Showing posts with label military doctrine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label military doctrine. Show all posts

Monday, 2 November 2015

The Strange Silence Surrounding an Indian Military Exercise


http://thediplomat.com/2015/11/the-strange-silence-surrounding-an-indian-military-exercise/

In late September, India’s media reported on a military exercise to be undertaken by one of the country’s three “strike” corps, 21 Corps. Since then, Indian military watchers have encountered only silence on the exercise. This is uncharacteristic of India, on two counts.
One, India has always undertaken such exercises with a flurry of publicity, even if the military details are necessarily kept under wraps. There is sense in publicity in that it reassures the public of a vigilant military; it is good for the government’s image as “strong on defense”; and it sends a deterrence message in the form of military readiness to India’s neighbor, Pakistan. Yet this autumn’s round of exercises is an interesting shift in India’s information strategy.
The silence could well be for a mundane reason: During October the formation moved into an exercise location in the desert sector and is undertaking preliminary training. The exercise proper could build up to its climax in the near future with the relevant publicity and the attendance of high-level officials such as the defense minister and Delhi-based military brass.
Nevertheless, thus far, all that is known is that 21 Corps is on exercise along with the remainder of Southern Command. Even the name of the exercise – usually a martial one and sometimes with mythological roots – has not reached the public domain yet; and therein is the mystery.
Two, this is the second exercise involving one of India’s strike corps in the same year; the earlier one being held in earlysummer, in which India exercised 2 Corps, alongside the “pivot” 10 Corps. In effect, two field armies have been exercised this year: South Western Command earlier, of which 10 Corps is part, and now the Southern Command.
Usually, India exercises one strike corps a year. This owes to reasons such as the cropping pattern in exercise areas only allowing a window in early summer along with budget limitations. To exercise a second strike corps in the second seasonal window in late autumn/early winter the same year is a departure that, while indicating more budget availability, also suggests urgency.
Why the silence and possible urgency attending this exercise?
It can plausibly be speculated that the lack of publicity so far owes to a statement made by Pakistan’s foreign secretary on the eve of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s visit to the U.S., namely that Pakistan’s tactical nuclear weapons (TNW) have been acquired to deter and if necessary respond to India’s conventional operations.
Since strike corps operations are offensive and have strategic ends, their employment can be expected to flirt with Pakistan’s nuclear thresholds. Pakistan has now publicly acknowledged a low nuclear threshold. Therefore, for strike corps operations it can no longer be business as usual.
From India’s conventional doctrine and exercises, it cannot easily be discerned if India is sufficiently cognizant of the nuclear reality. Its doctrine is of post-Kargil War vintage, though officially adopted after Operation Parakram in 2004. Much water has flown under the nuclear bridge since, including vertical proliferation and the addition of TNW to Pakistan’s arsenal in 2011.
India’s military, in exercising two field armies and two strike crops this year, is indicating that it can activate the border theater, from the semi-developed terrain abutting the northern part of Rajasthan to the desert terrain in the south. Strategically, it is projecting to Pakistan that it is not deterred by TNWs.
Such muscle flexing cannot be seen merely as going about what armies normally do in peace time: train. This could well imply that India has an answer to TNW that enables it to believe that it can persist with conventional operations.
Thus far, India’s declaratory nuclear doctrine has been of “retaliation only” and predicated on deterrence by punishment. However, since this would be a disproportionate response to TNW and could trigger a strategic exchange, it is possible that India’s operational nuclear doctrine has shifted to “proportionate” response or “graduated” deterrence. That way it can provide nuclear cover for conventional operations by employing TNW in retaliation. This has been the thrust of the recent strategic debate in India.
The urgency of two field armies exercising in the same year consequently derives from India’s conveying to Pakistan’s military unmistakably that it continues to have options, even when confronted by a lower nuclear threshold.
At the same time, the accompanying public silence (at the time of writing) surrounding the exercise appears to be intended to keep the focus of both strategic analysts and the international community away from this message intended for Pakistan’s military.
Strategic analysts skeptical of the so-called Cold Start doctrine of 2004 have pointed to the truncation of the crisis response window that quick-off-the-block conventional operations portend as well as the subsequent nuclear dangers. With India’s next edition of the conventional doctrine of 2010 not in the public domain it cannot be critiqued adequately. The manner in which the military exercises unfold will offer clues as to potential nuclear risks. Keeping the lid on this aspect enables the military to go about its business without external scrutiny.
If strategic analysts are unable to blow the whistle for want of evidence, the advantage for India is the lack of alarm in the international community. Even India’s public is kept ignorant of nuclear dangers, allowing its politicians to enjoy the limelight from military prowess while obscuring the dangers.
India’s belief that there is a conventional reply for any mega-terror action from across the border has one positive: It could help deter any Pakistani covert intelligence engagement in any such action. However, the flip side is that should rogue or autonomous elements undertake such action, the two states could be at blows before peace has a chance to intervene.
While both militaries apparently envisage few TNW mushroom clouds, they need to be forewarned that this will only be so if they mutually put in place de-escalatory measures.

Wednesday, 30 September 2015

The strategic doctrine of an Assertive India

Published in Agni July 2015

India is a status quoist power. This is easier to establish in terms of its approach to territory. It appears to have reconciled to the fact that some of its territory is occupied by neighbours, Pakistan and China. While rhetorically it is inclined to see the return of this territory, it has not taken any military or political steps to bring this about. However, it would not like to see any more territory lost to neighbours and on this count has a credible military in place. However, is India politically a status quoist power?
Politically, it is an emerging power. A regional power, it is now also a power of reckoning in Asia. This can be easily seen from the busy diplomatic schedule of the new prime minister in his first year. Its growing economic clout, self-evident from the finding that it has displaced China as the fastest growing economy, is being translated into political power. Its growing economy is also enabling military power, with it being the largest importer of weapons over the past decade and having its defence budget touch $40 billion this year. This makes India’s position as a regional power unassailable, thereby partially sustaining the proposition that it is politically a status quo power.
However, India is also demonstrating assertiveness as a power under the new National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in Delhi. The strategic refrain of the political forces currently in government when in opposition during the preceding United Progressive Alliance (UPA) regime was that India was not measuring up to its weight. It was constantly reactive and on the back foot. Such arguments came to a head in the wake of the 26/11 attacks in which India did not respond militarily. When elected via a majority in the lower house for the first time in two decades, the government has attempted to distance itself from the strategic policies of its predecessor.
The most visible manner it has done so is in the way it cancelled the talks with Pakistan last August and engaged in a prolonged standoff with that country on the Line of Control (LC). Even while engaging China, it is clear from its stance with Japan, the US, Vietnam and Australia that it is hedging its options even if not part of the containment of China. The recent outreach by the prime minister into the Indian Ocean Region, backed by rhetoric of India as a security provider, indicates the direction of the future. Cumulatively, these are suggestive of an Assertive India.
This means that it is not quite a status quoist power politically, but would like to see a change in the status quo with India acknowledged as a pre-eminent power in the region and one with a continental role in Asia. The former implies distancing from Pakistan decisively and the latter implies measuring up to China, if not substantially, at least nominally and perceptually. Therefore, the short answer to the question is that politically India can be counted as a quasi-revisionist power.
It is a truism that the strategic doctrine of a status quoist power is different from that of a revisionist power. The former tend towards the defensive and defensive-deterrent end of the doctrinal continuum, whereas the latter’s strategic doctrine can be situated towards the offensive and offensive-deterrent ends. The continuum can be imagined with defensive at one end and compellence on the other, with defensive-deterrence, offensive deterrence and offensive, as three mid-course stops (See Figure A below).

