Mapping India’s doctrinal movement

In his very first extended interview, in the run up to Army Day in January of 2017, General Bipin Rawat got off the mark by publicly dusting the army’s conventional war doctrine, its ‘proactive strategy’ dubbed as Cold Start. Earlier chiefs were rather coy, unwilling to own up the doctrine dating to 2004 lest it shows India as a state with an offensive intent. One chief even denied that any such doctrine exists.

On the sub-conventional doctrine front, recently, the general has gone on to award Major Leetul Gogoi for quick thinking in use of a ‘human shield’ against stone throwers in the Kashmir Valley. This comes on the heels of his threatening those impeding ongoing operations in Kashmir that they would be treated as ‘over-ground workers’ (OGW). Many in the Valley recall that at least some occupants of the 2000 plus unmarked graves across the Valley were ‘OGW’, mostly Jamaatis taken as the front of the Hizbul and the Lashkar by the security forces back in the nervous nineties.

When Jawaharlal Nehru sent the army to quell the Naga rebellion in the mid-fifties, he was keen that the army should earn the respect of the people. While General Rawat has made it amply clear that he prefers that people should be ‘afraid’ of the army.

A movement in India’s nuclear doctrine - how and when it plans to use nuclear weapons - has also been detected by avid analysts in their close reading of the joint doctrine, Joint Doctrine: Indian Armed Forces, released earlier in April this year.

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The joint doctrine in its reference to the nuclear doctrine described it as ‘credible deterrence’ instead of ‘credible minimum deterrence’. While to one analyst, the omission suggests ignorance on part of the drafters, this is too glaring to have been less than deliberate. The ‘minimum’ in the nuclear doctrine stood for deterrence-by-punishment based on holding a few counter-value targets of the nuclear adversary hostage to his good behaviour.

By eliminating ‘minimum’, analysts fear that India appears to be headed towards a warfighting nuclear doctrine. The two possible answers to Pakistani nuclear first use by employing tactical nuclear weapons, would be proportionate response and preemptive first strike. Both the responses require large numbers; thereby, impinging on ‘minimum’ and making the term expendable.  

The across-the-board doctrinal movement is not surprising.

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Fearing criticism from the strategic community - the self-styled guardians of national security in New Delhi with the current-day National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval being one of its leaders - the UPA I government was not able to clinch the peace feelers it had sent out to Pakistan and Kashmir.

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The strategic community, amongst whom were many closet cultural nationalist and current day Modi ‘bhakts’, closed ranks behind Ajit Doval in the later UPA II years. This further held up UPA II, as it didn't want to appear to be outflanked by the right wing for being ‘soft’ on Pakistan or in Kashmir. The final nail in the UPA coffin was the drafting of a press release in 2013 by Vivekananda International Foundation, a think tank then headed by Ajit Doval. In retrospect, the press release, with its hardline stance on Pakistan can be seen as precursor of a strategic manifesto.

While the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was on the campaign trail, Doval – perhaps by then sounded out that he would get the coveted post of NSA - projected himself as holding a mild, ‘defensive offence’, perspective on the use of force. However, as a national security czar, Doval has since pursued the Doval doctrine, encapsulated in the phrase ‘You do one more Mumbai, and you lose Baluchistan’.

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While the actions on the nuclear level have been kept below the radar, muscle flexing on the conventional and sub-conventional level has been rather visible lately. ‘Surgical strikes’ have been witnessed on both the eastern and western fronts. It is back to fire assaults at the LoC and cordon and search sweeps in the Valley. The army chief reprised the ‘two and half front war’ trope, more than five years after it was last heard of. Some $200 billion are lined up for acquisitions over the coming decade. These are fallout of the Doval doctrine, which passes for the overarching strategic doctrine lending direction to India’s military doctrines.

The UPA II saw India move from offensive deterrence to offensive, under hyper nationalist and cultural nationalist pressure. Under the present dispensation, India’s strategic doctrine has moved towards what can be called “compellence”. Military doctrines, keeping pace, consequently have had to become more aggressive.

The dangers are in the inter-linkages between the levels of the conflict spectrum: nuclear-conventional-sub-conventional. With more ‘surgical strikes’ on the cards, the buffer between sub-conventional and the conventional level has been done away with. Pakistan had early on whittled the divide between the conventional and nuclear levels. In absence of any distinction between the levels, there is a short fuse to conflict and conflict is set to escalate in short order.

The problem with compellence – what Doval’s doctrine advocates - is that the onus of throwing in the towel is with the target, Pakistan. India appears to be relying on Pakistan’s strategic good sense in knowing when to play ball.  Though General Rawat has signaled as much to Pakistan (‘If you (Pakistan) accept peace, we will go along’), alongside he noted that there is a ‘dirty war’ on in Kashmir.

Clearly, Pakistan is unfazed. Compellence does not seem to be working. This might force India to tweak compellence further. When it does, it would likely find - at some cost to itself - that the doctrinal movement has not made India any safer.

