Indian Defence Review

The 18th Vjay Diwas was celebrated with all the fervor and gusto on 26 July 2017 pan-India especially at the Kargil Memorial at Dras and India Gate, New Delhi. Wreaths were laid for paying homage to the martyrs who sacrificed their lives in evicting the treacherous enemy.

This year is more special since the Chinese appear resolved to stoke instability in J&K in concert with their protégé Pakistan, with latter achieving a new low in targeting schools through cross-border firings. In 1999, Musharraf must have wretched that had his army maintained surprise till the time the snows shut off both the road axis leading to Ladakh, Indian operations would have been that much more difficult especially with Pakistan’s next phase of operations aiming to wrest the Siachen area.

Eventually the grit and determination of the Indian Army was on display and the world watched with admiration as hill after hill, barren, devoid of cover and occupied by well fortified Pakistani regular army soldiers were assaulted and recaptured, with the barrage of a hundred Bofors guns providing cover. The result was an emphatic military and diplomatic victory for India, greater glory to Indian Military and a blow to Pakistan as it stood shamed; two Pakistani Prime Ministers later acknowledging that “Kargil war was Pakistan’s biggest blunder and disaster.”

Musharraf himself appeared shameless refusing to accept bodies of Pakistani soldiers killed under pretext of them being freedom fighters. The ultimate shame for Pakistan was some 500 dead bodies of Northern Light Infantry (NLI) soldiers dumped at doorstep of their homes in the dead of night without ceremony – as brought out by ‘Dawn’ later.

Musharraf recently stated he mulled using nukes against India in 2001. He did so in 1999 during the Kargil Conflict too but it was later discovered that the trigger mechanisms did not work. His present boast is obviously to remain in limelight for the senile fox would know that such an act could actually revert Pakistan to the Stone Age. In fact the thought itself possibly made him sleep under the cot for several days. But getting back to 1999, the scale and extent of the Kargil intrusions that the enemy could undertake proved massive intelligence failures both at the strategic and tactical levels by India; R&AW and the Joint Intelligence Committee should have kept the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) informed of all enemy movement beyond Skardu, as should have the military observed and blocked enemy occupation of hilltops especially Tiger Hill and Tololing overlooking Dras. R&AW’s claim that they had sent a note to the military about possible intrusions was an absolute joke.

That many Ambassadors and High Commissioners at out foreign missions like Belgium, Germany, Afghanistan and China asked for reversion of R&AW officers posted at their missions on grounds of financial bungling, siphoning off secret funds, embarrassing contacts, affairs with subordinates and foreign interpreters, compromising security, poor quality reports and the like anyway proves that R&AW is no holy cow, aside from the defection of a joint secretary of R&AW to the US in 2004.

Unfortunately even today our strategic intelligence is based more on technical intelligence including satellite monitoring than human intelligence. This is just one failure of learning from the Kargil Conflict. Our Special Forces were hardly used for the type of tasks they are supposed to be undertake, even used in direct assaults for which they are not organized, resulting in needless casualties. They could have easily hit the main enemy gun position at Gultari, support base of the enemy, as also enemy helipads.

The Kargil intrusions were deep into our territory and the IAF could have literally knocked out enemy positions on the hilltops provided they had laser guided weaponry, which they did not possess. It is only towards the end of the conflict that some improvisation was resorted to and enemy logistic support echelons and one support base could be targeted. There had been apparent lack of imagination, forethought, prioritization and budgeting on this count knowing full well conflict along the LoC and LAC will require targeting such positions.

If the IAF had the laser guided bombs during the Kargil conflict then coupled with Bofors fire, enemy positions particularly on Tiger Hill and Tololing could have been pulverized thoroughly and saved precious lives of troops assaulting uphill without cover. Still we continue to fail in taking the sub-conventional war into the enemy territory, causing avoidable casualties of our security forces on our own territory. 

Inter-Service synergy continues to be an illusion sans a Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) despite the Kargil Review Committee (KRC) and the follow up Group of Ministers (GoM) reports had both recommended early establishment of the CDS. HQ Integrated Defence Staff (IDS) that was supposed to have come up as “part of MoD” has been allowed to come up as a separate HQ, losing the advantage of synergy that it had been raised for.

No effort has been made to amend Government of India Allocation of Business (AOB) and Transaction of Business (TOB) Rules 1961 that task the Defence Secretary (not Defence Minister) for defence of India. Under these rules, the Services HQ continue to remain “attached offices” to MoD continuing the British era legacy that gives the bureaucrats all the authority sans responsibility. Moreover, where the requirement is to have Service Chiefs as part of CCS and select military officers in the NSCS, NSAB, SPD and MoD, only some ‘middle level’ appointments are being identified in MoD for being occupied by military officers. This is a ploy by the bureaucracy to continue ruling the roost without accountability and grossly inadequate to national security requirements, especially with enemy knocking at our doors.

