Indian Defence Review

While India put in a reasonable amount of effort to build up our scientific and technological base, we never went anywhere near to integrating it to our military needs. Our ancient Indic culture and civilisation that has been the victim of so many invasions and assaults over thousands of years showed an inexplicable paralysis when it came to the protection of our newly-acquired freedom. In contrast, Israel and France saw the lighting on the wall and went all out to integrate their military structure with their scientific-technical capabilities. For the former, it was a question of sheer survival. In the case of France, it came down to restoring its lost glory and power.

In the last few decades there have been numerous studies on the basic nature of a country’s military capacity and the critical elements that contribute to it. There are many issues involved in this subject, ranging from sociopolitical, cultural and historical factors on one hand, to economic, scientific, industrial and social parameters.

Recently, I had occasion to study the first set of elements in an essay published in the INDIA FOUNDATION’s journal (https://indiafoundation.in/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Jay-Bhattacharjee-1.pdf, The many integral components of National Defence: Why a Country’s Socio-Economic Structure is as Important as its Military Forces)(1).

The crux of this essay was that democratic political institutions, high levels of human capital, and amicable civil-military relations significantly enhance the quality and level of a country’s military power. In the present article, I will look at the other constituents of military strength that are essential, namely the industrial and technological foundations of a country. Needless to say, both these sets of variables are needed to form the complete spectrum.

It would be appropriate if we go back to the immediate years preceding Indian independence and thereafter. Some universities in the country had developed centres of excellence in certain sciences (particularly physics and chemistry) in the first four decades of the twentieth century. The reputation of Calcutta University in these two subjects had even spread internationally. Scientists like Jagdish Bose, PC Ray, Meghnad Saha, Satyendra Nath Bose and CV Raman were world-renowned scholars and researchers. Raman’s Nobel Prize work had been done in the laboratories of Calcutta University, where the great Vice Chancellor Sir Ashutosh Mookerjee had offered Raman a professorship.

In Bombay and Bangalore too, there were centres of excellence in science and engineering. Homi Bhabha was already doing good work in the area of nuclear physics, while Bangalore already had the Indian Institute of Science which was attracting scholars and researchers from the entire country. The Mysore royal family was extraordinarily committed to the development of learning, particularly in science and engineering.

The dedication of Sir M Visvesvaraya, the 19th Diwan of Mysore and a visionary civil engineer and statesman in building the country’s educational and industrial foundations was remarkable by any standard. The Mysore Government also collaborated with the Walchand Hirachand industrial group of Bombay to set up Hindustan Aircraft Limited, the precursor of the present-day Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL).

The establishment of the first IIT was initially recommended by the Sarkar Committee in 1947- 48 when it urged the establishment of notable centres of science and engineering throughout the country, modelled on MIT and equivalent institutions. The foundations of high-class engineering research and teaching were laid by Sir JC Ghosh when he became the first Director of the pioneer Indian Institute of Technology in Kharagpur. The great JC built a strong foundation and attracted talented teachers and researchers from every part of India and the world.

In the western part of the country, Homi Bhabha continued his task of leading India to the nuclear age. Leveraging his Tata connections and his proximity to Nehru, he set up the Atomic Energy Commission and led the country to the nuclear age.

While talking of the Indian experience, we must remind ourselves of the catalytical role of science and engineering in America’s rise to a superpower. If it had not been for the very close collaboration between U.S. academia and the country’s government, the American nuclear programme during the second world war might not have been so successful. We need to look at only two examples, the famous Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and the Los Alamos National Laboratory, that contributed so much to the American nuclear and space programmes and continue to do so.