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The Parrikar thesis

Manohar Parrikar can be excused the exaggeration when speaking back home in his backyard in Goa. On that count and since by now he has a reputation for shooting from his mouth, we can let the macabre in his allusion to ‘gouge out eyes’ of the enemy pass. However, is his declaration that Pakistanis have thrown in the towel - a trifle premature?

The way the defence minister put it, the Pakistanis hurting from a bout of cross border and trans-Line of Control (LoC) firing, sought out our Director General Military Operations (DGMO) to call a truce.  They have reportedly kept their side of the bargain since. Perhaps Raheel Sharif wanted to retire with a blaze of gunfire in the background, lest the memory of surgical strikes plagues him in retirement. 

Nevertheless, this is all for the good, since civilian casualties were also being regularly reported on both sides. These were of levels beyond what might be reasonably clubbed as collateral damage. Pakistanis, while appearing responsive to the pleading of their border populace, are interested in turning down the heat so that their army is spared paying for what the jihadis wrought.

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The pitch is higher this time as evident from the surgical strikes, mutilations, attacks on military targets in the interior and the political rhetoric in India. Presumably for deterrence and as punishment, Parrikar threatens to give back double of what India receives. Does this help India in any way?

The terror attack in Nagrota is just another instance of a pattern of attacks over the past few years in which Pakistan has exacted a toll on our security forces. It has evidently moved away from targeting civilians in wake of the opprobrium it was subjected to post 26/11 Mumbai attacks.

The move is sensible from Pakistani point of view. Politically, it keeps the pot boiling in Kashmir, suggesting externally that all is not quite in Kashmir and internally to Kashmiris that they have not been entirely abandoned by it. Militarily, it helps tie down the Indian army in protective duties, thereby, tiring it out.

Then there is the culture of chowkidari in Indian army. The army throws manpower at every problem, ranging from warding of China (with a mountain strike corps) to grass cutting (with fatigue details). It can be expected to continue doing so as reflected in its recruiting and training systems.

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However, the potential for Kashmir to boil over at a crunch is clear from the 133 days standoff across the state this summer. While India has sufficient paramilitary adept at suppressive duties in such conditions, they would likely aggravate the situation in the circumstance of war. Pakistan can thus potentially tie down the Rashtriya Rifles too. 

The upshot is that the offensive forces India has for deploying against Pakistan cannot upset the status quo in Kashmir. As they say, ‘mountains eat troops’. Mr. Modi’s reference to Pakistan Occupied Kashmir and Gilgit and Baltistan from the Red Fort ramparts is but chimerical.

Sure, India has offensive capability in the plains. While the offensive content of pivot corps can be blunted by Pakistan, India has locked up its offensive punch in strike corps, which can be unusable in the nuclear age. This has more to do with internal turf wars within the military than a war winning strategy . 

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The logical next steps from surgical strikes and demonetization is war. Pratap Bhanu Mehta calls this a permanent revolution. India can blame Pakistan for making it go nuclear. Even so, India has not come up with an answer to break out of  the Pakistani sandwich of its conventional forces with irregular  war on one hand and nuclear war on the other. 

Consequently, if probed, Parrikar would be hard put to explain his thesis that India can put Pakistan’s ‘gouged out eyes’ back in its hand.  Gouging out eyes can certainly be done. India has the kilo tonnage for that, but putting the eyes back in Pakistan’s hand would be a tall order. For in the bargain India would also be blind.

The myth of ‘strategic restraint’

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In mid-2013, a group, referring to itself as ‘members of India’s strategic community’, brought out a press statement at their haunt, the Vivekananda International Foundation that read: ‘It is time that policies are devised that will impose a cost on Pakistan for its export of terror to India, and thus change the cost-benefit calculus of these policies and actions. A proactive approach by India towards Pakistan must be the order of the day, as it will yield us much better results than those garnered by policies of appeasement which have regrettably been pursued by us for years.’[1]

The group amongst which was Mr. Doval, current day national security adviser, has since captured the national security policy making establishment. The results are self-evident, with India’s Pakistan policy taking a final policy turn – after several ‘pirouettes’, in one apt phrasing. Today, if prime time strategists are to be believed, India is following a doctrine of strategic proactivism, jettisoning the strategic restraint of the preceding NDA and UPA periods.

The jury is still out on whether the shift is indeed as marked as its votaries shout about. After all, a set of ‘surgical strikes’ in wake of the Uri attack, are not qualitatively different from those India has reportedly engaged in over the years, dating back to Sharad Pawar’s stint at the defence ministry’s helm. Only, now India is acknowledging outright what it has been at all along, and, while doing so, noticeably couching its language so as to align its action with international law and with the tenets of limitation in the nuclear age.

There are two divergent inferences from this lack of shift: one that the strategic doctrine does indeed continue to be one of strategic restraint; and, two, that what passed for strategic restraint earlier was instead - unacknowledged and misinterpreted - strategic proactivism. Agreeing with the proactive strategy votaries, here a case is made that the second inference is more in accord with reality.

