Stop calling Indira Gandhi a strong leader. She wasn't. If you have to impose Emergency & land your opponents in jail for no reason it is a sign of despotism not strength. If you watch over a mass sterilisation campaign, then it is a sign of sheer weakness & fickle-mindedness
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Anyway coming to the 1971 war. The propaganda has been such that Indira Gandhi stood tall against the US, defied Henry Kissinger and went ahead with the war. Of course, those who support this view are unimaginative. 1971 war took place in the Cold War era.
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These were the times of bipolar world order and it wasn't as if the US was in command of how the world went about. With USSR in the background, it was clear that the American presence was negated. That being said, Indira Gandhi's defiance of the US is somewhat overstated

3/n

And what after the War- India won on the battlefield because of the valiant efforts of the forces, but Indira Gandhi govt gave away the advantage on the diplomatic table. True Pak got divided into two. And that should have emboldened us further. We had 93,000 prisoners of war
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We also had some Pakistani territory under our control. Pak was devastated beyond recovery. This was the time that Indira Gandhi should have pressed for PoK. Complete integration of Kashmir into India could have been achieved. But what we got was Shimla Agreement

5/n

Bangladesh had already been irreversibly carved out but the pre-Summit dialogue focussed entirely upon recognising Bangladesh, rather than securing a peaceful solution for Kahsmir. Shimla Agreement only created an instrument for bilateral & peaceful negotiations on Kashmir

6/n

When India had already won the War, why did she secure peace from Pak? She couldn't enforce decisiveness despite India's decisive victory. This certainly isn't the trait of a strong leader. Had she been the leader she is made out to be, India would have won back PoK in 1971.

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