Air Chief Marshal V R Chaudhari on Wednesday said that “Balakot-like operations” in which Indian planes raided terrorist camps in Pakistan in February 2019 have shown that given political will, aerospace power can be effectively carried out beyond ‘enemy’ lines.

Addressing a seminar on “Aerospace Power in Future Con . in Future Conflicts”, he also said that as nations increasingly rely on space-based assets for building strategic advantage, militarisation and weaponisation of space has become an inevitable reality.

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“Balakot-like operations have shown that given the political will, aerospace power can be effectively carried out beyond enemy lines, in a no-war, no-peace scenario, under a nuclear overhang without escalating into a full-blown conflict,” the air chief said.

He said that skies have often been regarded as realms of wonder and exploration, where dreams take flight and boundaries dissolve into the vast blue expanse.

ACM Chaudhari said, “As we navigate these uncharted skies, air power being a key component of national power, would undoubtedly play a pivotal role and also serve as a symbol of national strength, a tool for peace and cooperation.”

The IAF chief mentioned that future conflicts will be characterised by a blend of simultaneous application of kinetic and non-kinetic forces, high-levels of battle space transparency, multi-domain operations, a high-degree of precision, enhanced lethality, a compressed sensor-to-shooter cycle, and of course, all under intense media scrutiny.

Meanwhile, ACM Chaudhari visited the Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT), Delhi Campus on Tuesday. The C-DOT is the premier Telecom R&D centre of the Department of Telecommunications, Ministry of Communications, Government of India. It is actively working on developing indigenous, secured telecom solutions, for critical infrastructure such as defence communications & Cyber Security.

The air chief interacted with senior officials of C-DOT and stressed the need for better synergy between C-DOT and the Air Force for integration of futuristic and advanced secured communication solutions in the wake of changing landscape from network centric to data centric in modern warfare.