Contrary to the conventional  thinking, the argument here is that strategic restraint is a myth and that India instead has a healthier record of strategic proactivism, though kept well under wraps till Mr. Modi stepped up to unwrap it in the run up to a consequential round of elections in UP and Punjab soon.   

Those spearheading strategic restraint rummage the cupboard of history to make their case that India has been a power always imposed on by nefarious neighbours, particularly Muslims to its north west. This explains their reject of the last thousand year strategic history of the subcontinent as not quite ‘Indian’ since India’s strategic trajectory was not dictated by natives as much as foreigners, with Muslims settled in India for over half a millennium continuing to be regarded as foreigners, including the likes of southerner Tipu Sultan.

A reading of the introductory chapter to the book India’s Wars,[2] by a member of the – by all accounts - apolitical and secular military brass and on the faculty of an august institution that turns out its future higher commanders, informs as much. He writes that he is ‘inclined to look at the Mughals as foreigners who ravaged India.’ He finds the Haidar-Tipu sojourn in the Deccan as relatively short and therefore not worth including alongside the martial exploits of the contemporaneous Marathas and Sikhs to his dating of the origin of the modern Indian army. He chooses to miss out on an opportunity to rehearse the secular imagery - Ranjit Singh, a Sikh; the Peshwas, Hindus; and Tipu, a Muslim – keeping colonialism at bay. His wards at the National Defence College cannot exit its portals unscathed by such history telling. Since this mythology shall get wider as the Modi era firms in, it is best exposed sooner than later. 

The more popular discourse within strategic circles – reproduced in the book – is that India – ever the ‘good guy’ - has since Independence been on the receiving end of its neighbours. That it did go on to retake PoK in 1949, has left regaining it as the ‘unfinished business of Partition’ – a newly minted interpretation of the phrase used hitherto by its adversary. In 1962, instead of throwing in the towel, Nehru should have chased the Chinese back, and used air power to do so, since they would have been caught on the wrong side of the Himalayas in the fast approaching winter then.

In 1965, India should have proceeded with the war beyond its three weeks since Pakistan was exhausted. In this line of thinking, giving back Haji Pir later at Tashkent is the quintessential example of India’s softness. In 1971, India should have used the PoWs as pawns in getting Pakistan to give up its Kashmir obsession. In the various crises unleashed by mega terror incidents, India should have ‘taught Pakistan a (military) lesson’. That it has apparently finally followed their advice explains the loud cheers following the Uri riposte.

All this papers over India’s proactivism. In 1947, it was first off the military-blocks by refraining from signing the Standstill Agreement even as it interestedly watched the Maharaja borrow its proxies, the Patiala State forces, for operations in Kashmir. Later, the timely arrival of its regular army led to chasing the tribal invaders back to Uri. In 1962, its ‘forward policy’ prompted in some measure the Chinese invasion. In 1965, it pulled the rug from under Pakistan by stretching the war zone to include the Lahore front from Pakistan’s plan to keep it confined to Kashmir. It returned Haji Pir in order to incentivize the firming in the ceasefire line as a mutually acceptable finality. It vivisected Pakistan in a well thought through intelligence, diplomatic and military operation over the better part of 1971. It is foolish to sell the notion that it could have ignored its compulsions under the Geneva Conventions to keep Pakistani troops hostage to Pakistan signing on the dotted line giving away Kashmir. It was assertive all through the eighties, be it in Sri Lanka or internally in Punjab.

By the nineties, it rightly understood that it was in the nuclear age. Internally, it deployed its army to quell the insurgency in Kashmir and Assam. The claim that IK Gujral shut down the R&AW’s external operations itself suggests that these were well in hand; and it also needs noting that the Gujral doctrine of unilateral concessions to neighbors had one notable exception, Pakistan.

In wake of terror attacks, the consistent call in the Delhi-centric strategic community has been to militarily take down Pakistan a peg or two. The army came up with a doctrine to enable India to do so, Cold Start. India’s devotion of a proportion of its liberalization-expanded national cake to gain the wherewithal to do so, indicates strategic proactivism not of the immediate kind but a future oriented one. This does not in any way make it less ‘proactive’, at least not where it matters, in General HQ, Rawalpindi. Alongside, the several attacks on Indian consulates across the Durand Line, suggests that it checkmated Pakistan’s redoubtable ISI in its own backyard, Afghanistan. The insertion of the reference to Baluchistan by Pakistan to the meeting’s outcome as far back as in the Sharm es Shaikh meeting in 2009 indicates that Indian interests in Baluchistan are not particularly recent. Diplomatically, India not only de-hyphenated itself from Pakistan and got up close to the US, but has managed to distance the US from its ‘most allied ally’ Pakistan.    