The entire American military-industrial-complex, a term later used disapprovingly by the American soldier President Dwight Eisenhower, when he demitted office in 1961, can be traced back to the days of WW2, when the US, Federal Government under Roosevelt, and the leading members of the American scientific community in academics, from Einstein to Fermi and Oppenheimer,worked dedicatedly to design, build and militarise the country’s atom bomb. The steady flow of reports from Nazi Germany about its progress in developing its atomic arsenal was, of course, a spur for the American nuclear programme. It culminated when the first American nuclear test took place and the titanic Robert Oppenheimer was inspired to recite the Bhagavad Gita, as he watched the giant fireball at the testing site in New Mexico on the 16th July 1945 (Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds).

However, we will have to study the examples of two other countries in detail when we assess the theme of this essay. These two countries are Israel and France, both of which designed and built copybook paradigms of collaboration and interface between science / technology and military power.

We will start with assessing the Israeli model first. A detailed study of the Israeli scenario is The Study of War and the Military in Israel: An Empirical Investigation and a Reflective Critiqueby Zeev Rosenhek, Daniel Maman and Eyal Ben-Ari, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 35, No. 3, Special Issue: Commemorating the 1973 War (Aug., 2003), Cambridge University Press (2).

A more general (and less technical) report is to be found in this newspaper article (https://nypost.com/2017/01/29/why-israel-has-the-most-technologically-advanced-military-on-earth/(3).

The first point that these studies show is that there is an enormous amount of military-related research that is done in Israel, much more than in comparable countries like the United Kingdom. The other is that Israeli scholars freely rely on non-Israeli sources of expertise and analysis in their work. Since there is a huge amount of work on military technology done by non-Israelis, this is only to be expected. The issue here is that a country that studies its own defence forces so meticulously as the Israelis do is understandably very well equipped to make meaningful decisions on military matters. The mind is as important as machinery when it comes to having an effective military strength.

The hard facts about Israeli defence capabilities are also quite evident. Despite its small size,the country spends about 4.5 percent of its GDP on research and development, almost twice the figure of OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries. Out of this amount, nearly 30 percent goes to military or defence-related products. The comparative figures are 2 percent for Germany and 17 percent for the US. Indian data is not readily or officially available. The psychological aspect of this issue cannot be sidestepped. We can discuss purely economic issues like this but the fact remains that Israel’s military-age population is also vastly better equipped to handle danger and life-threatening situations that any other people on the planet.

Let us starting with risk-taking. Simply put, Israelis are more willing and able to take and successfully confront risks than other people. We can very well attribute this to their compulsory military service, in the course of which they are routinely required, even at a very young age, to carry out very deadly missions. The contrast with India (and indeed many other countries) could not be starker.

The relationship between wealth and power has changed as societies transit to the information age. Manuel Castells argues that technology does not determine society but “the ability or inability of societies to master technology, and particularly technologies that are strategically decisive in each historical period, largely shapes their destiny, to the point where we could say that while technology per se does not determine historical evolution and social change, technology (or the lack of it) exemplifies the capacity of societies to transform.” (https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/21806/GoldmanBlanken.pdf)(4), https://voxeu.org/article/how-government-spending-defence-research-benefits-private-sector)(5)

Now, we should look at the remarkable rise of France as a world-class centre for military research, technology and products. This entire process started after the end of WW2, when the country emerged from a catastrophic period of defeat and enemy occupation. The reasons for the French debacle in 1940 can be easily summarised : political uncertainty, lack of industrial progress, inadequate attention to upgrading the capabilities of the armed forces and of course, pathetic leadership both in the military and in the civilian wings of the state.

