http://epaper.kashmirtimes.in/index.aspx?page=4

Whither Northern Command? Getting theaterisation right

With war’s metamorphosing to hybrid war, information war is now a central fixture in both war and peace. This is not self-evident from the website of the Northern Command (NC). The NC webpages on the army website depict the NC stuck combating terrorism alone, though much water has flown down the Indus and Jhelum. There is no mention of the heroes of Galwan, leave alone last year’s Chinese invasion that capped their intrusions since 2013. In effect, NC is in a time warp, best illustrated by the it’s webpage saying that it is deployed in the ‘state of Jammu and Kashmir’ that was consigned to history over two years ago. This observation is not casual nitpicking, but to highlight that the NC is rather busy with operations. This article makes the case that on account of this, it needs a helping hand.

The NC has been left out of the latest structural re-jigging of the army, advertised as the most consequential reform since Independence. Media reports have it that the theaterisation process has been kicked-off after much deliberation. General Rawat, who wears three hats (Chief of Defence Staff, Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee and Secretary of the Department of Military Affairs), is working to a timeline of his retirement by when he wishes to deliver on his mandate. Happenstance is that the timeline coincides with the run up to the next national elections, allowing the ruling party at the Center to appropriate yet another military achievement as its own handiwork.  

Notably, the mandate itself does not necessarily call for theaterisation, as popularly interpreted and seemingly subscribed to in the military. The press release on the forming of the department of military affairs states: “Facilitation of restructuring of Military Commands for optimal utilisation of resources by bringing about jointness in operations, including through establishment of joint/theatre commands.” If theaterisation was the directive, the forward slash (/) that depicts ‘or’ would have been replaced by a hyphen. When joint commands are sufficient, the aim of injecting jointness into warfighting does not compel theaterisation. In any case, the interpretation that theaterisation has been mandated appears to have carried the day and caviling about it now is moot.

The makeover underway

A recent update has it that the theaterisation concept has the maritime theater complemented by three landward theaters: western, eastern and the northern. NC therefore covers the territorial spread of the two adjacent theaters – western and eastern – into Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh respectively. The consideration here is whether the NC should be retained more or less intact in this manner or should be split with the Pakistan and China facing stretches of its geography taken over by the respective neighbouring commands.

As of now, since theaterisation is a work-in-progress, which of the two options above is envisaged for the NC over the long term is not known. Along the two fronts, the operational functions of the current day commands are to be first taken over by a designated command headquarters (one for each of the western and eastern fronts) that is to form the bedrock of the theater command, followed, over time, by other functions as logistics. But the NC has been kept out of this makeover, with only its boundaries with the neighbouring theaters liable to being adjusted slightly.

For now, this retention of NC as a theater of its own may owe to it being an operationally active command. Counter-insurgency operations are set to heighten after the Taliban victory in Afghanistan and the Ladakh intrusion by the Chinese has not reverted to status quo ante yet. The military has perhaps kept NC as a third theater temporarily. Doing so prevents structural instability at a time when the operational challenge is nigh.

However, the second option has the northern theater persisting into the future.  The NC is where the much vaunted two-front threat is likely to be incident most critically. Geographical contiguity at the northern extremities allows India’s two adversaries – Pakistan and China - to act in sync. An integrated response under one theater command adds weight to this option and might have led to the northern theater being retained as such in the theaterisation concept.

Splitting the northern theater?

From its website, it is evident that the NC is rather preoccupied with counter insurgency, officially put as “counter terrorism”. This is perhaps what led to its being caught flat-footed by the Chinese intrusion. And once the Chinese intruded, Ladakh has become its preoccupation. More pertinently, it has shifted a proportion of the specialist counter-insurgency force, the Rashtriya Rifles (RR), to Ladakh. This has been done when many apprehend a spike in the Kashmiri insurgency. Pakistan, having returned the Taliban to Kabul, may turn its attention back to its jugular vein: Kashmir. This may lead to the speedy reversion of the RR from Ladakh once the phony war breaks into a renewed bout of proxy war as early as next spring. From back and forth actions as this - reminiscent of the motion of the neck of a spectator sitting astride the net at a tennis match - it is evident that the NC has a rather a lot on its plate, that when shared is better digested.

