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Why Naya Bharat needs a Jameel Mehmood

Even as the Indian armed forces engaged in Operation (Op) Sindoor, some concerning headlines this side of the border collectively call out for tempering of the elation in its wake.

Here, the incidents in question are first listed, followed by a caution.

It's not all that glitter is gold

One, with the hot-pursuit of terrorists who perpetrated the atrocity at Baisaran meadow failing, Kashmir witnessed the demolishing of houses of militants with controlled explosions, including of those uninvolved. The operation was by night and in at least one instance, neighbouring houses were also damaged. The security forces involved refrained from releasing official information on the action.

Two, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar has opened an inquiry into “unconscionable, unacceptable acts” off the Rakhine coast in Myanmar. Allegedly, under the cover of darkness, the Navy dumped Rohingya refugees – who had been corralled from Delhi and transported by air to the Andamans by air - into the sea. (It would be a pity of the aircraft for move to Andamans were furnished by the air force.) Worse, allegations include sexual misconduct by unspecified escorts aboard the vessel.

Three, the Eastern Command informed of killings of 10 armed cadre of an unnamed armed group near the border in Manipur by the Assam Rifles. A Myanmarese group involved in the civil war against the military-led central authorities has since questioned the encounter. Apparently, the group was against the ongoing fencing of the border in the area; also objected to by local communities.

Four, the Sikh clergy denied deployment of air defence assets within the Golden Temple complex, forcing the army to distance itself from the statement of its air defence chief and local army commander. It appears that army was countering an earlier propaganda plank of the Pakistani military that improbably held that the Indian side had targeted Golden Temple during Op Sindoor.

For Indians to also refer to Golden Temple in a mirroring information war is to unnecessarily involve an Indian community in intelligence games. Whether the Temple witnessed a ‘surfeit of drone and missile attacks’, in keeping with the intelligence on threat to the Temple, is questionable.

Further, the commanding general in Amritsar in his media statement held that consequent to the Pahalgam attack, ‘the nation’s anger under able leadership took the form of Operation Sindoor.’ In Hindi, he describes it as ‘prabal netritva ke adheen (under bold leadership)’. Since the reference to the ‘able and bold leadership’ can only be to the political masters of the military. This is of a piece with the air force’s shabash: “…has been possible only because of budgetary and policy support from the government of India in the last decade." Both are egregious.

Five, the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Anil Chauhan’s new book just hit the stands. In it, the general has opined against any need for a written national security doctrine (NSS). Evidently, the leading military authority, in face of expert opinion to the contrary, provides covering fire to the government that has not been able to come up with one for over a decade.

Further, the timing along with its aim – “a cogent viewpoint…as to how the Indian Armed Forces are transforming…and their steadfast contributions towards realization of the national vison of becoming ‘Sashakt, Surakhshit, Samridh and Viksit Bharat’ by 2047” – lends ballast to the ruling party’s surge, capitalising on the military’s operational showing as is its wont.

Get up, stand up

It was not always this way. The military has been known to retain its lights even in face of political pressures. Its reputation for professionalism rests on this feature, of truth telling.

In the Nehruvian period, General Thimayya’s confrontation with Defence Minister VK Krishna Menon is well known. General Manekshaw, in keeping with Indira Gandhi’s view, reassured Indira’s cabinet that it would be premature to take down Pakistan in April 1971. General SK Sinha as Western Army Commander held a different perspective from Indira Gandhi on how the then nascent Sikh extremism should be handled. He was superseded, and the rest as they say is history. The military consistently pushed for nuclearization, even when the political class dithered. A naval chief was sacked, inter-alia, for intercepting gun-running through the Andaman Sea for Myanmar rebels favoured by the then defence minister.

General JJ Singh, though initially in favour of a peace deal over Siachen, changed his mind. General VK Singh was not above keeping the bureaucracy on tenterhooks during his stand-off over the date-of-birth issue. From the turn of the 2010s, the military stood for a two-front threat perspective, in face of foot-dragging by successive governments. In Kashmir, the army withstood pressures for rollback of its special powers, though operational circumstance made it appear feasible. The army shied away from deploying in Central India against Maoists, though termed the graver threat to national security.

Don’t give up the fight

Have things changed over the last decade?