Starting from the initial government of General de Gaulle and continuing even in the midst of the chaos of the 4th Republic, France built up its military strength slowly but with full commitment. This entailed research and development in the universities and laboratories, collaboration with industry to fruitfully utilise the R & D and market the products both at home and internationally. When General de Gaulle returned to power as the first President of the 5th Republic in 1958, under a new Constitution and are-designed national governance framework, the country was well positioned to launch itself as an industrial and military power in the top international league. The relentless growth of French high-tech industries both in the civilian and military sectors is now obvious to all researchers and commentators. (https://www.ifri.org/sites/default/files/atoms/files/notes_15bis.pdf)(6)

As one of the official assessments on the subject summarised the subject: “The industries linked to defence are an essential component of France’s level of technological and industrial development. It has been possible to mobilise this technological potential in the civilian field, and it has been a significant factor in the development of high-performance products…” [CGP 1993, p. 17]. The linkage between civilian and military research was also bench marked by the leading French mandarin in the government in this field: “Now it is civilian research which drives military research” Jean-Yves Helmer, Delegate-General for Armament [1999]

Another detailed study looks at the entire panorama from the mid-1950s and studies in detail how the French state, its military forces and the industrial / business sector successfully and seamlessly interacted with each other to build France’s military structure which is the envy of other countries in the world, including larger ones. This has valuable lessons for India, because we have not yet fully incorporated the private industrial sector into our defence manufacturing and research structure. (https://www.rosalux.de/fileadmin/rls_uploads/pdfs/Veranstaltungen/2019/FranceMilitary_Serfati.pdf)(7).

We have looked at Israel and France in this study, because these are two dissimilar countries that have done very well in building up their national military strengths through carefully designed and planned programmes. There are possibly other countries too, like South Korea and Japan that have also been quite successful, but research on their work is difficult for Indian analysts because of the language constraints.

The brief overview we have done earlier in this essay about the efforts made by two different countries, separated by culture, history, distance and resources, in seamlessly integrating their science – technology base with their military structure is of considerable significance to us in India. The key issues that the examples of Israel and France highlight for Indian observers are the following:

There has to be a clear national consensus on the country’s defence policy and posture. Contentious and fissiparous stands by some political and social groups invariably delay or even prevent the development of a national consensus. This is where India went terribly wrong when it started the humongous task of building up its defence capabilities. Right from the immediate post-independence days, India pushed all the wrong buttons. Even when it was faced with an enemy onslaught on its western border just after independence, the Nehru regime never attempted to build up a coherent policy on the country’s defence capabilities and its armed forces. This semi-suicidal stance continued till the 1962 debacle and beyond. The Congress Party was not the only culprit; the Left was equally culpable, if not more.

While India put in a reasonable amount of effort to build up our scientific and technological base, we never went anywhere near to integrating it to our military needs. Our ancient Indic culture and civilisation that has been the victim of so many invasions and assaults over thousands of years showed an inexplicable paralysis when it came to the protection of our newly-acquired freedom.

In contrast, Israel and France saw the lighting on the wall and went all out to integrate their military structure with their scientific-technical capabilities. For the former, it was a question of sheer survival. In the case of France, it came down to restoring its lost glory and power.

There are very limited examples of this integration in India. While Armed Forces officers routinely attend (and perform commendably) in our higher institutions of learning like the IITs etc, the panorama has to be widened enormously. A relevant percentage of Defence R&D must be allotted to the national institutes of higher learning and their performance monitored as rigorously as is done in the Defence research centres.

The country’s private business sector has to nurture a national viewpoint, where pure profit considerations may have to be curtailed when called for. This was relevant for France and Israel. In India, this was another bus that we missed – the one which linked the private sector to the defence industry. Even when the Indian public sector and government enterprises proved to be woefully incompetent and incapable in coming up with suitable results, the private sector was never called upon to join the national defence effort. It is only during the last few years that we have taken some baby steps to rope in the prowess and capabilities of our private corporations. And from all available evidence, although the actual record is still not available to the extent required, the Indian private sector has performed creditably.

The scientists – technologists in the military and their civilian counterparts, both in the private sector and the government, who are working in defence areas, have to be given a free hand in their own spheres of competence.

The ubiquitous Indian bureaucrat and his/her discretionary powers must be eliminated from the paradigm; any civilian control over the military-industrial complex must be directly that of the government at the highest level.

India may have had a late start in this field. Nevertheless, we can certainly catch up and make amends for the delay.