Relations with the Small Countries of South Asia |title=China and International Security: History, Strategy, and 21st-Century Policy |volume=1 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |page=226 |isbn=978-1-4408-0002-3 |language=en}}</ref> To this date, its relations with Bangladesh are determined by the Pakistan factor.<ref name="Vij Books India Pvt Ltd, Raghavan">{{cite book |last1=Raghavan |first1=V. R. |year=2013 |title=Internal Conflicts- A Four State Analysis: India-Nepal-Sri Lanka-Myanmar |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mv-pCQAAQBAJ&pg=PA69 |publisher=Vij Books India Pvt Ltd |page=69 |isbn=9789382573418 |access-date=15 September 2020 |archive-date=11 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201011003511/https://books.google.com/books?id=mv-pCQAAQBAJ&pg=PA69 |url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Ceylon === {{See also|Tamil Eelam}}

Ceylon (modern-day Sri Lanka) saw the partition of Pakistan as an example for themselves and feared India might use its enhanced power against them in the future.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP83S00854R000200130001-0.pdf |title=India and Its Neighbors: Cooperation or Confrontation? |website=CIA |page=7 |access-date=13 April 2021 |archive-date=13 April 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210413100321/https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP83S00854R000200130001-0.pdf |url-status=live}}</ref> The left-wing government of Sirimavo Bandaranaike following a neutral non-aligned foreign policy.<ref>{{cite news |title=The Foreign Policy of Sirimavo Bandaranaike |url=http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=13217 |work=The Island |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101213125733/http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=13217 |archive-date=13 December 2010 |access-date=8 April 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Brief Overview of Sri Lanka's Foreign Relations to Post-Independence |url=https://www.mfa.gov.lk/brief-overview-of-sri-lankas-foreign-relations-to-post-independence/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190408011417/https://www.mfa.gov.lk/brief-overview-of-sri-lankas-foreign-relations-to-post-independence/ |archive-date=8 April 2019 |access-date=8 April 2019 |website=Foreign Ministry – Sri Lanka}}</ref> As Pakistani aircraft could not fly over Indian territory, they would have to take a longer route around India and so they stopped at Bandaranaike Airport in Sri Lanka where they were refuelled before flying to East Pakistan.<ref>{{cite news |date=11 June 2011 |title=Pak thanks Lanka for help in 1971 war |newspaper=Hindustan Times |url=https://www.hindustantimes.com/world/pak-thanks-lanka-for-help-in-1971-war/story-UpZWXd0fFX5eDPac0KMIYL.html |url-status=live |access-date=14 February 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210321063210/https://www.hindustantimes.com/world/pak-thanks-lanka-for-help-in-1971-war/story-UpZWXd0fFX5eDPac0KMIYL.html |archive-date=21 March 2021}}</ref> This decision did not strain relations between Ceylon and India.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_hhREAAAQBAJ&dq=ceylon+neutral+1971&pg=PA47 |title=The Diplomatic Ideas and Practices of Asian States |date=2021-11-22 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-47803-9 |language=en |access-date=17 August 2023 |archive-date=2 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231002142316/https://books.google.com/books?id=_hhREAAAQBAJ&dq=ceylon+neutral+1971&pg=PA47 |url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Arab World === As many Arab countries were allied with both the United States and Pakistan, it was easy for Kissinger to encourage them to participate. He sent letters to both, the King of Jordan and the King of Saudi Arabia. President Nixon gave permission for Jordan to send ten F-104s and promised to provide replacements.<ref>{{cite news| title=Documents reveal US tilt to Pak in 1971 - India News | work=The Times of India | date=2002-12-20 | url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/documents-reveal-us-tilt-to-pak-in-1971/articleshow/31811208.cms | access-date=2022-08-20 | archive-date=20 August 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220820050754/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/documents-reveal-us-tilt-to-pak-in-1971/articleshow/31811208.cms | url-status=live }}</ref> F-86s from Saudi Arabia helped camouflage the extent of PAF losses, and some Libyan F-5s were reportedly deployed to Sargodha AFB, perhaps as a potential training unit to prepare Pakistani pilots for an influx of more F-5s from Saudi Arabia.<ref name="Pen and Sword, Bowman"/>{{rp|112}} In addition to these three countries, an unidentified Middle Eastern ally also supplied Pakistan with Mirage IIIs.{{citation needed|date=January 2024}}

=== Israel === Despite not having diplomatic relations at the time, Israel supplied India with armaments, ammunition, intelligence and training ahead of its intervention in East Pakistan, which has been described as a "surprising minor success" of India's efforts to garner international support. In July 1971 Golda Meir, Israel's prime minister, got Israeli arms manufacturer Shlomo Zabludowicz to provide India and the Mukti Bahini with mortars, ammunition and instructors.<ref>{{cite book |last=Bass |first=Gary |author-link=Gary J. Bass |year=2013 |title=The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a Forgotten Genocide |url=https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/212279/the-blood-telegram-by-gary-j-bass/ |publisher=Alfred A. Knopf |isbn=978-0-307-70020-9 |access-date=12 October 2023 |archive-date=27 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230627195707/https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/212279/the-blood-telegram-by-gary-j-bass/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Meir reportedly sought diplomatic ties with India in exchange, which were finally established in 1992 under P. V. Narasimha Rao.<ref name="raghavan">{{Cite book |last=Raghavan |first=Srinath |title=1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh |year=2013 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=9780674731295 |pages=182–183 |language=en |author-link=Srinath Raghavan}}</ref>

== Aftermath ==

=== Territorial changes === In the western front (present-day India-Pakistan border), both countries sparred indecisively.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Gill |first=John H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m2q6SgAACAAJ |title=An Atlas of the 1971 India - Pakistan War: The Creation of Bangladesh |date=2003 |publisher=National Defense University, Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies |language=en |quote=In the west, the two armies sparred indecisively, each side's small advances being balanced by the other side's gains. The only exception was the dramatic drive by India's 11th Division into the sandy wastes of Pakistan's Sindh Province which netted India approximately 4,500 square kilometers of Pakistani territory, albeit barren desert.18 |access-date=21 March 2023 |archive-date=22 March 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230322122749/https://books.google.com/books?id=m2q6SgAACAAJ |url-status=live}}</ref> By the end of the war, India had captured a larger quantity of territory than Pakistan. The majority of territory India held was mostly barren, sandy desert in Sindh<ref name="Singh1981">{{Cite book |last=Singh |first=Maj Gen Sukhwant |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4688VpqB8r8C |title=India's Wars Since Independence The Liberation Of Bangladesh |date=1981 |publisher=Lancer Publishers LLC |isbn=978-1-935501-60-2 |language=en |quote=The biggest territorial conquest in terms of territory was however in the Naya Chor and Chachro area of the Barmer sector, where two simultaneous thrusts towards Naya Chor and Umarkot had created a salient in the Sind sector of Pakistani territory. Although impressive on maps and in terms of statistics, this was a vast expanse of empty, unproductive sand. Apart from the burden of upkeep of the refugee population of the desert, its continued occupation was embarrassing to the holding troops because of lack of water and an inadequate logistic infrastructure. Much work had to be done in the way of laying a sweetwater pipeline and storage tanks, restoring the railway line to Naya Chor and constructing desert roads with coastly duckboards to maintain the troops deployed there. These facilities, created at considerable expense, had to be abandoned, almost intact, at the time of withdrawal. Militarily, conquest was a prerequisite for an advance into the productive green belt. Since the momentum of the thrust had already fizzled out on reaching its fringes possession of this territory was of no consequence. Economically, it was a drain and certainly no longer cost effective. Its loss had made no dent in Pakistan's economy, nor affected its political standing in Sind. |access-date=10 July 2023 |archive-date=22 May 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230522034726/https://books.google.com/books?id=4688VpqB8r8C |url-status=live }}</ref> which did not dent Pakistan's economy or harm its political standing in Sindh but greatly effected on the morale of Pakistan.<ref name="Singh1981" /> On the other hand, although smaller in quantity, the Indian territory captured by Pakistan in Punjab had significantly greater economic value.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Singh |first=Maj Gen Sukhwant |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4688VpqB8r8C |title=India's Wars Since Independence The Liberation Of Bangladesh |date=1981 |publisher=Lancer Publishers LLC |isbn=978-1-935501-60-2 |language=en |quote=Immediately after the ceasefire the Indians claimed the occupation of about 3,600 square kilometres of West Pakistan territory against a loss of some 125 square kilometres of their territory. As described earlier, the statistics were impressive indeed, but like all such statistical juggling they were rather deceptive. From a purely economic point of view 125 square kilometres yielded more than 3,600 square kilometres, much of it desert, and the upkeep of the refugees and its attendant problems was proving more irksome politically for Indian democracy than Pakistani autocracy. |access-date=10 July 2023 |archive-date=22 May 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230522034726/https://books.google.com/books?id=4688VpqB8r8C |url-status=live }}</ref> After the ceasefire on 17 December, both sides attempted to take back lost territory. On 17 December, India's 51 Para brigade launched a successful but costly attack on a sand dune occupied by an intruding Pakistani platoon, which cost the Indian unit 21 killed and 60 wounded.<ref name="Gill2003" /> In May 1972, as the snow melted, Pakistan attacked the Lipa Valley, where the heavily outnumbered Indian forces fell back, with both sides suffering heavy casualties as well as Pakistani forces losing their senior commander.<ref name="IW">{{Cite book |last=Singh |first=Sukhwant |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4688VpqB8r8C |title=India's Wars Since Independence The Liberation Of Bangladesh |date=1981 |publisher=Lancer Publishers LLC |isbn=978-1-935501-60-2 |language=en |quote=As the snows melted, Pakistan tried constantly to reclaim its lost territories in Jammu and Kashmir and improve its defensive posture along the ceasefire line in the process. In May 1972, Pakistan made a surprise brigade attack on the Indian forward posts in the Kayan area of the Lipa valley. The Indian posts fell back, suffering heavy casualties. Similarly, the Minimarg Lake area in Gurais was becoming active and large tracts of snow earlier claimed to be in Indian hands were gradually shrinking. The same was the case in the Tartok area of the Partapur sector of Ladakh. These ceasefire violations were prompted by Indian tactical and administrative difficulties in the newly acquired territory. |access-date=10 July 2023 |archive-date=22 May 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230522034726/https://books.google.com/books?id=4688VpqB8r8C |url-status=live}}</ref> Pakistan would launch similar attacks to attempt to regain lost territory at Minimarg Lake and Turtuk.<ref name="IW" />

Subsequently, in 1972, India and Pakistan signed the Simla Agreement, after which both sides would retain territory they captured in Kashmir and demarcate the Line of Control, while the international border would return to its pre-war limits.

