https://m.thewire.in/article/security/the-defence-vision-2047-document-is-a-political-position-pleasing-their-political-masters

https://aliahd66.substack.com/p/troubling-ideas-in-general-chauhans

The Defence Forces Vision 2047 document was released by the raksha mantri two weeks back. It has been competently reviewed elsewhere. Implementation contingent on factors outside the military’s domain, a cautionary word for the military has it that ‘the vision risks remaining a powerful prose on paper.’

The scrutiny here begins at the beginning, with the title, in its use of the term ‘defence forces.’ Ten years back, the last edition of the joint doctrine was titled, ‘Joint Doctrine of the Indian Armed Forces.’ A conflation of ‘defence services’ and ‘armed forces’ appears to have resulted in a bastardisation, with none the wiser. This, when India’s strategic mentor has gone from department of defence to war department!

The vision document is heavily caveated. The document is a ‘guideline’ for defence forces, but requires exertion for outcomes also by other stakeholders, such as the scientific community in relation to technical thresholds. In his foreword, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh notes the need for a Defence Vision 2047 as distinct from the Defence Forces 2047. If the document punches above its weight, why did the ministry not take ownership and instead placed the cart before the horse? It also includes aspects yet to be cleared by the Cabinet Committee on Security. This confession begs the question: why the hurry?

An answer readily suggests itself: Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Chauhan - whose headquarters wrote it up - is due to retire soon. With little to show for movement on theaterisation – long projected as the core contribution of a CDS - this document must suffice. Therefore, it deems critical interrogation.

The major issues

The armed forces’ vision is predicated on a national vision of a Viksit Bharat, which presents India as ‘developed nation’ by 2047. While economists have weighed on its feasibility, critics foreground its implausibility, arguing that it takes more than just economic growth to get there.

Viksit Bharat is in turn predicated on Sashakt Bharat that has ‘absolute sovereignty,’ defined as ‘complete independence in strategic decision making.’ Apparently, India wishes to move further from the hardy ‘strategic autonomy.’ Even if globalization is a holdover from the post-Cold War liberal-internationalist phase, it is improbable that interdependence will reduce, especially when current-day India is casting about for multi-alignment.

To be sure, the HQ IDS has had little else to start-off with, given that the national security doctrine has been in the works now for close to a decade. Therefore, its recourse to the regime’s rhetoric to populate its opening paras on national vision. Even so, this is a departure from the mentioned joint doctrine, that instead echoed Constitutional values of the preamble, alighting on a reasonable national aim: ‘comprehensive national development.’ That the military has chosen to adopt the regime’s self-delusive taglines is only more evidence of the suspected politicization of the military.

The lazy connection the document draws between surakshit (secure) and atmanirbhar (self-reliant), as pillars of sashakt (empowered), is not unproblematic. There is no arguing self-reliance in the defence sector would be a feature of economic development, but by no means can it substitute for development per se, translated as prosperity for the masses.

Development is not growth or infrastructure, but is better gauged by the capabilities of the people. The Soviet Union’s example is that an over-developed defence sector hollows out a country. The example must reverse the perspective in the document: ‘(O)ur economic growth must match the pace and span of our strategic goals.’

Economically, military power has mostly ridden on the back of prior industrial capacity. For the defence sector to push the industrial applecart is to convert swords into ploughshares. Such is the case with defence atmanirbharta being used to kick-start the somewhat languid manufacturing sector. The expectation of delivery from the scientific, technological and industrial sectors is liable to be ‘little more than a well-worded illusion.’ The worry does not escape even General Chauhan. Curiously, there is no whiff of corruption, despite precedence of Bofors, Kargil coffins etc. and peer example of China.

Politically, even if the incidence of crony capitalism in the defence sector holds promise, the problem is that the moral authority of the uniform buttresses the electorally-sensitive regime-capitalist relationship. Recall, Germany’s big business interests backed Hitler and supported his rearmament program. In America, the pernicious influence of the military industrial complex was pointed out early enough: “we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”

Institutionally, for the armed forces to argue that ‘an integrated civil-military approach, reinforcing the focus on defence and development, one complementing and reinforcing the other,’ is of a piece with the fashionable idea lately of fusionism, an idea “known to us from our vedic times.” The forces cannot be judge if defence sector-led manufacturing and industrial development is a valid proposition, leave alone whether it is a desirable direction. Under the guise of fusion, defence attachés are being put to what is patently not a military function: acting as vendors for defence sector capitalists.