It is apparent that India’s strategic postures and actions cannot easily be taken as strategic restraint. Instead, strategic restraint was not so much a misnomer, but appears to have been conjured to dull attention to India’s strategic moves. It helped justify the moves as resulting from neighbours ganging up to pose it a ‘two front’ problem. It obscured the security dilemma of its principal neighbour stemming from India’s low-profile strategic proactivism, including of the long-term kind.

Strategic restraint did involve keeping the military sheathed for good reasons, but being militarily restrained does not fully equate with strategic restraint, since strategy has several instruments at its command – intelligence, diplomacy, economic - all of which more than compensated for any military restraint. At tripling of the defence budget over this century cannot by any stretch qualify as military restraint either.

In effect, India has been strategically proactive for long, only now its people are being let in on the state secret. Acknowledging this is the first step back from the nuclear brink. Newly minted strategic proactivism entails not only going too far but also to be seen to be doing to. Against a Muslim red rag held by equally charged religious extremists, this is a sure recipe for nuclear disaster. Averting this requires, as the second step, adopting strategic restraint for real.

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[1] VIF, ‘Press Statement on India-Pakistan Relations by Members of India’s Strategic Community’,

http://www.vifindia.org/event/report/2013/august/09/press-statement-on-india-pakistan-relations-by-members-of-india-s-strategic-community

[2] Arjun Subramaniam, India’s  Wars: A Military History 1947-1971, New Delhi: Harper  Collins, 2016. 

Modi worsens India’s doctrinal muddle

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The current time on the Doomsday Clock of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists is set at three minutes to midnight. Had there been such a clock for South Asia, it would have oscillated between four and five minutes to nuclear reckoning.

However, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s stopover late last year at Lahore on his return trip from Moscow had the potential to set a hypothetical South Asian Doomsday Clock back by a couple of minutes.

Even so, the terrorist attack on the Pathankot airfield demonstrates that the additional minutes gained between now and nuclear reckoning by the outbreak of India-Pakistan bonhomie may not be good enough.  

What needs to be done is clear: setting back the South Asian Doomsday Clock finally and for good. This would require bringing India’s emerging strategic doctrine i.e the organising principles and ideas on which national security and foreign policy are based  in sync with its military - defence and nuclear - doctrine.

The prime minister’s speech to the military brass gathered aboard INS Vikramaditya for the Combined Commanders’ conference provides a starting point for identifying the doctrinal disconnect that needs reconciling.

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Strategically, better relations are important from the point of view of South Asia being hostage to the success of the next set of would-be jihadis. For illustration, had the jihadis succeeded in destroying a few aircrafts on the Pathankot airfield, the fallout from the attack would have been markedly different.

Ajit Doval, the National Security Advisor (NSA) forced on the back-foot by the controversial response, would have been left with little personal option than to recommend a hard response. An embarrassed government with little clue – judging from the ‘foot in mouth’ wrangle its defence and home ministers got it into following the Pathankot episode – would have seized war as the option, even if its foreign ministerruled that out only a fortnight ago.

Here Modi’s outlining of the military doctrine at the conference kicks in. He articulated it thus: “We need capabilities to win swift wars, for we will not have the luxury of long drawn battles.”

Little does Modi’s speech writer know that neither of these – ‘swift wars’ nor ‘long drawn battles’ – are in India’s interest. While long drawn battles are self-evidently unaffordable, ‘swift wars’ on that account are no more appealing, since wrapping up wars swiftly is easier said than done.

A potential scenario on the western front illustrates this. 

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If India generates a 1965 war like situation on the western front - in which its valiant forces actually crossed the Ichhogil Canal only to be called back - the denouement this time round would be different. It is unlikely that, Pakistan would give up the fight like it did in 1971.

It could instead be stampeded into hasty decisions. Pakistan’s foreign secretary has only last September officially let on that Pakistan would go nuclear with tactical nuclear weapons.

India’s possible nuclear response has been reinforced by Modi in his speech thus: “Our strategic deterrence is robust and reliable, in accordance with our nuclear doctrine, and our political will is clear.”

In effect, he promises retaliation will be in accord with India’s nuclear doctrine: ‘massive’ irrespective of the type of nuclear first use by Pakistan. Such an exercise of ‘political will’ by India’s Political Council of its Nuclear Command Authority would certainly be genocidal and since Pakistan has a lead on India in terms of warhead numbers, it would also be suicidal.

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The doctrinal disconnect has been brought out by the military advisor in National Security Council Secretariat, who writing in a Ministry of Defence think tank’s publication, Journal of Defence Studies (p. 61), says:

"If the nuclear shadow demanded war avoidance as a political outcome, the operational sphere attempted to keep alive the notion of victory despite the risk of mutual annihilation ... operational doctrines that are not nested in a realistic political context."

While it appears that Modi’s strategic doctrine is a product of his national security staff, he has inherited a military doctrine predicated on a ‘short war’. He acknowledges that there is much to be done. In his speech, he said, “we look to our Armed Forces to prepare for the future. And, it cannot be achieved by doing more of the same, or preparing perspective plans based on outdated doctrines....”

