Indian Defence Review

Specifically, defence preparedness is the direct responsibility of the Prime Minister and the National Security Council (NSC), which need to receive accurate advice from the country’s military so as to take the right political, foreign policy, internal security and economic decisions to prosecute war or other military operations when required, in the best immediate and long-term interest of the country. But as of now, there is no mechanism in place for the government to receive essential single-point advice from the military, since summoning the three defence Services Chiefs and seeking their views orally or in writing, cannot give a holistic idea of defence preparedness.

Recently there was a report about the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence (PSCD) summoning the three defence Service Chiefs “to seek their views on the state of defence preparedness pointed out by Army Chief General VK Singh in his leaked letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh” as they “needed to examine the whole spectrum of defence preparedness.”1 Although the concern was triggered by the leaked contents of General’s letter, it was heartening to at last see the concern in the legislature regarding India’s lack of defence preparedness.

But the fundamental question is whether one meeting with the Service Chiefs individually or together, will provide the PSCD a realistic or holistic view of defence preparedness involving all three defence services operating together, as would be necessary for defence against external aggression. In any case, the PSCD is not immediately responsible for the defence of the country which is the government’s responsibility. It is the Union Cabinet that needs to have a holistic view of defence preparedness. The real question is whether the Union Cabinet has or can have a holistic idea of defence preparedness.

Apart from actual manning, arming, provisioning and training of the three Services for war, holistic defence preparedness involves:

• Assessing threat through intelligence inputs and strategic evaluation
• Diplomatic initiatives, without prejudice to India’s sovereignty or territorial integrity to avoid armed conflict or limit its duration if unavoidable
• Internal security measures so that defence measures can be wholly effective
• Planning for economic and fiscal measures to handle the huge expenditures demanded by war

Specifically, defence preparedness is the direct responsibility of the Prime Minister (PM) and the National Security Council (NSC), which need to receive accurate advice from the country’s military i.e. the Indian Army, the Indian Navy and the Indian Air Force, so as to take the right political, foreign policy, internal security and economic decisions to prosecute war or other military operations when required, in the immediate and long-term interest of the country. But as of now, there is no mechanism in place for the government to receive essential single-point advice from the military, since summoning the three Services Chiefs and seeking their views orally or in writing, cannot give a holistic idea of defence preparedness. However, even with the best military advice, defence preparedness cannot be complete without a mature strategic vision.

Strategic Vision

Pandit Nehru’s strategic outlook of foreign policy neutrality and sturdy political independence in the first two decades after Independence has gradually changed to its current US-predicated strategic dependence, even political subservience. It is regrettable that over the last four decades, India has not produced a single political leader with a strategic vision to enable India to adjust to and be on top of today’s rapidly changing geo-economic-political situations in a globalised world.

Notwithstanding the lack of statesmanship at the apex, reputed Indian strategic think-tanks have recommended the creation of a document defining strategic policy encompassing India’s international and regional political, economic (including energy) and military aims and objectives, depending upon its present and future needs. Realistic national security is only possible when strategic policy is explicitly understood by persons in government. But none of the successive union governments over six decades have either propagated such a policy or produced a strategic document, thereby effectively compromising national security by their inaction.

The Defence Spectrum

Defence is a highly specialised area and a military officer rises to the position of a Service Chief of the Army, Navy or Air Force with about 40 years of service. He acquires knowledge of the operational capability of the other two services by inter-services exposure in various courses, through joint exercises as well as in the arena of arduous, active operations. He is responsible for and concerned with the operational capability of his own service and looks to the other two services to receive or provide operational support, depending upon the threat situation or type of operation. But in military conflicts-of-the-future, warfare, hitherto limited to operations concerning land, sea, under-the-sea and air, will include dimensions of space and cyberspace warfare. Thus, for the primary role of effective deployment and operations to protect India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, a Service Chief should be well-versed in the operational and logistic capabilities of his own service and adequately knowledgeable in respect of the other two. It can safely be said that no Service Chief in India, has ever fallen short in this respect.

In a democratic republic like India in which the military is civilian control, defence preparedness requires mutual trust between the military and the political leadership. Trust can only emanate from direct official, institutionalised, periodic contact and discussions between the government and the military. The bureaucracy serves to facilitate communication but cannot substitute for direct contact between the government and the military. However, as noted by Lt. Gen. Vijay Oberoi, “Our political leadership is highly uncomfortable in dealing with the military directly and prefers to let the bureaucracy do so.”2 Thus the bureaucracy is the de facto functional link between the defence services and the political executives of the union government and has a stake in maintaining the distance between them.

