Operation Brasstacks was a major combined arms military exercise of the Indian Armed Forces in Rajasthan state of India, that took place from November 1986 to January 1987 near Pakistan border. As part of a series of exercises to simulate the operational capabilities of the Indian armed forces, it was the major and largest mobilization of Indian forces on the Indian subcontinent, involving the combined strength of two Army Commands - almost 500,000 troops - half the Indian Army. Operation Brasstacks was tasked with two objectives: the initial goal was the deployment of ground troops. The other objective was to conduct a series of amphibious assault exercises by the Indian Navy near to the Pakistan naval base. Operation Brasstacks involved numbers of infantry, mechanized, air assault divisions, and 500,000 army personnel who were massed within 100 miles of Pakistan. An amphibious assault group formed from Indian naval forces was planned and deployed near to the Korangi Creek of Karachi Division in Pakistan. However, the most important aim of this war alert simulation was to determine tactical nuclear strategy, overseen by the Indian Army. The Pakistan Military regarded this war game as a threatening exhibition of overwhelming conventional force, perhaps even as a rehearsal for nuclear war, amounting to the most critical moment in India–Pakistan relations. The security information website Global Security.org characterized Operation Brasstacks as "bigger than any NATO exercise – and the biggest since World War II". Even today, Pakistani military analysts and strategists regard it as a planned "blitzkrieg-like" integrated deep offensive strategy to infiltrate into dense areas of Central Pakistan. On the other hand, India maintained that "[the] core objective of Operation Brasstacks was to test new concepts of mechanization, mobility, and air support devised by Indian army." Background Indian Strategic overview After the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, the Indian Army had long been advocating for practicing modern methods of land-based warfare and professionalism. The Chief of Staff of the Indian Army, General Krishnaswamy Sundarji, an officer who earlier had commanded the infantry division in the Bangladesh Liberation War, threw himself into the Indian Army's modernisation. He was granted permission, and ordered a large scale military exercise to test new concepts of mechanization, mobility, and air support. He issued orders to mobilize the mechanized and armoured divisions, and armed tanks were sent to take position in the Thar desert. In December 1986, with more than ten thousand