Worrying phrases

An overstretch is in the egregious inclusion of ‘meritocratic’ in visualising the future military: ‘A modern, strong and combat ready military (lethal and meritocratic)…’ Meritocratic is set to be a rather vexed term soon. The military appears vigilant to the possibility and has in its introduction of the term here pre-empted what it may perceive as an emergent institutional threat. It is not for the military to determine its social composition. The position, reflective of the military’s sentiments, is a political position pleasing to their political masters.

In the document, there is certain reticence in engaging globally, with an over-emphasis on indigeneity of thought and practice. One of the seven ‘strategic priorities and goals’ - ‘strategic culture and climate’ - has this verbiage: ‘Our strategic outlook must be rooted in Indian knowledge and culture... Promote indigenous knowledge, take pride in our legacy and develop a nationalist outlook…. Colonial practices need to be shed.’ Elsewhere it exhorts: ‘The concept of self-reliance or Atmanirbharta… will help us develop new concepts/doctrines, tactics, systems and platforms for war fighting.’

Surely, the military is not oblivious to the contention in the political and social space on the idea of India. The regime’s conception of India as Hindu, in a departure from the Constitutional ideal of civic nationalism, is self-evident from its exertions in the educational domain. Over the coming years, new-fangled sainik schools are set to change the secular-liberal ethic of the officer corps. The agnipath scheme – with its inclination towards ‘all-India all-class’ – is already reshaping the social composition of the soldiery. Empowering, as the document has it, ‘ex-servicemen to maximise their potential towards strengthening nationalist efforts,’ is yet another tack amplifying regime-defined nationalism; and, mistakenly, presumes that wider society lacks a patriotic spirit.

If the windows of the military mind are kept open, fresh doctrinal and military-sociological winds blow in, preventing insularity. The military advances over last century have been in mimesis of peer militaries, beginning with the use of tanks or planes after the Great War; operational art of the Air-Land battle in the Cold War; the Revolution and Transformation in Military Affairs after the Cold War; and the current import of jargon as multi-domain and grey-zone operations. Drawing on a society goose-stepping its way to vishwaguru-dom puts a premium on the military’s receptivity to new and fresh ideas, irrespective of the origin.

Finally, the document has a word on the military’s roles: ‘ensuring our territorial integrity and internal stability which is essential to foster an environment conducive to growth and prosperity.’ This is a move away from the term, ‘internal security,’ advisedly used in the 2017 Joint Doctrine. Surreptitious shifts are dangerous; in this case the military appears to be identifying with dominant political forces. With growth deepening inequality, the link the military makes with prosperity is to fall for the regime’s chimera.

Spotting an opportunity

The document is rightly cognisant of the changing character of wars of today. Imagining the trends, it lays out a roadmap to prosecute such wars tomorrow. A military articulation, it is unexceptionable in its operational focus, other than being tight-lipped on ‘possible’ nuclear war. If the current-day and ongoing wars offer any lessons, it is against recourse to military power, implying that having more of it does not necessarily secure.

However, in its discussion of higher-order political aspects, the military has wittingly provided the wary regime its epaulette-laden shoulders to fire from. The document provides an renewed opportunity to discuss its major point: the relationship between defence and development. It’s formulation could do with being both problematised and politicised. The result may deflect the military from its desired trajectory, an eventuality it should prepare to receive with equanimity.

https://m.thewire.in/article/government/the-union-govts-counter-terror-policy-paper-raises-more-questions-than-answers

https://open.substack.com/pub/aliahd66/p/shouldnt-north-block-withdraw-its?r=i1fws&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Shouldn’t North Block withdraw its policy paper on terrorism?

A paper, ‘National Counter-Terrorism Policy and Strategy,’ was recently put out on the home ministry’s website. Since its very first sentence reads, “India has been at the forefront of the ongoing fight against terrorism for several decades now,” it begs the question: Why now? Speculating on the answer yields three prompts: internal, internal-external and external.

