assistance from the Navy Special Service Group, code named, Barisal, in April 1971. Although, the Governor of East Pakistan, Vice-Admiral S.M. Ahsan, made efforts to increase the naval presence and significance in 1969 but the Indian Navy's Eastern Naval Command continued to pose a significant threat since it had capability of conduct operations in long-range areas. Furthermore, the defections from Navy's Bengali officers and sailors had jeopardise the Navy's operational scope who went onto join the Awami League's militant wing, the Mukti Bahini in a program known as Jackpot. Though, the program was disrupted by the Navy from further annihilation but the naval facilities were severely damaged due to this operation on 15 March 1971. East-Pakistan's geography was surrounded by India on all three landward sides by the Indian Army as the Navy was in attempt to prevent India from blocking the coasts. During this time, the Navy NHQ was housed in Karachi that decided to deploy the newly MLU Ghazi submarine on East while in West for the intelligence gathering purposes. With no naval aviation branch to guard the Karachi port, the Indian Navy breached the seaborne borders of Pakistan and successfully launched the first missile attack, consisting of three Soviet-built s escorted by two anti-submarine patrol vessels on 4 December 1971. Nearing Karachi's port area, the Indian Navy's squadron launched Styx missiles anti-ship missiles, which the obsolescent Pakistani warships had no viable defence against. Two of the warships, and , were sunk, while was damaged beyond repair. After the attacks, the Indian Navy's missile boat squadron safely returned to its home base without sustaining any damages. On 8 December 1971, commanded by its Commander Ahmed Tasnim, sank the Indian frigate off the coast of Gujarat, India— this was the first sinking of a warship by a submarine since World War II, and resulted in the loss of eighteen officers and one-seventy six sailors of the Indian Navy while the inflicting severe damages to another warship, INS Kirpan, by the same submarine. The Pakistan Air Force now covering for Karachi made several of the unsuccessful attempts to engage the Indian Navy's missile boat squadron by carrying out the aerial bombing missions over the Okha Harbor– the forward base of the Indian Navy's missile boat squadron. The Indian Navy retaliated with a second missile attack on Pakistan's coast on the night of 8 December 1971 when a small flotilla of