From the archives, 25 Jan 2003

REFLECTION ON MILITARY ETHOS

                                                     

“Society has imbued the soldier with sterling qualities of character…his reputation and prestige must be built up, to make him physically and morally superior to the rest of the society…Social degeneration and increasingly materialistic norms in our country are bound to adversely influence soldiers also…”

     Lt Gen VK Kapoor, ‘Soldiering, Spirituality and Leadership’, Combat Journal, Sep 02

 

Theory has it that the military is a profession owing to the service it performs, of security, for state and society.  Therefore, the values inherent in all professions are to be part of the ethos of the military as well.  These include a sense of service and obligation, whereby the autonomy accorded to the profession for self-regulation, is not transgressed.  Whereas these are to be inherent in the military, there are a few additional features specific to it that are required to be present, particularly in militaries of democratic societies. 

 

Two major ones need to be mentioned here, namely, sense of subordination to the political imperative, and, secondly, the obligation of self-sacrifice should duty so demand. If these are constitutive of service ethos, the value systems of members will accordingly be conditioned.  Individual character traits that these systemic values encourage include non-partisan behavior and subordination of the self to the collective respectively.  The former is external in orientation linking the military with society, while the latter, internal to the military, is a measure of its cohesion.

 

A caveat needs introduction at this stage - it being that the military is a heterogeneous system.  The desirable traits will vary across it from the combat arms to the combat support elements.  The support elements owing to the nature of the job exhibit the managerial culture of their civilian peers.  However, it is the combat arms that have the distinctive and defining function in any military thereby separating it from the mainstream of national life.  They are at the operating edge where mission fulfillment may demand the ultimate in commitment.  Therefore the character traits its members exhibit are the ones referred to here and accepted as representative of the military.

 

A survey of the theory is useful as a measure of the reality.  The bias towards the Army owes to the central position it occupies on account of its size and commitment in national security affairs.  Therefore, the terms ‘military’ and the ‘Army’ are used synonymously here, and within the Army the reference to service ethos is directly concerning the combat arms.

 

The expansion over the years has lead to the Army getting to be more representative of society {as befits those of a democratic society}. The officer cadre is now drawn from the middle classes that are the most politically potent strata of society in liberalizing India.  It is only axiomatic that the restiveness of society under change seeps into the cantonments.  This permeability of cantonments has increased owing to the pervasiveness of mass media fostering a ‘pop’ culture.  This has led to a dilution in `island’ as descriptive of the secluded image of the military.  Given the heightened operational engagements of the military over the last two decades, there has also been an expansion of the military, particularly the Army, to cope with the same.

 

These two points taken conjointly have had a ‘civilianising’ influence on military culture.  Thus, ironically an army with a diluted service ethos now addresses the operational situation that demanded it. This makes the answer – expansion - a part of the problem.  This is a self-reinforcing problem.  A deepening operational commitment is reducing the opportunity and time for socialization of its members into military mores. In other words, the Army is fighting to losing battle in preserving its ethos.  This could eventuate in the Army literally fighting a battle it is unable to win on the operational front.

 

The intensity of LIC operations has necessitated deployment of additional numbers.  These have been created largely through amalgamation of myriad elements into a new paramilitary force.  Each constituent brings the baggage of the ethos into which it has been nurtured, to the high- tension environment.  The point is that inattention to the basics of a fighting man’s value system is itself evidence that the managerial ethic has penetrated warrior value systems at an inopportune juncture.  No doubt the warrior ethic is healthy at the spear tip preserved by a regimental system.  That the benefits of this have not been extended to the ‘paramilitary’ force engaged in the Army’s, if not the nation’s, greatest challenge yet is also well known.

 

The other parameter - apolitical behavior - needs also to be approached critically rather than reflexively.  The globalising phenomenon has lead to a certain cultural resurgence in all societies.  This has been particularly marked in the strata that provide the officer corps, specifically the middle classes.  Therefore for the officer corps to exhibit a similar consciousness is a high probability. Proof that this possibility exists can be gleaned from a textual analysis of service journals that carry articles reflecting the revivalism affecting larger society. There is an element of defensive nationalism and ideological conservatism discernible.

 

The argument that the military is but a cross section of society and will mirror it loses sight of the theoretical imperative that, as an instrument of polity, it has to stand autonomous from societal forces and political currents.  The point is that the military has to fight a rear guard action now to preserve its identity, autonomy, culture and unity.  The evidence is the Indian military is understandably finding it problematic to remain an ‘island’.  However, it certainly can preserve its core culture should it be seized of the issue. 