Figure A: Strategic doctrine in theory
This framework informs this review of India’s strategic doctrine. A discussion of strategic doctrine is a necessary prelude to discussing military doctrine since the former informs and determines the latter. An offensive strategic doctrine finds expression in and is reflected by offensive military doctrines.
The popular image is that India is a status quoist power and its strategic doctrine is one of defensive deterrence. However, there are two very diverse adversaries that India contends with. Therefore, it has a differentiated strategic doctrine: in effect two strategic doctrines. With respect to China, India would readily accept that it moved from a defensive strategic doctrine to a defensive-deterrent one. At the conventional level the mountain strike corps is evidence a credible defensive-deterrent doctrine. At the nuclear level, the long range Agni series and the efforts for a ‘boomer’ underway indicate firming in of such a doctrine. India’s foreign policy confabulations with the US, Japan, Australia and Vietnam are also indicative of this. This is the case for the moment.
However, taken cumulatively, the three – conventional, nuclear and foreign policy – enable a potential turn towards an offensive-deterrent strategic doctrine. An invulnerable second strike capability, a deepened strategic relationship with partner US and maturing of the mountain strike corps in terms of equipment and infrastructure needs met, could by end of the decade position India at a juncture of choice between the defensive-deterrent and offensive-deterrent. It is here that the preceding discussion on India’s positioning as a status quo or revisionist power comes in. A revisionist India, one with a self-image of an Asian power, if not a great power itself, would want an Asian balance of power reflecting this image. This would imply greater involvement in the strategic games afoot in Asia, pitching it at odds with China and in the US camp, even if today the refrain is one of multi-alignment. An offensive-deterrent can be envisaged once all the enabling elements are in place. The current defensive-deterrence is for the interregnum (See Figure B below).

Figure B: Situating India’s strategic doctrine
In respect of Pakistan, the 1965 War fifty years back was the juncture at which India moved decisively away from a defensive strategic doctrine. The subsequent war in 1971 is evidence of an offensive inflection in India’s strategic doctrine before it once again settled back into one of defensive-deterrence. In the eighties and nineties, India’s posture was one of conventional deterrence by denial through its holding formations and punishment in the form of counter offensive by its strike corps. Its nuclear posture was one of NFU and minimum deterrence, implying counter value targeting but only in retaliation. The Kargil War and Operation Parakram resulted in a shifting away from defensive-deterrence. The question is whether this is a shift to offensive-deterrence or to an offensive strategic doctrine.
In the NDA period the shift towards offensive was made, with changes in both the nuclear and conventional doctrines. The nuclear doctrine that preceded the conventional doctrine created space for conventional operations by positing ‘massive’ nuclear retaliation in case of Pakistan going nuclear even in face of conventional pressure by India. The conventional doctrine – dubbed ‘Cold Start’ - was made proactive and offensive. Even if mindful of potential nuclear thresholds, the nuclear deterrent posture was to enable heightening of any such thresholds. Together the two spell an offensive strategic doctrine rather than an offensive-deterrence one. The NDA displaced soon thereafter led to the new offensive strategic doctrine being still born. Hypothetically, the NDA could if reelected could have employed the ‘carrot and stick’ strategy to get Pakistan to heel, by using the two doctrines – military and nuclear – as stick while the Vajpayee opening up to Pakistan was the carrot.
In the event, the UPA decade led to a step back from the offensive strategic doctrine to offensive-deterrence. The strategic doctrine was influenced by neo-liberalism, the wider strategic philosophy of the government. Even though there was no change in the declaratory doctrines, both conventional and nuclear, the government less than enthusiastic in respect of both. There was no political imprimatur to the conventional doctrine and the government was less than forthcoming on equipment demands, as the preparedness profile of the army in wake of 26/11 demonstrated. At the nuclear level, the critique of the ‘massive’ nuclear retaliation formulation was allowed to play out, discrediting the nuclear doctrine. The nuclear status quo did not matter since the government did not have an offensive strategic doctrine involving ‘Cold Start’ conventional offensives in first place. It was not a defensive-deterrent strategic doctrine either in light of the unmistakable offensive content in conventional doctrine and continuity in nuclear doctrine despite its lack of credibility.
Further at the nuclear level was continuing work on missiles and warheads which when viewed against the discredited ‘massive’ nuclear retaliation formulation meant a move away from the ill-thought out formulation. As to whether the move away was back to the safety of the earlier mantra of ‘punitive’ nuclear retaliation or further to not discounting a nuclear warfighting is moot and can only remain unknown for lack of evidence. The latter - a move towards nuclear warfighting involving lower order retaliation for lower order nuclear first use by Pakistan, such as employment of nuclear armed Nasr – cannot be ruled out owing to such a response being non-escalatory and assured.
This indicates an offensive-deterrent strategic doctrine was in play in the UPA period as seen from the two doctrines – conventional and nuclear. This finding is buttressed by the fact that there was no move in the Manmohan Singh years to coerce Pakistan, despite some grievous terror attacks targeting Indian interests such as at Mumbai and Herat. Even the intelligence game, cited frequently by Pakistan as targeting it, was caliberated at a level to sensitise Pakistan to its underbelly with a deterrent intent in respect of its proxy war in Kashmir. It was therefore not an offensive strategic doctrine.
The discussion brings one up to the current Modi era. The question is whether in light of the projection of itself as a decisive government that is strong on defence, the strategic doctrine is one of offensive-deterrence, offensive or one of compellence. What is Assertive India’s current strategic doctrine? What are the potential strategic doctrines for the future?
There is no question that a qualitative change has taken place with the advent of BJP to power with a parliamentary majority for the first time in a quarter century. This along with the government’s year long distancing from its predecessor in terms of optics and its projection of the prime minister as a decisive leader are indicative of a different India from hitherto fore. In its first year it has concentrated on strengthening fences, even more so than on the economy. In fact it would appear that the economic card of ‘Make in India’ has the defence industrial sector as key. Its foreign policy activism, being tough with Pakistan and taking a stand on the border issue with China are evidence of an Assertive India. The National Security Adviser (NSA) has articulated the intelligence possibilities of Balochistan, if only to deter Pakistani interference in Kashmir. The ‘terror boat’ incident off the Gujarat coast at the turn of the year indicates preparedness. It has hinted at organizational changes in the offing, such as the Permanent Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee that the previous government ignored despite its own committee, the Naresh Chandra Task Force, advice on the matter.
The strategic doctrine of the government has remained unarticulated so far. This is of a piece with India’s strategic culture and precedence. It can only be inferred from statements of higher appointments and actions on ground. The measures that make for an Assertive India are suggestive of a shift in strategic doctrine from the offensive-deterrent to an offensive strategic doctrine. Is this reflected in military doctrines: nuclear and conventional?
In the campaigning season last year, it was suggested that the nuclear doctrine would be up for revision. However, since India, as part of its hedging against China is also courting Japan, nuclear doctrine revision has been shelved. This does not mean that it is not underway, in that while declaratory doctrine could remain unchanged, the operational doctrine could be tweaked. With Prahaar posing as India’s answer to Pakistan’s Nasr, it can be taken that India potentially has lower order retaliatory strikes to Pakistani nuclear first use. Its movements towards operationalising the boomer on both fronts - nuclear power and nuclear armed submarine – enable it to move beyond the ‘massive’ formulation since it will by end decade have invulnerable second strike capability.
On the conventional front, the go-ahead to the Army on the LC can be taken as reinforcing conventional deterrence. While the measure was useful from point of view of deterring proxy war action during election season in Kashmir, it also is a message of offensive action on India’s part in case it is provoked by mega-terror attacks. In the event, that India has not been challenged so far is a positive. Also, feelers from the Pakistani army are largely that it is not averse to Nawaz Sharif taking the India relationship further. The downside is of a commitment trap in which India is forced to match its rhetoric and Mr. Modi is to live up to his image when and if tested by just such a terror attack the strategy is designed to deter. Will India in this case behave differently from the Manmohan Singh government when faced with 26/11?
Based on the foregoing the plausible answer to this question is affirmative. It would appear that India may take coercive action in such a case. This need not necessarily be military led. India’s NSA’s intelligence background enables prioritization of other instruments of response. The suggestions in Pakistan of an Indian hand behind Pakistani discomfiture from terror attacks indicate that this lesser known option is a live one. During the Manmohan years a constant refrain from former intelligence officials was underdevelopment of this option. The usual reason cited was that this was taken off the table by Inder Gujral who had excised the capability. That Mr. Manmohan Singh had ineptly allowed Balochistan to figure in his Sharm es Shaikh declaration with Zardari had made his reaching out to Pakistan after 26/11   a dead initiative. It had been pilloried in intelligence circles. Therefore, now that the national security elite and environment is more receptive and Pakistan revealed as more vulnerable after the Peshawar terror attack, it can be expected that the intelligence option figures prominently. Plausible deniability that Pakistani hid behind in the heyday of its proxy war is a card that can now be turned against it. Diplomatically, Mr. Modi’s shuffle of bureaucratic hand in the foreign ministry alongside enables a diplomatic offensive. Obama’s Republic Day visit on invitation to India and Mr. Modi’s impending China visit can help with isolating Pakistan.
This implies that the military option is not necessarily the default option. The Cold Start doctrine is now into its second decade and can be expected to be considerably practiced. The equipment shortfalls are being remedied by the government with one of its first major decisions last August clearing Rs 17000 crores of acquisitions. Since this will take time to materialize, India’s military option can be expected to take a back seat so as to avoid a repeat of the post 26/11 scenario in which its army chief reportedly pointed to equipment shortfalls on being asked after a military response. A military option is particularly risky in terms of outcomes. Inability to prevail could lead to escalation impetus from within the Indian side. This would imperil over the long term the developmentalist plank of the government. It would also expose it to embarrassment if it exposes lack of strategic finesse. The military reforms such as levels of jointness necessary for such operations have not been undertaken yet. There are no indicators in open domain as to whether the government has ironed out the issues roundly critiqued in both the conventional and nuclear doctrines. It is hardly likely to chance the military instrument with unrevised doctrines it has not had time to familiarize itself with. It would also be more difficult to sustain diplomatically. The China factor cannot be discounted. Therefore, the military option can better serve to deter rather than be deployed if it comes to the crunch.
What is the potential strategic doctrine of the new regime? Once all the military cards are on the table in terms of doctrinal revision, organizational reform and equipment acquisitions, possible by end decade and in the prospective second term of the current NDA government, it is possible for India’s strategic doctrine to move up a notch. On the Pakistan front, this could be from the offensive strategic doctrine today to a coercive and compellent strategic doctrine. For China, an explicit offensive-deterrent can be envisaged with acquisitions in the offing in terms of mobility and firepower for the Mountain Strike Corps. The direction of India’s US relationship, including its military-technology prong with US displacing Russia as India’s largest arms exporter, is such as to make primarily for a force projection capability. This is in keeping with US’ expectations of India in the relationship, currently couched in the security provider framework. This will be the culmination of Assertive India and signal its ‘arrival’ as a Great Power.
To sum up, this article has made the case of a shift up the strategic doctrinal continuum by India. In the UPA period, India placed at the interstices of defensive-deterrent and offensive-deterrent juncture of the spectrum. In the second NDA period, an Assertive India has been posited. The implication of this is a movement in strategic doctrine up one notch to an offensive strategic doctrine in respect of Pakistan and offensive-deterrent in respect of China. The multiple defence related measures in place by the new government suggest a potential movement towards a compellent doctrine in respect of Pakistan and an explicit offensive-deterrence in relation to China.
Previous governments have not been inclined to articulation of strategic doctrine. This owed to India’s unstated strategic doctrine being slightly more reliant on force than India’s strategic professions would have it. India’s present government has no such inhibitions. Therefore, its stepping up to acknowledge the strategic doctrine attributed here to it is possible to envisage. This should be encouraged by calls for a national security policy white paper or open domain periodic strategic reviews. This will serve deterrence, besides conditioning the government to the underside of the offensive-compellent direction it appears headed.  