Since the end of the war, India continues to retain control over the regions such as Chalunka, Thang, Turtuk, Takshi and Pachtang meanwhile Pakistan retain control on Chumb.<ref name="Warikoo 2009">{{cite book | last=Warikoo | first=K. | title=Himalayan Frontiers of India: Historical, Geo-Political and Strategic Perspectives | publisher=Taylor & Francis | series=Routledge Contemporary South Asia Series | year=2009 | isbn=978-1-134-03294-5 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=w_Z8AgAAQBAJ&pg=PA71 | page=71}}</ref><ref name="International Living">{{cite book |title=International Living |publisher=International Living, Incorporated |issue=v. 22 |year=2002 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XlgsAQAAMAAJ |page=22}}</ref>

=== India === The war and subsequent independence of Bangladesh stripped Pakistan of more than half of its population, and with nearly one-third of its army in captivity, clearly established India's military and political dominance of the subcontinent.<ref name="time27Dec1971" /> India successfully led a diplomatic campaign to isolate Pakistan.<ref name="ABC-CLIO, Heo and Jr."/> On state visits to the United Kingdom and France, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi convinced them to break with their ally the United States and block any pro-Pakistan resolution in the United Nations.<ref name="ABC-CLIO, Heo and Jr."/>

The victory also defined India's much broader role in foreign politics, as many countries in the world had come to realise – including the United States – that the balance of power had shifted to India as a major player in the region.<ref name="British Academic Press, Mudiam">{{cite book|last1=Mudiam|first1=Prithvi Ram|year=1994|title=India and the Middle East|publisher=British Academic Press|page=79|isbn=9781850437031|url=https://archive.org/details/indiamiddleeast00prit|url-access=registration}}</ref>{{rp|80}}<ref name="Brookings Institution Press, Kemp">{{cite book|last1=Kemp|first1=Geoffrey|year=2012|title=The East Moves West: India, China, and Asia's Growing Presence in the Middle East|publisher=Brookings Institution Press|isbn=978-0815724070|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Z-rV05oQ_4AC&q=iran%20and%20india%201971&pg=PA57|access-date=24 December 2016|language=en|archive-date=14 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201014161315/https://books.google.com/books?id=Z-rV05oQ_4AC&pg=PA57&q=iran%20and%20india%201971|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|57}} In the wake of changing geopolitical realities, India sought to establish closer relations with regional countries such as Iran, which was a traditional ally of Pakistan.<ref name="Brookings Institution Press, Kemp"/>{{rp|57}} The United States itself accepted a new balance of power, and when India conducted a surprise nuclear test in 1974, the US notified India that it had no "interest in actions designed to achieve new balance of power."<ref name="Springer, Watering"/>

In announcing the Pakistani surrender, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared in the Indian Parliament:

{{Blockquote|Dacca is now the free capital of a free country. We hail the people of Bangladesh in their hour of triumph. All nations who value the human spirit will recognise it as a significant milestone in man's quest for liberty.<ref name="time27Dec1971" />|sign=|source=}} Colonel John Gill of National Defense University, US, remarks that, while India achieved a military victory, it was not able to reap the political fruits it might have hoped for in Bangladesh. After a brief 'honeymoon' phase between India and Bangladesh, their relationship began to sour.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://www.scribd.com/doc/22107538/An-Atlas-of-the-1971-India-Pakistan-War-The-Creation-Of-Bangladesh |title=An Atlas of the 1971 India – Pakistan War: The Creation of Bangladesh |last=Gill |first=John H. |publisher=National Defense University. Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies |year=2003 |location=Washington DC |page=66 |access-date=9 April 2016 |archive-date=18 April 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160418190410/https://www.scribd.com/doc/22107538/An-Atlas-of-the-1971-India-Pakistan-War-The-Creation-Of-Bangladesh |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{citation |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/login?auth=0&type=summary&url=%2Fjournals%2Fjournal_of_military_history%2Fv069%2F69.2higham.html |title=An Atlas of the 1971 India – Pakistan war : the creation of Bangladesh (review) |last=Higham |first=Robin D. S. |journal=The Journal of Military History |volume=69 |number=2 |date=April 2005 |doi=10.1353/jmh.2005.0101 |s2cid=162129844 |access-date=9 April 2016 |archive-date=19 November 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151119045105/http://muse.jhu.edu/login?auth=0&type=summary&url=%2Fjournals%2Fjournal_of_military_history%2Fv069%2F69.2higham.html |url-status=live |url-access=subscription }}</ref> The perceived Indian overstay revived Bangladeshi anxieties of Hindu control.<ref>{{cite book |last=Baxter |first=Craig |author-link=Craig Baxter |title=Government and politics in South Asia|edition=5th|year=2002|publisher=Westview Press|page=269}}</ref> Many were concerned that Mujib was permitting Indian interference in the country's internal matters<ref>{{cite book |last=Lewis |first=David |title=Bangladesh: Politics, Economy and Civil Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5lH40gT7xvYC |year=2011 |publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-139-50257-3|page=81|quote=There were high levels of corruption and cronyism within the administration and widespread concerns that he [Mujib] was allowing India to interfere in Bangladesh's domestic affairs existed.|access-date=18 February 2019|archive-date=6 January 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170106064248/https://books.google.com/books?id=5lH40gT7xvYC|url-status=live}}</ref> and many in the Bangladeshi army resented his attachment with India.<ref>{{cite book |last=van Schendel |first=Willem |title=A History of Bangladesh|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7Y2bBQAAQBAJ|date=12 February 2009|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-316-26497-3|page=182|quote=Another, far more dangerous group felt deeply affronted: the army ... Their resentment originated in the final days of the war of 1971. According to them, the Indian army had robbed the Bangladeshi fighters of the glory of liberating Bangladesh, walking in when the freedom fighters had already finished the job, and had taken away to India all sophisticated weaponry and vehicles captured from the Pakistanis ... they also felt bitter about Mujib's closeness to India, which, they thought, undermined the sovereignty of Bangladesh. By 1973, many in the army were both anti-Indian and anti-Mujib; in the elections that year the garrisons voted solidly for opposition candidates.|access-date=18 February 2019|archive-date=26 May 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190526180022/https://books.google.com/books?id=7Y2bBQAAQBAJ|url-status=live}}</ref> Whilst India enjoyed excellent relations with Bangladesh during the Awami League tenures, relations deteriorated when the Bangladesh Nationalist Party assumed power. A 2014 Pew Research Center opinion poll found that 27% of Bangladeshis were wary of India. However, 70% of Bangladeshis held a positive view of India: while 50% of Bangladeshis held a positive view of Pakistan.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.pewglobal.org/2014/07/14/chapter-4-how-asians-view-each-other/|title=Chapter 4: How Asians View Each Other|date=14 July 2014|website=Pew Research Center's Global Attitudes Project|access-date=2016-04-09|archive-date=15 October 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151015203043/http://www.pewglobal.org/2014/07/14/chapter-4-how-asians-view-each-other/|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Pakistan === For Pakistan, the war was a complete and humiliating defeat,<ref name="time27Dec1971" /> a psychological setback that came from a defeat at the hands of rival India.<ref name="Haqqani2005p87">{{cite book |last=Haqqani |first=Hussain |author-link=Hussain Haqqani |year=2005 |title=Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military |publisher=Carnegie Endowment for International Peace |page=87 |isbn=978-0-87003-214-1}}</ref> Pakistan lost half its population and a significant portion of its economy, and suffered setbacks to its geopolitical role in South Asia.<ref name="time27Dec1971" /><ref name="Haqqani2005p87" /> In the post-war era, Pakistan struggled to absorb the lessons learned from the military interventions in the democratic system and the impact of the Pakistani military's failure was grave and long-lasting.<ref>{{cite news|title=Pakistan's leaders should heed the lesson of Bangladesh|url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/aug/15/pakistan-flood-warning|work=The Guardian|access-date=26 December 2016|date=15 August 2010|archive-date=26 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161226224317/https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/aug/15/pakistan-flood-warning|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=No lessons learnt in forty years|url=http://tribune.com.pk/story/307080/no-lessons-learnt-in-forty-years/|work=The Express Tribune|access-date=26 December 2016|date=15 December 2011|archive-date=24 October 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161024093415/http://tribune.com.pk/story/307080/no-lessons-learnt-in-forty-years/|url-status=live}}</ref>

From the geopolitical point of view, the war ended in the breaking-up of the unity of Pakistan from being the largest Muslim country in the world to its politico-economic and military collapse that resulted from a direct foreign intervention by India in 1971.<ref name="Routledge, Malik">{{cite book|last1=Malik|first1=Anas|title=Political Survival in Pakistan: Beyond Ideology|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781136904196|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dLkuCgAAQBAJ&q=world%27s%20largest%20islamic%20state%20west%20pakistan&pg=PA50|access-date=7 November 2016|language=en|date=2010-10-22|archive-date=19 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201019094440/https://books.google.com/books?id=dLkuCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA50&q=world%27s%20largest%20islamic%20state%20west%20pakistan|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|50}}<ref name="Cambridge University Press, Waines">{{cite book|last1=Waines|first1=David|title=An Introduction to Islam|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=9780521539067|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YYxZ0QpKBGsC&q=world%27s%20largest%20islamic%20state%20%20pakistan%201971&pg=PP15|access-date=7 November 2016|language=en|date=2003-11-06|archive-date=13 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201013172430/https://books.google.com/books?id=YYxZ0QpKBGsC&pg=PP15&q=world%27s%20largest%20islamic%20state%20%20pakistan%201971|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|1}}<ref name="Lancer Publishers LLC, Dogra">{{cite book|last1=Dogra|first1=C. Deepak|title=Pakistan: Caught in the Whirlwind|publisher=Lancer Publishers LLC|isbn=9781940988221|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3zooCwAAQBAJ&q=world%27s%20largest%20islamic%20nation%20west%20pakistan&pg=PT223|access-date=7 November 2016|language=en|date=2015-12-09|archive-date=15 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201015014751/https://books.google.com/books?id=3zooCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT223&q=world%27s%20largest%20islamic%20nation%20west%20pakistan|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>Further information relates in Hamoodur Rahman Commission.</ref> Pakistani policy-makers further feared that the two-nation theory had been disproved by the war, that Muslim nationalism had proved insufficient to keep Bengalis a part of Pakistan.<ref name="Haqqani2005p88">{{cite book |last=Haqqani |first=Hussain |author-link=Hussain Haqqani |year=2005 |title=Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military |publisher=Carnegie Endowment for International Peace |page=88 |isbn=978-0-87003-214-1}}</ref>

