Your editorial of August 12 headlined, 'Shooting down peace', failed to look at some obvious facts.
You referred to an ' . . unarmed propeller-driven plane . . . '. I wonder how you came to the conclusion that the Pakistani plane was 'unarmed'. The plane in question, a French-built Atlantique maritime surveillance plane, is capable of carrying deadly weapons like Exocet missiles and also the plane failed to respond to the repeated warnings flashed by the Indian MiG pilots. Indian pilots did exactly what the rules of engagement call for in such a situation.
You also overlooked the fact that the intrusion made by the highly sophisticated Pakistani surveillance plane (which resulted in it being downed) into Indian airspace was the ninth violation since May this year and hence the onus of this unwanted incident falls squarely on Pakistan. Any other responsible sovereign country would have acted in a similar manner faced with such a situation. Can you guess what the PRC would have done had such a surveillance plane come across the Taiwan Strait and violated its airspace for the ninth time? NABENDU PAL Lafayette, Louisiana, US