  




Saturday, 16 May 2015

Doctrine in Civil-Military Relations
http://www.indiandefencereview.com/spotlights/doctrine-in-civil-military-relations/

16 May , 2015

Supervision of doctrine making is one way by which civilian control is exercised over the military. Military doctrine writing is largely done within the military. However, it is to be in close coordination with the Ministry and national security institutions. This is clear from the fact that, firstly, military doctrines are based on the government’s strategic doctrine; secondly, the civilian part of government has to have a sense of ownership of the doctrine by being part of the process; and, finally, military doctrines must receive ministerial imprimatur to signify that they are outcome of a shared process and responsibility.
As for the first, the fact that India does not have a strategic doctrine in the form of a white paper or an open-domain strategic defence review is well known. While the National Security Advisory Board does undertake defence review, it is not within the pail of government. As seen when it released the Draft Nuclear Doctrine in 1999, the government indicated that it is merely advisory. As for the second -civilian participation in doctrine making – it is not self-evidently the case in India. And, the last – governmental ownership – can be assumed from the press statements that accompany release of doctrine.
This article reflects on the second aspect: ministry participation in doctrine making.
It is not known as to the extent the Ministry of Defence is part of the process of doctrine formulation in India. Its website carries no mention of doctrine formulation. There is also no reference to conventional doctrines in the Annual Report of the Ministry. This suggests the Ministry is keeping at a distance from the doctrinal sphere, perhaps under the mistaken impression that the doctrine function is solely the military’s preserve.
If this inference is a fair approximation of reality, it is certainly yet another area of deficit in civil-military relations in India. It indicates that the ‘lesson’ of 1962, of civilians keeping out of military matters has possibly been over-learnt. Since there is considerable overlap with the civilian sphere, the doctrinal space is not one that can be left to the military alone. While the overlap is self-evident for subconventional doctrine involving as it does the defence and home ministries, it is equally so for conventional doctrine.
The region now into the second decade of the nuclear age, the nuclear and conventional doctrines are intertwined. Since the nuclear doctrine is a politico-strategic function, with apex level military input and participation, the nuclear doctrine making is understandably a civilian led process. Military conventional doctrines are to be sensitive to the demands of nuclear doctrine on the conventional space. For instance, conventional doctrine cannot envisage operations that are overly escalatory. Since conventional military doctrines have to be cognizant of the civilian led nuclear doctrine, they cannot be without reference to civilian expertise in the national security establishment. Such participation of civilians is at two levels: at the ministry and at the National Security Council institutions.
Military doctrines give out the manner the military wishes to fight future wars. Consequently, in peacetime they are critical to the type of military being formed in terms of strength, equipment, training and elan, and serve to inform military plans. In wartime, they inform military strategy. Since the Ministry has a role to play and an interest in all these aspects, such as for instance in platform acquisitions necessitated by doctrine, it needs to play its part in the doctrinal process. In case the Ministry’s engagement with the process is suboptimal then problems emerge down the line.
An illustration is the indication by the defence minister of a stepping back for financial reasons from the creation of the mountain strike corps. 17 Corps is reportedly to be pruned so as to make its additional manpower and necessary equipment acquisitions affordable. The corps has been under discussion for over half a decade. It is a result of the revision in army doctrine that was reported in the press in end 2009. The army doctrine of 2004 had thereafter been revised and released internally in 2010. The revision of doctrine was however not revealed in the public domain through a press release as is usually the case.
The revised doctrine, unlike its 2004 predecessor, being confidential, press reports on doctrinal change of the period suggest a ‘two front’ doctrine with a similar offensive turn on the China front being envisaged as had been adopted on the Pakistan front under the 2004 doctrine.The ‘two front’ doctrine envisages a counter offensive capability also be created for the China front, akin to the strike corps in the plains. The implications for size and equipment of the army are of such magnitude that a doctrinal shift cannot obviously be taken without governmental imprimature.
The previous UPA government authorized two mountain divisions late last decade and with reluctance gave approval for the mountain strike corps only in mid 2013 after much stalling by the finance ministry. It would appear that the present government’s reservations on the costs are a legacy of the period. It can therefore be concluded that had a ‘whole of government’ approach been part of doctrine formulation at the outset itself, this awkward stepping back on 17 Corps would not have been necessary.
A second illustration of disconnect between the ministry and the military concerns subconventional doctrine. It has recently emerged that in 2013 the army adopted a new edition of the Doctrine on Sub Conventional Operations of 2006. As with the 2010 revision of the conventional doctrine, Indian Army Doctrine 2004, the DSCO 2013 has been kept confidential. It is not known as to the extent the changes are merely cosmetic making the 2013 version merely a new edition or are substantial enough to reckon that it is indeed a revised doctrine. Since it is confidential, it cannot be known as to the levels of participation of the two ministries in internal security – defence and home – in its revision.
The DSCO 2013 was released internally without intimation in the open domain through a press release. Therefore, it cannot be known if the doctrine has ministerial imprimature. Clearly, subconventional operations overlap the civilian sphere almost wholly. Since the DSCO 2006 version was in the open domain and well received for its ‘iron fist in velvet glove’ thesis, that the 2013 version has instead been kept confidential is intriguing. Had the two ministries been hands-on participants in doctrine making then this situation would unlikely have arisen.
This underlines the point of ministries distancing themselves from the doctrine sphere. It can be argued that this owes to ignorance of matters military. This is probably quite right, but cannot on that account be allowed to stand unchallenged. The ministry cannot abdicate the doctrinal space owing to its deficiency. It has to be instead to be held accountable. It has to create the structures necessary to participate actively and exercise oversight effectively. This can be done, for instance, by empowering the affiliated think tanks of the ministry and the forces HQs. Just as the ministry of external affairs has ratcheted up its policy and planning division under the new foreign secretary, the defence ministry could likewise upgrade itself with an in-house think tank of academics, bureaucrats, veterans and practitioners.
Clearly, there is a case for governmental ownership of the doctrinal space even if the military is in the lead.It must begin with an NSCS strategic review followed by a ministry driven doctrine process with the product minimally being acknowledged in the open domain or, maximally, being democratically placed in it