Notwithstanding the few selected bureaucrats who undergo courses at the Defence Services Staff College, the College of Defence Management and the National Defence College for better understanding and coordination with defence services officers, they cannot be held to blame for not knowing the details of the functioning of any of the three services, much less about the issues involved in their integrated functioning in war. At the same time, most politicians are ignorant of the functioning of the defence services and their capabilities, mainly because of their ‘distance’ from the military for whatever reasons.

Reforms in Higher Defence Management

The National Security Council (NSC) headed by the PM was formed in November 1998 by the BJP-led NDA government and is the apex agency for national security. It was formed to address the need to systematise higher defence management, particularly following India’s dramatic entry into the nuclear club with Pokharan II six months earlier. The functions of NSC were earlier being carried out by the Principal Secretary to the PM and, since the formation of the NSC, a senior bureaucrat is the National Security Advisor (NSA). Thus earlier and also currently, the advisor to the Prime Minister on national security is a bureaucrat. The decision-making members of the NSC include the NSA, the Ministers of Defence, External Affairs, Home and Finance as also the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission.

The three Service Chiefs, along with bureaucrats of Secretary rank, are part of the Strategic Policy Group (SPG), which advises the NSC in decision-making and policy formulation. Thus, when the NSC is meant for higher defence management, excluding a military officer in the decision-making body and having the three Service Chiefs merely in the SPG, but on the other hand having a bureaucrat as NSA, is clearly a bureaucratic machination. There can be no objection to having a bureaucrat in the decision-making body; rather since a bureaucrat is expert in secretarial work and functioning, it is essential to have a bureaucrat as Member-Secretary of the NSC. But excluding a military officer from a key decision-making body on defence matters is bound to prove to be detrimental to national security. The absence of a national security strategic document even after 65 years of Independence and 13 years of NSC’s existence can perhaps be attributed to the absence of a military officer in national security policy formulation.

Question of Competence

The question arises that if a military officer is to be inducted as a member of the NSC, will it be the Chief of the Indian Army, Indian Navy or Indian Air Force, or the senior-most among them? Why not the Chairman of the existing Chiefs Of Staff Committee (COSC)? But this is unsatisfactory to say the least, because the incumbent always has the responsibilities, interests and functionality of his own service at the forefront. Thus, the COSC Chairman cannot do justice to rendering single-point advice and assist in decision-making in matters that concern the other two services. The COSC mainly focuses on inter-service coordination issues and cannot have the NSC’s real-time perspective of geo-politics, economics (including energy), foreign affairs, home affairs, finance or development planning that influence national policy.

The COSC is a Committee without powers residing in its military ivory tower, though its isolation is not of its own making. Also in question is whether the other two Service Chiefs will abide by the advice that the COSC Chairman may render, which can lead to decisions impinging on the operational functioning or provisioning of their respective services. Importantly, such advice (even if it is sincere) would be partisan because a Service Chief’s primary area of experience is in his own service and his primary responsibility is its effective operational functioning. Hence, a Service Chief as a member of the NSC is not likely to be an asset to the NSC and worse still, could be a spoiler of inter-service synergy. What then would be the solution for inducting a senior military officer into the NSC at the decision-making level?

Reverting to the need to examine, “the whole spectrum of defence preparedness”, the previous question morphs to, “Who is competent to brief or advise on the whole spectrum of defence preparedness?” Clearly, this has to be a military officer and not a bureaucrat. Also as argued above, any of the three Service Chiefs may not be able to do justice to the job. Hence the necessity of a military officer who represents all three services without being burdened with the direct responsibility of running any of them. He must also be senior to all three Service Chiefs, serving as National Security Advisor to the PM just as the PM’s Scientific Advisor does on matters of science and technology. He would necessarily be a member in the NSC and, if he is to be superior to the three Service Chiefs, with five-star rank (though he may be of four-star rank if he is the senior-most).

This brings the discussion directly to the decades-old demand of the military for appointing a Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), as a measure of urgent necessity. This has also been supported post-Kargil 1999 by the Kargil Review Committee, headed by strategic affairs analyst K Subrahmanyam, and the 2001 Group of Ministers (GoM) led by Parliamentarian L K Advani. The GoM report on ‘Reforming the National Security System’ underlined the need to have a CDS because it felt the functioning of the existing COSC comprising the three service heads, “revealed serious weakness in its ability to provide single-point military advice to the government.” Further, in 2009, the PSCD, in its report tabled in the Lok Sabha said that India urgently needs a CDS as well as concrete long-term strategic planning. Lame excuses by the government or the Ministry of Defence (MoD) in these critical matters will simply not do any longer.3 Notwithstanding these clear recommendations and dire necessity of a CDS for single-point military advice to the government at the level of the NSC in the interest of national security, there are at least two reasons why the post of CDS has as yet not been created.

