Thread by @ACG1947

Starting off with the famous yet wildly misrepresented Battle of Longewala. In this thread I will break down the tactics and weapons used in this epic battle. (1/n)

The battle took place on the night of 4th December 1971 and continued on till 7th December.

Pakistan's objective was to march on from Longewala to Ramgarh and capture Jaisalmer. This would cut off the salient and put India on the defensive on the Western front. (2/n)

For this long march, the Pakistani tanks were carrying extra fuel tanks and with their massive superiority in numbers, weren't expecting strong resistance at Longewala.

The Longewala post sat on a dune offering good defensive positioning and was surrounded by barbed wires. (3/n)

As the massive, Pakistani contingent approached, Indians were caught by surprise. They hastily tried laying an anti-tank minefield which resulted in the death of 1 soldier. They had 1 anti-tank jeep-mounted gun which worked well at short-range. (4/n)

The Pakistani attack started at midnight. Indians held their fire till the tanks were as close as 30m to effectively use their anti-tank weapons. Additionally, the Pakistanis discovered the barbed wire and assumed it was a dense minefield. This stalled their attack. (5/n)

The Pakistanis called their engineers to remove the mines. On the other hand, Indians discovered the Pakistani tanks were catching fire easily due to the additional fuel tanks. This lit up the Pakistani positions making firing easy for Indians. (6/n)

2 hours were lost before the Pakistanis realized that there was no proper minefield there. Having stalled and taken casualties, Pakistanis decided to flank the post by getting off the main approach road.

However, their vehicles got bogged down in the soft sand. (7/n)

Even after an entire night of attacking the outnumbered post, Pakistanis had failed to capture it. With the dawn, IAF joined the action with Hawker Hunters (British) and HAL Maruts (Indian). They were fitted with T-10 rockets and 30mm cannons. (8/n)

The operational altitude of these jets was higher than Pakistani anti-aircraft weapons. The PAF, which had struck Indian airfields just a night ago was occupied in other operations. This meant that the Pakistani tanks and vehicles were practically sitting ducks for IAF. (9/n)

The tanks had no option but to take evasive measures but they were futile. While the Indian army had knocked out 12 tanks, the IAF destroyed another 24. This annihilated the Pakistani thrust.

The image taken by IAF sums up the one-sided nature of the IAF attack. (10/n)

Tactical Summary:
Indian losses - 2 soldiers killed, 1 M40 rifle knocked out
Pakistan losses - 200+ soldiers killed, 36 tanks destroyed, 100+ other vehicles destroyed

Strategic Summary:
Pakistani thrust into Jaisalmer blunted, no major offensive in the Rajasthan sector

(11/n)

Trivia: Border (1997) movie dramatized the battle with Sunny Deol playing the role of Major. Kuldeep Singh Chandpuri

Although the movie exaggerated casualties, showing dozens of Indian soldiers dying, in reality just 2 Indian soldiers died. (n/n)

Tags: #Longewala #IndianArmy #IndianAirForce #BORDER #Tanks #antitank #hawkerhunter #1971war #IndvsPak #indiaVsPakistan #bangladesh #defensivebattle #jaisalmer #BattleWon #epicbattles #halmarut #kuldeepsinghchandpuri #SunnyDeol #indopakwar #airattack #minefield #liberation