The internal prompt has the Delhi terror incident late last year focusing minds. The writing up of this policy-cum-strategy paper is perhaps an outcome. The internal-external prompt was the Baisaran meadow terror incident nine months back. Normally it takes that long to come up with a policy. However, the paper appears to be a rushed job, with at least one spelling mistake and one amendment, betrayed by an insertion in a different font. This brings to fore an external prompt.

The release of the paper coincided with the prime minister’s trip to Israel, which - as it turned out – was just prior to the launch of the ‘unprovoked and illegal’ attack by the United States (US) and Israel on Iran. The paper’s rehashes officiously the old canard, ‘while all Muslims are not terrorists, all terrorists are Muslim.’ Of a piece with the scepticism of Zionism and Hindutva of Islam and Muslims, this perhaps signalled India’s reliable presence in Israel’s corner. Whether that served to incentivize Israeli aggression is moot.

The paper’s deficits

The paper itself is a curious amalgam of policy and strategy, that any public policy undergrad knows are in themselves notably distinct tracts. Ordinarily, the expectation is of an exposition on policy from a ministry. National level strategies follow, but merit separate strategy papers because internal security strategies require addressing the differentiated terrorism variants (proxy war and indigenous) that beset India.

The only policy-level articulation in the paper is the tired refrain: “…the Indian policy of ‘zero tolerance’ against terrorism.” Parenthetically, it is up for an English professor’s input whether it should be rephrased as ‘‘zero tolerance’ for terrorism.’ At any rate, a single-phrase is inadequate to holistically to cover the conceptual edifice, guiding tenets and major considerations. While not being verbose, policy decidedly cannot be merely two-word long, especially in a nation with a continental geography, history and demography. The remainder of the paper carries the counter-terrorism strategy, which incidentally National Security Adviser Ajit Doval once ruled out (1:06:40) as a non sequitur.

Even the phrase ‘zero tolerance’ needs elaboration and guardrails. For instance, while the law provides for banning organisations, it only outlines the process. A policy must set what criteria must inform the state’s decision, to rule out arbitrariness, unilateralism and policy hijack by vested interests and dominant forces.

More significantly, ‘zero tolerance’ is somewhat misleading, given that ‘selective tolerance’ is more apt. Rightly, Muslim-perpetrated and Maoist terrorism has been subject to zero-tolerance. However, terror of regime-friendly right-wing actors – not excluding cow vigilantes, lynch mobs, communal mobs, encounter killings and bull-dozer action – is elided, though within definitional scope.

An international definition – that lacking international consensus is yet to see light of day - includes the overawing of communities through violence as constitutive of terrorism. A definition reads: “criminal acts, including against civilians, committed with intent to cause death or serious bodily injury… with the purpose to provoke a state of terror in the general public or in a group of persons or particular persons, intimidate a population…”

Even the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) acknowledges acts against a ‘section of people’ in its definition meriting the term: “Whoever does any act with intent to threaten or likely to threaten the unity, integrity, security, economic security, or sovereignty of India or with intent to strike terror or likely to strike terror in the people or any section of the people in India or in any foreign country….”

Majoritarian political violence is also terrorism, given that the result and effect is indeed a ‘crushing fear.’ Late Prime Minister Vajpayee’s words need heeding: “No organisation, irrespective of whether it claims to espouse the cause of the majority or the minority community, can be allowed to inflame passions, spread hatred and incite violence.” However, in practice vigilantes enjoy impunity.

Instead, a majoritarian state views any counter-action by communities against majoritarian pressure – such as self-defence against mobs – as terrorism. Even a verbal counter is taken as falling afoul of the clause: ‘causing disaffection against India,’ using expansive UAPA clauses that read: “unlawful activity… means any action taken… intended… to bring about… the cession… or the secession… or which incites… which … questions… to disrupt the sovereignty and territorial integrity… which causes or is intended to cause disaffection…” With a collapsing of India with Naya Bharat or Hindu India, such trends can only get more troubling. A non-parochial policy paper would have mitigated such concerns.