Tuesday, 12 May 2015

Exercise Brahmashira

This Year’s Maneuver Season In India

http://www.eurasiareview.com/11052015-this-years-maneuver-season-in-india-oped/
From separate media reports on ‘massive’ exercises in India’s western deserts, we learn that India’s premier ‘strike’ corps, two Corps (Kharga Corps), and a ‘pivot’ corps, 10 Corps (Chetak Corps), are being exercised. Interestingly, media reports that carry mention of the two Corps exercise, ‘Exercise Brahmashira’, make no mention of the other exercise, Exercise Akraman II of 10 Corps, and vice versa.
It would seem that the two are not interconnected. However, this is improbable since the exercises are taking place in the same geographic area, Suratgarh sector. Therefore, it can be plausibly be inferred that a pivot corps and a strike crops are exercising together. What are the implications?
Pivot corps are erstwhile ‘holding’ corps in a defensive role. India’s doctrine, now a decade old, converted these into ‘pivot’ corps, equipping each with an offensive element, termed ‘integrated battle group’. From the name of the pivot corps exercise, Akraman (attack) II, it is likely that the Chetak corps exercise is to practice its integrated battle groups (IBG).
Each of India’s three strike corps is orbited to one of the three geographic commands facing Pakistan. Kharga Corps, under Western Command, is reasonably understood to operate in the developed plains sector in Punjab which Western Command faces. However, strike corps, owing to their inherent mobility, are able to achieve surprise. Therefore, they can be launched across the entire front at any point. In this case, it appears that the Kharga Corps is being put through its paces in the semi-developed terrain opposite South Western Command.
In the doctrine, while the initial offensives are launched by division-sized IBGs of pivot corps and of strike corps formations located closer to the border, the remainder of the strike corps mobilizes in their wake. It can use the areas already captured by IBGs for jump off for battles within enemy territory.
Clearly, in light of possible Pakistani nuclear thresholds, one salient exit point from conflict for both sides is therefore prior to launch of strike corps. Pakistan may be able to countenance shallow thrusts by IBGs along the front with greater equanimity than deeper thrusts that could potentially threaten its vital areas and communication networks in greater depth by strike corps in deep battle.
In this case in the semi-developed sector there is arguably greater space for strike corps operations without flirting inordinately with the proverbial nuclear threshold as would be the case in developed terrain, say, opposite Lahore.
Therefore, if in the current exercise the strike corps is advertised as rehearsing maneuvers that ‘will allow the Army formations to break through multiple obstacles within a restricted time frame’, then the army expects sufficient space for territorial gains and attrition of Pakistani reserves without the nuclear factor intervening. Presumably, this is so in the desert sector further south too, where another strike corps, 21 Corps, is slated to operate under Southern Command.
Pakistan has in its testing of a tactical nuclear weapon hinted at a lower nuclear threshold precisely to stay such operations by India’s strike corps in their tracks. India, for its part, is exhibiting nonchalance by going about an exercise that takes the strike corps across multiple obstacle systems to indicate that it is not self-deterred from using its conventional advantage.
The two states are playing a ‘game of chicken’.
The questionable part is in the doctrine being practiced envisages strike corps operations in depth areas. This does not lend confidence to whether India’s 2004 ‘Cold Start’ doctrine that was revised in 2010 is sufficiently cognizant of the criticism that had greeted its release in 2004. The critique primarily had two points: one is the short time window for crisis response since IBGs were to be launched in short order, and second, that deep operations could trigger nuclear thresholds.
Unlike the 2004 doctrine, the 2010 revised version is not in the open domain. Last heard, a leak at the turn of the decade in late 2009 had it that the 2004 doctrine was under revision in the form of the ‘two front’ doctrine. That it has been thereafter adopted has not been made known in a press release as is the form in India. Can it be that the confidentiality owes to the military neglecting the critique in its revision of doctrine?
If this is the case with revision of the conventional doctrine, it is possible that such doctrinal reticence can also attend India’s nuclear doctrine. Nuclear doctrine revision had found controversial mention last year in the run up to elections. India’s reaching out under Mr. Modi to Japan had resulted in the revision being shelved. However, given the manner the new edition of the conventional doctrine has been kept internal to the military, a shift from declaratory nuclear doctrine of 2003 cannot be ruled out.
Currently, India envisages ‘massive’ nuclear retaliation to any form of nuclear first use by Pakistan. However, if its army formations are practicing maneuvers that could trigger tactical nuclear first use by Pakistan, it is possible that India is prepared with the more appropriate nuclear retaliatory response: proportional retaliation. Deterrence may be tending towards nuclear war-fighting, something India’s nuclear trajectory of delivery vehicles and nuclear ordnance enables.
Had the doctrinal space been less opaque, it would have been easier to substantiate this argument and raise a timely warning. India would do well to revert to doctrinal transparency in order that it benefit from the doctrinal debate that follows. In the nuclear age, how the state intends to defend the nation is a legitimate public query. A reading of the exercises underway does not inspire confidence India is sufficiently mindful of the nuclear overhang.

