Пакистанская подводная лодка "Гази": обстоятельства гибели и тайны войны 1971 года.

Pakistan Navy submarine
the submarine named Ghazi, bought by the Pakistan Navy in 1975

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| Ship armament = *10 × torpedo tubes (6 forward, 4 aft), 28 torpedoes (previously USS Diablo (SS 479); reporting name: Ghazi), , was a diesel electric submarine, the first fast attack submarine in the Pakistan Navy. She was leased from the United States Navy in 1963. She served in the United States Navy from 1945 to 1963 and was loaned to Pakistan under the Security Assistance Program (SAP) on a four year lease after the Ayub administration successfully negotiated with the Kennedy administration for its procurement. In 1964, she joined the Pakistan Navy and saw military action in the Indo Pakistani theatres in the 1965 and, later in the 1971 wars. While the Indian Navy credits Ghazis sinking to its destroyer , the Pakistani military oversights and reviews stated that "the submarine sank due to either an internal explosion or accidental detonation of mines being laid by the submarine off the Visakhapatnam harbour". In 2010, it was revealed the Indian Navy destroyed all records of their investigations into this matter in 1980 after the Indo Pakistani War of 1971. Nonetheless, Indian historians consider the sinking of Ghazi to be a notable event; as they have described the sinking as one of the "last unsolved greatest mysteries of the 1971 war."

The mysterious sinking of Ghazi took place on 4 December 1971 during its hunt to find Vikrant and/or during the minelaying mission on the Visakhapatnam Port, Bay of Bengal. On 19 November she was off to Sri Lanka and entered the Bay of Bengal on 20 November 1971. Unable to detect her target, PNS Ghazis commanders became disillusioned about their hunt for Vikrant and turned back to Visakhapatnam to start laying mines off the harbour with a confidence that it would take a swipe at INS Vikrant or at least bottle up the Indian Navy's heavy units clustered in this major Indian naval base on the night of 2–3 December 1971.") under mysterious circumstances

On 26 November 1971, Ghazi was expected to communicate with the Navy NHQ to submit its mission report but did not communicate with its base. The Navy NHQ repeatedly made frantic efforts to establish the communication and anxiety grew as days passed for her return to the base. India credits the INS Rajput for sinking Ghazi and her crew were honored with gallantry awards for this event, but the actual details of Ghazis sinking became unclear, as new narratives soon began to emerge after the war. However, Admiral Hiranandani maintained that the submarine almost certainly suffered an internal explosion but its causes are debatable. In 2003, the Indian Navy again sent its divers to overlook its investigation and the divers recovered some items including the war logs, official backup tapes from her computers, and mission files that were sent to the Eastern Naval Command of the Indian Navy. The divers who studied the wreckage confirmed that the submarine must have suffered an internal explosion which blew up its mines and torpedoes. Another theory suggests an explosion of hydrogen gas which built up inside the submarine while its batteries were being charged underwater. Jacob also stated in the article that the Indian Navy had no information about the sinking of Ghazi until they were informed by the local fishermen the next day. One of the retired navy officer who saw action in 1971 said that the destruction of the Ghazi papers and those of the army in Kolkata depicts the many instances when Indian war history has been deliberately falsified. He further stated that 'We have enough heroes. In the fog of war, many myths and false heroes may have been created and many honest ones left unsung'. Parkash later published an article in Indian media in 2021 in which he stated that PNS Ghazi sank due to an internal explosion.

In 1972, the Hamoodur Rahman Commission (HRC) never carried out an investigation into this incident despite its formation to assess the military and political failures of the country in the war of 1971. It was only on 10 February 1972, when the incident was officially recognised by the Government of Pakistan and then President Zulfikar Bhutto met with the grieving families and loved ones of the officers and sailors who served in Ghazi, and told them that they may have all perished due to this incident as many of the slain family members were pushing for repatriation to the Government of Pakistan as they were keeping the hope alive that they may have survived and rescued by India. Pakistani military oversights into this incident were not immediate. Instead, the Naval Intelligence took time to conclude its investigations that went on for several years. Another theory from foreign experts, also favoured by Pakistan, is that the explosive shock waves from one of the depth charges set off the torpedoes and mines (some of which may have been armed for laying) stored aboard the submarine. From information found in the investigation conducted on the cause of the loss of the American submarine USS Cochino, it is possible that the lead acid battery vented explosive hydrogen gas while charging underwater. Henceforth the hydrogen gas, if not properly vented, could have accumulated into an explosive concentration.

An independent testimony stems from an Egyptian naval officer who was at that time serving on an Egyptian submarine which was undergoing refit in the harbour. He has confirmed the occurrence of a powerful explosion in the vicinity of the harbor late at night. There were no naval ships, as reported by this officer, outside the harbor at that time and it was not until about an hour after the explosion that two Indian naval ships were observed leaving harbor. Some independent writers and investigators maintained Ghazi was sunk mysteriously not by two depth charges alone, Ghazi may have sunk either by the hydrogen explosion produced when the batteries were charging, or by the detonation of a mine, or either by the sea floor impact while trying to avoid the depth charge released by INS Rajput.

In 1972, both the United States and the Soviet Union offered to raise the submarine to the surface at their expense. After the war, President Richard Nixon forgave the remaining debt of Ghazi to Pakistan when the U. S. Navy's CNO Admiral Elmo Zumwalt visited Admiral Mohammad Shariff in Calcutta in 1972. At the Naval Dockyard in Karachi, a 'Ghazi Monument' was built to perpetuate the memory of the submarine and its 93 men. In 1974, the naval base, PNS Zafar, was commissioned and constructed in the memory of Commander Zafar Muhammad Khan that now serves as the headquarter for Northern Naval Command. Her loss to the Pakistan Navy through an accident was a watershed and a significant event, leading the Navy's engineering to the implementation of a rigorous submarine safety programme. Another movie, Untold Stories: Ghazi and Hangor were sponsored and released by the ISPR to commemorate Ghazi and her crew during their missions in 1971.