Operation Bunyan-un-Marsoos: A timeline

During the wee hours of Saturday, Pakistan finally initiated a military operation named Bunyan-un-Marsoos against India as it launched Fatah-I missiles, targeting multiple Indian military installations in response to an unprovoked attack on its airbases.

Drawn from a verse of the Holy Quran, Bunyan-un-Marsoos means “a wall constructed of molten lead”, symbolising strength, solidarity and impenetrability.

The operation was launched moments after Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Director General (DG) Lieutenant General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry addressed a press conference confirming that India had attempted to attack the Pakistan Air Force’s (PAF) Nur Khan (Chaklala, Rawalpindi), Murid (Chakwal) and Rafiqui (Shorkot) airbases.

He said that all assets of the PAF remained safe as a majority of the projectiles had been intercepted by Pakistan’s air defence systems, but India was “pushing the entire region towards a dangerous war with its madness, aggression and deceit” as New Delhi had also attempted to launch a drone strike on Afghanistan.

“Now you just wait for our response,” he concluded.

It wasn’t much later that state-run PTV News, at 4:38 am, reported that the Pakistani military had launched a counter-attack. At 5:52 am, it was revealed that the military had destroyed a storage site of the BrahMos missiles in India’s Beas region and at least two airfields, one each in Udampur and Pathankot, had also been destroyed.

At 6:29 am, PTV reported that Pakistani drones were active in the skies of New Delhi and at 7:13 am, PAF’s JF-17 Thunder’s hypersonic missiles had destroyed India’s S-400 air defence system “worth approximately $1.5 billion”.

While the military is yet to officially reveal details of the operation, Deputy Prime Minister (PM) Ishaq Dar has told a private media outlet that Pakistan is operating on the defensive and has no choice but to retaliate against Indian misadventures.

“This operation that we started today will end in some way. It all depends on what India wants,” he said, adding that Pakistan had no choice, so the civil-military leadership had made the decision following the attack on Nur Khan Air Base.

“No more patience. We are just giving them a response. We’ve exhibited a lot of patience so far. There is a threshold which we cannot go beyond, especially when it comes to hypocrisy and double standards,” DPM Dar said.

Separately, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has spoken to Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Gen Asim Munir, urging both Pakistan and India to “find ways to de-escalate” and offering assistance in starting constructive talks to avoid future conflicts.

A meeting between President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif is also reportedly underway.