Saturday, 2 June 2012


India’s Strategic and Military Doctrines: A Post 1971 Snapshot

Colonel Ali Ahmed (Retd)*

http://www.usiofindia.org/Article/?pub=Journal&pubno=578&ano=4
Introduction
A state’s strategic doctrine precedes its military doctrine. The political leadership determines the strategic doctrine in accordance with the nation’s values and aims; and the military formulates the military doctrine to reflect and enable the strategic doctrine. Strategic doctrine can be defensive, offensive, deterrent or compellent. For instance, Switzerland has a defensive strategic doctrine that accounts for its defensive military doctrine. Hitler’s Germany had an offensive strategic doctrine that was reflected in the offensive military doctrine of the Wehrmacht. India has a strategic doctrine of deterrence predicated on punishment. Therefore, it maintains a dissuasive defensive posture on the border, even as it has reserves to deliver a counter offensive. Example of a compellent doctrine is that of the US under President Bush. The military doctrine reflecting this was provisioned under Defence Secretary Rumsfeld through the military’s ‘transformation initiative’ of early decade.

Strategic doctrine has been defined by Henry Kissinger as: “It is the task of strategic doctrine to translate power into policy. Whether the goals of a state are offensive or defensive, whether it seeks to achieve or to prevent a transformation, its strategic doctrine must define what objectives are worth contending for and determine the degree of force appropriate for achieving them.”1 Jasjit Singh concurs stating that, “The central driving force for planning for defence, whether articulated in specific documentation or not, remains the strategic doctrine for defence that the country adopts…The twin goals of credible and affordable defence capability really grow out of the national strategic doctrine.”2 Military power is a consequential component of grand strategy, since it is the ultimate arbiter. It is the visible manifestation of the state’s strategic doctrine. The military reflects the strategic doctrine through its military doctrine. The effectiveness of the military instrument is not only a function of military budgets, sound strategy, leadership etc., but also of appropriate military doctrine. Morris Janowitz, termed military doctrine as the ‘operational code’ or ‘logic’ of their professional behaviour.3 Doctrine enables leveraging of military power for ends of policy.

This article traces the relationship between India’s strategic doctrine and military doctrinal development since the 1971 War, given that it was a watershed in India’s post-Independence military history. India’s strategic doctrine has been one of deterrence based on counter offensive capability. But since deterrence was not sufficient to deter the threat from Pakistan in the form of proxy war, the Army moved towards a greater offensive bias in its military doctrine. This has culminated in the proactive doctrine of Cold Start that can be taken to countenance compellence in case of Pakistan’s continued provocation.4 The article covers this ground by a decade wise look at the relationship between the two. It brings out the manner in which the Army has turned towards a more offensive doctrine by incremental shedding of the ‘defensive’ and ‘reactive’ mindset. This has culminated in the offensive content of the 2004 doctrine dubbed ‘Cold Start’. It recommends further evolution of the doctrine in the articulation of a Limited War doctrine also, given that nuclearisation has to be contended with into the foreseeable future.

Seventies

In wake of the 1971 War, K Subrahmanyam outlined the national aim as: “India has to be strong enough to deter interventionism and aggression by other nations but at the same time should not adopt a posture which will induce fears in the minds of other nations.” To him “India had no ideology to export and no big-power interests to defend.” Instead, he required that India keep at “readiness adequate forces to deter China and Pakistan from launching an attack either jointly or individually and in case deterrence fails to repel aggression effectively.”5 With respect to Pakistan, Subrahmanyam argues that “with a clear margin of superiority both in numbers and firepower, it should be possible to deter Pakistan from contemplating any more aggression against this country or invoking external political or military support to pursue a policy of confrontation against this country.” 6 Thus India’s strategic doctrine can be taken as one of deterrence.

The 1971 War represented a quantum leap in Indian employment of the military instrument, from defensive and restrained military operations to taking the war into the enemy’s territory. Post 1971, doctrinally, refinements to the Ditch cum Bund (DCB) concept were undertaken. It was not dispensed with since it had been inspired in part by the experience of the Army at the Icchogil Canal in the 1965 War 7 and was in keeping with military thinking elsewhere, such as the Bar Lev line along the Suez Canal. A writer wrote of the period: “Assuming that in the foreseeable future India’s policies will be mainly defence oriented; the purpose of its defence policy would be to prevent war. The best deterrent to conventional war is the capacity to dominate by force any situation involving offensive action by the enemy. This is justification enough for maintaining a highly mobile and adequately powerful standing army (Choudhary 1976: 208).” 8 Speed in operations was taken as necessary to undercut international pressures for ceasefire. Therefore an offensive capability was required to bring about gains in a short time frame that would be useful on the negotiating table. Carrying the war to the enemy territory required avoiding a frontal assault on his prepared defences. This meant having manoeuvrable forces in order to hit him in depth on his lines of communication, rather than merely inflict casualties. The refrain in service writings was that “In the next war with Pakistan, the deciding factor will be the superior employment of mechanised forces, with emphasis on armour.” 9 These ideas figured in the famous Rao-Sundarji report of mid seventies.

Eighties

To this decade can be traced the strategic dialectic that is ongoing to the present day. The hiatus of the Seventies in Indo-Pak strategic equations was broken by the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union at the turn of the decade. In the event, Pakistan profited from its ‘frontline state’ status, with knock-on implications for Indo-Pak security relationship. Of the US $ 3.2 billion sanctioned in 1981 by the US Senate, US $ 1.7 billion worth of credit was earmarked for arms sales. These included 40 F 16, AWAC type Hawkeye surveillance aircraft, Harpoon and TOW missiles, M 60 tanks, Vulcan Phalanx air defence systems, 100 sets of airborne and ground communicators, 100 M 45 A 5 tanks, 300 M 113 APCs etc.10 Pakistan’s perception was that as the ‘guardian of the Khyber Pass’, it required a powerful military capability.

Indian strategists vehemently disagreed with this proposition. Cohen writes: “They saw a strong Pakistan as disruptive: their image of regional stability envisioned a Pakistan as an Afghanistan: a weak not a strong buffer.”11 Taking this view as an existential threat to itself, Pakistan even during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, did not transfer any forces for the defence of its frontier along the Durand Line. Its threat perception is based on geography since it has its major port, subject to interdiction or blockade close to the border; its population centres in Punjab are also within striking distance; and the bulk of the armed might of the two states is maintained in ideal tank country in the plains along the border. Given its size, location and terrain, it ‘evolved a strategic style (italics in original) which may be called a strategic doctrine’ of ‘offensive defence’.12 The doctrine envisages that in time of heightening crisis, Pakistan will not hesitate to be the first to employ a heavy use of force to gain an initial advantage. It is thought that a short, sharp, war would achieve Pakistan’s military as well as political objectives. Its lack of strategic depth virtually dictates an offensive mindset. It sees war as an opportunity to bring international opinion to focus, though this involves a political risk. The doctrine hopes to achieve deterrence through raising the risk of Indian resort to war.
Pakistan went in for nuclear checkmating of India and fostering of a people’s guerrilla war; experience in which it was then speedily accumulating in associating with the Central Intelligence Agency’s activities with the mujahedeen. The nuclear capability would help neutralise an assumed Indian capability. The assumptions were that India has several nuclear weapons; that these are Pakistan centric; and that these could be used politically to paralyse Pakistani reaction by holding its population centres hostage in case of Indian action in Kashmir. It could also provide a cover under which the Kashmir issue could be reopened by checkmating a conventional Indian counter. It could be used to cover a bold conventional offensive in Kashmir in case the Indian leadership proved to be weak and indecisive. Of the second, guerrilla war, the idea of training and arming friendly populations in the neighbour’s territory would help to ‘tie him down in a hundred places’. However, Cohen assessed that resort to this would be unlikely since Pakistanis did not prefer ‘Cambodiasation’ that could result, as the situation in Afghanistan then clearly presaged.13 It is interesting that merely half a decade on, Pakistan was enabled to undertake this risky strategic choice by Indian mishandling in Kashmir and the departure of the Soviets from Afghanistan.