The Pakistani people were not mentally prepared to accept the magnitude of this kind of defeat, as the state media had been projecting imaginary victories.<ref name="Haqqani2005p88" /> When the ceasefire that came from the surrender of East Pakistan was finally announced, the people could not come to terms with the magnitude of defeat; spontaneous demonstrations and massive protests erupted on the streets of major metropolitan cities in Pakistan. According to Pakistani historians, the trauma was extremely severe, and the cost of the war for Pakistan in monetary terms and in human resources was very high.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Siddique |first1=Abubakar |title=The Pashtun question: the unresolved key to the future of Pakistan and Afghanistan |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PkVeBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA39 |year=2014 |publisher=Hurst & Co. |isbn=978-1-84904-292-5 |page=39}}</ref><ref>Langewiesche, William (November 2005). "The Wrath of Khan". The Atlantic. Retrieved 31 July 2016.</ref>{{rp|xxx}} Demoralized and finding itself unable to control the situation, the Yahya administration fell when President Yahya Khan turned over his presidency to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was sworn in on 20 December 1971 as President with the control of the military.<ref name="National Book Club, Ghazali" /> The loss of East Pakistan shattered the prestige of the Pakistani military.<ref name="Haqqani2005p87" /> Pakistan lost half its navy, a quarter of its air force, and a third of its army.<ref name="Ali1983" /> The war also exposed the shortcomings of Pakistan's declared strategic doctrine that the "defence of East Pakistan lay in West Pakistan".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.defencejournal.com/2000/oct/yaqub.htm |title=Prince, Soldier, Statesman – Sahabzada Yaqub Khan |website=Defence Journal |access-date=20 October 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090312092440/http://www.defencejournal.com/2000/oct/yaqub.htm |archive-date=12 March 2009}}</ref> Hussain Haqqani, in his book ''Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military'' notes,

{{Blockquote|Moreover, the army had failed to fulfill its promises of fighting until the last man. The eastern command had laid down arms after losing only thirteen hundred men in battle. In West Pakistan, too, twelve hundred military deaths had accompanied lackluster military performance.<ref name="Haqqani2005p87" />}}

In his book ''The 1971 Indo-Pak War: A Soldier's Narrative'', Pakistan Army's Major General Hakeem Arshad Qureshi, a veteran of this conflict, noted: {{Blockquote|We must accept the fact that, as a people, we had also contributed to the bifurcation of our own country. It was not a Niazi, or a Yahya, even a Mujib, or a Bhutto, or their key assistants, who alone were the cause of our break-up, but a corrupted system and a flawed social order that our own apathy had allowed to remain in place for years. At the most critical moment in our history we failed to check the limitless ambitions of individuals with dubious antecedents and to thwart their selfish and irresponsible behaviour. It was our collective 'conduct' that had provided the enemy an opportunity to dismember us.|Qureshi, p. 288<ref>{{cite book |last=Qureshi |first=Hakeem Arshad |year=2002 |title=The 1971 Indo-Pak War: A Soldier's Narrative |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=288 |isbn=978-0-19-579778-7}}</ref>}}

After the war, the Pakistan Army's generals in the East held each other responsible for the atrocities committed, but most of the burden was laid on Lieutenant-General Tikka Khan, who earned notoriety from his actions as governor of the East; he was called the "Butcher of Bengal" because of the widespread atrocities committed within the areas of his responsibility.<ref name="LATimes">{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2002-mar-30-me-passings30.1-story.html|title=Gen. Tikka Khan, 87; 'Butcher of Bengal' Led Pakistani Army|date=30 March 2002|work=Los Angeles Times|access-date=11 April 2010|archive-date=19 June 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210619021031/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2002-mar-30-me-passings30.1-story.html|url-status=live}}</ref> Tikka was a "soldier known for his eager use of force".<ref name="Nation Books, Bhutto">{{cite book |last1=Bhutto |first1=Fatima |author-link=Fatima Bhutto |title=Songs of Blood and Sword: A Daughter's Memoir |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mjo3xkGSV6cC&pg=PA100 |year=2010 |publisher=Nation Books |page=100 |isbn=978-1-56858-632-8 |access-date=1 December 2023}}</ref>

Lieutenant-General A. A. K. Niazi commented on Tikka's actions: "On the night between 25/26 March 1971, General Tikka struck. Peaceful night was turned into a time of wailing, crying and burning. General Tikka let loose everything at his disposal as if raiding an enemy, not dealing with his own misguided and misled people. The military action was a display of stark cruelty more merciless than the massacres at Bukhara and Baghdad by Chengiz Khan and Halaku Khan ... General Tikka ... resorted to the killing of civilians and a scorched earth policy. His orders to his troops were: 'I want the land and not the people'".<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nYppZ_dEjdIC |title=Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military |last=Haqqani |first=Hussain |author-link=Husain Haqqani |publisher=Carnegie Endowment |year=2005 |isbn=978-0-87003-214-1 |page=74 |access-date=11 April 2010 |archive-date=12 January 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160112183547/https://books.google.com/books?id=nYppZ_dEjdIC |url-status=live }}</ref> Major-General Rao Farman wrote in his table diary: "Green land of East Pakistan will be painted red," which has been interpreted to mean that he planned to massacre Bengalis.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Khan |first1=M. H. |year=2016 |title=Memoir of M H Khan: Turbulence in the Indian Subcontinent |publisher=Mereo Books |page=144 |isbn=978-1-86151-569-8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Dp-QDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA144 |access-date=1 May 2022 |archive-date=1 May 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220501060250/https://books.google.com/books?id=Dp-QDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA144 |url-status=live }}</ref> Farman said the entry was not expressing a thirst for blood, but concern that East Pakistan's future could be the red flag of Communism.<ref>{{cite book |last=Mamoon |first=Muntassir |translator-last=Ibrahim |translator-first=Kushal |year=2000 |title=The Vanquished Generals and the Liberation War of Bangladesh |publisher=Somoy Prokashan |pages=88, 148–149 |isbn=984-458-210-5}}</ref>

Major reforms were carried out by successive governments in Pakistan after the war. To address the economic disparity, the National Finance Commission system was established to equally distribute the taxation revenue among the four provinces, the large-scale nationalisation of industries and nationwide census were carried out in 1972.<ref name="Bureau of Statistics">{{cite web |title=Population of Pakistan in 1972|url=http://www.pbs.gov.pk/sites/default/files/other/pocket_book2006/2.pdf|publisher=Bureau of Statistics|access-date=24 December 2016|archive-date=20 September 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180920213536/http://www.pbs.gov.pk/sites/default/files/other/pocket_book2006/2.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> The Constitution was promulgated in 1973 that reflected this equal balance and a compromise between Islamism and Humanism, and provided guaranteed equal human rights to all.<ref name="Nazaria-e-Pakistan, Part IV">{{cite web |title=Constitution of Pakistan |url=http://storyofpakistan.com/the-constitution-of-1973/ |date=June 2003 |website=Story of Pakistan |publisher=Nazaria-e-Pakistan, Part IV |access-date=2 June 2014 |archive-date=2 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131002225754/http://storyofpakistan.com/the-constitution-of-1973/ |url-status=live }}</ref> The military was heavily reconstructed and heavily reorganised, with President Bhutto appointing chiefs of staff in each inter-service, contrary to C-in-Cs, and making instruction on human rights compulsory in the military syllabus in each branch of inter-services.<ref name="Lancer Publishers, Singh">{{cite book|last1=Singh|first1=Ravi Shekhar Narain Singh|title=The Military Factor in Pakistan|publisher=Lancer Publishers|isbn=9780981537894|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wCm2DFZblOYC&q=Bhutto%20appoints%20chiefs%20of%20staff%20of%20air%20army&pg=PA62|access-date=24 December 2016|language=en|year=2008|archive-date=9 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201009141523/https://books.google.com/books?id=wCm2DFZblOYC&pg=PA62&q=Bhutto%20appoints%20chiefs%20of%20staff%20of%20air%20army|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|62–100}} Major investments were directed towards modernising the navy.<ref name="Sona Printers, India" />{{rp|100}} The military's chain of command was centralized in Joint Staff Headquarters (JS HQ) led by an appointed Chairman Joint Chiefs Committee to coordinate military efforts to safeguard the nation's defence and unity.<ref name="Lancer Publishers, Singh"/>{{rp|62–63}} In addition, Pakistan sought to have a diversified foreign policy, as Pakistani geostrategists had been shocked that both China and the United States provided limited support to Pakistan during the course of the war, with the US displaying an inability to supply weapons that Pakistan needed the most.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Kapur|first1=Ashok|title=India and the South Asian Strategic Triangle|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781136902611|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iALGBQAAQBAJ&q=Pakistani%20generals%20surprised%20by%20Chinese%201971&pg=PT257|access-date=26 December 2016|language=en|date=2010-12-14|archive-date=13 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201013064558/https://books.google.com/books?id=iALGBQAAQBAJ&pg=PT257&q=Pakistani%20generals%20surprised%20by%20Chinese%201971|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|xxxiii}}

