http://www.kashmirtimes.com/newsdet.aspx?q=97739
Welcoming the new
army chief
One file is likely to go through
the bureaucratic mill rather quickly over this week. Ajit Doval, no stranger in
this part of India for his dynamism, will likely pilot the file of his ethnic
kin, General Bipin Rawat – to whom he owes much for implementing his Kashmir
policy with gusto – for as the first chief of defence staff (CDS). The ticker
on television at the time of writing has it that the government has cleared the
mandate of the CDS. All that remains is to reward Bipin Rawat for his services
in Operational All Out that set teh stage for Amit Shah’s August constitutional
initiative on Kashmir by allowing Rawat another two years to loyally serve the
regime.
To its credit, however, the
government has done well to appoint Lt Gen MM Naravane as the new army chief,
though the post of chief of defence staff (CDS) that was widely expected to be
announced simultaneously continues without its first incumbent. One good thing
about Naravane’s elevation is that it blocks Lt Gen Ranbir Singh from the
position, unless down-the-line the government makes another change when it gets
round to appointing the CDS – if Rawat does not make the cut.
It is not unknown for an
incumbent chief to get an extension. Gen GG Bewoor’s extension is precedent. It
allowed Indira Gandhi to set the popular and strong Lt Gen Prem Bhagat to
pasture in the Damodar Valley in order to usher in Lt Gen ‘Tappy’ Raina, to cap
off her kitchen cabinet of Kashmiri Pandits. In the event, Raina disappointed
her by steering the army off the emergency. So Rawats chances have not dimmed
as yet.
But then Rawat had competition,
from his own northern army commander, Lt Gen Ranbir Singh. Singh also went out
his way to establish his credentials on amenability with the government. He
engaged in two public spats – albeit via the media – with his predecessor in
his appointment, retired Lt Gen DS Hooda. The issue they indirectly faced off over
was whether surgical strikes after the Uri terror attack were an innovation or
were they merely an extension of what the army had been mounting all through
the preceding decade and half along the Line of Control (LC).
The first exchange between the
two generals was in wake of Hooda’s position taken at the last edition of the
annual military literature festival at Chandigarh last year when he opined that
the hype surrounding the surgical strikes was unwarranted. He was referring
perhaps to the government only two months prior indulging in a bit of
self-congratulations when starting off on the run up to national elections the
following year when it observed the second anniversary of the surgical strikes
as the Parakram Parv.
The second round of disagreement
between the two was just as elections drew to close. The military operations
had untimely from an elections point of view claimed, apropos nothing in
particular, that the surgical strike was a unique event. Hooda had by then been
contracted by the Congress party to write up a national security doctrine for
them that informed the security part of their manifesto. The army’s raising of
the matter yet again at election time was as if to discredit Hooda and his
liberal doctrinal take, though even Hooda’s doctrine endorsed surgical strikes
as an arrow in India’s deterrent quiver. Ranbir Singh, yet again unnecessarily
and with eminently questionable timing, waded in by backing his military
operations colleagues. For his pains, Ranbir Singh remains in the higher
appointment race, if not as army chief for now, then as CDS, since CDS is open
to deep selection from the ranks of three-star brass.
The good thing about Naravane’s
appointment is that both Rawat and Ranbir Singh would no longer be able to
impact directly the army’s apolitical culture. Both have gone out of their way
to signal political like-mindedness to the government, which has compromised
the army’s long-standing apolitical ethic. Even if Naravane shares the world
view of the government, he has been discerning in his speech so far and on that
account is a welcome change from the verbosity – if not bombast – of his
immediate predecessor.
The only known occasion Naravane
signaled his acceptability for the government was when he was appointed vice
chief from his army commander post at Kolkata, seen as a step up to being front
runner for taking over as next chief. He had said that India’s transgressions
of the Line of Actual Control with China were twice as many as Chinese
incursions up to their line of territorial claims.
Since the mainstream media keeps
up a lament over Chinese incursions, it was a useful addition to open domain
knowledge that India was way ahead of the Chinese. Perhaps, Naravane was
signaling that the eastern army had not slept on his watch, making it as active
– even if less visible - in staring the stronger foe, the Chinese, as Ranbir
Singh’s northern army tackling the Kashmiri insurgency. This was to the
government’s credit since it had political dividend in projecting the
government being strong on defence in first place and keeping China at bay with
the Doklam stand-off as centerpiece.
