Comment by adityaathalye
1 day ago
The terrorists were only able to do so because mass-media news was live broadcasting everything on the air, and the terrorists holed up with hostages in the hotel were able to follow the blow-by-blow live.
(edit: i.e. SatCom alone can't do much, if there is no verifiable on-ground intel. And in 2008, our mass-media supplied it in liberal quantities, through multiple camera angles and replays and blow-by-blow commentaries.)
cf. Westpoint's Urban Warfare Project Case Study #16: Mumbai Terrorist Attacks: https://mwi.westpoint.edu/urban-warfare-project-case-study-1...
> Maintaining communications with their handlers in Pakistan was critical for several reasons. First, the handlers were monitoring live Indian news broadcasts and social media feeds, so they could provide real-time instructions throughout the operation and thus afford the attackers the ability to react to developments outside their targets.
> The communication also provided the attackers psychological support.
> The handlers were able to encourage the young, inexperienced militants to maintain their resolve and continue killing civilians and security forces by reinforcing their religious and financial motivations.
> During the operation, the handlers actively coached some of the attackers to continue shooting civilians and to hold positions against Indian security force responders.
A similar thing happened in the Falkland's War: https://www.warhistoryonline.com/history/bbcs-treason-battle...
That's wild. TIL; thanks for sharing. That appears to be an epic failure of all kinds of intelligence on both sides of the war.
And, it's a miracle the gaffe was not explained away as a "strategic master stroke" psyop engineered by the British to fool the other side and lull them into complacency.
> Side 1: Henlo world, look our people are here, about to surprise-attack Side 2, at this surprise location, at this time.
> Side 2: Lol. Not falling for that.
> Narrator: This is all totally absurd, and totally real of course.
> Side 1: Goes ahead with globally broadcasted secret plan anyway.
> Side 2: FML.
> Side 1: After the dust settles. "Psych! Master-Stroke!".
Also, pray tell why is everything (supposedly) "done" by those in positions of power framed as "strategic master stroke"s these days? I suppose only hyperbole makes sense, in a zeitgeist where "leadership" behaviour is jerk, knee-jerk, reactionary-by-default... epileptic.
I was in school back then, lived in a town near Mumbai and watched it on TV
The media was so stupid that it literally showed commando positions. Literal position second by second.
The govt then later banned this information, staggering it to one hour after the fact
You would have also observed how every single politician wanting to become PM had showed up around the Taj while the act was in progress to leech off the media feeding frenzy.
To broadcast that they are there to "stand in person with the heroes", literally making it all about themselves. How they showed up. But unfortunately they could only come the day after, because the then home minister beseeched them to not come on site. But now they are there, surrounded by their Z-plus security, in an ongoing urban conflict zone.
What kind of a state leader shows up in another state, compounding the security nightmare with their own entourage at the site of an ongoing security debacle and literal national emergency,with people being murdered as they spoke?