In January 1972, Pakistan under Bhutto launched the clandestine development of nuclear weapons<ref name="McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP">{{cite book |last1=Paul |first1=T. V. |author-link=T. V. Paul |year=2000 |title=Power Versus Prudence: Why Nations Forgo Nuclear Weapons |publisher=McGill-Queen's Press |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XCm0JSs27eAC&q=Pakistan%201971%20war%20nuclear&pg=PA133 |page=133 |isbn=978-0-7735-2087-5 |language=en |access-date=24 December 2016 |archive-date=10 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201010232233/https://books.google.com/books?id=XCm0JSs27eAC&pg=PA133&q=Pakistan%201971%20war%20nuclear |url-status=live}}</ref> with a view to "never to allow[ing] another foreign invasion of Pakistan."{{Quote without source|date=April 2023}}

=== Bangladesh === {{main|1971 East Pakistan genocide}}

As a result of the war, East Pakistan became an independent country, Bangladesh, as the world's fourth most populous Muslim state on 16 December 1971.{{citation needed|date=February 2020}} West Pakistan, now just Pakistan, secured the release of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman from the Headquarter Prison and allowed him to return to Dacca. On 19 January 1972, Mujib was inaugurated as the first President of Bangladesh, later becoming the Prime Minister of Bangladesh in 1974.{{citation needed|date=February 2020}}

On the brink of defeat in around 14 December 1971, the media reports indicated that the Pakistan Army soldiers, the local East Pakistan Police they controlled, ''razakars'' and the ''Shanti Committee'' carried out systematic killings of professionals such as physicians, teachers, and other intellectuals,<ref name="nyt12-19-1971">{{cite news|title=125 Slain in Dacca Area, Believed Elite of Bengal|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1971/12/19/archives/125-slain-in-dacca-area-believed-elite-of-bengal-125-found-slain.html|work=The New York Times|location=New York|page=1|date=19 December 1971|access-date=4 January 2008|quote=At least 125 persons, believed to be physicians, professors, writers and teachers, were found murdered today in a field outside Dacca. All the victims' hands were tied behind their backs and they had been bayoneted, garroted or shot. These victims were among an estimated 300 Bengali intellectuals who had been seized by West Pakistani soldiers and locally recruited supporters.|archive-date=28 March 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140328143516/http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50C13F83C5E127A93CBA81789D95F458785F9|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="massacre-intel">{{cite journal|last=Murshid|first=Tazeen M.|year=1997 |title=State, Nation, Identity: The Quest for Legitimacy in Bangladesh|journal=South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies|volume=20|issue=2|pages=1–34|issn=1479-0270|doi=10.1080/00856409708723294}}</ref> as part of a pogrom against the Bengali Hindu minorities who constituted the majority of urban educated intellectuals.<ref>{{cite book |last=Khan |first=Muazzam Hussain |year=2012 |chapter=Killing of Intellectuals |chapter-url=http://en.banglapedia.org/index.php?title=Killing_of_Intellectuals |editor1-last=Islam |editor1-first=Sirajul |editor1-link=Sirajul Islam |editor2-last=Jamal |editor2-first=Ahmed A. |title=Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh |edition=Second |publisher=Asiatic Society of Bangladesh |access-date=4 July 2015 |archive-date=26 May 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190526180022/http://en.banglapedia.org/index.php?title=Killing_of_Intellectuals |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Shaiduzzaman |title=Martyred intellectuals: martyred history |url=http://www.newagebd.com/2005/dec/15/murdered/murdered.html |newspaper=The New Age|location=South Africa|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101201162513/http://www.newagebd.com/2005/dec/15/murdered/murdered.html |archive-date=1 December 2010 |access-date=20 October 2009}}</ref> This massacre of Hindus was confirmed by the Pakistani military brass in a postwar judicial inquiry.<ref>{{Cite web |title=1971 Bengali Hindu Genocide |url=https://www.hinduamerican.org/1971-bangladesh-genocide/ |access-date=2023-11-26 |website=Hindu American Foundation |language=en-US}}</ref>{{better source needed|date=November 2023}}

Young men, especially students, who were seen as possible rebels and recruiters were also targeted by the stationed military, but the extent of casualties in East Pakistan is not known, and the issue is itself controversial and contradictory among the authors who wrote books on the pogrom;<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bose |first1=Sarmila |author-link=Sarmila Bose |date=2010 |title=Dead reckoning : memories of the 1971 Bangladesh war |location=London |publisher=C. Hurst |pages=164–165, 176–181 |isbn=978-1-84904-049-5}}</ref><ref name="ABC-CLIO, Mikaberidze">{{cite book |last1=Mikaberidze |first1=Alexander |year=2013 |title=Atrocities, Massacres, and War Crimes: An Encyclopedia [2 Volumes]: An Encyclopedia |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jVqqAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA511 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |pages=511–512 |isbn=978-1-59884-926-4 |access-date=7 February 2019 |archive-date=20 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200420054037/https://books.google.com/books?id=jVqqAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA511 |url-status=live }}</ref> the Pakistani government denied the charges of involvement in 2015.<ref name="The Daily Star, 2015">{{cite news |title=Pakistan denies committing war crimes in 1971|url=http://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/pak-statement-creates-outrage-180628|access-date=26 December 2016|work=The Daily Star|date=1 December 2015|archive-date=5 December 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151205151039/http://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/pak-statement-creates-outrage-180628|url-status=live}}</ref> R.J. Rummel cites estimates ranging from one to three million people killed.<ref name="Rummel-8-2" /> Other estimates place the death toll lower, at 300,000. Bangladesh government figures state that Pakistani forces aided by collaborators killed three million people, raped 200,000 women and displaced millions of others.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://indianexpress.com/article/research/birth-of-bangladesh-when-raped-women-and-war-babies-paid-the-price-of-a-new-nation-victory-day-4430420/|title=Birth of Bangladesh: When raped women and war babies paid the price of a new nation|work=The Indian Express|date=19 December 2016|access-date=17 December 2016|archive-date=6 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190406193430/https://indianexpress.com/article/research/birth-of-bangladesh-when-raped-women-and-war-babies-paid-the-price-of-a-new-nation-victory-day-4430420/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=26 March 2010 |title=Bangladesh sets up war crimes court |url=http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/03/2010325151839747356.html |publisher=Al Jazeera |access-date=27 March 2010 |archive-date=5 June 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110605014512/http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2010/03/2010325151839747356.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

According to authors Kenton Worcester, Sally Bermanzohn and Mark Ungar, Bengalis themselves killed about 150,000 non-Bengalis living in the East.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Worcester |first1=Kenton |last2=Bermanzohn |first2=Sally Avery |last3=Ungar |first3=Mark |year=2013 |title=Violence and Politics: Globalization's Paradox |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CTlFAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA111 |publisher=Routledge |page=111 |isbn=978-1-136-70125-2 |access-date=18 September 2018 |archive-date=20 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200420054512/https://books.google.com/books?id=CTlFAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA111 |url-status=live }}</ref> There had been reports of Bengali insurgents indiscriminately killing non-Bengalis throughout the East; however, neither side provided substantial proofs for their claims and both Bangladeshi and Pakistani figures contradict each other over this issue.<ref name="Yale University Press, Tripathi">{{cite book |last1=Tripathi |first1=Salil |year=2016 |title=The Colonel Who Would Not Repent: The Bangladesh War and Its Unquiet Legacy |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bcffCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA108 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-21818-3 |access-date=18 September 2018 |archive-date=20 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200420044556/https://books.google.com/books?id=bcffCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA108 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hossain |first1=Mokerrom |year=2010 |title=From Protest to Freedom: A Book for the New Generation: the Birth of Bangladesh |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2Vt3KxEBYk0C&pg=PA133 |publisher=Mokerrom |page=133 |isbn=978-0-615-48695-6 |access-date=18 September 2018 |archive-date=20 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200420050529/https://books.google.com/books?id=2Vt3KxEBYk0C&pg=PA133 |url-status=live }}</ref> Bihari representatives in June 1971 claimed a higher figure of 500,000 killed by Bengalis.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Gerlach |first=Christian |date=2010 |title=Extremely Violent Societies: Mass Violence in the Twentieth-Century World |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=48N-XbOltMEC&pg=PA148 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |page=148 |isbn=978-1-139-49351-2 |access-date=18 September 2018 |archive-date=26 May 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190526180020/https://books.google.com/books?id=48N-XbOltMEC&pg=PA148 |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 2010, the Awami League's government decided to set up a tribunal to prosecute the people involved in alleged war crimes and those who collaborated with Pakistan.<ref>{{cite news |date=25 March 2010 |title=Bangladesh sets up 1971 war crimes tribunal |url=https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8587511.stm |work=BBC News |access-date=26 March 2010 |archive-date=28 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100328045749/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8587511.stm |url-status=live }}</ref> According to the government, the defendants would be charged with crimes against humanity, genocide, murder, rape and arson.<ref>{{cite news |date=26 March 2010 |title=Bangladesh to Hold Trials for 1971 War Crimes |url=https://www.voanews.com/a/bangladesh-to-hold-trials-for-1971-war-crimes-89258207/114704.html |publisher=Voice of America |access-date=27 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100329134544/http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/asia/Bangladesh-to-Hold-Trials-for-1971-War-Crimes-89258207.html |archive-date=29 March 2010 |url-status=live }}</ref>

According to John H. Gill, there was widespread polarisation between pro-Pakistan Bengalis and pro-liberation Bengalis during the war, and those internal battles are still playing out in the domestic politics of modern-day Bangladesh.<ref>{{Cite book|title=An Atlas of 1971 Indian-Pakistan war-the Creation of Bangladesh|last=Gill|first=John H|publisher=NESA|year=1994|page=66}}</ref> To this day, the issue of committed atrocities and pogroms is an influential factor in the Bangladesh–Pakistan relations.<ref>{{cite news|title=Dhaka demonstrators protest Pakistan's reaction to Molla's execution|url=http://tribune.com.pk/story/647281/dhaka-demonstrators-protest-pakistans-reaction-to-mollas-execution/|newspaper=The Express Tribune|date=18 December 2013|access-date=2013-12-18|archive-date=26 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161226215216/http://tribune.com.pk/story/647281/dhaka-demonstrators-protest-pakistans-reaction-to-mollas-execution/|url-status=live}}</ref>

