India Launches Military Operation Against Pakistan in Response to Terror Attack, Pakistan Vows Retaliation

India launched a military operation in Pakistan and Pakistan-administered territories in Kashmir on Tuesday. India’s Ministry of Defense said it was targeting “terrorist infrastructure” in response to a deadly attack last month.

CNN’s report described Tuesday as a “major escalation” in the simmering tensions between the two neighboring countries on the Indian subcontinent.

A statement released by the Indian Ministry of Defense said that nine sites had been targeted and were done “in the wake of the barbaric Pahalgam terrorist attack in which 25 Indians and one Nepali citizen were murdered,” referring to an April 22 terrorist attack in India-administered Kashmir. India blamed the Pakistani government; Pakistan said it had no role in the attack.

“Our actions have been focused, measured and non-escalatory in nature,” the statement said. “No Pakistani military facilities have been targeted. India has demonstrated considerable restraint in selection of targets and method of execution.”

Pakistani military spokesperson Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry called the missile attacks a “heinous provocation” that “will not go unanswered.”

“Pakistan will respond to it at a time and place of its own choosing,” he said.

CNN International diplomatic editor Nic Robertson reported live from Pakistan on the strikes during The Arena with Kasie Hunt, telling the anchor that information was still being gathered but they had been able to confirm three different places where the Pakistani military said missiles struck, two in Pakistan-administered Kashmir and one inside Pakistan itself.

“The reason that I make that distinction is because, as I say, Pakistan was expecting India to strike back,” Robertson explained. “There were levels of strike back that they were worried about, and their maximum main concern was if India hit inside Pakistan proper, which appears to have happened, that for the Pakistani side would be a massive escalation. They said that if it happened inside Pakistan-administered Kashmir, then there would be a lower level response.”

The New York Times reported that the Pakistan military had confirmed strikes in five sites and that Indian military jets did not enter Pakistani airspace.

Robertson added that “several senior security officials inside Pakistan” had told him that an Indian strike within Pakistan proper would mean “there will be no doubt” that “they would respond in a similar way back to India,” as part of their “military doctrine.”

“We are now in a position of potential military escalation,” he said, where Pakistani officials have vowed to retaliate, made that “a very public position,” and India is expecting that response.

The Pakistani airspace had also been shut down after the attack, an “expected decision of Pakistan’s military,” said Robertson, “so they have freedom to use their airspace for their fighter jets, which have been patrolling the border.”

He reiterated that this was “a very significant escalation” that “will likely lead to more escalation.”

The Times report concurred that these Indian military strikes were “an intensification of the conflict that runs the risk of setting off an all-out war that could be difficult to contain,” since both of these “neighbor and archenemy” nations are nuclear-armed and “have the capacity to inflict tremendous damage.”

Watch the clip above via CNN.

This article has been updated with additional information.