There is no other Nation in the history of human civilization which has been taken by surprise by its adversaries so often & with such remarkable regularity. We were taken by surprise in 1947 by the tribals from Pakistan & lost half of Kashmir, thereafter the Chinese surprised us in 1962 & took away Aksai Chin. In 1965, the Pakis once again surprised us, In 1989-90 we were surprised by the uprising in Kashmir and then started the long saga of surprises; the Kargil intrusion, highjack, bomb explosions and fidayeens. And then as recent as last year, the Chinese once again surpised us in Ladakh as they had come fully prepared.
What Does Military Mean to Civic Polity.
The Indian army because of its apolitical nature has often been confined to the cantonments & is therefore known to the civil society only through the electronic media and Hindi movies.
The soldier for our society is like a sacrificial goat ; looked after by the Govt, who only knows how to use a weapon and do parade and is supposed to die while fighting the enemy. The officer for them is a habitual drunkard , keeps huge moustache, who parties around and laughs loudly. Little realizing that it requires hell of a Leadership skill to lead people to face fire. It is this reason why no eye brows were raised when 1500 soldiers were killed in Srilanka, and almost 20 times of this in J&K while fighting the Pakis and terrorists & unfortunately the leaders responsible for creating this mess are still revered by the Indian polity.
Stephen Cohen while discussing about the Indian military traditions writes in his book The Indian Army “There are particularly two different sets of attitude towards military in India. Modern militarism and traditional militarism”. The modern militarism, he says, was the outcome of the realization that the Army is the symbol of state power and was an expression of national will which demanded equalitarian recruitment. This sentiment was more prominent in Bengal and Western India and thereafter grew in other regions. Whereas, the Traditional Militarism was confined to specific regions and castes. He further adds that, “As a result of agitation both in England and India the strength of Indians in ICS increased to the 5% of the total within a span of 15-20 years whereas during the same period although the lower ranks of Indian Army were mainly Indians but there representation in the officer cadre was much below 5% and it was not till late 20th century that there was some pressure from urban India”. This implies that Army was never a lucrative career for urbanite and educated Indian youth(except in some regions).
Why so many Strategic Goof Ups.
The tactical and strategic goof ups and excessive casualties have never been a cause of concern for the Indian polity as well as media to make it an election issue during any of the Indian elections and as a result Indian polity has never punished the political leaders for ; referring the J&K issue to the UN, declaring cease fire in J&K in 1948, humiliating defeat in 1962, giving up Haji Pir Pass at Tashkent, not settling the J&K issue once for all in 1972, inducting Indian troops in Sri Lanka in 1987 in a hurry without basic logistic planning and preparation, and for fighting the Kargil war in a manner it should n’t have been fought and allowing China to nibble territory inch by inch by signing an agreement which termed Line of Existing Control into Line of Actual Control.
As a matter of fact strategy has never been our domain. Nehruji also after the ignominious defeat in 1962 remarked’ We were living in our own make believe world’. The recent Chinese incursions that surprised the Indians and Pak belligerence at LOC has once again shown that we are still continuing to grope in that make believe world. Remember, when Mr George Fernandez had said Its China which is our enemy Number One, the media and our arm chair scholars got after him. Historically also except the great strategist Chanakaya, we have not produced any military thinker unlike the Chinese, British and Germans. Col Anil Athale in his article in IDR ; Does India Lack Strategic Culture while commenting on the Strategic culture wrote ; In India we have discourses on philosophy, religion, science, mathematics and even sexology, but none on warfare! There is no Indian Sun Tzu or Clausewitz. For this neglect of the military dimension India paid a heavy price, it is no wonder that Indian history can also be described as a chronicle of military disasters.
However, we can boast of number of legendary warriors who laid down their lives fighting the enemy. Probably, very few Indian leaders had the vision and experience like the British with the application of Force and its relationship to statecraft and diplomacy. Those who had the vision and took interest in military matters were politically marginalized (Stephen Cohen ; India Emerging Power).
We Indians as a result seem to have no strategy to deal with our inimical neighbors, and to project India as a power. We therefore live from crisis to crisis; sometimes China fingers us and sometimes Pakistan, as highlighted by Pak’s ability to wage unconventional war against India with impunity for such a long time. We are Even unable to truly exercise power and influence the behavior of our neighbors, which are being used for anti India activities by China and Pakistan. Today we face a peculiar situation where small South Asian Nations are apprehensive of antagonizing China and arrogantly cancel infrastructure projects with Indian businessmen and even bilateral agreements with India. We are being pushed in from all sides.
If the taxpayer is not concerned about how the security forces are spending his hard earned money and what purpose is being achieved or likely to be achieved , the consequences can be disastrous. Hajendra Baweja in her book; The soldier’s Diary while blaming the entire set up for the Kargil war says, ‘Maybe this diary will expose those responsible. But who will pay the price? My overwhelming fear is that the sacrifices of so many brave soldiers will have been in vain.
Can the armed forces and the Government alone be blamed for all the strategic goof ups ? Or it should be shared by the civic society as well, including the media.
Stephen Cohen in his book, Emerging Power: India says, “No other country has ever engaged in as lengthy wide ranging and intensive discussions as India did before it crossed various nuclear thresholds. This was when its neighbor with whom it had fought a war had become nuclear in 1967. Probably, under the influence of the moral precepts the Indian establishment does not possess the expertise to deal with such concepts as limited nuclear war or deterrence.”
Lt Gen RS Dayal, whose team had captured Hajipir Pass in 1965, had also expressed similar sentiments when asked as to how he felt when Hajipir was surrendered, he said; The Indians Do not know How to read a Map.
Few arm chair scholars while praising India for its greatness and discourage punitive action against inimical powers, often boast that India has never conquered territories but the influence of its culture has spread far and wide to distant lands, little realising that only an economically developed and militarily powerful country can sell its culture, a weak nation can not. (The Clash of Civilisations By Samuel Huntington). Asoka, the Great sold Buddhism to the World when he became the Emperor after the Battle of Kalinga and the Cholas could spread Indian culture to South East Asian nations because they were powerful Kings, and had strong navy.
The Military strategy never caught the attention perhaps because of our Religious doctrines ; Buddhism, Jainism and the Bhartiya philosophical ideal of ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbakm’ (Whole Earth is one family), . In such an environment winning or losing a war is of little consequence.
Thus the contemporary India is finding it difficult now to have any influence on its neighbors whether it adopts Gujral doctrine or not. Although, economically India may appear to be on a rising path, however it is far from becoming a world power in its true sense. A country where after every monsoons children die of dengue and chickengunia can never become a super power. We need to work out a strategy to project India as a power and in order to do that there is an urgent need to overhaul the entire setup and develop strategic vision for the future.
Conclusion
We can not set smaller targets for ourselves like ; Becoming a South Asian Power. It’s a stupid target to be set, for a Nation which is double the size of these nations put together.
Brahma Chellany a renowned strategist sets a grand approach towards achieving this objective of India getting to the position amongst comity of nations it truly deserves ; In spite the economic progress, India can neither wait half a century to be heard with respect internationally nor can rising prosperity by itself bring power and respect as exemplified by todays Japan, which faces a dwindling international profile inspite remaining the worlds second largest economic power house. There is hence a need to project national power through an integrated approach, which utilises the military, economic, cultural, social, political & technology levers. It is only then that the world would listen to us and we would be able to spread our values, our culture to far off areas as the Cholas and Emperor Ashok did. Can we not work together to become innovative, discover and invent new horizons and technologies, develop innovative methods of improving governance rather than singing all the time the old song of SECULARISM and finding ways to damage the reputation of people who have the passion to make India a powerful nation.