In Kashmir, the army abandoned the ‘velvet glove’ in favour of solely an ‘iron fist’. The air force went along with the shift towards a smaller number of Rafales at a higher cost. The army stood askance as the ruling party capitalised on its surgical strikes for electoral gains, using the army to organise Parakram Parv. Its operations’ head then denied surgical strikes were previously conducted. The air force hid its blue-on-blue helicopter accident till the elections were over, while maintaining a façade over the Balakot strikes. The army maintained a stiff upper lip on the extent of Chinese intrusions onto Indian territory. Lately, the air force was reticent on its losses.

Withholding information amounts to turning the information war inwards, to keep citizenry in the dark and the parliament uninformed. Willy-nilly the dividend is yet again to their political master, embarked on yet another campaign on the military’s shoulders.

It appears the military has abandoned taking a position on a professional matter professionally arrived at. This is colourfully put by a middle order politician as: ‘forces are bowing down to Modi.’ Veterans ruing such a state of affairs is testimony.

State capture by the right wing appears near complete.

So now you see the light, ay

Brigadier RR Palsokar, the commander of Mullaitivu brigade, brought out a heart-felt account of his command tenure at one-star rank. Anyone of the generation that witnessed or participated in the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) would know Mullaitivu as a hotspot then, and later as the site at which the Tamil Tigers took their last stand.

The Brigadier recounts a dilemma he faced towards the end of his command when the IPKF was recalled to the mainland by VP Singh on the change of government.

The Perumal government propped up by India was wary of ending up a foundling. The intelligence agency, perhaps with the concurrence of Indian diplomats in Colombo as Jaishankar and Hardeep Puri (‘Viceroy’ Dixit had likely left by then), wanted to steady their protégé in Jaffna. The Citizen’s Volunteer Force (CVF) was thought up.

While Perumal’s coalition herded Tamil youth together for the ‘boots on ground’, the agency ferried in weapons. What the project had not reckoned with was the commander on the ground in Trinco, Major General Jameel Mehmood.

Not lost on anyone in IPKF at the time - including this author - was that another fiasco was in the offing. A CVF company of underage youth rounded up from villages was deployed in his company area.

As Palsokar mulled over what he should do, he received a call from Jameel, whose area abutted Mullaitivu. Jameel told him what he had done in Trincomalee; going to the camp where the CVF was being assembled and asking after who were volunteers. Those who were not volunteers were marched out to rejoin their families. Palsokar’s recall in his own words:

Now came General Jameel’s crunch question. What was I going to do? I tried to tell him what our divisional headquarters had told us. He then asked me a direct question, what did I think personally? I said that I would like to do what he did, but I was not sure if I had either the authority or the guts to do so. General Jameel’s response was, ‘are you a commander?’ That settled it (pp. 169-70).

Folklore has it that Jameel, knowing that the weapons when in CVF hands would eventually get to the Tigers, took a stand. He was transferred out before the weapons were handed over to the CVF.

When I went round the CVF company in my area checking alert levels by night, I could see the luminous foresights of the Kalashnikovs from yards away. This, when I carried a World War II Sten. By when we reached Madras port on de-induction, the CVF had dissolved.

No wonder it took the Sri Lankans another two decades to clear out the Tigers; at the cost of being arraigned internationally for genocide.

Jameel was overlooked for three-star rank. On representation, he went on to command the eastern army.

You stand up for your right

Victories with stand-off weapons are laudable, but by the prime minister’s promise, the next round will be different. The Pakistanis have made that equally clear. If it turns out so, the Chinese might not sit it out either.

Instances recorded at the outset here could get to be a habit and habits we know are character-forming. If careers of officers of the Jameel ilk are not preserved, the CDS-envisioned Transformation and, in turn, Modi’s dream of Viksit Bharat will come to naught.

https://www.thecitizen.in/in-depth/peace-keeping-in-troubled-times-1148231

 https://aliahd66.substack.com/p/a-un-force-commanders-saga

A UN Force Commander’s saga

The travails of UNAMSIL

General VK Jetley has finally self-published his version of the travails of the UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL), of which he was the Force Commander.

Below, passages from another book are contrasted with his version to suggest that his is an important contribution to military history of both the Indian army and UN peacekeeping.

On the activity of British forces who arrived in early May to evacuate their nationals as part of their Operation Palliser, Jetley writes:

After completion of the British evacuation operation, the British Task Force Commander was perhaps accorded permission by his country to fly Harrier jets and Chinooks over Freetown in a show of force…. While it is necessary to give credit to the British for this show of force, it is also necessary to dispel the myth that the RUF (Revolutionary United Front) was poised to attack Freetown and that they were deterred by the presence of one battalion of the British in Sierra Leone.