As an aside, it bears reflection
that none of the generals in tactical level command connected to Doklam made it
to next rank. Does this mean India blundered into the stand-off and muddled
through before being bailed out by deft diplomatic footwork by S Jaishankar,
then foreign secretary, and Mandarin expert, VK Gokhale, the current one? This
explains in part Modi’s craven call on the Chinese strong man at Wuhan later
and the elevation of firefighter, Jaishankar, who since retired, to head the
ministry. This perhaps explains the hyper-alertness of Naravane’s army,
signified by double the number of transgressions of the LAC, movements up to
India’s claim line on the Chinese side, in order to recreate conventional deterrence
post-Doklam.
More significantly from the
discussion on Naravane’s suitability from a civil-military relations point of
view, the general early on in Modi’s term, speaking at a seminar at Panjab
University, Chandigarh, as then head of the army’s training command, reiterated
the secular credentials of the country as among its core values. This echoed
the section on values underpinning national security and military doctrine that
find mention in the joint doctrine of 2017. This perhaps led to his continuing
to cool his heels in Shimla even has his junior Ranbir Singh sped off to
command the prestigious and India’s largest northern army. Naravane’s move
later to head a field army out of Kolkata seemingly rehabilitated him, after
partial eclipse by Ranbir Singh, in the race for next chief.
Such moves are significant, since
the last time a junior skipped the queue for field army was with Bipin Rawat
taking over southern army even as his senior, the first Muslim general in a
quarter century to reach army commander rank, Lt Gen PM Hariz, continued in
Shimla. In the event, Rawat outpointed both Hariz and the then frontrunner, Lt
Gen Praveen Bakshi.
The other good thing from
Naravane’s appointment is that the government appears to have got over its
Pakistan and Kashmir fixation. When it appointed Rawat to head the army, it had
let on that his expertise was required for ending the proxy war and insurgency
in Kashmir. Perhaps it believes that extant violence indices indicate that it
has managed to end the proxy war and insurgency. It can now turn to the more
significant rival, China. It is not as if Naravane is a spring chicken when it
comes to counter insurgency, having commanded a battalion of the Rashtriya
Rifles, or against Pakistan, having headed a strike corps. However, his
expertise is on the China front, with stints as defence attaché in Myanmar and
brigade and division command in the north east.
This will help India get over its
Kashmir obsession, that would have otherwise continued had Ranbir Singh, who oversaw
the recent lockdown, taken over instead. That Rawat and Ranbir Singh did not
provide the right military input India’s misconceived Kashmir and Pakistan
policies is evident from the constitutional initiative in early August. India
flirted with a war that could potentially go nuclear, an unwarranted price to
pay for the ruling party to indulge its ideological agenda.
Civil-military relations on even
keel require military advice uncompromised by ideological convergence. It is
not for a military head to tell the government what it wishes to hear. That
Kashmir will stay as a head ache – on account of India’s missteps and his
predecessor’s pliability – will keep Naravane to the till in Kashmir.
At the mentioned seminar,
Naravane called out the lack of traction of the political track with Pakistan,
despite the reactivation of the LC. He virtually predicted the escalation that resulted
and the death of prospects of a negotiated return to a pre-existing ceasefire.
Now he is better positioned to act on his instinct. He can convey the same
piece of advice. Having seen that a hard-nosed policy has limited utility, the
government could reverse course. Could it be that its appointment of Naravane
indicates a budding policy shift?
At the Panjab University seminar,
which was on Pakistan, he drew analogy from Pakistan's case, saying, "This
(Pakistani praetorianism) is in stark contrast to India where the armed forces
owe allegiance to the Constitution, and not to any party, person or
religion." He would do well to keep his words to the fore. The state of
civil-military relations he inherits is best illustrated by the recent
statement by his successor in Kolkata, Lt Gen Anil Chauhan, praising the
government’s Citizenship Amendment Act as another instance of hard decision
making on its part.
Kolkata oversees the areas that
are likely to see most instability from this Act and its follow on legislation,
on the National Register of Citizens. With unrest bound to proceed till next
end decade occasioned by following through with this ideological tilting at the
windmills by the government, the military may well give up any thought of
measuring up to the China threat with its hinterland beset by agitations over
detentions camps into the decade. As a first step he may have to rein in
Chauhan, incidentally, the military operations head who was seconded by Ranbir
Singh in the above mentioned second tiff with Hooda.
By this yardstick, Naravane is the
right man and at the right time for the job. Now if he will only advise the
government - prone acting hastily on its ideological and parochial political
compulsions – to keep ideology from contaminating strategy.