Indian strategic orientation in the period had two prongs – diplomatic and military. Among the many peace initiatives included efforts to bring about better understanding through discussion on drafts of ‘No War Pact’ proposal by Pakistan and a ‘Treaty of Peace and Friendship’ proposed by India and setting up of an Indo-Pak Joint Commission. Agreements have been reached on Advance Notification of military exercises and prevention of Airspace Violations by military aircraft. A bilateral agreement on non-attack on nuclear installations proposed by India in December 1985 was signed in December 1988 and finally came into force with the exchange of lists of locations on 01 Jan 1992.

In India, on the military front was a movement away from the defensive posture of the Seventies to an offensive posture. Therefore, the resulting ‘carrot and stick’ approach can be characterised as a strategic doctrine of deterrence, one inducing self-restraint on the other side. DK Palit opined that “maximum force has for all intents and purposes become outlawed as a value in military strategy. This is a development that we have to adjust to in this nuclear superpower age.” These developments gave rise to a fusion between diplomatic policy making and the military conduct of war. Limitations were in setting of the aim, geographical spread and in use of weaponry, resulting in a de-emphasis on decisive battle and concept of maximum force.14 Palit’s thesis of restraint was promptly challenged. Reflecting an offensive spirit, the author wrote: “The strategy of restraint has little meaning when two neighbouring countries with a record of short wars, engage in combat…However, in not being drawn easily into war will remain an option of National Strategy and not an option of Military Strategy.”

The Eighties witnessed a pronounced move towards the offensive. In part, this was the result of the pursuit of mechanisation first under Army Chief, General Rao and then with greater vigour, under his successor General Sundarji. Thinking on offensive operations was cast in a more aggressive mode. The usual progress of operations involving breaking the crust of defences, establishing a bridgehead and breakout were seen as operationally unacceptable. The Commandant, College of Combat, required creation of a “viable strike force capable of being speedily launched into enemy territory for the capture of objectives in considerable depth…air mobility…mechanisation of these formations…and the armour content of the division increased and greater flexibility provided by the introduction of at least one more battle group headquarters…to do justice to the requirement to move fast and strike deep.” On defensive operations, holding formations were to “introduce and practice with realism the capture of enemy positions across the border on the outbreak of hostilities; such actions would go a long way in …furthering our offensive aims.” He maintained that “unless this is practiced…it will be too much to expect our troops that are secure in pill boxes to get out to tackle the enemy defences…if we were to achieve any positive change in our present defensive approach we must reorientate our thinking and training on a completely offensive basis.” 16 Thus, the force was being suffused with an offensive manoeuvre warfare orientation, with defensive operations seen only as a ‘temporary phase’. Thinking along these lines culminated in Exercise Brasstacks, a brainchild of General Sundarji to test his mechanisation initiatives. In Rikhye’s expansive, if controversial, take on the exercise the idea was to crash through into Sindh with 13 divisions.

The other aspect introduced in security calculus in the later half of the decade was the nuclear one, revealed in the famous AQ Khan interview with Kuldip Nayar. However, the highlights of the decade were Exercise Brasstacks; Indian pre-emption on the Saltoro ridgeline of Siachen in 1984; intervention in Sri Lanka through the Indian Peace Keeping Force; development of maritime mindedness and air modernisation.

Nineties
Three factors defined the Nineties for the Indian military. One was the proxy war by Pakistan; it’s continuance in Punjab and being fostered in Kashmir. The second was in declining defence budgets. Last was the effect of nuclearisation that was initially covert, but requiring the military taking cognisance of the emerging security situation. These had a retarding effect on the turn to the offensive seen in the previous decade. Thus, even as the threat heightened in terms of a more aggressive Pakistan, India could not leverage its power. Pakistani acquisition of the nuclear capability rendered India’s conventional superiority questionable. Therefore the Sundarji era doctrine of ‘deep strike’ could not be employed with impunity. This detracted from credibility of India’s conventional deterrent. Resulting Pakistani adventurism culminated in the Kargil intrusion in end decade, barely a year after both states had gone nuclear in May 1998.

By end of the previous decade, Pakistan had practiced, in Exercise Zarb e Momin, a doctrine of ‘offensive defence’. A pre-emptive launch of its two strike corps’ pincers was envisioned.18 The exercise attempted to incorporate lessons of the Air Land Battle concept and thereby can be seen as an answer to India’s preceding Exercise Brasstacks. Under nuclear cover, initially a perception was that Pakistan could make a conventional grab for Kashmir. The conventional option was not in the foreground, though its existence did ensure that Pakistan kept the provocation below Indian tolerance thresholds. Despite constrained circumstance, India’s conventional capability did ensure that Pakistan was deterred from escalating its military support to levels where India would feel compelled to allowing its superior military capability to be decisively used. Pakistan therefore persisted with its ‘low cost, low risk’ operation that had the diplomatic advantage of ‘plausible deniability’. India’s response was restricted largely to counter insurgency operations, both in Punjab and Kashmir.

Conventional reticence owed in part to declining defence budgets through the period. This was compelled by India embarking of liberalisation in 1991 forced by a financial crisis, brought on in part due to military profligacy of the Eighties. However, this was a period in which Pakistan also faced constraints, primarily the withdrawal of US assistance in October 1990 when President George W Bush was not able to give necessary certification that Pakistan did not possess a nuclear explosive device required under the Pressler Amendment to the Foreign Assistance Act. Its declining financial position reinforced its proxy war policy, in that it increased the need to keep Indian forces tied down since Pakistan was less able to cope.

The implications of liberalisation for the Army were such that a former Vice Chief had to say that the lack of funds for modernisation had automatically led to a delay in the restructuring plans of the Services. The Army’s mechanisation had been held up and the overall effect was of the little modernisation undertaken was loss of the technological edge.19 The strategic option for India during the decade was deemed to be restricted to defence owing to the resource crunch. Of its two variants, dissuasion and deterrence, an analysis had it that declining defence budgets would effect deterrence capability adversely. It was thought possible to visualise even dissuasive capability as being difficult to maintain. A balanced military prefers a mix of both variants, the proportion of each depending on the war objectives sought and operational situation. In this analysis, it was assessed that India had a deterrent capability with respect to Pakistan.

The third aspect of nuclearisation resulted in doctrinal developments in the form of thinking through ‘recessed deterrence’. The impetus was in the emerging threat from the nexus between China and Pakistan in both nuclear and missile spheres. This was referred to by Prime Minister Vajpayee in his letter to the US President justifying Indian tests of 1998. On 11 and 13 May 1998, India successfully completed a planned series of nuclear tests. The aim was to demonstrate a secure and effective deterrent against the use or threat of use of weapons of mass destruction against India. The decade ended with doctrinal innovation on both conventional and nuclear planes brought about by the Shakti tests and the Kargil War. A significant ‘first’ was the articulating of doctrine by the Army (1998) and the Air Force (1995) in this period.

