“…If Thommo doesn’t get you, Lille will”

Director General Military Operations Lt Gen Rajiv Ghai drew on an old cricketing tale to emphasise the foolproof aspect of India’s integrated Air Command and Control System that neutralised most of the drones and missiles fired at Indian targets by the Pakistan military.

Australia’s fearsome pace duo of Jeff Thompson and Dennis Lillee, recalled Gen Ghai, struck such terror among the English batsmen in the 1970s that a chant would begin to go around the ground whenever the duo were in operation. “From Ashes to Ashes, from dust to dust, If Thommo don’t get ya, then Lillee surely must,” Gen Ghai said, adding the message he was conveying is obvious.

Prefacing his remarks by observing that a cricketing analogy seems appropriate on a day Virat Kohli announced his retirement from Test cricket, Gen Ghai said India’s layered air defence system ensured that incoming missiles or drone would run into one or the other counter measure. It could be the tried and tested shoulder fired legacy systems or the most modern air defence mechanism.

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