https://aliahd66.substack.com/p/specialism-getting-to-the-military

Specialism: Getting to the military’s future

The Indian Army’s Transformation, underway since late 2000s, is catching steam. Agnipath and Atmanirbharta are indicative. Rightsizing, retrieving from protracted deployment in Kashmir, the culmination of jointness in theaterisation and completion of pivot from the West to the North are impending. A measure to keep up the momentum is to induct Specialisation into officer corps repertoire.

Currently, a largely generalist profile prevails in the officer corps. Officers undergo a common, all-encompassing training enabling them to tenant staff appointments with divergent mandates. This has served the Army reasonably well, allowing exposure of officers to the whole gamut of functions – operations, administrative, logistics.

However, to complement the Transformation underway, such an officer profile cannot persist into the future. Specialisation is necessary for efficiency and mastering complex subsystems and processes, be these operations, intelligence, cyber, space, information operations, human resource and facility management, project management, procurement and acquisition, military international cooperation or supply chain management.

What might an upgraded career profile look like and how to get to it?

Specialism is key to the future. There are two aspects to this.

The first is creation of an army leadership. Second, is to have officers tenant appointments in specialised streams – operations, administrative, logistics.

Taking the latter first, officers while in regimental service can self-select to the specialisation they wish to identify with. A combination of vacancies available, self-selection and identification of aptitude, signed off on in confidential reports, can lead to placement in a staff vertical.

At the Junior Command (JC) course level of seniority, the JC tactical content needs being supplemented with an elective – operations (joint operations, intelligence, information operations, cyber, space), administrative (human resource or facility management) and logistics (supply chain and associated verticals) – that is either on site at War College or outsourced to a lead training institution.

The College of Defence Management, Army War College and the Military Intelligence School are already running short courses. The prototype needs firming in, with officers of a suitable talent being trained, with surety that each would be employed subsequently in appointments which the training prepares her for.

Now for the first Specialism.

After regiment command tenures, the higher command level is at which the army leadership of the future should be culled for preparation for the future. A meritocratic exercise, the catchment must include all combat arms and support arms. This does away with the controversial pro-rata aspect that attends promotions till two-star level.

The command appointments must be tenanted by those so selected and progressively trained at the Higher Command course for the operational and strategic levels and at the National Defence College for the strategic and grand strategic levels.

Progression in the command hierarchy should be assured to these officers. This will end any need to look-over-the-shoulder and lend them confidence to look beyond the next confidential report. Their staff appointments must mainly be in the operations vertical, with mandatory appointments in a joint headquarters necessary for career advancement to higher levels.

For a younger leadership, longer tenures in command of formations and a longer service at senior levels, the sifting must be in immediate aftermath of command tenures, followed straight away by the Higher Command course.

Induction into the leadership cum operations stream must be done by the 16th year of service, allowing for another 20 years service for making full and best use of such officers.

Other officers would be vertically mobile through respective arms and service command hierarchy, with alternation in the staff vertical originally placed in.

Theaterisation is expected to reduce numbers of command headquarters. The integrated battle group (IBG) roll out would see a delayering in formations, with divisions being axed in favour of corps controlled brigade sized bricks of IBGs. A delayering can be done with the Area, Sub Area and Station hierarchy of headquarters.

Officer numbers can accordingly be pruned by encouraging an up or out system, with surplus officers choosing to leave at pensionable years of service with due preparation for the civil street as of now.

Just as the Agnipath scheme has been affected for lower ranks, a reversion to the original intent of short service commission officer cadre should be done, with officers of this stream leaving at five years and ten years as chosen by them and only a limited proportion, duly vetted staying on.

As of now there is no discernible debate on the direction of the officer cadre, though it will not only be affected by the Transformation underway, but will be driving it.

Some hard truths necessitating change need to be faced squarely.

The officer corps is bloated. The argument in the reverse direction that the vacancies exist that need being filled is status quoist. Instead, ridding those vacancies is the need of the hour, such as by amalgamating and delayering headquarters in keeping with information technology increasing spans of control.

The hegemony of the bloated arms of higher ranks needs being broken. Rightly reckoned as Mandalisation, it is not sustainable as the earlier legitimising logic of counter-insurgency participation and deployments meriting higher pro rata apportioning for the advantaged arms is no longer valid.

Since large numbers of officers are inducted, quality control at the inception has been sacrificed. There is no way mentoring in regiments can polish the material taken in. The impending downsizing of the Army will help reduce numbers.

Let the Border Police substitute the military in border guarding. An over enthusiasm in the Northern Command and Eastern Command to have operational control over border guarding function and continuing army deployments needs revision.

Moving from a war readiness military with a deterrence by denial doctrine to being a war deterrent military with a deterrence by punishment doctrine facilitates the proposed measure.

Training and employment have to be synced. Adhocism in the Military Secretary’s branch will only then be reined in.

Tenures in some appointments such as the budget or acquisitions related could be extended to five years. End colonial era designations, viz. DAA&QMGXYZ, for the U series to designate verticals.

The higher ranks are depleting in credibility. The duration at colonel’s rank is currently a life sentence. The musical chairs in command assignments thereafter is almost comical. Take the four changeovers already in India’s most significant theatre, Fire and Fury Corps in Ladakh, since the crisis outbreak.

Due diligence must attend the officer corps reset for the twenty first century, even if already a quarter century late. Its not impossible that there is thought to such like measures already in the system, and will be foisted on the Army and country in due course, as yet another Modi masterstroke we can do without.