 

The assumption of continuing utility into the future of character values reflecting service ethos needs now to be addressed.  The responsibility of the military has not changed. However, the Revolution in Military Affairs has placed weapons in the control of the military whose usage requires stricter political oversight and input than hithertofore. The military is now unable to prosecute a conflict without reference to the other issue areas equally relevant to the outcome of such an enterprise. War cannot be left to the Generals alone. The understanding therefore is that the macro service ethos cannot remain unaffected. 

 

A corresponding change in character traits is axiomatic. This is true also at the micro-level as the very nature of the spear end itself is in the throes of change.  This process is underway elsewhere and replication of the same in India is but a matter of time. Assessment of the manner of change will of necessity be based on military models in the West in order not to reinvent the wheel and must be mindful of the socio-cultural context in which the evolution of those armies is taking place. 

 

The interesting theoretical insight emerges is that both the character attributes of members and the ‘military mind’ must undergo a change.  This owes to the fact that rising to the ultimate in dedication will not now normally be required, given the stand-off war-fighting tools of war available.  ‘Asymmetric war’ { taken in the sense of one waged by conventional armies as against that waged by irregulars} that ensures survival of the warrior will be engaged in.  Where force levels and technological prowess are about equal, mutual deterrence is likely to prevail.  The declining utility of the war waging tools owes to the heightened destructive potential that renders dubious the cost effectiveness of war as perceived in the economy-centric analysis of governments. The warrior is transformed, if not reduced, to being more a ‘manager of the means of violence’.  The ethos pervading such a system, and the character attributes of its members, will naturally be divergent from that of the armies of yore and the present. Thus the warrior ethos, though not obsolescent, is endangered. The point is that while the warrior ethic is still valid for modern Armed Forces, a post-modern military will require to exhibit a changed, diluted warrior ethos. This is occasioned by the Tofflerian insight that the value systems of the armies, and character attributes of their members, are of necessity different for agricultural age, industrial age and information age armies. 

 

Our military is indeed well on its way from being in a ‘war waging’ mode to being a ‘war deterrent’ one, to use terms coined by the leading military sociologist, Charles C Moskos.  The nuclear umbrella and the surge towards a technological edge are pointers.  However, ours is still a ‘mass army’ – the induction of a new generation of tanks, additional commissioning of young officers and the new paramilitary raising being evidence.  To an extent this is the last gasp of the subsets that lend ‘mass’, a feature most evident in the Army as against other services.  {This reinforces the recommendation of downsizing as an antidote – a matter that will require top–down enforcement, possibly under political intervention to regulate the backlash of vested interests.}

 

In India’s case, the Armed Forces are transiting from a modern to a post-modern future, as is the society they form part of. However, the combat arms, particularly of the Army, are as yet in the modern, industrial age. There is a need to reclaim the diluted warrior ethic appropriate to the circumstance on two counts. One is that the warrior ethic has not outlived its utility, reason being the widespread operational commitment requiring it. The second is that a future that necessitates a changed ethos is not quiet here. The imperative is an in-service return to the radical professional ethic for coping with the present. However to tackle the future, a managerial ethos more relevant to handling technology and technical hands may be privileged.

 

In conclusion it may be said that, firstly, the distinctiveness of the military value system has eroded under the assault of the socio-political change of revolutionary proportions underway in our society. Service ethos in the form of radical professionalism may need preservation against this onslaught. Secondly, the demands of future warfare compel a change in service ethos away from radical professionalism. Acknowledging the existence of the apparent contradiction here would help initiate measures then can enable re-institutionalizing the warrior culture to tide over the present, even if a warrior culture may be dysfunctional for the future.  The remedy over the long term is downsizing in order that the military obligation is met not by escapees from the job market as of now, but through self-selection of inductees, particularly in the officer cadre, being inspired only partially by traditional warrior traits. Over the middle term, there is need to progressively privilege managerial culture in order to usher in a post-modern technology intensive, war deterring military. In the short term, an in-service reemphasizing of the warrior ethic may yield operational dividend for the present day mass and civilianized army enmeshed in LIC. The challenge facing service ethos is in managing the contradictory pulls of the present and the future in face of the influence of the past.