Querying the ‘threat profile’

Ideological baggage from the political market-place has contaminated what ought to be an exercise in ideology-immune policy formulation. This is clear from the one-para long ‘threat profile’ painted in the paper:

India has since long been affected by sponsored terrorism from across the border, with Jihadi terror outfits as well as their frontal organizations, continuing to plan, coordinate, facilitate and execute terror attacks in India. India has been on the target of global terrorist groups such as Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which have been trying to incite violence in the country through sleeper cells. Violent Extremists operating from the soils of foreign countries have hatched conspiracies to promote terrorism.

There appear to be only two sources of terrorist threat: one is state-sponsored Islamist threat and the other is from non-state actor affiliated jihadists. A possible third site of terror can faintly be gleaned from a passing mention: “…use of Drones, for facilitating terror-related activities and attacks in Punjab…”

In the paper, there is no mention of left wing extremism (LWE) or Maoist terrorism, even though the term terrorism is liberally associated with it. If non-minority groups are not to figure as terrorists, then a policy paper ought to make that clear. Since terrorism is a tactic of insurgency (1:06:15), a distinction must be made between terrorism, terrorism as part of an insurgency and insurgency.

To be sure, at a point some two decades back, a terror threat in the hinterland was manifest. The threat was attributed to Muslim extremists, described as ‘sleeper cells’ both then and in the paper. This is a misrepresentation of self-help groups that organically come up in mohallas, particularly where and when the police plays partisan.

The threat perception disregards the fact that the statistics on terrorism stood inflated by actions of majoritarian extremists designed to pass off as Muslim-perpetrated. Clearly, the paper is missing a significant national security threat.

The latter of the two listed threats – from Daesh and Al Qaeda - has long been debunked. The paper is anachronistic since that global threat is largely passé. As for any residual threat, India now has an obliging security partner in the Afghan Taliban. Or is the paper anticipating an Islamist backlash in wake of renewed US intervention in West Asia, whose possible spillover needs to be deterred? If so, doesn’t the timing of the paper’s release showup Indian foreknowledge?

Querying the ‘principled approach’

The paper holds: “India… has been steadfast in its belief that there can be no justification whatsoever, for violence in the world (italics added).” Other than Jainism perhaps, all four major Indian religions have place for righteous resort to violence, albeit plentifully caveated. Self-defence is a birth-right. Even Gandhian thought is not so pacifist, as his dispelling of self-doubt within British Indian army officers shows. This is also at variance with the regime’s own muscular ideology, evident in the choice of title, Prahaar, meaning ‘strike’.

So, what is the origin of this bland articulation as an Indian ‘ideal’?

Understandably with its minister pronouncing (obliviously of Tamil Tigers) ‘no hindu can ever be a terrorist,’ a paper from the ministry can hardly be realistic. The answer therefore must be seen in light of the pronounced Muslim-baiting in the paper. The ‘ideal’ held out pre-emptively deprives Muslims of any recourse – either verbal or physical – against pressures that can only mount with the Special Intensive Review, the looming census and - who knows - the national register of citizens, national population register et. al. to follow.

Not quibbles

In its homework the ministry may have chanced upon prescriptions out there. Yet, blackholes exist, testifying to lack of due diligence and a standard operating procedure on preparing its flagship products. Providing no executive summary, the ministry enthused by the recent AI summit apparently expects readers to rely on an AI-generated summary.

There is no mention of accountability. For instance in J&K, does the army answer to the defence ministry or the home ministry? There is no mention of a negotiated settlement, though peace processes abound other than in J&K. The ‘no talks with terrorism’ position could have done with elucidation, given the indigenous component of the insurgency persists. There is no mention of mediation using the good offices of interlocutors, when the discord is between two communities, as in Manipur. Finally, there is no mention of how strategy implementation will be audited; for instance, how will the homilies on human rights be evaluated?

Since the catchy acronym – ‘PRAHAAR’ – is only strategy-relevant, an opportunity for accolades on finally putting together its higher-order policy thoughts stands wasted. The democratic scheme of checks and balances bases on intrinsic strength in institutions, which ministries are expected to possess. The paper reveals much more of the ministry than its text lets on; all of which spell ominously for the future.