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Radio War Nerd EP #521 — India-Pakistan Conflict, feat. Aditya Velivelli (Patreon)

Published:
2025-05-09 20:53:51
Edited:
2025-05-09 23:38:01
Imported:
2025-05
Tags:

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Guest: Aditya VelivelliRecorded: May 8, 2025

We're joined by Aditya to talk about the latest outbreak of restrained-warfare between India and Pakistan following the terror attack in Kashmir in late April.

*Map of Kashmir*India's first bombing sites, May 6

*Further listening:-RWN EP #109 — Kashmir Separatism, feat. Ahsan Butt-RWN EP #193 — Kashmir Clampdown, feat. Aditya Velivelli-RWN EP #103 — 1857 Indian Rebellion, feat. Aditya Velivelli

Total time: 56:22Direct link to this episode's mp3 here

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Subscribe to Radio War Nerd at patreon.com/radiowarnerd

Sound production by Telescope Audio

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Order your print or ebook of John Dolan's new book Erdogan Pizza: Dispatches from a Violent & Grotesque World

Files

Comments

CR

Even Trump realized that the Houthi can sink a carrier any time they want and are simply showing mercy.

Tim Mullen

Hoping I’m wrong, but it’s difficult to see an off ramp in the coming days. Pretty bleak for so much of humanity to be so close to nuclear war

a clash of purple

I just don't understand why the world can't unite against a common foe: England (no, not Britain or the United Kingdom, just England). No matter our differences, we can all agree that we hate the English. We should work out our collective anger by beating them up.

Faisal Sultan

Id like an unbiased objective view of the situation. This felt one-sided Hope you guys do another one soon. This one felt flat.

BigCheese1000

As per Al Jazeera, a cease fire has been declared (thank god)!

JoR

Agreed. But with Britain killing itself in a lot of ways, they’re hardly a decent common foe anymore lol

JoR

Maybe they can get the Fakiir (spelling?) on for the opposing POV? I understand why the show uses guests so much but there’s always some bias, understandably

Doug Cartel

With all the talk in the Ukraine theater about this or that side using a ceasefire as an opportunity to regroup, I hope that's not the case with this ceasefire

James

Mark &John - you guys need to renew your subscriptions to Aviation Week and Space Technology. It is shameful, shameful I say, that you didn’t mention the PL-15 has an AESA seeker and is indeed the only air-to-air missile in the world to have one. This skirmish may go down in the history books as the point in time when the Chinese miltech exporters started to pull ahead of the western ones.

James

The PK-15 is also significantly cheaper than the meteor.

a clash of purple

What's the other side? Pakistan (or more specifically, the ISI) is basically just a giant CIA prop they use to keep India and the Middle East from ever stabilizing and becoming a rival to the Anglo empire, isn't it? They're just doing what's best for their Western backers, as usual. I feel like that's rude to Aditya, anyway. He might be Indian, but he's not some nationalist chauvinist, and he's certainly no fan of the Modi regime.

a clash of purple

The fact that it would be easy to beat them up is a plus, not a minus. I might be slightly biased; I'm of Norwegian extraction, so to me England is just that place where we go viking to burn down their churches and steal their gold.

Maciek

Reddits world news is funny right now. The same people who are radio war nerd types or nafo dorks wanting that sweet Russian blood and hoping and praying this war boner never goes away. They’re like having Reddit jokes about hoping both india and Pakistan finish this up quick with a cricket match and be friends because presumably it’s taking away from their favorite war

Maciek

What I’m learning is that the radio war nerd specimen has specific wars and eras that get their nipples hard. And for these types that keep working for free cheerleading for Ukraine never surrendering only to keep the daily feed of drone murder footage going. These people need a Cold War type war. This Hindu Muslim nonsense is a distraction for them.

Joe Bowden

Nonsense. Aditya sounded very biased to me as someone who has Indian and Pakistani friends. Gross simplification to say its all CIA/ISI’s fault, completely dismisses pakistani agency and the most important factor in Pakistani society, the army. Would be nice to hear more about domestic Pakistani issues as Aditya seems incapable of that

Joe Bowden

To say Pakistan=ISI shows how a little knowledge is dangerous. And when they were talking about Ziah and the 70’s, that is well over 50 years ago, its important but not exactly relevant

Faisal Sultan

This. Joe Bowden is correct. This issue is very complicated and I was surprised at how elementary this episode was from M&J. Its like they cant focus on anything other than Ukraine. Disappointed.

Tim Mullen

I am happy I am wrong

a clash of purple

India and Pakistan are never going to actually go to war. They've been locked in this endless conflict since partition and they always will be, but they seem to have worked things out such that it will never escalate past the point of no return. And in the meantime, both countries grow increasingly sectarian and reactionary. Good for the empire, bad for humanity.

a clash of purple

I think it's more like they understand that if they sank a U.S. aircraft carrier, then America would react by dropping a thousand nukes on Yemen. And it's not as if sinking aircraft carriers would do anything to help their cause. It's not worth it. Especially not when merely *threatening* the U.S. Navy works just fine.

a clash of purple

Of course Pakistan=ISI=CIA isn't true, that is a gross oversimplification on my part. But in the grand scheme of things, the only reason Pakistan exists is just to make sure India remains a basket case forever, and to harbor and support Islamist insurgents wherever the Anglo empire wants to destabilize.

