The Patton Wreckers by Brig Khutub Hai (Hardcover)

Description

On the night of September 7, 1965, Pakistan launched a surprise offensive on the Kasur-Khem Karan axis with its prized 1 Armoured Division comprising the latest M48 Patton tanks and M113 Armoured Personnel Carriers. The objective was to capture the bridges on the Sutlej and Beas Rivers that would cut off Punjab from the rest of India, threaten Amritsar and lay open the road to Delhi. To oppose them was a hastily prepared defensive position at Asal Uttar by 4 Mountain Division and 3 Cavalry, an armoured Regiment comprised of Centurion tanks. At the end of the four-day battle, the ruins of over 90 Patton tanks lay strewn in the sugarcane fields around Asal Uttar – an area aptly called the ‘Graveyard of the Patton tank’. 3 Cavalry on its own destroyed over 68 tanks, mainly Pattons and had been instrumented in the annihilation of the vanguard of the famed Pak 1 Armoured Division. Thus, the threat to Punjab was over. According to the military historian Steve Zaloga, Pakistan admitted that they lost 165 tanks during the 1965 War and more than half were knocked out during the debacle at Asal Uttar. This is the story of the heroic actions and deeds of 3 Cavalry in  the Battle of Asal Uttar, which has been called the most decisive battle of the Indo-Pak War of 1965.