NEW DELHI – Indian Special forces commandos division has been deployedalong the Pakistani border who launched counter-terrorism operations insimulated environments that could emerge while countering terrorists.
The operations cum surgical strikes were conducted at Pakistani border inthe first spec ops exercises. Indian Army, Air Force, and Navy commandostook part in “Operation Smelling Field” to fine-tune theircounter-terrorism skills and other drills in anticipation of receivingorders from the central government to undertake possible surgical strikeson terror training camps and launch pads located across the border in thenear future.
This first exercise of the Armed Forces Special Operations Division,codenamed “Smelling Field”, was conducted near Naliya town in Kutchdistrict of the Indian state of Gujarat, Indian news agency ANI quoteddefence sources as saying.
“There are important Air Force and Army bases in and around the town ofNaliya which is a part of Kutch district. The exercise was conducted inGujarat to test the team’s skills”, said Indian defence sources speaking oncondition of anonymity.
After the success of the drills conducted over the weekend, the defencesources confirmed that the Special Operations Division will undertake moresuch exercises in the near future.
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The Armed Forces Special Operations Division (AFSOD) is currently led byMajor General Ashok Dhingra. He is the first chief of this commando force.
Future plans include tighter integration of the three Special Forces toreduce costs of training, logistics, and administration. Prior to the firstwar games, the three special forces functioned independently. A decisionhas now been taken to make the AFSOD the nodal command and control pointfor all three commando structures.