Impediments to National Security

At present, the three Service Chiefs are placed below the Cabinet Secretary in precedence. Appointment of a CDS of five-star rank would make him above the Cabinet Secretary, and this is unacceptable to the bureaucracy on account of ‘civilian supremacy, something that causes general resentment within the military. The reason for the traditional stand-off between the bureaucracy and the military is that, while the military unreservedly accepts control by the elected executives in government and understands the role of the bureaucracy as the link between itself and the Defence Minister, it resents bureaucratic dominance. Whether this resentment is valid and has a basis, is source for a separate discussion, but it is necessary to mention here, that the bureaucrat-NSA has a retired senior Army officer as his military advisor! This is sufficient evidence of bureaucratic hubris, the readiness of some senior military officers to acquiesce to blandishments and the regrettable disinterest of the political hierarchy especially at the highest levels, all combining to adversely affect national security.

The fact is that bureaucrats enjoy easy and direct access to the Defence Minister and the PM because that access is institutionalised; whereas a Service Chief would only get heard based on his professional reputation or personal relationship or ‘equation’ with the country’s executives or when he is invited to render advice. Thus the bureaucracy resists creating the appointment of a CDS since it would effectively challenge the pre-eminence of the IAS and weaken its grip over the military. This is clearly an impediment to national security.

The second reason for no-CDS is internal to the three services and is as serious an impediment to national security as the first. Even though the military recognises the strategic need for a CDS, the three services are locked in an internecine conflict over which service should provide the CDS. The tacit (and less than honourable) assumption in this is that he would be partisan to his own service besides allowing one more promotion at the top level. This rivalry is based as much upon personal relations between Service Chiefs in-the-chair as upon traditional opinions of which service is pre-eminent among the three from a strategic or operational standpoint. There is also an innate fear that the importance of the other two services would be in some manner, downgraded. It would be unrealistic not to recognise that this is connected with rivalry for financial and budgetary allocations for military procurement. Perhaps a scheme of rotational appointment would solve this problem but inter-service rivalry is not in the best interest of national security and even goes against the best interests of the defence services. This rivalry is kept simmering by a devious and scheming bureaucracy playing on senior military officers and the Service Chiefs to thwart the appointment of a CDS.

In 2009, Rajat Pandit4 succinctly wrote, “Reforms have a way of coming in late. No wonder then that a decade after the Kargil conflict exposed deep fissures within the military top brass, some critical lessons, especially on the need for a single-point advice structure, and by extension a General Number One are yet to be learnt. It doesn’t help that the Indian Army, Indian Navy and Indian Air Force do not see eye-to-eye on this. Compounding matters is the smugness of a bureaucracy happy with the status quo even as it exercises a vice-like grip on the armed forces in the name of ‘civilian control’. The political leadership, in turn, remains apathetic about genuine reforms in the country’s higher defence management.”

Necessity for a CDS

There are some issues that demonstrate the necessity and urgency for creating the post of a CDS. The first and most important one is that, as discussed above, the PM and the NSC cannot obtain a full and true picture of the military dimensions of national security from the existing setup. This is vital in the emerging regional scenario of Chinese military build-up on India’s northern borders within easy missile-strike distance of Delhi, and India’s successful launch on April 19, 2012, of a 5,500-km range Agni V that can target Beijing. Noting that there are arguments that nuclear deterrence cannot work at all or that a nuclear deterrent can work only when it is backed by adequate conventional military force, the NSC strategising with nuclear second-strike capability (in view of India’s no-first-use policy) without well-considered military advice, is not merely dangerous but is potentially disastrous. A CDS answerable to the PM and NSC may well be the only competent person to manage India’s nuclear arsenal, which is currently in the hands of bureaucrats and technocrats who have little or no idea of military strategy and Nuclear-Biological-Chemical (NBC) warfare.

