The terrorist attack on tourists in Pahalgam's Baisaran Valley left 26 people dead and over 20 were wounded. A meadow where families came to rest became a burial ground for their loved ones. The Resistance Front (TRF), a group believed to be an offshoot of the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and backed by Pakistan's deep state, is linked to the attack. Pakistan denies involvement. The script is familiar.
But behind this latest tragedy lies a decades-old reality - one that the US intelligence saw coming. In 1993, the CIA declassified a secret assessment. Buried inside it is the idea that Pakistan fears India. Not just economically or militarily, but existentially. The document, a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), studied the India-Pakistan dynamic and offered one conclusion: if war erupts, it will likely start with something like Kashmir, and Pakistan will be on the back foot from the beginning.
The 1993 Forecast
The NIE was prepared under Bruce Riedel, a seasoned CIA hand. It came at a time when India had just seen the demolition of the Babri Masjid (1992), and Pakistan was grappling with internal instability. Nuclear weapons were a silent threat, not yet tested, but very real.
The CIA analysts saw a slim "20 per cent" chance of full-scale war. But what worried them was the chain reaction - miscalculation, provocation, retaliation. A major terrorist incident, a misread military exercise, or sudden communal riots could trigger it.
The document also noted something critical - neither India nor Pakistan wanted war. But Pakistan, feeling dwarfed by India's growing power, was likely to act out of fear. This included supporting proxy groups in Kashmir or forming informal alliances with terrorists to offset India's influence.
The report didn't name TRF. That group didn't exist back then. But it warned of Pakistan's strategy of arming and training anti-India terrorists to "liberate Kashmir."
Pakistan's Strategic Fear
At the core of the CIA report was an uncomfortable truth for Islamabad. The balance of power had already tilted in India's favour. Economically, militarily, and diplomatically, New Delhi was rising, and Pakistan couldn't catch up. The gap wasn't just in firepower; it was also in stability.
India, for all its internal challenges, had stable governments and a growing economy. India was, at the time, led by Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao, with Dr Manmohan Singh as the finance minister.
Pakistan oscillated between military rule, political crises, and economic breakdowns. Fear, not confidence, drove its Kashmir policy.
The CIA assessment explicitly said that a shift in military balance could push Pakistan to open nuclear deployment or seek asymmetric warfare. That included terrorism - low-cost, high-impact operations designed to bleed India without open confrontation.
The 1993 document predicted that Pakistan might embrace Islamism not out of belief but as a tool. If an economic collapse came, or if a military dictator took charge, Pakistan could "join with militants" to distract the public and provoke India.
It also warned that India's domestic politics - if dominated by religious polarisation - could fuel more communal unrest, making Pakistan's meddling easier to justify at home.
The US' Role
The NIE wasn't just for internal CIA use. It was meant to brief the White House and State Department. Bill Clinton had taken office, and South Asia was gaining attention. The former US President would visit India seven years later in 2000, right on the day of the Chittisinghpura Massacre, where Pakistan's Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) killed 35 Sikh villagers.
The CIA warned to be careful. Confidence-building measures like hotlines and nuclear pacts were useful, but in a real crisis, they "might prove irrelevant." Verification was weak. Trust was thinner. Once violence began, leaders would rely on instinct, not protocol.
The NIE also captured what the Pahalgam attack has now reignited: "a spectacular terrorist outrage that one side could attribute to the other" might be all it takes.
Today, in Delhi, policymakers are flipping through that same scenario. More than thirty years later, the 1993 CIA document reads less like a historical paper and more like a warning label for the present.
