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NEW DELHI: The IAF now wants to debunk the conventional narrative, reinforced by blockbuster movie `Border’ in 1997, that the famous battle of Longewala was primarily won by the gallantry shown by the 120 infantry soldiers led by Major Kuldip Singh Chandpuri during the 1971 war.
A new book “The Epic Battle of Longewala”, written by Air Marshal Bharat Kumar (retd) after extensive research, contends it was actually airpower that decisively won the battle against Pakistan’s major armoured thrust at the border outpost in Rajasthan on December 5-6, 1971.
A meagre force of just six Hunter ground-attack jets based at the Jaisalmer airbase “destroyed or damaged over 40 Pakistani tanks” in successive attacks, making the rest of the tanks as well as the Pakistani infantry scurry back across the desert.