==Impact== ===Pakistan: War Enquiry Commission and War prisoners=== {{Main|Hamoodur Rahman Commission|l1 = War Enquiry Commission|Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 Prisoners of War Investigation}}

In the aftermath of the war, the Pakistani Government constituted the War Enquiry Commission, to be headed by Chief Justice Hamoodur Rahman, who was an ethnic Bengali,<ref name="LV" /> and composed of the senior justices of the Supreme Court of Pakistan.<ref name="LV">{{Cite journal|last=Bose|first=Sarmila|date=22 September 2007|title=Losing the Victims: Problems of Using Women as Weapons in Recounting the Bangladesh War|url=http://www.politics.ox.ac.uk/materials/profile_materials/sbose-losing_the_victims-epw_v_42_no_38_2007.pdf|journal=Economic and Political Weekly|page=3865|access-date=30 March 2016|archive-date=9 October 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161009214557/http://www.politics.ox.ac.uk/materials/profile_materials/sbose-losing_the_victims-epw_v_42_no_38_2007.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> The War Enquiry Commission was mandated with carrying out thorough investigations into the intelligence, strategic, political and military failures that causes the defeat in the war.{{citation needed|date=February 2020}}

The War Commission also looked into Pakistan's political and military involvement in the history of East Pakistan that encompasses 1947–71.{{citation needed|date=February 2020}} Written in moral and philosophical perspective, the First Report was lengthy and provided accounts that were unpalatable to be released to the public. Initially, there were 12 copies that were all destroyed, except for the one that was kept and marked as "Top Secret" to prevent the backlash effects on the demoralised military.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Shah |first1=Aqil |year=2014 |title=The Army and Democracy |publisher=Harvard University Press |page=127 |isbn=9780674419773 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ShihAwAAQBAJ&q=hamoodur%20&pg=PA334 |access-date=26 December 2016 |language=en |archive-date=11 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201011224826/https://books.google.com/books?id=ShihAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA334&q=hamoodur%20 |url-status=live }}</ref> In 1976, the Supplementary Report was submitted, which was the comprehensive report compiled together with the First Report; this report was also marked as classified.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Hamood-ur-Rahman Commission Report {{!}} Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pakistan |url=http://storyofpakistan.com/the-hamood-ur-rahman-commission-report |date=1 June 2003 |website=Story of Pakistan |access-date=26 December 2016 |archive-date=28 December 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201228012634/http://storyofpakistan.com/the-hamood-ur-rahman-commission-report/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 2000, the excerpts of the Supplementary Report were leaked to a political correspondent of Pakistan's ''Dawn'', which the ''Dawn'' published together with ''India Today''.<ref name="IndiaToday2000">{{cite magazine |last=Halarnkar |first=Sameer |date=21 August 2000 |title=The Untold Story of 1971 – Behind Pakistan's Defeat |url=https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/cover-story/story/20000821-secret-inquiry-into-pakistans-debacle-in-1971-war-held-army-atrocities-widespread-corruption-as-prime-reasons-for-defeat-in-east-pakistan-779681-2000-08-20 |journal=India Today |access-date=17 December 2011 |archive-date=13 January 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160113144826/http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/secret-inquiry-into-pakistans-debacle-in-1971-war-held-army-atrocities-widespread-corruption-as-prime-reasons-for-defeat-in-east-pakistan/1/246922.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="BBC20000830">{{cite news |title=Bangladesh requests war report |url=https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/903149.stm |work=BBC News |date=30 August 2000 |access-date=24 April 2011 |archive-date=28 October 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091028101923/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/903149.stm |url-status=live }}</ref> The First Report is still marked as classified, while the Supplementary Report's excerpts were suppressed by the news correspondents.<ref name="Lancer Publishers, Bhatt">{{cite book |last1=Bhatt |first1=Arunkumar |year=2015 |title=Psychological Warfare and India |publisher=Lancer Publishers |pages=288–289 |isbn=9788170621331 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1whOBwAAQBAJ&q=hamoodur%20Rahman%20commission&pg=PA288 |access-date=22 August 2016 |language=en |archive-date=23 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201023171622/https://books.google.com/books?id=1whOBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA288&q=hamoodur%20Rahman%20commission |url-status=live }}</ref> The War Report's supplementary section was published by the Pakistan Government, but it did not officially hand over the report to Bangladesh despite its requests.<ref name="BBC20000830" />

The War Report exposed many military failures, from the strategic to the tactical–intelligence levels, while it confirmed the looting, rapes and the unnecessary killings by the Pakistan military and their local agents.<ref name="Genocide">{{cite magazine |last=Halarnkar |first=Sameer |date=21 August 2000 |title=The Genesis of Defeat – How many Hindus have you killed? |url=https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/cover-story/story/20000821-1971-war-how-many-hindus-have-you-killed-779684-2000-08-20 |magazine=India Today |access-date=17 December 2011 |archive-date=25 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131025055051/http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/1971-war-how-many-hindus-have-you-killed/1/246925.html |url-status=live }}</ref> It laid the blame squarely on Pakistan Army generals, accusing them of debauchery, smuggling, war crimes and neglect of duty.<ref name="Immorality">{{cite magazine |last=Halarnkar |first=Sameer |date=21 August 2000 |title=The Loss of Character – "Lust for wine, greed for houses" |url=https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/cover-story/story/20000821-1971-war-lust-for-wine-greed-for-houses-779690-2000-08-20 |magazine=India Today |access-date=17 December 2011 |archive-date=2 June 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160602062452/http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/1971-war-lust-for-wine-greed-for-houses/1/246931.html |url-status=live }}</ref> The War Commission had recommended public trial of Pakistan Army generals on the charges that they had been responsible for the situation in the first place and that they had succumbed without a fight,<ref name="Cowardice">{{cite magazine |last=Halarnkar |first=Sameer |date=21 August 2000 |title=Bravado And Capitulation – "Further resistance is not humanly possible" |url=https://www.indiatoday.in/magazine/cover-story/story/20000821-1971-war-further-resistance-is-not-humanly-possible-779693-2000-08-20 |magazine=India Today |access-date=17 December 2011 |archive-date=2 June 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160602062107/http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/1971-war-further-resistance-is-not-humanly-possible/1/246934.html |url-status=live }}</ref> but no actions were ever taken against those responsible, except the dismissal of chiefs of the Pakistan Army, Pakistan Air Force, Pakistan Navy, and decommissioning of the Pakistan Marines.<ref name="IndiaToday2000" /><ref name="Cowardice"/>

The War Commission, however, rejected the charge that 200,000 Bengali girls were raped by the Pakistan Army, remarking, "It is clear that the figures mentioned by the Dacca authorities are altogether fantastic and fanciful," and cited the evidence of a British abortion team that had carried out the termination of "only a hundred or more pregnancies".<ref name="LV" /><ref name="D'Costa2011">{{cite book |last=D'Costa |first=Bina |year=2011 |title=Nationbuilding, Gender and War Crimes in South Asia |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ivzKjY5LncIC&pg=PA76 |publisher=Routledge |page=76 |isbn=978-0-415-56566-0 |access-date=18 October 2016 |archive-date=20 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200420054344/https://books.google.com/books?id=ivzKjY5LncIC&pg=PA76 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>Hamoodur Rehman Commission (HRC) Report of Inquiry into the 1971 War (Vanguard Books Lahore, 513)</ref> The commission also claimed that "approximately 26,000 persons (were) killed during the action by the Pakistan military"<ref name="D'Costa2011" /><ref name="deathcount-pakistani">[http://www.bangla2000.com/Bangladesh/Independence-War/Report-Hamoodur-Rahman/default.shtm Hamoodur Rahman Commission Report] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160816211333/http://www.bangla2000.com/bangladesh/Independence-War/Report-Hamoodur-Rahman/default.shtm |date=16 August 2016}}, [http://www.bangla2000.com/Bangladesh/Independence-War/Report-Hamoodur-Rahman/chapter2.shtm chapter 2] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141012130637/http://www.bangla2000.com/Bangladesh/Independence-War/Report-Hamoodur-Rahman/chapter2.shtm |date=12 October 2014}}, paragraph 33</ref> Bina D'Costa states that the War Commission was aware of the military's brutality in East Pakistan, but "chose to downplay the scale of the atrocities committed."<ref>{{cite book |last=D'Costa |first=Bina |year=2011 |title=Nationbuilding, Gender and War Crimes in South Asia |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ivzKjY5LncIC&pg=PA76 |publisher=Routledge |page=78 |isbn=978-0-415-56566-0 |access-date=18 October 2016 |archive-date=20 April 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200420054344/https://books.google.com/books?id=ivzKjY5LncIC&pg=PA76 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The second commission was known as Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 Prisoners of War Investigation, conducted solely by the Pakistani government, that was to determine the numbers of Pakistani military personnel who surrendered, including the number of civilian POWs.<ref name="BBC News, India Pakistan">{{cite news |url=https://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/in_depth/south_asia/2002/india_pakistan/timeline/1971.stm |title=India Pakistan | Timeline |work=BBC News |access-date=27 November 2015 |archive-date=11 October 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171011102832/http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/in_depth/south_asia/2002/india_pakistan/timeline/1971.stm |url-status=live }}</ref> The official number of the surrendered military personnel was soon released by the government of Pakistan after the war was over.<ref name="BBC News, India Pakistan"/>

===India: Indo-Pakistani summits=== {{Main|Simla Agreement|l1 = Agreement Between the Government of India and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan on Bilateral Relations|Delhi Agreement|l2 = Transfer of Population Under the Terms of the Delhi Agreement}}

On 2 July 1972, the Indo-Pakistani summit was held in Simla, Himachal Pradesh, India where the Simla Agreement was reached and signed between President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.<ref>{{cite web|title=Simla Agreement|url=http://www.mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl%2F5541%2FSimla+Agreement|website=Bilateral/Multilateral Documents|publisher=Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India|access-date=27 September 2013|archive-date=28 September 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210928163212/http://www.mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl%2F5541%2FSimla+Agreement|url-status=live}}</ref> The treaty provided insurance to Bangladesh that Pakistan recognised Bangladesh's sovereignty, in exchange for the return of the Pakistani POWs.<ref name="time20Dec71" /> Over the next five months, India released more than 90,000 war prisoners, with Lieutenant-General A.A.K. Niazi being the last war prisoner to be handed over to Pakistan.<ref name="time20Dec71" />