In contrast, Kofi Annan, then UN Secretary General (SG), in his memoirs, Interventions, recalls the episode thus:

After a deeply troubled period for the UN peacekeeping mission in Sierra Leone in 1999 and early 2000, in which the entire mission looked set to collapse due to the intransigent and brutal intentions of the factions to the conflict there, I was able to call upon the support of the UK (United Kingdom) prime minister Tony Blair. Rather than watch Sierra Leone fall into another bout of atrocious civil war of the kind that had devastated the country throughout the 1990s, what followed in May 2000 was a decisive military intervention by the British military task force that routed the rebel factions and returned the balance to Sierra Leone’s political system. The UN operation was saved as was Sierra Leone, in large part to the courageous leadership of Tony Blair….

From a reading of the book, it can be anticipated that the general would have a hearty laugh over Annan’s version above. Jetley quite categorically states:

Nothing is further from the truth as this was never the case and UNAMSIL Force Headquarters made it clear to the DPKO (Department of Peacekeeping Operations), the press and anyone else who cared to listen, that there was no threat from the RUF rebels to Freetown…. Code cables sent to DPKO at that time would support this statement.

Code cables presumably inform the SG’s report to the Security Council. The report covering the period appears oblivious to the input from the mission, putting the Secretariat perspective in the following words:

A pivotal factor in restoring stability was the arrival of United Kingdom troops on 7 May and of a substantial British naval presence offshore a week later. The deployment of British troops at Lungi airport and in the western part of Freetown had as its objective the safe evacuation of nationals of the United Kingdom and others for whom it was responsible. Nevertheless, this presence boosted the confidence of the Sierra Leoneans, and enabled UNAMSIL to redeploy much needed troops to areas east of Freetown.

At the outset of the crisis, I (the SG) called upon those Member States with the capacity to deploy well-trained and well-equipped troops to constitute a rapid reaction force to provide UNAMSIL with the necessary deterrent capacity. In this regard, I very much welcome the decision made by the United Kingdom to deploy a spearhead battalion and other assets which, although sent for national reasons, was instrumental in restoring calm in Freetown….

The contrary perspective of the Force Commander on the ground is scathing.

Jetley makes clear that the Nigerian contingent deployed for the protection of the airfield did not need any hand-holding. The British on arrival inserted themselves in its protection without so much as a by-your-leave from the Force, which to Jetley shows up the afterlife of a colonial power.

Jetley goes on to reveal the British commandeering the Sierra Leonean air assets for unnecessary strafing of supposed rebel positions ahead, resulting in targeting of civilians and, thereby, constituting International Humanitarian War (IHL) violations, arguably amounting to war crimes.

The book’s revelations require incorporation into the information available on such landmark episodes. The subaltern view is now available to, if warranted, revise the popular version of events.

The British narrative is the dominant one, finding its way into peacekeeping pedagogy, with one such tract claiming, ‘British troops defended parts of Freetown and Lungi International Airport, and set up patrols on the streets of Freetown and the main highway leading out of the capital. British officers also sat in on UN military planning sessions….’

More pertinently, the book is also significant from broadening the understanding on the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine that was then under construction.

Kofi Annan’s para above saluting Blair informs of, ‘a culture of humanitarian intervention seemed to be growing also in the actions of may of the global powers. This is evident from the determination of some of the most impressive international leaders during my time as secretary-general to respond to this call.’

The British can be seen to be manufacturing a crisis where none existed of the claimed proportions so as to lend ballast to the R2P doctrine being cooked up. Jetley’s recall of the British force and its commander, a brigadier’s, actions show up the British, a declining great power, even at that time, searching desperately for legitimacy as a great power and credibility of its seat amongst the Permanent Five of the Security Council.

This is clear from another episode recounted by Jetley in which he is petitioned by the British permanent representative (PR) to the UN to pitch for a Chapter VII mission during his brief at the Security Council on the mission’s activity.

The British PR surely had read the SG’s report that had put such advocacy in perspective, and yet he wished to fire the gun from Jetley’s shoulders. The SG report had it:

…many Member States advocated that UNAMSIL should be given a strong peace-enforcement mandate under Chapter VII of the Charter…. I am not opposed to such a mandate in principle, as long as the United Nations is able to obtain, from Member States with ready capacity, the necessary resources to carry out the tasks that such a mandate implies.

Jetley is quite clear that without the participation of competent military forces in missions, peace enforcement would be a pipedream. He made a pitch for a brigade each separately with the PRs of the US and the UK to little avail. The West too was clear that it was not about to get into the mud, preferring to leave African problems to African ministrations.