Secondly, a CDS will be able to advise the PM and the NSC on the military aspects of border issues with neighbouring countries. For example, the advice of a CDS on how to handle Pakistani General Kayani’s recent suggestion that both Indian and Pakistani troops should withdraw from the icy heights of the Siachen glacier would be invaluable. Few outside the military know that Pakistan’s forces are not on the Siachen glacier at all, but have been kept well to its West by the Indian Army along the Actual Ground Position Line (AGPL) North of point NJ9842. There is need for the NSC to take a call on the history of territorial disputes and conflicts with Pakistan in the whole of Jammu & Kashmir and particularly in the Ladakh region, by consulting the CDS to get a holistic view of the past situations leading up to the AGPL and possible future scenarios.Note 1

It is doubtful whether General Kayani’s suggestion has the sanction of the Pakistani government. Therefore, without the involvement of the Indian government, a detailed examination of his proposal and assessment of Pakistan’s hidden aims and agendas can be done most effectively by the CDS who would have on-the-ground knowledge of positions, operational and logistical problems as also the pros and cons.

Thirdly, to further strengthen Indo-US strategic ties5, the US Pacific Unified Combatant Command (PACOM) Chief, who commands combat forces of the US Army, Navy, Marines and Air Force, interacts separately with the three Service Chiefs in India. This does not allow the Indian military to get a holistic view of the interactions and plans, thus conceding strategic military advantage to the USA. A CDS who only can have a genuine tri-service perspective will be able to interact to India’s strategic and military advantage.

Finally, as a five-star rank military officer, the CDS will be in a position to advise and mentor the three Service Chiefs on inter-service operational doctrine, encourage tri-service synergy and implement reforms in higher defence management. This will enable India to play a greater strategic role in international affairs and secure for India the necessary resources for its developmental growth.

Need of the Hour

With regard to national security, the discerning observer inevitably comes to the conclusion that India’s national political executives have been without any mature concept of strategic vision, or that they have been too pre-occupied with politics of power to bother about national strategy (thus violating the people’s trust), or they do not trust the military. Or else, the machinations of the bureaucracy have ensured that India’s military is not a part of national security policy formulation. To be generous, perhaps it is a little of each, with a large dose of the last. The NSC, functioning with a bureaucrat NSA to advise the PM on national security over the past 13 years, has not even brought out a national security strategy document6 let alone defining the military’s role in national security, omitting to even consider it systemically compromises national security. And this is well understood by India’s political and military adversaries as well as allies and strategic partners.

The appointment of a CDS as NSA to the PM and with a position as a full member of the NSC with a senior bureaucrat as Member-Secretary, and with the three Service Chiefs remaining in the Strategic Policy Group of the NSC, is a vital necessity if national security is to be addressed rationally. With Chinese military build-up on our northern border along with the so-called ‘string of pearls’ and India’s response with the Agni-V, the appointment of a CDS is a critical strategic responsibility of the government of the day.

References

1. “House Panel Calls All Three Service Chiefs”, <http://www.indianexpress.com/news/house-panel-calls-all-three-service-chiefs/934758/0>; Indian Express; New Delhi, Apr 10, 2012.
2. Lt Gen Vijay Oberoi; “Political Direction, Military Leadership And Morale”; Lecture delivered on the occasion of 112th Birthday Celebrations of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose; FICCI Auditorium, New Delhi; January 23, 2010.
3. “India Urgently Needs Chief Of Defence Staff”; <http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2009-12-17/india/28078701_1_defence-staff-cds-post-perspective-plan>; Times of India; December 17, 2009.
4. Rajat Pandit; “Missing in Action: General No.1”; <http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-5060551,prtpage-1.cmshttp://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-5060551,prtpage-1.cms>; Times of India; 26 September 2009.
5. Vombatkere, S.G., “Deepening India-US Strategic Ties – Evidences and Repercussions”, Mainstream, New Delhi, Vol XLVIII No 40, September 25, 2010, p.13-15.
6. “IDSAComment”;<http://www.idsa.in/idsacomments/ANationalSecurityStrategy DocumentforIndia_arvindgupta_201011>; Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses; October 20, 2011.

Notes

1. For example, in the military operations between India and Pakistan in 1965 and again in 1971, the Haji Pir pass in POK was captured by Indian troops at tremendous cost of loss of lives and limbs, but after the cease-fire, both times Haji Pir pass was “restored” to Pakistan by India’s political leadership without consulting the military, thereby losing important strategic and tactical advantages. Also, when India’s military forced Pakistani Lt Gen A A K Niazi to sign an instrument of surrender on December 16, 1971, at Dhaka, and took 93,000 Pakistani soldiers prisoner. The prisoners were returned to Pakistan without the political leadership extracting any tactical or strategic advantage, since the military was not consulted. Not consulting the military on national security issues goes against the country’s best security interests.