The treaty also gave back more than 13,000 km2 of land that the Indian Army had seized in Pakistan during the war, though India retained a few strategic areas, including Turtuk, Dhothang, Tyakshi (earlier called Tiaqsi) and Chalunka of Chorbat Valley,<ref>{{cite news |url=https://thewire.in/politics/turtuk-story-of-a-promise-land|title=Turtuk, a Promised Land Between Two Hostile Neighbours|work=The Wire|access-date=27 October 2020|archive-date=30 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201030083934/https://thewire.in/politics/turtuk-story-of-a-promise-land|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://scroll.in/article/815863/an-encounter-with-the-king-of-turtuk-a-border-village-near-gilgit-baltistan|title=An encounter with the 'king' of Turtuk, a border village near Gilgit-Baltistan|first=qz com|last=Rajrishi Singhal|work=Scroll.in|access-date=27 October 2020|archive-date=24 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201024100411/https://scroll.in/article/815863/an-encounter-with-the-king-of-turtuk-a-border-village-near-gilgit-baltistan|url-status=live}}</ref> which was more than 883 km2.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.livemint.com/Leisure/nkoE1dc52oYwoWRNmhEeYK/A-portrait-of-a-village-on-the-border.html|title=A portrait of a village on the border|date=10 August 2017|access-date=26 August 2017|archive-date=26 August 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170826113604/http://www.livemint.com/Leisure/nkoE1dc52oYwoWRNmhEeYK/A-portrait-of-a-village-on-the-border.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=22 December 2011 |title=Have you heard about this Indian Hero? |url=http://www.rediff.com/news/slide-show/slide-show-1-the-hero-of-nubra/20111222.htm#5 |work=Rediff.com |access-date=28 May 2015 |archive-date=14 June 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170614095202/http://www.rediff.com/news/slide-show/slide-show-1-the-hero-of-nubra/20111222.htm#5 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.storyofpakistan.com/articletext.asp?artid=A109&Pg=6 |title=The Simla Agreement 1972 |website=Story of Pakistan |access-date=20 October 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110614014904/http://www.storyofpakistan.com/articletext.asp?artid=A109&Pg=6 |archive-date=14 June 2011}}</ref> The Indian hardliners, however, felt that the treaty had been too lenient to President Bhutto, who had pleaded for leniency, arguing that the fragile stability in Pakistan would crumble if the accord was perceived as being overly harsh by Pakistanis and that he would be accused of losing Kashmir in addition to the loss of East Pakistan.<ref>{{cite book |last=Haqqani |first=Hussain |author-link=Hussain Haqqani |year=2005 |title=Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military |publisher=Carnegie Endowment for International Peace |page=99 |isbn=978-0-87003-214-1}}</ref> As a result, Prime Minister Gandhi was criticised by a section in India for believing Bhutto's "sweet talk and false vows", while the other section claimed the agreement to be successful, for not letting it to fall into "Versailles Syndrome" trap.<ref>{{cite news |date=9 June 2014 |title=The collapse of the Shimla Accord |url=http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/the-collapse-of-the-shimla-accord/ |access-date=9 April 2016 |archive-date=23 April 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160423001529/http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/the-collapse-of-the-shimla-accord/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1973, India and Pakistan reached another compromise when both countries signed a trilateral agreement with Bangladesh that actually brought the war prisoners, non-Bengali and Pakistan-loyal Bengali bureaucrats and civilian servants to Pakistan.<ref name="UNCHR">{{cite web |title=Report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees|url=http://www.unhcr.org/print/3ae68c6f0.html|website=UNCHR|access-date=16 February 2013|archive-date=14 May 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130514075016/http://www.unhcr.org/print/3ae68c6f0.html|url-status=live}}</ref> The Delhi Agreement witnessed the largest mass population transfer since the Partition of India in 1947.<ref>{{cite book |last=Wolpert |first=Stanley |title=Zulfi Bhutto of Pakistan:his life and times |year=1993 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780195076615 |url=https://archive.org/details/zulfibhuttoofpak00wolp}}</ref>

===Bangladesh: International Crimes Tribunal===

In 2009, the issue of establishing the International Crimes Tribunal began to take public support. The tribunal was formally established in 2010 to investigate and prosecute suspects for the genocide committed in 1971 by the Pakistan Army and their local collaborators, ''Razakars'', ''Al-Badr'' and ''Al-Shams'' during the Bangladesh Liberation War.<ref>Wierda, Marieke; Anthony Triolo (31 May 2012). Luc Reydams; Jan Wouters; Cedric Ryngaert, eds. International Prosecutors. Oxford University Press. p. 169. {{ISBN|978-0199554294}}.</ref>{{rp|169}}

== Long-term consequences == * Steve Coll, in his book ''Ghost Wars'', argues that the Pakistan military's experience with India, including Pervez Musharraf's experience in 1971, influenced the Pakistani government to support jihadist groups in Afghanistan even after the Soviets left, because the jihadists were a tool to use against India, including bogging down the Indian Army in Kashmir.<ref>{{cite book|last=Coll|first=Steve|title=Ghost Wars|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ToYxFL5wmBIC|year=2005|publisher=The Penguin Press|isbn=978-1-59420-007-6|access-date=15 September 2020|archive-date=8 January 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160108000045/https://books.google.com/books?id=ToYxFL5wmBIC|url-status=live}} pg 221, 475.</ref><ref>[http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people5/Coll/coll-con0.html Kreisler interview with Coll "Conversations with history", 25 March 2005] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090118052754/http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people5/Coll/coll-con0.html |date=18 January 2009 }}, UC Berkeley Institute of International Studies</ref> * Writing about the war in ''Foreign Affairs'' magazine, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto stated "There is no parallel in contemporary history to the cataclysm which engulfed Pakistan in 1971. A tragic civil war, which rent asunder the people of the two parts of Pakistan, was seized by India as an opportunity for armed intervention. The country was dismembered, its economy shattered and the nation's self-confidence totally undermined."<ref name="FA197304">{{cite magazine |last=Bhutto |first=Zulfikar Ali |date=April 1973 |title=Pakistan Builds Anew |url=http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/24423/zulfikar-ali-bhutto/pakistan-builds-anew |magazine=Foreign Affairs |access-date=8 July 2011 |archive-date=16 January 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110116091710/http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/24423/zulfikar-ali-bhutto/pakistan-builds-anew |url-status=live }}</ref> This statement of Bhutto has given rise to the myth of betrayal prevalent in modern Pakistan. This view was contradicted by the post-War Hamoodur Rahman Commission, ordered by Bhutto himself, which in its 1974 report indicted generals of the Pakistan Army for creating conditions which led to the eventual loss of East Pakistan and for inept handling of military operations in the East.<ref name="IndiaToday2000" />

== Military awards ==

=== Battle honours === After the war, 41 battle honours and 4 theatre honours were awarded to units of the Indian Army; notable among them are:<ref name="Sarbans">{{cite book|title=Battle Honours of the Indian Army 1757 – 1971|last=Singh|first=Sarbans|year=1993|publisher=Vision Books|location=New Delhi|isbn=978-81-7094-115-6|pages=257–278|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5ATfAAAAMAAJ|access-date=3 November 2011|archive-date=25 February 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120225201447/http://books.google.com/books?id=5ATfAAAAMAAJ|url-status=live}}</ref> {{div col|colwidth=22em}} * East Pakistan 1971 (theatre honour) * Sindh 1971 (theatre honour) * Jammu and Kashmir 1971 (theatre honour) * Punjab 1971 (theatre honour) * Basantar River * Bogra * Chachro * Chhamb * Defence of Punch * Dera Baba Nanak * Gadra City * Harar Kalan * Hilli * Longewala * Parbat Ali * Poongli Bridge * Shehjra * Shingo River Valley * Sylhet {{div col end}}

=== Gallantry awards === For bravery, a number of soldiers and officers on both sides were awarded the highest gallantry award of their respective countries. Following is a list of the recipients of the Indian award Param Vir Chakra, Bangladeshi award Bir Sreshtho and the Pakistani award Nishan-E-Haider:

====India==== Recipients of the Param Vir Chakra:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://nda.nic.in/html/nda-martyrs.html |title=Martyrs |publisher=National Defense Academy, Pune |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110929182428/http://nda.nic.in/html/nda-martyrs.html |archive-date=29 September 2011 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://india.gov.in/myindia/paramvirchakra_awards_list1.php|title=Param Vir Chakra|publisher=Government of India|access-date=14 November 2011|archive-date=22 December 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111222230606/http://india.gov.in/myindia/paramvirchakra_awards_list1.php|url-status=live}}</ref> {|class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center" ! scope="col" style="width: 150px;" | Rank ! scope="col" style="width: 300px;" | Name ! scope="col" style="width: 200px;" | Unit ! scope="col" style="width: 10px;" | References |- |Lance Naik |Albert Ekka (Posthumously) |14 Guards |<ref>{{cite web |title=Gallantry Awards {{!}} Ministry of Defence, Government of India |url=https://www.gallantryawards.gov.in/awardee/1062 |website=www.gallantryawards.gov.in |access-date=13 December 2023}}</ref> |- |Flying Officer |Nirmal Jit Singh Sekhon (Posthumously) |No. 18 Squadron IAF |<ref>{{cite web |title=Gallantry Awards {{!}} Ministry of Defence, Government of India |url=https://www.gallantryawards.gov.in/awardee/3432 |website=www.gallantryawards.gov.in |access-date=13 December 2023}}</ref> |- |Major |Hoshiar Singh |3 Grenadiers |<ref>{{cite web |title=Gallantry Awards {{!}} Ministry of Defence, Government of India |url=https://www.gallantryawards.gov.in/awardee/1061 |website=www.gallantryawards.gov.in |access-date=13 December 2023}}</ref> |- |Second Lieutenant |Arun Khetarpal (Posthumously) |17th Horse (Poona Horse) |<ref>{{cite web |title=Gallantry Awards {{!}} Ministry of Defence, Government of India |url=https://www.gallantryawards.gov.in/awardee/1060 |website=www.gallantryawards.gov.in |access-date=13 December 2023}}</ref> |- |}