It is time we revive the Technical Support Division (TDS) of the Army, the only intelligence arm which the Pakistani military and the ISI feared like the fiend. Disbanding of the TDS was a grave anti-national act, much more much more treacherous than contriving of the Malegaon blast under which Col Purohit was falsely implicated and jailed. As per recent media reports, the MoD and Army have provided documents to show that Col Purohit, an intelligence officer, was tasked to collect important information regarding terror activities in India and was ordered by his seniors to interact with the terror accused and gather information on terror activities.

The question here is that wasn’t this information available all along and who in MoD stopped this from being given to the Courts and under pressure from which political authority. Merely, granting bail to Col Purohit, who should have not been imprisoned in the first place, and absolving him eventually is no justice. What about his ruined career, life and reputation? How do you compensate all that? Should the then Defence Minister not be held responsible and investigated?

What about Col Hunny Bakshi who was heading the TSD when it was disbanded; his ruined career, life and reputation? Both these cases were under the same Defence Minister; AK Anthony. There is little doubt that the then political dispensation in connivance with the treacherous Indian Deep State and presstitutes of the paid media sabotaged the TDS to support their masters and counterparts in Pakistan, while the ‘accidental prime minister’ remained dumb. It is no secret that an editor-in-chief of a daily claiming to be the country’s largest circulated newspaper, was attending seminars sponsored by Ghulam Nabi Fai (who FBI says was being operated by the ISI since 1980’s) and made light of Capt Saurabh Kalia’s martyrdom until a commentator pointed out he would have felt very differently had his own son been in Saurabh Kalia’s place. Disbanding of the TSD should be seriously investigated and anyone found conniving with the India Deep State must be punished, irrespective of being from the polity, bureaucracy, military or others.

The fact that one former Lieutenant General was offering crores in bribe to a serving Army Chief, was jailed, and a renowned high profile lawyer went running to bail him out, shows how deep the Deep State has roots. The rot needs to be speedily cleaned irrespective of individuals from any organization. It appears quite obvious that inquiries in the case of Colonels Purohit and Hunny Bakshi were contrived under political pressure, which should not go unpunished.

The recent statement by General Ved Malik, former Army Chief “Military no longer right choice” should have raised eyebrows unless the “entrenched bureaucracy” is too hot for the government to handle. Besides, with all the big-ticket projects of Make-in-India, why are we neglecting the arming and equipping of soldiers at the cutting edge. Then is the judiciary, which functions without realizing ground realities; ordering that an FIR be lodged for every action by soldiers in counter insurgency / counter terrorism is highly retrograde, tying them up in knots while undertaking very difficult and complex operations.

President Ram Nath Kovind as a Rajya Sabha MP from Uttar Pradesh during a debate in Parliament on 2 March, 2006 had stated, “If any citizen of this country can criticize the President of India (appointing authority for Judges) for his wrong-doing, I don’t think it could be valid … if the judiciary is exempted.” He also mentioned that the then chief justice of India had referred to corruption in the judiciary, adding, “It is not only the citizen. We know that once even the chief justice of India had said – he did admit – that some percentage of the judiciary was corrupt. Of course, he can’t be hauled up for contempt of court because he happens to be from the same community (of the judiciary).” So if there is corruption in judiciary, are the judges not subject to blackmail? Would the ISI not love hands of our soldiers tied behind their backs, and can the government remain complacent in such situations?

The logic being given by a cross-section of the inside coterie that the bureaucracy entrenched for the last 70 years cannot be shaken up easily is illogical and smells adverse to national security requirements. Surely we cannot afford to wait another few decades to acquire requisite defence synergy even as we have been fighting hybrid wars over the past three decades.

Finally are the vital voids of a National Security Strategy and a Comprehensive Defence Review, both of which contributed towards why the Kargil intrusions happened in the first place. Unfortunately virtually no progress has been made on these counts. There is little sign of the DRDO, DPSUs and OF being reorganized. On the contrary, the DRDO has been brought into ‘Strategic Partnership’ through the backdoor whereas the Dhirendra Singh Committee had recommended Strategic Partnership purely for the private industry. Unless we have serving military professional inducted at senior and below levels in MoD, unless we have serving military professional at various levels including control and management in the DRDO, DPSUs and OF, we are likely to continue in the same state. It is actually quite baffling why the government is not looking into these issues seriously.

If we really want to pay homage to the martyrs who paid the ultimate sacrifice during the Kargil conflict, we must go beyond laying wreaths during successive Vijay Diwas celebrations.