Thus, without furnishing the resources, Security Council minders, as the penholder on Sierra Leone, the British, wished for peace enforcement – the quelling of recalcitrant signatories as the RUF. Incidentally, the British had given some 10000 weapons to a rival faction, only prior to the arrival of Jetley in the mission.

The first part of Jetley’s book shows up the wishfulness of enforcement, informing of the incapacity of the contingents furnished to the UN by member states, noted in an SG report on the findings of an after-crisis review.

Jetley is particularly incensed with Nigerians.

In the event, it appears that their wheeling dealing led to his ousting from the post of Force Commander.

The sorry episode was brought about by an unknown actor hacking into his computer to pull out a personal note-to-self he had written up in wake of the crisis in the mission area in May. The note was put in the open domain with the intention of creating bad blood within the mission by embarrassing those involved, who would then turn on Jetley.

The crisis in question had witnessed force elements handing over weapons and turning themselves in as hostages to the RUF without a challenge. Jetley had been put out by their pusillanimity.

Jetley was particularly struck by the crisis breaking out precisely at the time the West African regional organisation, ECOWAS’ Ceasefire Monitoring Group, ECOMOG, wound up, with the Nigerian contingent being spared the indignities inflicted on the other country troops held hostage.

This, to Jetley, shows up the complicity of the Nigerians with the RUF and among other matters led to his conviction that the Nigerians were up to little good in Sierra Leone.

Though beginning on a Chapter VI note, the mission had acquired Chapter VII cover for the increments to its mandate resulting from the departure of the ECOMOG. The initial mandate was to assist ECOMOG with disarmament as agreed to in the Lomé peace accord.

However, the Nigerians, in particular, wanting the re-hatting of the ECOMOG into a UN mission, were outflanked by the UN authorising the UNAMSIL to take over the responsibilities of the ECOMOG.

While there is no record of why this change occurred, it can be inferred that the UN was not blind to the Nigerian-RUF nexus with diamond trade at its bottom. The UN moved to sanction ‘blood diamonds’ under Chapter VII during Jetley’s tenure, culminating in the Kimberley process on conflict-free diamond trade.

In Jetley’s view, this enlightened switch left the Nigerians without the better emoluments that go with serving in the UN, besides leading the Nigerian ECOMOG force commander, who wanted to lead a Nigerian-heavy UNAMSIL, high and dry.

The Nigerian interest, per Jetley’s revelations, was in continuing on a good wicket with the RUF, who controlled the diamond rich areas.

Evidently, Jetley put a spanner in the works. This is entirely believable.

Jetley was bitter at the treatment he received. Instead of the UN backing him, he was relieved, with the excuse that an expanded Force component required that a three-star general head it.

To his credit, Jaswant Singh, a staunch military man who was then foreign minister, shot back that Jetley was in any case due for a promotion, so should be retained. The UN disregarding the entreaty, India sensibly pulled out its contribution to the mission.

That the Indian contribution was exceptional is clear from the later half of the book, in which Jetley details the planning and conduct of the Operation Khukri, the breaking of the siege of Kailahun, where a couple of Indian companies were besieged by the RUF.

This recount is another contribution to military history and is sufficiently legible for military enthusiasts to follow with sufficient comprehension.

At the recent book launch at the premises of the United Services Institution, a film-wallah was present, who indicated that he was thinking through a film project on this. There is enough masala in the episode that he would not need to add any Bollywood spice witnessed of late in films like the one on Uri.

Even so it bears reflection that a book that covers the breakout of the two companies from their hostage situation at Kailahun by the senior of the two company commanders has it that they shot their way out.

While it is true that the RUF was around, so were civilians. They ended up targeting civilians while levelling the village, in violation of the Protection of Civilians (POC) mandate of the mission.

It is uncertain if this was warranted in terms of proportionality and discrimination, given the final casualty figure of the two-day operation was one killed and six wounded.

Instead of a highpoint in Indian peacekeeping success as Jetley’s account places it, the worm’s eye view from the book brings the operation under a cloud.

General Jetley was demanding of professionalism and persuasively argues that the UN deserves a better deal from its troop contributors.

However, even though a Chapter VII cover was available for robust use of force, any such use had to be below the threshold level of rupture in strategic consent. The general was aware of the limitations in equipment and deficits in professionalism of the elements under him. He best knew that his resources were stretched, leading to a lack of reserves.