====Bangladesh==== Recipients of the Bir Sreshtho:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://en.banglapedia.org/index.php?title=National_Awards|title=National Awards|last=Khan|first=Sanjida|website=Banglapedia|access-date=2018-07-08|quote=Through a gazette notification of the government issued on 15 December 1973, the insignia of Bir Srestha was conferred upon seven martyr freedom fighters (posthumously)|archive-date=24 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211224091531/https://en.banglapedia.org/index.php?title=National_Awards|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Rahman |first=Rifaat |date=4 December 2015 |title=Swadhinata Chattar built as memorial to seven Liberation War heroes ruined by encroachers |url=https://bdnews24.com/bangladesh/2015/12/04/swadhinata-chattar-built-as-memorial-to-seven-liberation-war-heroes-ruined-by-encroachers |work=bdnews24.com |access-date=2018-07-08 |quote=Inside, there are separate plaques for Bir Shrestha Captain Mohiuddin Jahangir, Bir Shrestha Flight Lt Motiur Rahman, Bir Shrestha Sepoy Mostofa Kamal, Bir Shrestha Sepoy Hamidur Rahman, Bir Shrestha Lance Naik Munshi Abdur Rouf, Bir Shrestha Ruhul Amin, and Bir Shrestha Lance Naik Nur Mohammad Sheikh. |archive-date=9 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180709010444/https://bdnews24.com/bangladesh/2015/12/04/swadhinata-chattar-built-as-memorial-to-seven-liberation-war-heroes-ruined-by-encroachers |url-status=live }}</ref> * Captain Mohiuddin Jahangir (Posthumously) * Lance Naik Munshi Abdur Rouf (Posthumously) * Sepoy Hamidur Rahman (Posthumously) * Sepoy Mostafa Kamal (Posthumously) * ERA Mohammad Ruhul Amin (Posthumously) * Flight Lieutenant Matiur Rahman (Posthumously) * Lance Naik Nur Mohammad Sheikh (Posthumously)

====Pakistan====

Recipients of the Nishan-E-Haider:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.pakistanpaedia.com/celeb/nh/celeb_1.htm|title=Nishan-e-Haider holders of Pakistan Army|access-date=19 February 2013|archive-date=24 April 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130424162206/http://pakistanpaedia.com/celeb/nh/celeb_1.htm|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.shaheedfoundation.org/nishanehaider.asp |title=Nishan-e-Haider |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140812211253/http://www.shaheedfoundation.org/nishanehaider.asp |archive-date=12 August 2014}}</ref> {|class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center" ! scope="col" style="width: 150px;" | Rank ! scope="col" style="width: 300px;" | Name ! scope="col" style="width: 200px;" | Unit ! scope="col" style="width: 10px;" | References |- |Major |Muhammad Akram (Posthumously) |4 Frontier Force Regiment |<ref>{{cite web |title=Major Muhammad Akram |url=http://www.pakistanarmy.gov.pk/AWPReview/TextContent.aspx?pId=182 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100824194224/http://www.pakistanarmy.gov.pk/AWPReview/TextContent.aspx?pId=182 |url-status=dead |archive-date=2010-08-24 |access-date=13 December 2023 |date=24 August 2010}}</ref> |- |Pilot Officer |Rashid Minhas (Posthumously) |No. 2 Squadron PAF |<ref>{{cite web |title=PAKISTAN AIR FORCE - Official website |url=https://paf.gov.pk/paf_shaheeds.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100314063453/https://paf.gov.pk/paf_shaheeds.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=2010-03-14 |access-date=13 December 2023 |date=14 March 2010}}</ref> |- |Major |Shabbir Sharif (Posthumously) |6 Frontier Force Regiment |<ref>{{cite news |title=Major Shabbir Sharif's 51st martyrdom anniversary observed |url=https://tribune.com.pk/story/2389761/major-shabbir-sharifs-51st-martyrdom-anniversary-observed |work=The Express Tribune |access-date=13 December 2023 |language=en |date=6 December 2022}}</ref> |- |Sowar |Muhammad Hussain (Posthumously) |20th Lancers |<ref>{{cite web |title=Inter Services Public Relations Pakistan |url=https://www.ispr.gov.pk/sowar-hussain-shaheed.php |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190809100331/https://www.ispr.gov.pk/sowar-hussain-shaheed.php |url-status=dead |archive-date=2019-08-09 |access-date=13 December 2023 |date=9 August 2019}}</ref> |- |Lance Naik |Muhammad Mahfuz (Posthumously) |15 Punjab |<ref>{{cite web |title=Lance Naik Muhammad Mahfuz |url=https://www.pakistanarmy.gov.pk/AWPReview/TextContent.aspx?pId=179 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180130205831/https://www.pakistanarmy.gov.pk/AWPReview/TextContent.aspx?pId=179 |url-status=dead |archive-date=2018-01-30 |access-date=13 December 2023 |date=30 January 2018}}</ref> |- |}

==Civilian awards== On 25 July 2011, Bangladesh Swadhinata Sammanona, the Bangladesh Freedom Honour, was posthumously conferred on former Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.<ref>{{cite news |last=Habib |first=Haroon |author-link=Haroon Habib |date=25 July 2011 |title=Bangladesh honours Indira Gandhi with highest award |url=http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/bangladesh-honours-indira-gandhi-with-highest-award/article2293016.ece |newspaper=The Hindu |access-date=18 May 2013 |archive-date=10 October 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171010075735/http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/bangladesh-honours-indira-gandhi-with-highest-award/article2293016.ece |url-status=live }}</ref>

R. M. Muzumdar - IOFS officer. Second Indian Director General of the Indian Ordnance Factories. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan by the Government of India, in 1973, in the Civil service category, for his contributions during the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971.

O. P. Bahl, an IOFS officer. Former Additional Director General Ordnance Factories and Member of the Ordnance Factory Board. Received Padma Shri, in 1972 in the civil-service category for his efforts during the war.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/nagpur/govt-offers-to-form-committee-of-unions-to-think-over/articleshow/70811672.cms|title=Govt offers to form committee, OF unions to think over | Nagpur News |work=The Times of India|access-date=24 December 2021|archive-date=24 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211224164534/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/nagpur/govt-offers-to-form-committee-of-unions-to-think-over/articleshow/70811672.cms|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://archive.india.gov.in/myindia/padmashri_awards_list1.php?start=1810|title=Padma Shri Awardees|website=Government of India|access-date=17 October 2019|archive-date=4 March 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304033024/http://archive.india.gov.in/myindia/padmashri_awards_list1.php?start=1810|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/at-200-yr-old-ordnance-factories-anxiety-anticipation-and-some-sulk/articleshow/71613086.cms|title=At India's 200-year-old ordnance factories, anxiety and anticipation | India News |work=The Times of India|access-date=24 December 2021|archive-date=24 December 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211224164032/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/at-200-yr-old-ordnance-factories-anxiety-anticipation-and-some-sulk/articleshow/71613086.cms|url-status=live}}</ref>

On 28 March 2012, President of Bangladesh Zillur Rahman and the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina conferred Bangladesh Liberation War Honour and Friends of Liberation War Honour to 75 people, six organisations, Mitra Bahini and the people of India at a special ceremony at the Bangabandhu International Conference Centre, Dhaka. This included eight heads of states: former Nepalese President Ram Baran Yadav, the third King of Bhutan Jigme Dorji Wangchuck, former Soviet general secretary Leonid IIyich Brezhnev, former Soviet head of state Nikolai Viktorovich Podgorny, former Soviet Prime Minister Alexei Nikolaevich Kosygin, former Yugoslav President Marshal Josip Broz Tito, former UK Prime Minister Sir Edward Richard George Heath and former Nepalese Prime Minister Bishweshwar Prasad Koirala. The organisations include the BBC, Akashbani (All India Radio), International Committee of the Red Cross, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Oxfam and Kolkata University Shahayak Samiti.

The list of foreign friends of Bangladesh has since been extended to 568 people. It includes 257 Indians, 88 Americans, 41 Pakistanis, 39 Britons, 9 Russians, 18 Nepalese, 16 French and 18 Japanese.<ref>{{cite news |date=28 March 2012 |title=Friends of freedom honoured |url=http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=228046 |newspaper=The Daily Star |access-date=28 March 2012 |archive-date=29 March 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120329093524/http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=228046 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=28 March 2012 |title=B'desh honours foreign friends |url=http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/more.php?news_id=124849&date=2012-03-28 |location=Dhaka |newspaper=The Financial Express |access-date=28 March 2012 |archive-date=24 February 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150224194105/http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/more.php?news_id=124849&date=2012-03-28 |url-status=live }}</ref>

