World-famous Forbes Magazine lists the United States, Russia, China, and India as the four most militarily powerful states in the world. During the last 25 years, three of these militarily powerful states--the United States, Russia, and India--of the world crossed the international border of one or the other states in the international system. The world international system is established on the premise that all states in the system are independent and sovereign within their territory and their international borders are inviolable. A purely realist interpretation of international politics points out that the world system is anarchic. But there are international laws, norms, and traditions that uphold the sovereignty, independence, and inviolability of their borders. Out of these three states, which violated the international borders, two states militarily crossed international borders on the premise that they are carrying out military operations as part of retribution against offending states.
The United States crossed international borders in 2001 and 2003 when its forces invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, respectively. India crossed the international borders on May 7, 2025, when its Air Force launched air-to-surface missiles against civilian targets inside Pakistan. Russia’s crossing of Ukrainian borders was not on account of some kind of retribution but because of some territorial disputes between the two states. Israel is another powerful military state, which, though, has not found any place in the Forbes top ten list of military states, but which did carry out military strikes and an invasion of a stateless, military non-entity, and pathetically hapless, Gaza. Israel, by way of its American and Western European contacts, is a producer of state-of-the-art military equipment and is considered one of the most powerful military states in the Middle East. The model of military retribution adopted by these states is particularly similar in nature of political content, and military style.
The United States is the founder of this model. The United States was attacked by a terror organisation, and in response, it destroyed the whole society of Afghanistan, from which it thought the attack originated. Israel followed in the footsteps of its mentor when it destroyed the whole society of Gaza after it was attacked by another political/militant organisation, HAMAS. India was the last to follow on this track when it made a failed attempt to destroy the whole society of Pakistan after it thought, just thought with no evidence, that it was attacked by a militant organisation based in Pakistan.
The only thing that stopped India from similarly brutalising Pakistani society was the powerful military of Pakistan
These retributive military invasions and attacks have been carried out by militarily powerful states against militarily non-entities or militarily weaker states. No militarily weak state has ever carried out retributive strikes--for instance, hundreds of thousands of people have been killed in terror strikes in Pakistan, and multiple times Pakistan has pointed fingers of accusation against India, but has never carried out retributive strikes against India. These retributive military strikes are carried out by countries that claim to be liberal democracies, including the United States, Israel, and India. These strikes or invasions also partially belie the much-advertised concept that democracies are inherently peace-loving and therefore don't attack or fight each other. What about democracies launching brutal attacks against non-democracies? What about American democracy brutalising Afghan and Iraqi societies? True, Israel is a democracy, but what it has done to Gaza is inhuman.
The only thing that stopped India from similarly brutalising Pakistani society was the powerful military of Pakistan. If Pakistan’s democracy is a joke, then Indian democracy is no less of a joke. In Pakistan, they burn kids alive in the minority communities’ colonies. In India, they lynch an person who is found to be in possession of meat of a butchered cow. So, only democracies don’t attack democracies--a democracy can attack non democracy. No problem with that.
The problem with the American model of retribution practiced in the wake of the 911 attacks is that it would surely pave the way for a practically anarchic world--Anarchic not only in theory but also in practice. Violence is followed by more and more brutal violence. This is the lesson of human history. If not today, it will be followed by more and brutal violence. It is not a wish. It is a prediction based on educated guesses. The use of brutal military force to avenge a terror attack on one’s society or state has been glamorised in the Western media and Hollywood to a hyperbolic extent. The Indian media and movie industry are not lagging behind in this race. Retribution is simply praised as a moral and ethical option in these movies and media coverage. Superman-type characters take revenge and kill people in foreign countries like mice.
As if human life outside the United States, Western Europe, and India has no value. Let me give you an example: in the 911 attacks on American cities, around 4 to 6 thousand people were killed. In retribution, the American military killed more than 90000 Afghans during 20 years of occupation. This 90000 is a conservative figure provided by the American wire service AP. In Israel, around 1300 people were killed during the October 7 HAMAS attack on the border towns of Israel. In retribution, Israelis killed more than 50000 people in Gaza. A man of ordinary intelligence would know that this would have the opposite impact on Muslim societies than what is intended--it would produce more terrorists and spawn more militant and terrorist organisations. The world is now dangerously interconnected, and no country is living on Mars. Battlefield solutions have never brought peace to the world in the past, and they would not do it in the future. The events of the last 20 years have proven that the military is a poor tool in this situation.
What is the post-9/11 American model of retribution?
Netflix has recently released a documentary series on the post-9/11 American decision-making process. In the first episode and American CIA official who was deployed in White House for daily briefing to US President Bush is shown saying that in the first security meeting after the attacks a senior State Department official tried to convince President Bush that he should give diplomacy a chance, “F*ck Diplomacy, we will punish them”. By then, Americans were not even sure who was “them”. Only later did they detect that Al-Qaeda and its chief were the masterminds of these attacks. But President Bush's first reaction or assertion was the crux of the US model of retribution--don’t think, don’t listen, just go for the military option.