The problem is that his solution in the speech is based on ‘outdated doctrine’. The prime minister feels “our forces and our government need to do more to reform their beliefs, doctrines, objectives and strategies.” Rectifying the disconnect between strategic and military doctrines must be on in the busy Sardar Patel Bhawan, the site of the National Security Council Secretariat.

Clearly, India cannot resolve the doctrinal muddle alone, it has to do so in league with Pakistan. Doctrinal reconciliation is predicated on Modi keeping up the promise in his reference to “the NSA-level dialogue (designed) to bring security experts face to face with each other.” That the two NSAs met once again, this time in Dubai, is a positive sign towards this end.

Even so, Modi appears to hedge his bets. His caveat to his changed Pakistan policy is indicative: “we will test their intentions to define the path ahead ... But, we will never drop our guard on security and we will continue to judge progress on their commitments on terrorism.”

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Putting off foreign secretary talks suggests that India has not quite turned a corner. While Pakistan has taken action to rein in the Jaish-e-Mohammad it can be hazarded that its chief Maulana Masood Azhar would be back on the streets sooner than later, giving India another excuse to ease up on talks.

This is no way to push back the South Asian Doomsday Clock. Only doing so ensures that “the effort is worth it, because the peace dividends are huge and the future of our children is at stake.” There would be no future in case the next bunch of jihadis pushes the Clock across the midnight hour.

Fighting the ISIS: Why India should measure its steps

http://indiatogether.org/fighting-the-isis-op-ed                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, while interacting with the press at the wreath laying ceremony commemorating the 1971 victory anniversary at Amar Jawan Jyoti, said, "We have made it clear that if there is a UN resolution and if there is UN flag and a UN mission, then as per India's policy to operate under UN flag, we will participate."

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There are two dimensions to the unfolding game. One lies in addressing the fighting between the Russia-supported Assad regime and the US-supported rebels. The second and more daunting prospect is dealing with the ISIS. Rationally, the first should precede the second.

It is not clear what Parrikar has in mind. If he is referring to the first then it can be reasonably backed. After all, the conflict has seen 250000 deaths and over 10 million displaced or refugees. Halting the fighting politically and bringing in UN peacekeeping forces for overseeing the ceasefire and follow-up political arrangements can only be taken as urgent and necessary.

Indian participation can easily be seen as facilitating the above. It is, after all, on top of the table of UN peacekeeping contributors alongside Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal. It would also be in keeping with this tradition and its national security stakes including a voice in the Security Council. As it is, Indian blue helmets are already in close vicinity of the fighting in Lebanon and the Golan Heights.

However, Parrikar appears to have had the second in mind – military operations against the ISIS albeit under a UN flag. There are two aspects to this: the UN-mandated operation and the foe, ISIS.

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It can easily be seen why India might like to sign up. It wishes to be on the high table. It makes up with military might what it lacks in diplomatic heft. Especially where ‘boots on ground’ matter, it is streets ahead of all armies. Since cleaning out the ISIS would require troops, It is also easily understood why the US may look to India.

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The manner in which the media campaign has shaped up since Russia joined the fray and the Paris attacks occurred makes it difficult to argue against participating in wrapping up the ISIS. India is determined to place itself in the same corner as those fighting the ISIS under the garb of fighting terrorism. Soon after the Paris attacks it invited the French President for gracing the next Republic Day parade.

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There are internal political reasons that should not be discounted. The deep wellsprings of cultural nationalism are watered by a belief of Muslim domination of Hindus over the last millennium. Here is an opportunity for Hindu power to stride across Muslim lands. The internal political utility of such projection would be in suitably cowing India’s Muslims, their red rag.

The rationale would be their susceptibility to outside blandishment towards terrorism – witnessed over the last two decades through their hobnobbing with Pakistan’s ISI. This necessitates tackling the problem at its origin. Watch this argument being trotted out over the following months by closet right wing strategists.

Words of caution

That said, anticipatory arguments against premature commitment to military adventurism are in order. The ISIS is all that the western media says, and more. It is an ogre. It is however not a monolith. The West and Russia have good reasons to want to get rid of it. Its rise shows up their underside.

The West has flirted with radical Islam not only for strategic heft against Soviet Union initially, but also in this case against Assad. Russia has trampled Chechnya and the Russians in the ISIS is a blowback brewing. The ISIS is resident in an Iraqi Sunni populace with its own political and strategic moorings. To add to complexity, a proportion of its funding is from Arab sources alienated from their feudal regimes to an extent that cosmetic elections as the latest one in Saudi Arabia are simply too late salvage.

A military roll back of ISIS, even with the powers on the same page, would be to address symptoms. This means that just as ISIS succeeded Al Qaeda, there would be another new kid on the block. The military way as currently underway does not lend confidence that it is sufficiently cognizant of the laws of war. Incessant bombing of populated areas is on. It is hard to believe that the ISIS is sitting out in the desert without its human shields.