==In media== ===Films=== * ''Ora Egaro Jon'' (''The Magnificent Eleven''), a 1972 Dhallywood war film directed by Chashi Nazrul Islam, featuring real Indian Army and Pakistani Army personnel. This was the first ever feature film about Bangladesh Liberation War.<ref name="Haq2022p429">{{cite journal |last1=Haq |first1=Fahmidul |title=Cinema of Bangladesh: Absence of 1947 and abundance of 1971 |journal=India Review |year=2022 |volume=21 |issue=3 |page=429 |doi=10.1080/14736489.2022.2086409}}</ref> * ''Hindustan Ki Kasam'', a 1973 Bollywood war film directed by Chetan Anand about Operation Cactus Lilly.<ref name="TOI_top10_films"/> * ''Aakraman'', a 1975 Bollywood film set during this war featuring a romantic love triangle. * ''Border'', a 1997 Bollywood war film directed by J.P.Dutta. This movie is an adaptation from real life events that happened at the Battle of Longewala fought in Rajasthan (Western Theatre).<ref name="TOI_top10_films">{{cite news|title=Top 10 films on Indo-Pak conflict|url=http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/top-lists/top-10-films-on-indo-pak-conflict/videols/7824538.cms|access-date=28 July 2012|newspaper=The Times of India|date=30 March 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120511042921/http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/top-lists/top-10-films-on-indo-pak-conflict/videols/7824538.cms|archive-date=11 May 2012|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/border-director-jp-dutta-pays-tributes-paid-to-brig-chandpuri/articleshow/71557191.cms|title='Border' director JP Dutta pays tribute to Brig Chandpuri | Chandigarh News|work=The Times of India|access-date=16 October 2020|archive-date=15 December 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201215172208/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/border-director-jp-dutta-pays-tributes-paid-to-brig-chandpuri/articleshow/71557191.cms|url-status=live}}</ref> * ''16 December'', a 2002 film directed by Mani Shankar. * ''1971 – Prisoners of War'', a 2007 Bollywood war film directed by Amrit Sagar. Set against the backdrop of a prisoner-of-war camp in Pakistan, it follows six Indian prisoners awaiting release after their capture during the war.<ref name="TOI_top10_films"/> * ''Midnight's Children,'' a 2012 film was adapted from Salman Rushdie's novel, is fictional story of two twins born on the midnight of 15 August 1947. It also has references to 1971 war. * ''Children of War'', a 2014 Hindi drama film, revolves around the events of 1971 Bangladesh genocide and the liberation war. * ''The Ghazi Attack'', a 2017 war film directed by Sankalp Reddy. It is based on the sinking of PNS Ghazi during the war. * ''1971: Beyond Borders'', a 2017 Indian war drama film written and directed by Major Ravi.<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/malayalam/movie-reviews/1971-beyond-borders/movie-review/58063353.cms|title=1971: Beyond Borders Review {3.5/5}: The film puts across the message that fighting wars for "borders and orders" robs away so many lives needlessly|work=The Times of India|access-date=2017-06-20}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/malayalam/movies/news/the-thrill-lies-in-being-the-first-person-to-do-something-that-has-not-been-done-before-mohanlal/articleshow/57839218.cms|title=The thrill lies in being the first person to do something that has not been done before: Mohanlal|work=The Times of India|access-date=16 October 2020|archive-date=24 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201124133504/https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/malayalam/movies/news/the-thrill-lies-in-being-the-first-person-to-do-something-that-has-not-been-done-before-mohanlal/articleshow/57839218.cms|url-status=live}}</ref> * ''Raazi'', a 2017 fictional spy film, based on the novel "Calling Sehmat", was set before the events of war about the detection of plans to deploy PNS Ghazi<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-metroplus/That-spy-princess/article15446864.ece|title=That spy princess!|date=2008-05-03|work=The Hindu|access-date=2018-05-10|language=en-IN|issn=0971-751X|archive-date=9 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201109023931/https://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-features/tp-metroplus/That-spy-princess/article15446864.ece|url-status=live}}</ref> * ''Romeo Akbar Walter'', a 2019 spy thriller film was set against the backdrop of the 1971 Indo-Pakistani war, which tells the story of Rehmatullah Ali, a young Indian bank clerk, who is recruited by the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), for a covert operation in Pakistan. * ''Bhuj: The Pride of India'', 2021 action film set during the war tells the story of rebuilding the Bhuj airbase in India, which was damaged by the Pakistan air attacks.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/bollywood/sanjay-dutt-rana-daggubati-sonakshi-sinha-bhuj-the-pride-of-india-cast-5635383/|date=20 March 2019|language=en|work=The Indian Express|title=Bhuj The Pride of India: Sanjay Dutt, Sharad Kelkar and Sonakshi Sinha join Ajay Devgn's film|access-date=25 June 2019|archive-date=21 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190321145811/https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/bollywood/sanjay-dutt-rana-daggubati-sonakshi-sinha-bhuj-the-pride-of-india-cast-5635383/|url-status=live}}</ref> * ''Pippa'', a 2023 action film based on the life of Brigadier Balram Singh Mehta who fought in the Battle of Garibpur on the eastern front in November 1971. * ''Sam Bahadur'', a 2023 film, is based on the life of India's first Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw and his contribution to the 1971 Indo-Pak war. * ''Border 2'', an upcoming 2026 film, is based on multiple battles fought during the India-Pakistan war of 1971.

===Short films=== * ''Mukti: Birth of a Nation'', a 2017 short film directed by Manu Chobe depictsalso focuses on hs contribution to 1971 war. the negotiations between Major General J. F. R. Jacob and Lieutenant General A. A. K. Niazi over the Pakistani Instrument of Surrender.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.news18.com/news/movies/mukti-birth-of-a-nation-showcases-history-of-indian-military-during-1971-1494717.html|title=Mukti – Birth of a Nation Showcases History of Indian Military During 1971|date=18 August 2017|work=News18|access-date=27 October 2020|archive-date=30 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201030180227/https://www.news18.com/news/movies/mukti-birth-of-a-nation-showcases-history-of-indian-military-during-1971-1494717.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Miniseries/Dramas=== * ''PNS Ghazi'', an Urdu (Pakistani) drama based on sinking of {{ship|PNS|Ghazi||6}}, ISPR

===General=== * History of Bangladesh * History of Myanmar * List of conflicts in Asia {{clear}}

== References == {{reflist|colwidth=30em}}

== Notes == {{notelist}}

== Further reading == * {{cite book |last1=Bass |first1=Gary J. |author-link=Gary J. Bass |title=The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a Forgotten Genocide |date=2013 |publisher=Vintage |location=New York |isbn=978-8184003703}} * {{cite book |title=Pakistaniaat: Special issue on 1971 War |year=2010 |editor=Cilano, Cara|title-link=Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies }} * {{cite book |last=Hanhimäki|first=Jussi M.|title=The Flawed Architect: Henry Kissinger and American Foreign Policy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3wolOABSg_YC&pg=PP1|year=2004|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-517221-8}} * Hayes, Jarrod. "Securitization, social identity, and democratic security: Nixon, India, and the ties that bind." ''International Organization'' 66.1 (2012): 63–93.[https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jarrod_Hayes/publication/241754960_Securitization_Social_Identity_and_Democratic_Security_Nixon_India_and_the_Ties_That_Bind/links/55a50fd008ae00cf99c94313.pdf online] * {{cite book |last=Niazi|first=General A. A. K.|title=Betrayal of East Pakistan|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nYppZ_dEjdIC&pg=PP1|year=1999|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn= 978-0-19-579275-1}} * {{cite book |last=Palit|first=D K|title=The Lightning Campaign: The Indo-Pakistan War 1971|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rPmTAAAACAAJ|year=1972|publisher=Compton Press Ltd|isbn=978-0-900193-10-1}} * {{cite book |last=Raghavan |first=Srinath |author-link=Srinath Raghavan |date=2013 |title=1971: A Global History of the Creation of Bangladesh |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-72864-6}} * {{cite book |last=Raja |first=Dewan Mohammad Tasawwar |title=O General My General (Life and Works of General M A G Osmany)|year=2010|publisher=The Osmany Memorial Trust, Dhaka, Bangladesh|isbn=978-984-8866-18-4 }} * {{cite book |last=Saigal|first=J R|title=Pakistan Splits: The Birth of Bangladesh|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gUfaAAAACAAJ|year=2000|publisher=Manas Publications|isbn=9788170491248}} * Warner, Geoffrey. "Nixon, Kissinger and the breakup of Pakistan, 1971." ''International Affairs'' 81.5 (2005): 1097–1118.

==External links== * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8MO52QQ6_o Video of General Niazi Surrendering] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20050802085547/http://www.freeindia.org/1971war/ A complete coverage of the war from the Indian perspective] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20081029150607/http://www.ndu.edu/nesa/docs/Gill%20Atlas%20Final%20Version.pdf An Atlas of the 1971 India – Pakistan War: The Creation of Bangladesh by John H. Gill] * [http://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/frus/nixon/xi/ Actual conversation from the then US President Nixon and Henry Kissinger during the 1971 War] – US Department of State's Official archive. * [https://web.archive.org/web/20050213035604/http://indianarmy.nic.in/armajop.htm Indian Army: Major Operations] * [http://www.icdc.com/%7Epaulwolf/pakistan/pakistan.htm Pakistan: Partition and Military Succession USA Archives] * [https://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/december/3/newsid_2519000/2519133.stm Pakistan intensifies air raid on India BBC] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20050906140622/http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/1971/ A day by day account of the war as seen in a virtual newspaper.] * [http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB79/ The Tilt: The U.S. and the South Asian Crisis of 1971.] * [https://www.dawn.com/news/1073092/dec-16-1971-any-lessons-learned ''16 December 1971: any lessons learned?'' By Ayaz Amir] – Pakistan's Dawn * [https://archive.today/20061015201345/http://www.vidyasoft.com/interest/war/war71.html India-Pakistan 1971 War as covered by TIME] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20061020233036/http://orbat.com/site/cimh/iaf/IAF_1971_kills_rev1.pdf Indian Air Force Combat Kills in the 1971 war (unofficial), Centre for Indian Military History] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20070926234047/http://frontierindia.net/op-cactus-lilly-19-infantry-division-in-1971/ Op Cactus Lilly: 19 Infantry Division in 1971, a personal recall by Lt Col Balwant Singh Sahore] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20070926233932/http://frontierindia.net/all-for-a-bottle-of-scotch/ All for a bottle of Scotch, a personal recall of Major (later Major General) C K Karumbaya, SM, the battle for Magura] * {{cite news|title=The Rediff Interview/Lt Gen A A Khan Niazi|date=2 February 2004|work=Rediff|url=http://www.rediff.com/../news/2004/feb/02inter1.htm}}

{{1971 Indo-Pak War}} {{1971 Bangladesh genocide}} {{Kashmir conflict}} {{Bangladesh Liberation War}} {{Military of India}} {{Military history of Pakistan}} {{Secession in Countries}} {{Bangladesh–Pakistan relations}} {{Authority control}} {{Portal bar|India|Pakistan}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:India-Pakistan war of 1971}} Category:India–Pakistan war of 1971 Category:1971 in India Category:Airstrikes conducted by India Category:Anti-Pakistan sentiment Category:Attacks in Bangladesh Category:Conflicts in 1971 Category:December 1971 in Asia Category:History of East Pakistan Category:History of the Indian Army 1971 Category:Military intervention Category:Military operations of the Bangladesh Liberation War Category:Post-independence history of Pakistan Category:Research & Analysis Wing Category:Wars involving Bangladesh Category:Wars involving India Category:Wars involving Pakistan