India's Little War Hands Pakistan Wins On Multiple Fronts

The Narendra Modi government's reaction, charged with virulent rhetoric and jingoistic posturing, was intended to demonstrate a steely resolve. Heightened troop deployments, zooming air fighters and missile attacks dominated local media coverage.

Yet this approach is now viewed as too ham-fisted and lacking diplomatic finesse. Rather than isolating Pakistan and mobilizing international support for its cause, New Delhi overplayed its hand, relying too heavily on the spectacle of military action and underestimating how global actors would respond.

The Pakistani establishment, on the other hand, seized the diplomatic moment. By framing its response as defensive and measured, the Pakistan government repositioned itself as the more responsible actor in the military exchanges between the nuclear-armed powers.

Pakistan's civil and military leadership emphasized restraint, national unity and the need for peace, while India's actions, however justified from its own security perspective, came across to many observers as needlessly aggressive. This narrative, fanned by fears of a possible nuclear exchange, quickly gained traction across global capitals.

Diplomatically, India suddenly found itself without robust backing . The United States, the European Union and key Gulf allies issued boilerplate statements urging de-escalation from both sides that drew a false equivalence that, in effect, undermined New Delhi's core message: that it had suffered yet another terror attack sponsored from across the border.

China, having armed Pakistan with the state-of-the-art aerial combat platforms, used the moment to underscore its calls for stability while quietly nudging Pakistan to play the role of regional stabilizer, a role Islamabad was only too happy to adopt with its made-in-China military kit.

India's attempt to internationalize its grievances - through backchannel diplomacy and strategic media briefings - failed to gain expected traction. Instead of Pakistan being cornered, it was India that appeared diplomatically isolated.

The post-attack narrative had shifted from terrorism to regional tensions. Rather than global condemnation of the militancy at Pahalgam, the prevailing international concern became regional escalation in a nuclear dyad. That shift marked a significant strategic loss for New Delhi.

Meanwhile, in Pakistan, the crisis has allowed the establishment to reassert its central role in national life. The military, already perceived as the guardian of the country's external security, returned to center stage.

Public criticism over election conduct and political interference took a backseat to calls for unity and deference. The ceasefire, a product of swift diplomacy involving third-party interlocutors, including the United States, was presented domestically as a triumph of restraint and balance.