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It is apparent that photo opportunities of the kind Prime Minister Modi is indulging in -- such as those showing him aboard IAF choppers providing relief in Chennai or onboard an aircraft carrier -- are being taken too seriously. Overconfidence in the military also calls for a warning. A brass that could not convince its political leadership that a combined commanders’ conference is not like a political party’s jamboree is not one that can be relied on to pull off peace enforcement half a continent away.

The only positive spin one can make of the statement is that India is perhaps under pressure from the USA to sign up for an impending ‘Coalition of the Willing II’, which it rightly wishes to avoid. Therefore, its insistence on UN resolution, which in the circumstance of peace enforcement in Iraq or Syria may be difficult to come by.

Pakistani “idiocy”: A general gets it half right

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General KJ Singh, commanding general of Western Command, brought the curtain down on the half year long celebrations of the fiftieth anniversary of the 1965 War in just the way he began the commemoration, by attending a seminar at a university. In February he spoke at Punjabi University in Patiala and this month again at the Punjab University, Chandigarh.

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That perhaps explains the general playing to the gallery in his Chandigarh address: “It (Pakistan) does something silly in ’47 with Razakars and which it repeats in ’65 and wants to do it again in Kargil, despite the famous saying that doing the same thing again and again and expecting results is the hallmark of being idiotic. Yet it is a country which we have to face.”

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As far as the military is concerned the water that has flown past the bridge includes considerable amount of exchange of ordnance across the Line of Control. The general’s own Command’s exercise, Brahmashira, apparently failed to impress General Raheel Sharifacross the border, who growled that whatever the type of war, ‘cold start or hot start’ the price exacted would be ‘unbearable damage’.

In Kashmir, though the army managed to kill the mastermind of the Udhampur terror attack, reportedly 30000 turned up for his funeral. Clearly, Mr. Modi’s Rs. 80000 crores cannot buy back Kashmiris.

Diplomatically, there has been a hold up in possible talks with Pakistan, with a pow-wow between NSAs being called off and consequent suspension of follow-up talks between the military operations heads. The situation is such that there is an active discussion now in strategic circles on limited war and limited nuclear war possibilities, with Americans in the lead as prospective peace brokers in case of the latter.

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Reaction to action

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In the 1947 War, Pakistan, taking cue from India’s actions in Junagadh that came to a head between mid-September and late October, jumped the gun for the bigger prize, Kashmir. Since there were no wholly Muslim units in the British Indian army after the 1857 rebellion, it did not have regular forces to force the Maharaja’s hand. It therefore employed demobilised soldiers from World War II to lead the tribal invasion.

Its hand in the 1965 War was forced by India’s moves to normalize its relationship with Kashmir. Assessing that keeping its stake alive required military action, it mistook Shastri’s sense of resolve. The least expensive option was adopted, irregular warfare with induction of infiltrators. Interesting, the Pakistan army web-pages make no mention of this episode in its history.

The first moves of the 1971 War were made by India when it clipped off Pakistan’s access to East Pakistan by banning over-flights after the eminently questionable hijacking episode of an Indian Airlines plane, Ganga, to Lahore. A vulnerable Pakistan overreacted through a crackdown in East Pakistan, which was capitalized on with unseemly alacrity by India.

Retrospect suggests that the Indian aim was to cut Pakistan and it’s military to size in order to force a decision on Kashmir on it. If the manner of observance of the fiftieth anniversary of the 1965 War is a guide, six years hence military history will undoubtedly edit out India’s culpability in arming the militants and its implications for the Pakistani genocide out of the frame.

The Kargil War was essentially an extension of the ongoing fight along the Line of Control. An energetic General Musharraf, who had signed his military record with his inability to take back Bana peak in Siachen, went about doing a ‘reverse Siachen’ to India. One advantage at some cost to Pakistan was to heighten and lengthen the fighting in Kashmir by the induction of ‘fidayeen’.

Between these military trysts, both states were equally proactive. After the 1971 War, India switched from its military doctrine of defensive defence to a counter offensive doctrine, predicated on a replay of East Pakistan on mainland Pakistan. In the eighties, its profligate military spending enabled this capability and by the nineties it had three strike corps, one more than Pakistan, giving it an ability to prevail. No wonder Pakistan attempted to actively tie down India’s army in Kashmir.

In the 2000s, India moved to an explicitly offensive doctrine, Cold Start, which in the 2010s is relatively well practiced. As a measure of its capability, it is set to hold the largest exercise of the decade – currently unnamed - this month. This despite the knowledge that Pakistan’s foreign secretary put across unmistakably in September, to the effect that Pakistan is pledged to ‘go nuclear’ in response.

This brief strategic history reveals that wars and militarisation have failed to impress Pakistan. Therefore, for India to persist down the military path, it would do better to avoid the term ‘idiotic’. This would also mean that the general is only half right in restricting the description to Pakistan.