Therefore, the apprehensions in some contingents of a fight with the RUF escalating - as had indeed occurred in the last round of civil war in ECOMOG’s presence - were not unfounded. Even Op Khukri was made possible only when the mission received reinforcements, which included the Indian infantry battalion made famous by the immortal Vikram Batra.

A deficit in the book is in Jetley only in passing mentioning one key feature of the mission’s mandate, that it was the first mission with an explicit POC mandate, termed thus: ‘Acting under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, decides that in the discharge of its mandate UNAMSIL may take the necessary action to ensure … within its capabilities and areas of deployment, to afford protection to civilians under imminent threat of physical violence…’

Had Jetley dilated on this aspect – on how the mission implemented this – it would have enhanced the book with another input to the history of peacekeeping.

An aspect understandably missing in the book is the wider military experience of Jetley. It would have introduced the writer to readers who may not know the Indian army and its leaders that well.

Jetley could have in such a chapter talked briefly of his experience as commander in Siachen and, later, his very significant role in the Operation Parakram, as evident from the recent biography of General Rostum Nanavatty.

The biography informs that Jetley had only in October taken over the corps with a dual role of an ‘ad hoc strike corps’ on the western front and had not in the interim till the parliament attack familiarised with its conventional operations role.

Nanavatty’s recommendation for a three-week preparatory period was perhaps the key factor that kept the two countries from war. While obviously these details need not have figured in the Saga, Jetley’s reflections on this would be of interest.

Back to the book’s content, it can be said that Jetley’s predicament was timely in that back then the UN was contemplating taking peacekeeping up a notch with the Brahimi report. Jetley talks of missing meeting Brahimi during his New York trip, perhaps because by the time he got round to it after a bout of malaria, the report had already been tendered in early August.

However, Jetley’s painstaking observations on shortcomings and shortfalls in UN missions were taken onboard, as the following extract from an SG report echoes Jetley’s call for quality in contributions:

enhancing the strength of UNAMSIL will ultimately depend on the willingness of Member States to make the necessary well-trained and well-equipped troops available to the United Nations, as well as on the continued support of the troop contributors. Assistance from Member States having the capacity to train and equip current and future UNAMSIL units will be crucial in this regard.

To be sure, Jetley’s book is not quite as significant or as well produced as that of Romeo Dallaire’s, Shake Hands with the Devil. While Dallaire was pitch-forked into the worst of all nightmares, a genocide, Jetley’s book covers a more common scenario peacekeepers find themselves in.

It can never reliably be said that the UN is out of the woods on games member states, especially the powerful ones, play. The situation in regard to diamond-laden Sierra Leone is currently at replay in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

In the DRC imbroglio, who is Sankoh, Taylor, Kabbah etc. and which countries are using which proxies, as the M-23, and which powers lurk in the background, is anyone’s guess. Clearly, the book is a valuable read because history repeats itself.

The book’s relevance is in the take-aways for India and the UN.

Indian diplomats need to stay engaged with mission trajectories across mission life where Indian troops are engaged, especially when crisis is at hand – such as now in South Sudan.

It is moot whether the Indian diplomatic corps in upper three digits has the bandwidth, but it could optimally use the cohort of military attaches seconded to it.

India should not be shy to follow the precedence set of withdrawal from a mission in case it’s interests, or norms of the international community, are being flouted, as may be the case in DRC.

As for the UN, it needs to be wary of being manipulated. It needs enforcing standards across the board, lest, for instance, in its current outsourcing of peace enforcement in Africa to African forces comes a cropper. It must continue on the ‘politics first’ approach to reduce the premium on efficacy of intervention forces.

At best, Jetley can be faulted for being too much of a soldier and not enough of a politico-diplomatic new-model military leader.

But even this criticism can well be taken the other way round - to Jetleys’ credit - for had he been less of a soldier, complicit in silence, successive UN missions would have been worse off.

Therefore, Jetley’s feeling of dejection from being let down by the UN must stand moderated. He stands tall in peacekeeping history, not so much from Op Khukri’s conduct, but from his standing up for standards the UN must itself insist on.

In fact, the later, successful avatar of UNAMSIL had Jetley’s imprint on it, since he participated in its framing, though on his way out.

By all accounts, with efforts of stalwarts as Jetley, UN peacekeeping has come of age, but regrettably just when dissonance in the Security Council appears to have put peacekeeping into a twilight zone.

Note: Lt Gen VK Jetley, The Unforgettable Saga of Sierra Leone, Gurugram: Jet Books, 2025, pp. 538, Rs. 700/-