Immediately after that, Bush granted American CIA authority to capture and detain anyone “whom it determines poses a continuing, serious threat to the United States”. Previously, the CIA had only a limited ability to detain specific individuals pending legal charges. The directive set in motion a process wherein the CIA established torture cells around the world, famously labeled as “Black sites,” where detainees were tortured. The first such detainee, commonly known as Abu Zubaydah, was captured in Pakistan in March 2002 and transferred to a black site in Thailand. The Bush Administration secured authorisation from Congress for the use of military force against whichever country they needed to attack. “The Bush administration initially uses the Authorisation for Use of Military Force (AUMF) to go after al-Qaeda and its Taliban sponsors in Afghanistan, but later expands its scope to include any forces “associated” with al-Qaeda around the world. The AUMF became the basis [PDF] for U.S. military actions in at least fourteen countries across Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia, including the proliferation of drone strikes under President Barack Obama, which raises ongoing concerns that the authorisation is used far beyond its original intent”.
We helped Americans shape this model, and now our arch enemy is emulating that model, and we are the victims
“After the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) invokes its collective self-defense mechanism for the first time, U.S. and UK forces begin air strikes against targets in Afghanistan. Ground forces follow within days. The U.S.-led invasion, called Operation Enduring Freedom, is supported by local anti-Taliban forces and troops from twenty-seven coalition countries. By December, the Taliban government collapses, but bin Laden evades capture. NATO assumed command of international security operations in 2003, and the occupation and counterinsurgency mission in Afghanistan continues for nearly two decades”.
How Israel emulated the American model:
Israel put GAZA under complete military siege after the October 7 attacks and subjected it to intense bombing using aircraft, artillery, and armor. GAZA was the first modern military campaign in which AI-governed military weapons, including Drones and precision ammunition, were used against innocent civilians. It was a brutal use of military power against people who were completely unarmed and a society that is a military non-entity. Western media describe it as a war, but nothing could be more preposterous than to describe the situation in Gaza as a war. War takes place between two belligerent parties where whereas in Gaza, there is only one belligerent, Israeli. Palestinians are the victims. A most prominent feature of the situation in Gaza is the reality of a completely helpless people subjected to bombings and raids by one of the most well-equipped military forces in the world. This is the crux of America's model of retribution: kill innocent and helpless civilians in societies that are potentially devoid of military manpower and valorise your military brutalities through the use of soft power, which your state controls. The Israeli soft power industry is not as powerful and penetrating as that of the United States and India. But nowadays it is not uncommon to watch Israeli-made feature movies, finding their way onto Netflix.
India’s failed attempt to emulate the American model:
Americans used their military power against military non-entities like Afghanistan or a militarily weak state like Iraq. Israelis used their military force against an absolute military non-entity like Gaza. But unfortunately for India, when it tried to emulate the American model, it came up against a militarily powerful state like Pakistan. The results were humiliating in the first phase. India was able to inflict considerable damage to Pakistani bases on the third day of the conflict, according to a New York Times report based on satellite images of Pakistani bases. But strategically, it was now equated with an economically much weaker state like Pakistan--the hyphen that Indians dreaded the most was back. The world started to advise Indian leadership that your terrorism problem has no battlefield solutions. The American model of retribution has, so far, been emulated by countries that are militarily powerful states.
The most ironic part of this situation is that the American model would never have succeeded in taking shape in the first place without the help of countries like Pakistan. A military government was in power in Pakistan when the American model was taking shape in this region. Our military government gave logistical, intelligence, and military bases to Americans to inflict damage on a country that was already completely devastated by a decades-long civil war. The Pakistan military government became its cheerleaders and provider of vital intelligence. We helped Americans shape this model, and now our arch enemy is emulating that model, and we are the victims. From a purely moral perspective, we are suffering from our own moral follies--we allowed rather than facilitated the devastation of a neighbouring country. Fortunately, our friends and neighbours didn’t behave as immorally as we did in the case of Afghanistan.
We can learn three lessons from this situation: First, our military power is something very precious in the jungle that this international system of states is fast transforming itself into. Therefore, this military power is not only to be preserved but also enhanced and harnessed under a democratic and civilian setup. Second lesson, never become a party to any international endeavor that would even remotely try to copy the American model of retribution. This will potentially turn against our own security interests. Thirdly, get rid of our internal political conflicts as quickly as possible, as they will potentially invite aggression from our Eastern border. A military power coming out of a divided or fractured society could be easily defeated. Or at least your enemy will perceive that they can defeat such a military power.