The Century’s First Decade

The decade began with heightened terrorism in Kashmir, a result of inability to control infiltration and momentary diversion of attention from counter insurgency during the Kargil episode. Thereafter, terrorism spread in the rest of India, spurred on by Pakistan but also due to local roots brought about by a worsening communal situation. Overt nuclearisation further cramped India’s conventional might, particularly during Operation Parakram. This, along with the earlier Kargil War, served to impel doctrinal thinking through which the military instrument was to be brought back into the reckoning. Of significance to its employability however was the presence and action of the US in the vicinity in the form of the Global War on Terror. Nevertheless, by decade end, the situation has stabilised in Kashmir, even as Mumbai 26/11, the late November 2008 multiple terror attacks in Mumbai, indicated continuing vulnerability to terror.

Under the limitations of the strategic circumstance outlined above, the state is to arrive at a strategic doctrine. The Limited War thinking in the early part of the decade led to acknowledging ‘the importance of strategic (politico-military) doctrine is much higher for limited war than those that are full scale, leave alone total wars. “In India’s case, as lamented by Jasjit Singh, there has not been a clearly articulated strategic doctrine. The consequence is that, ‘In the absence of a well established doctrine, there is a strong tendency to simply keep building on existing force levels and structures in what can only be described as an add-on strategy. Inevitably such an approach tends to be highly reactive…An overall defensive philosophy only tends to reinforce this reactive characteristic. This would be a serious handicap in limited war.” 21 Since lack of articulation of strategic doctrine operates against the building and sustaining of a national consensus on defence policies, Jasjit Singh attempts to outline a strategic doctrine. He takes India’s strategic objective as building of a sustainable peace to ensure socio-economic growth. The pillars in his framework are prevention of war, removal of the threat and risk of war and reduction of the threat perception of potential adversaries. He acknowledges a “fundamental need to move from the classical paradigm of competitive security to cooperative model of interstate security. He requires “necessary precautions” amounting to deterrence to remain, but alongside efforts towards détente and strategic stability are advanced. Broadly, two alternatives emerge: defence through either a strategic defensive or strategic offensive strategy; and second, prevention of war through credible deterrence if at a minimum level. Appropriate strategies would require supporting this strategic doctrine. He tends towards the second alternative, prevention of war with deterrence being central. This would entail quantitative and qualitative superiority but one tempered by affordability. He favours air power as an instrument that furnishes both deterrence by denial and punishment, as against land power that can only deliver the former.

The diplomatic strand of grand strategy took advantage of military self-confidence emerging from an improved counter insurgency situation as also the predicament of Pakistan hemmed in by the war on terror. On the J&K issue this optimistic perspective translated into India being ready to look at options, short of redrawing the boundaries and finding a pragmatic solution to resolve the J&K issue. It was prepared to work out cooperative, consultative mechanisms so as to maximise the gains of cooperation in solving problems of social and economic development of the region. Building on the November 2003 ceasefire along the International Border, Line of Control and Actual Ground Position Line and unconditional commitment given by President Musharraf on 06 Jan 2004 not to permit any territory under Pakistan’s control to be used to support terrorism in any manner, a number of initiatives were taken to ease tensions, normalise and improve relations.

At the level of the Government, the Composite Dialogue was initiated with the resumption of Foreign Secretary level talks in June 2004. At the level of Armed Forces, a number of Confidence Building Measures were envisaged. Upgrading the link between Directors General Military Operations, new communication links at division/corps level, annual meetings of Vice Chiefs of Army Staff and exchanges between the Armed Forces related academic institutions.23 Not all have been progressed as desired; but the pace and direction of progress is itself a pressure point in the overall effort to incentivise and pressurise Pakistan into realigning its strategy of proxy war.

The military strategy in the beginning of the decade has been described as one of dissuasive defence on two legs. One leg is to deploy strong forces to man prepared defences and limit penetration. These are to be supplemented by counter attack reserves to destroy enemy lodgements. The second leg is a reactive one that has counter offensive reserves strike back with its own offensive. The dissuasion aspect is in having strong defences, while deterrence is on the certainty of a strong reply by theatre reserves.24 This articulation of military doctrine was overtaken by the implementation of the lessons from Operation Parakram by 2004. The doctrine that emerges is considerably more offensive.

The military doctrine to complement strategic doctrine exists in the form of the Indian Army Doctrine released in 2004. Presently, the term ‘Limited War’ occurs but once in this publication and that too, on a graphic on Spectrum of Conflict. This is problematic since the graphic in question seamlessly melds Limited War with the next stage of Total War. Further, it makes a distinction between Total War and the next higher stage of Nuclear War, indicating that wider conventional war is possible in a nuclear environment. Such doctrinal reflection is difficult to concede for two reasons: one, that in the nuclear era keeping war from becoming Total War is imperative; and two, that Nuclear War could yet erupt even during prosecution of what is originally intended as a Limited War. The nuclear overhang virtually negates the conception of Total War. Therefore, Limited War is here to stay and requires deliberateness in thinking through that only a separately articulated doctrine can ensure. While thinking through military dimensions of Limited War is undeniable, more importantly it needs to be done in keeping the nuclear doctrine in mind. Movement in one may entail a corresponding movement in the other. Therefore, the doctrinal exercise cannot be restricted to being one internal to the military. It should instead be ‘military led’, considering input and cross fertilisation from a wider field, not excluding in particular, the National Security Council.

There is thinking along these lines. Characteristically, it was perceptive General Sundarji who had already by the early nineties discerned that this was the direction of the future, writing, “Indian conventional operations should be modulated in scope and depth of penetration into Pakistani territory so that ingress can stop before Pakistan resorts to the use of nuclear weapons.” Since Limited War would unfold under the nuclear backdrop, thinking on the implications for nuclear doctrine and the implications of nuclear doctrine need also be factored in. General Sundarji’s formulation is more in line with limitation in war, including one that has for some reason gone nuclear. He wrote: “Terminate nuclear exchange at lowest possible level with a view to negotiating the best peace that is politically acceptable.”

With nuclearisation, a more circumspect attitude to the use of force has developed. The predisposition of the military towards maximising employment of force has been tempered by the Limited War concept. Since wars have a dynamic of their own and if uncontrolled have a tendency towards escalation, there has to be a deliberate ‘hobbling’ (Bernard Brodie) of the effort in the nuclear age. This implies a move away from viewing war as a means to impose one’s will, but a ‘strategy of conflict’ (Thomas Schelling) in which adversaries bargain through graduated military responses towards the attainment of a negotiated settlement. The difference that nuclear weapons bring is that only the latter of the two natures of war as given by Clausewitz – total defeat of the enemy or war intended to bring him to the negotiating table - remains as the only option.28 Developments in the first decade have been along these lines. However, an explicit doctrine on Limited War has not been articulated yet by the military. While the air and naval components of military power lend themselves to easier insertion, moderation and retraction in a conflict situation, the land component lacks the inherent flexibility. There is an advocacy towards building in flexibility in India’s strike corps organisation through the concept of Integrated Battle Groups in the tradition of Soviet Operational Manoeuvre Groups.29 It awaits the next iteration of the Indian Army doctrine or publication of a separate publication covering Limited War as a specialised form of war.

Conclusion

It is well acknowledged that India does not have an explicitly articulated security policy. This is so despite the existence of a National Security Council that could have undertaken the task over the past decade. However, it would be inaccurate to say that India does not have such a policy. Nevertheless, articulating the policy would be useful, such as is done periodically in other democracies and indeed by authoritarian regimes also. This would be useful for those responsible for the individual components of grand strategy, such as diplomatic, military, internal security etc. to formulate respective strategies. The gain in particular would be in the formulation of military doctrine since theory informs that this should be in conformity with strategic doctrine (orientation given by grand strategy to the state); itself dictated by the state’s security policy. Absent this, the military is left without appropriate political direction in this vital exercise. Despite this handicap, the Army has, as seen in this article, proved responsive and has moved in its military doctrine towards a more offensive mindset. But further evolution would require more than mere jointness. A ‘whole of government’ approach is necessary for tackling conflict at any level across the spectrum – be it internal security, Limited War and unthinkable Limited Nuclear War. 
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Colonel Ali Ahmed (Retd), commanded 4 MLI and is presently Research Fellow at the Institution for Defence Studies and Analyses, New Delhi.