Faisal Sultan

@clash: not just pakistan. that obsession with pakistan also exists in India unfortunately. india has been behind the proxy war and insurgent attacks in balochistan as well as afghanistan to destabilise pakistan. So it goes both ways. The only reason why modi exists is just to make sure pakistan and more importantly, Muslims, remain basket cases forever.

Mac Robertson

@clash that’s changing now that Pakistan is China’s easiest way to bypass the US’s maritime containment line. All of a sudden, they are able to offer far more to the Pakistani elites than the West is

a clash of purple

Well, it sounds like the situation is more complex and dynamic than I assumed... Though, the end result seems about the same. It seems like everyone who matters, even the current regimes in New Delhi and Islamabad, is utterly determined to keep the bloodshed and chaos going forever, to the detriment of everyone in the region. Is there any movement genuinely trying to change the status quo and reach some kind of rapproachment on the subcontinent? Or is everyone down for the circular firing squad?

JoR

Responding to a flash of purple: If you think Pakistan is, literally, a puppet state with 0 agency, fine. But that is, at its core, a biased pov lol. It’s also a nation state for 80 years that has its own motivations, goals, and constituents. This also goes back to Aditya’s point that Pakistan was solely founded by the west and had absolutely 0 tangible reason for existing otherwise. Is that also true? Maybe! But again I’m sure there’s an opposing POv from the Pakistanis. It’s just a lot of similar stuff we’ve heard about Iraq. “Oh, it’s a us puppet:” “oh, it’s not a natural nation state, it’s only natural that the Kurds will form their own nation post isis”. Turned out that wasn’t true, Iraq, for its many flaws, did stay together as a state and it seems that a ton of Iraqis want Iraq to stay a country…

William

Love to see people claim something is “biased” or “one-sided” without offering any reasons why. I’m not asking you to convince me, can I just get one specific example of how what they said was one sided?

William

Okay, the first statement that really caught me as biased, ~32:00, is the claim that the ISI sends militants/agents(?) into India when India prospers more than Pakistan does. Gonna need a little more paperwork, than what’s presented, on that claim

a clash of purple

I don't think Pakistan is a puppet state with zero agency, any more than Israel or Saudi Arabia or Taiwan or Japan are. I do think that, like those other countries I listed, the current regime in Pakistan relies a lot on U.S. support, both covert and overt, in order to maintain power. I assume if the U.S. withdrew that support, Pakistan would still exist and still have autonomy, but I don't know enough to guess whether the current political status quo there would remain intact. I don't think it's controversial to say that the partition was a Western project (with plenty of local support from various factions, otherwise it would have failed) designed rather spitefully to screw the Indian subcontinent over forever just when they'd finally gained their independence. The result was the creation of competing sectarian nationalisms; India has now adopted a Hindu chauvinism just as Pakistan are Muslim chauvinists. The dream of a unified, free, secular India seems pretty dead at this point (which I'm sure the Anglos are very happy about). In that sense, the India that exists now, as opposed to what the independence movement was probably hoping for, can be considered a Western creation as much as Pakistan is. Unless the subcontinent can find a way to move on from this sectarian conflict and build a lasting peace (whether that means India reunifies, or Pakistan and Bangladesh remain independent but the killing stops, or whatever) then they're in the same position as the """decolonized""" states in Africa and South America, constantly tearing each other down and remaining easy prey for imperialist manipulations and exploitation. I'm sure neither the current regime in Pakistan nor Modi's regime in India think of themselves as pawns of the U.S. or any other foreign power, and they're acting according to their own interests and constraints, but in practice all of this redounds to the benefit of the empire and the detriment of everyone on the subcontinent, regardless of sect or nationality. But that's why cui bono is a fallacy. The partition was certainly a Western project, and so the West bears some responsibility for all the trauma and bloodshed that happened because of it. But the nationalisms that developed once Pakistan and India came into being are alive and organic in the sense that they don't exist solely at the behest of the West, and the countries don't act just based on the whims of the Anglo empire. Their actions benefit the Anglo empire greatly, but I understand they aren't doing it because the Westerners want them to. Regardless, it's a tragic situation, and all sides only seem to be getting worse and nastier as time goes on and the body count continues to rise.

AJ

Think we need a non biased source. This guy claimed that during Pakistans civil war there were 300k to 3mil killed, but the closer number is around 250k and it was between different Pakistani groups. In this episode he claims that only a single Indian plane was shot down when it was confirmed by neutral observers around 3-5 planes were shot down. The Indians due to their inherent lack of self awareness and deep seated hatred towards Pakistan can never be trusted to be impartial no matter if they are right wing Hindu extremists or “liberal” like this guy. They all drink from the same source.

AJ

Nah he is. All of them are right wing nationalists when it comes to Pakistan

Faisal Sultan

Not to mention anything at all about the proxy war India is fighting in Baluchistan, helping separatists there with their insurgency. It goes both ways.

Faisal Sultan

Sure @William. Just one example. A thorough examination of this issue would have to include the proxy war India is waging inside Pakistan in Balochistan. While ISI is always mentioned, nothing is ever mentioned about RAW doing the same.