Overview

• President Trump told Republican lawmakers on July 19 that “five jets were shot down” during the 87-hour India-Pakistan clashes in May and that he secured the ceasefire by threatening to suspend trade talks
• New Delhi has flatly rejected any decisive U.S. intervention, reaffirming that military-to-military DGMO discussions on May 10 achieved the halt in hostilities
• Congress leaders Jairam Ramesh and Rahul Gandhi have demanded that Prime Minister Modi clarify Trump’s repeated assertions during the upcoming Monsoon Session of Parliament
• Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan acknowledged unspecified aircraft losses in the Indian Air Force but dismissed the focus on exact numbers as unimportant
• The May escalation followed the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack, which killed 26 civilians and prompted India’s Operation Sindoor strikes on terror camps across the Line of Control