Thursday, 31 May 2012

IDSA COMMENT

Military Doctrines: Next steps

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The press release on the latest doctrine issued informs that, “The joint doctrine for air-land operations would serve as the cornerstone document for use of military power in a joint warfare scenario when the Army's infantry, armoured and artillery strengths are used alongside Air Force's fire power. It establishes the framework of concepts and principles to understand the approach to planning and conduct of air-land operation in a conventional war scenario.” Not being in the open domain, it can be taken as no more than what the press statement alludes to: the application of air power in a land campaign. Is this advance enough?
In the absence of a CDS, this recent release at best represents a minimal consensus between the two Services in integrating air power with land power. Another document integrating air power in naval operations is in the offing. What is missing is a joint approach to war-fighting between the Services. A joint doctrine dating to 2006 exists; but the silence that has surrounded it since and the fact that an additional, if supplementary, joint doctrine was felt necessary reflects on its credibility. Clearly, there is scope for doctrinal integration.
The Services have been doctrinally fecund over the past decade. The Army has arrived at ‘Cold Start’ which envisages early launch of limited offensives. These can be built upon by strike corps depending on the political decision on the nature of the war. Envisioning a strategic role for itself, the Air Force’s bid is for gaining air dominance at the earliest. This is, in order thereafter, to pursue a strategic infrastructure busting and military attrition campaign. This relegates its support for land forces to a supplementary role. For its part, the Navy, addressing a wider canvas and willing maritime-mindedness in the nation, has expansively named its doctrine, ‘India’s Maritime Doctrine’.
The doctrines are primarily prompted by the structural factor in terms of changes in the regional security situation and learning there from. The impact of Kargil and Operation Parakram have been to energise Limited War thinking and the Cold Start doctrine respectively. Also deepening of strategic culture through growing national power indices, expansion in the strategic community and changes in the political landscape including cultural nationalism have been influential. Lastly, bureaucratic politics surrounding expanding defence budgets and the need to keep the respective Service relevant in the nuclear age are also impelling factors.
The consequence of these pulls and pushes is that the Services are bidding to pursue ‘parallel wars’. While campaigns, though interdependent, can be relatively distinct from each other, separate Service-specific ‘parallel’ wars are difficult to concede in principle.
Firstly, this amounts to suboptimal use of military power. Synergy that raises the whole to a level higher than the sum of its parts would be missing. Mere co-ordination would not suffice. Secondly, against a nuclear armed opponent, even if action of each Service is individually below assessed nuclear thresholds, the cumulative impact of the three both physically and psychologically could yet trigger off a nuclear threshold. Besides, levels of diplomatic coercion and covert intelligence operations also need factoring in. Thirdly, political control would be difficult since each Service will vie for the lead role in the multiple campaigns.
With the integrating document missing, it is only political aims and the limiting parameters set in the run up or at the outset of a war that would bring about a unity of effort. While conceding that military doctrine formulation is a specialised activity, it can no longer be done in individual bureaucracies respectively or by the military independently. The sphere of autonomy of the military having been considerably attenuated by nuclearisation, there is a case for greater political oversight and bureaucratic participation.
The political aim may be to reduce the Pakistan Army’s potential to control the Pakistani state post-hostilities and any influence over the future peace. The other possible aim that usually finds mention is capture of territory. The latter is not discussed here since it appears to be a holdover from the previous century.
Piecing together the commentary on ‘Cold Start’ so far, the strategy apparently comprises launching of pivot corps limited offensives supplemented with strike corps resources. This would be done along with the Air Force wresting the initiative in the air in the early stages of the war. This phase would set the stage for punishment administered by the strike corps and by the Air Force. A combination of posturing, employment of strike corps, and application of operational level degradation fire assaults would force enemy strategic reserves into the open for the Air Force, in combination with the land forces, to degrade them. A clear aim and method emerges.
The political level consideration on the aim needs to be, one, whether the Pakistan Army will ride away into the sunset without a nuclear bang, and, two, if this attempt at compellence, virtually amounting to regime change, would not instead get a worse alternative into the saddle in Pakistan.
On the methods, there needs to be an outlining of parameters of limitation. Though a ‘short, sharp’ high-intensity war is projected by the Services, it is also the sales pitch for the option of war. The Services do not have an explicit Limited War doctrine. The limitation will be dependent on the political aim set and the parameters given by the political leadership when in sight of conflict. The Services believe that, as in Kargil, they are flexible enough to deliver within set limits.
Three problems however arise. One is ad hocism that may attend decision making with crisis as the backdrop. The second is the problem with compellence strategy, which involves keeping the promise of more punishment to come to get the rational, military decision maker in Pakistan to oblige on stated demands. In this is inherent the escalatory dynamic. Besides, what the war does to the internal political complexion in Pakistan is uncertain. The cases of Germany in WWI and Japan in WWII and Iraq in Iraq War II are instructive. The third is gauging how much punishment administered is ‘enough’ to remain short of nuclear thresholds. This cannot be dependent solely on bomb damage assessments internal to the military.
That India has managed warfighting credibly earlier resulted in its martial triumphs, 1971 and Kargil. This was in both the circumstances: of availability of time and in face of shortage of it. Therefore, there is no denying that it can be done again. The question is: Need it be so?
The next round may be taken on the run, as the term ‘Cold Start’ implies. Additionally, examples of shortfalls of integration also exist alongside, such as the 1965 War and in operations short of war like the IPKF episode. Institutionally, the national security bureaucracy has made considerable progress since the Kargil Committee Report. Doctrine formulation would generate and reflect a ‘whole of government’ approach, as was intended. The fear of militarization of governmental thinking, holding back next steps, need not necessarily happen. Instead, the military prong would be suitably ensconced in a wider grand strategy. What needs to be done?
Firstly, greater doctrinal involvement of the MoD, in conjunction with the NSCS and the MEA, and not forgetting the R&AW is necessary. An opportunity is the five-year review of the Joint Doctrine 2006, possibly due next year and therefore considerations on which can be expected to be underway. Such an exercise deserves wider participation.
Secondly, a separate joint Limited War doctrine needs to be brought out on the only kind of war feasible in the nuclear age. A written document on what the concept means in the Indian context will be useful in intimating the adversary of our thought content. This will help build a common understanding since limitation is a shared aim between nuclear armed adversaries.
Institutionally, the next step is clearly the creation of a CDS. The inescapable doctrinal implication of this post is the integration of conventional and nuclear doctrine. We must be prepared for enemy nuclear first use contesting our view that nuclear weapons are only ‘political weapons’. In the event, the double-hatted COSC or NSA would be found wanting as substitutes for a CDS. Next, unity of effort cannot be brought about by the Defence Secretary. He would be handling and answering for the sinews of defence. Third, receiving institutionally-informed military advice from three sources, in the form of three Chiefs of Staff, is not good enough. A COSC, also representing his Service, cannot also pitch in as a single point source. A happy circumstance of good interpersonal relations can be no compensation. Culmination of the post-Kargil restructuring is necessary. This cannot be a bottom-up exercise, which first awaits a consensus among the Services, or as is projected, between political parties.