If, as the general says, ‘it (Pakistan) is a country which is going to remain a problem for us’, we have had a hand in it. Our current hard nosed military stance, plausibly deniable intelligence operations and diplomatic chill are what ensure that Pakistan will remain a problem for us. Indeed, acknowledging that we have done no better may be the first step to recovering strategic sanity in the nuclear age.

The military musical chairs

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With the Bihar elections hogging all the attention in the news, an interesting development noted by military watchers is liable to be missed. A former military secretary informs that an unprecedented number of army appointments are currently vacant, including two very sensitive posts - Director General Military Operations, and Military Secretary.

What does this imply?

A positive answer to this could be that the government may be looking to create the appointment of Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) or permanent Chairman of the Chiefs’ of Staff Committee (COSC), as the case may be. This could entail a wider reshuffle and this may be holding up the filling in of vacancies.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE - http://indiatogether.org/military-musical-chairs-op-ed

In addition to the joint commands, Andaman and Nicobar Command and the Strategic Forces Command, and the HQs Integrated Defence Staff, there are a host of joint commands in the offing that would require single-point oversight: special operations command, cyber and space commands etc.

This government is reportedly mulling the creation of a CDS. Implementing this may require elevating one of the chiefs or deeper selection. If from the army, then this opens up the possibility of a wider shake up. The possibility of this puts a positive spin on the deliberateness seemingly accompanying the current holdup.

However, if this was the plausible reason there would likely have been a corroborating media report or leak to this effect. The converse is also possible that such news would have attracted the usual fight back by political parties not interested in the military acquiring such salience, and by the bureaucracy that has been dead set against such a move. This might explain why the move, if impending, is under wraps.

This column has consistently pointed to the risk of politicization of the military under an ideological regime. It is not in the form as usually assumed and well studied, of a politicized military out to seize power spurred by its institutional interests. Instead, it is the reverse, a neutralization of the military as a politically significant actor so that the ideological agenda of the regime is furthered without checks and balances.

The pre-WWII German government, for example, neutered the General Staff of the military as part of their totalitarian scheme. The tactics included implicating one leading general for marrying a prostitute and another for homosexuality.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE -http://indiatogether.org/military-musical-chairs-op-ed

It is well recognized that the appointment of the Chief is a political one, not only procedurally so with the Appointments Committee clearing it, but also substantively. While the senior most in line between the vice chiefs and the army commanders is usually made the Chief designate, allegations of the proverbial ‘line of succession’ being manipulated have often attended such successions, particularly in the more recent past.

The most infamous one was brought to fore by General V K Singh’s insinuations that  General J J Singh, the first Chief of Sikh faith, worked the succession line up to favour the chances of V K Singh’s successor, Bikram Singh, another Sikh, to take over. That VK Singh employed considerable energy and invested his reputation to undo this was evident from his ‘date of birth’ controversy.

V K Singh however hit himself in the foot when it emerged that his attempt at deflecting Bikram Singh from his destiny, may have been to ensure that Bikram Singh’s successor was not the current Chief Gen Dalbir Singh, but another general, Lt Gen Ashok Singh, who is the father-in-law of his daughter! Ashok Singh had organized the troop movementin the vicinity of Delhi when V K Singh’s court hearing had come up in January 2012.

What this look-back suggests is that higher echelon appointments have a political angle. However, since the professionalism of the various candidates is seldom in doubt, this has not been very controversial thus far. So why should it be different this time round?

Firstly, this government, unlike previous governments, has not stopped after reshuffling gubernatorial appointments in its first foray into an ideological takeover of institutions. It has moved into education and culture. This suggests the military cannot expect to remain unscathed; some anticipatory concern is warranted.

Secondly, the Director General Military Operations (DGMO) and Military Secretary (MS) posts are critical for keeping a check on and control of the military. The criticality of the DGMO post is obvious from V K Singh’s moving of military formations in the vicinity of New Delhi, without the then DGMO being in the loop.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE -http://indiatogether.org/military-musical-chairs-op-ed

The MS post is even more critical from an ideological regime’s point of view. The MS is in charge of promotions and postings of the officer corps. The apprehension is that the ongoing saffronisation of India will engulf the military leadership eventually. Having a known entity controlling this process, in the form of a hand-picked MS perhaps sharing its world view, would be better from such a government’s perspective.

Hopefully, the cautionary word here will be proven false, and officers with impeccable spoken reputations for professionalism and integrity are appointed to the coveted posts. The continuing spate of divisiveness in the country’s politics, however, is bad enough that such apprehensions must be plausibly raised.

MODI'S CHINA VISIT

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China policy: Will economics trump the military stance?

Surprisingly, the biannual jamboree of high brass was held as usual in New Delhi this spring. Surprising not because of any reason but that at its October edition last year, Narendra Modi, perhaps taking cue from venues of party conclaves, had suggested in his address that it be held elsewhere in the country. Sensibly, the brass did not bend over backwards to act on the suggestion since the intellectual repository to service the commanders’ conference is only at Headquarters.

As usual, the conference yielded interesting insights, the most significant one this time around being a dilution of the preparedness on the China front. Media reported that the defence minister had expressed scepticism over the steep requirements, both manpower and financial, stemming from the army’s creation of the mountain strike corps.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE http://indiatogether.org/army-strategy-on-china-and-modi-visit-op-ed

Strategic shifts

The two mountain divisions that were raised late last decade had enabled a shift from dissuasive defence to defensive deterrence. Defensive defence, implying an ability to fight back defensively, had been India’s posture on the China front since the sixties till the late eighties. India upped this posture to dissuasive defence, in which a robust defence was intended to dissuade an attacker, during the Sundarji period with Exercise Chequer Board.

This posture was yet again hiked around the end of the last decade to active defence with the two mountain divisions sucked into a defensive role in Arunachal Pradesh. Active defence is akin to defensive deterrence in which China is to be deterred with the knowledge of an active fight back by India.

The army in a doctrinal revision exercise over the turn of the decade, that was conveniently leaked to the press, alighted on the formulation of the ‘two front’ war. The ‘two front’ threat dates back to the early sixties when Pakistan and China began to see common strategic cause. However, economic factors did not permit India to do anything more than strengthen its fence with China. The steady economic growth of the century’s first decade enabled the army to think more ambitiously.

The army had already made a shift from defensive to offensive thinking on the Pakistan front. Prompted by the Kargil War and Operation Parakram, it had moved from basing its doctrine on a counter-offensive capability to a more proactive and offensive one, termed in the media as ‘cold start’. With increased defence outlays that have witnessed a near four-fold increase from $11 billion in 2001 to $40 billion today, it was possible for the army to transfer the offensive mindset to the eastern front.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE http://indiatogether.org/army-strategy-on-china-and-modi-visit-op-ed

UPA II was reluctant to concede this since it was presiding in a period during which India’s growth rate slowed down from its high of eight percent to about six percent. Over the period, the army fought a guerilla action through the media, hyping up the China threat to thirty divisions rolling down to the Ganga-Brahmaputra plains, along with a Pakistani hyena act along the upper reaches of the Indus.

Modi’s government, in keeping with its self-image as being strong on defence, has expectedly been more forthcoming. Arun Jaitley, when he wore the double hats as finance minister and defence minister, had taken an appraisal of the new corps in one of his first moves. The national security adviser too, in a speech late last year, borrowed the army terminology on two-front. And yet, the current minister Manohar Parrikar is shown in media dragging his feet on the advisability of the corps, blaming the UPA for approving the 90000-strong increase in troops and its budget demand of Rs 64000 crore. This raises the question: Why?

Can India sustain the grand strategy?

There could be three explanations. The first relates to the infirmity in the Indian national security establishment in which the doctrinal sphere is mistakenly assumed to be the military’s domain exclusively. It appears that South Block thought up the ‘two front’ doctrine and its requirements without recourse to a ‘whole-of-government approach’ in which North Block could have its say. While a lame duck Antony let it pass, Parrikar has been checkmated by Jaitley.

The second, following from the first, is that the new government is operating to a grand strategy. The national security adviser spelt it out in the same speech in which he mentioned the ‘two front’ threat. ‘Economic development is the best way to ensure security and a 9 percent growth will make us totally secure,’ he said.

FOR FULL ARTICLE SEE http://indiatogether.org/army-strategy-on-china-and-modi-visit-op-ed

Indeed, in terms of such a grand strategy, the UPA was also similarly engaged, but was not able to pull it off, since it had to constantly look over its shoulders at what the right wing opposition would say. Can results be any different this time around?

The fact that Modi has a new man in the foreign ministry in the form of China hand – S Jaishankar, who has inherited a fine strategic mind – gives this line credence. The problem is if this turns out to be only tactical, a pre-visit bit of signalling. When done, it would be back to the business of India, the new kid in the great power race, catching up with China. That would potentially upset Doval’s grand strategic apple cart, revealing it as product of an enlightened speech writer but out of sync with the hyper-nationalist national security policy of the right wing government.

While time will tell, the potential for tripping up is there. When Xi visited, there was an ongoing intrusion in Depsang.  Before Modi’s visit, Xi has scheduled his own trip to Pakistan, heightening India’s ‘two front’ paranoia with his promise of investing $45 billion in an economic corridor through Indian- claimed territory in Gilgit-Baltistan and the sale of nine submarines. The submarines, in particular, enable a diesel electric submarine-based nuclear second strike capability for Pakistan.

While its strong-on-defence image can enable the Modi government to contradict the commentary that it has blinked first with China, whether it can do so under the prevailing political circumstances – an opposition rejuvenated by its electoral control of Delhi and the escalating situation over the land bill – is the question. While ‘acche din’ theoretically follows the grand strategy, the absence of ‘acche din’ in the interim can lead the government to lean once again on defence. In other words, the prime minister can end up a victim of his own self-image.