If the northern theater is split, the theater command handling the Pakistan front – coming up at Jaipur - can have a holistic view of the Kashmir situation, enabling it to modulate conventional deterrence as necessary and, when warranted, conduct integrated conventional operations across the whole front. It would have the two mechanised strike corps and elements of the new mountain strike corps (the third mechanized strike crops duly realigned for a role in mountains) at its disposal. If the Pakistan front is instead reformed - as the current plan has it - by frontage split between two theaters – western and northern – then the very concept predicated on a front and theater being co-extensive stands negated. 

This is especially relevant since India has been at pains over the past two decades to doctrinally link the two levels of war – subconventional and conventional – in order to deter Pakistan’s proxy war at the latter level. India is reorganising its strike forces into integrated battle groups to make its conventional military advantage credible. A single, operational-level, theater headquarters thinking up the simultaneous assaults of IBGs across the western front is better than one each handling these across the international border and across the line of control respectively. This will keep the higher headquarters at Delhi - to be eventually based on the headquarters Integrated Defence Staff (IDS) and answering to an operationally empowered CDS - free to maintain a strategic view of the conflict and keep a wary eye on the other neighbour under the two-front rubric. 

A similar argument is valid for the other front too. Having Ladakh under one theater and the remainder of the line of actual control with China stretching to Arunachal Pradesh under another, would yet again embroil the strategic level headquarters IDS in calibrating the response to future Chinese adventurism across two theaters, rather than maintaining an eagle eye on both fronts. At the operational level, any future intrusions would require to be met with speedy tit-for-tat grab actions, best mounted by one headquarters fully abreast with the strengths and vulnerabilities and the developing situation across the entire China front. Hiving off Ladakh from the eastern theater militates against the logic of theaterisation. At the strategic level, the likelihood of a hyena-like action by Pakistan is taken as more likely in a situation of a limited conflict on the other front. It would not do for the strategic level headquarters to be distracted by integrating the response of the two separate theaters on the China front, when the second front is also activated.

Keeping the northern theater whole?

The two-front situation is considered most pertinent at the northern extremity, where India has the vulnerability of Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO)-Depsang plains on one side and the Siachen-Kargil area, where India is on a surer footing, on the other. Admittedly, managing this area requires an innovative approach. In the case of the northern theater being split into two adversary-specific fronts respectively, Siachen would fall to the western theater. Were the two adversaries to join hands in a collusive effort here, the two theaters can respond by opening up other sectors along respective fronts. For instance, in case of a grab of DBO by China, the northern theater can counter with pressure points elsewhere and outside Ladakh, even as the western theater can ‘go for’ Hunza-Gilgit-Baltistan, targeting the Chinese Achilles heel along the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, or elsewhere.

A persuasive argument for retaining NC has it that in such a circumstance, a single theater based on NC would provide for a better response, rather than have the Indian response divided between two theaters. With NC handling the situation, the possibility of keeping the conflict geographically limited is higher. However, the northern theater may not be able to counter the weight the two collusive adversaries might bring to their preplanned nefarious grab. Therefore, it may be prudent to recognize this vulnerability and deter it by an implicit of conflict expansion ab initio. A split of the northern theater along the Karakoram Range will broadcast that both fronts could open up along their entire respective length, making for robust deterrence of the scenario. 

Rethink the northern theater

The NC was carved out of the Western Command after the 1971 War. The idea was that the northern theater due to its extensive geographical spread merited its own theater, though the Western Command had proved itself efficacious against both Pakistan and China in preceding conflicts. However, earlier, relations with the two neighbours were never adversarial at the same time, as is the case in recent times. Consequently, the northern theater is beset. This predicament can be eased by splitting it.

The logic of accountability with Udhampur as it faces of the upcoming threat of insurgency is not persuasive, since NC is also simultaneously squaring off against China in Ladakh. Therefore, having Jaipur take on the responsibility of overseeing the two corps at Badami Bagh and Nagrota makes sense. There is no guarantee that proxy war resumption by Pakistan will not escalate. A single theater for taking on Pakistan in such a circumstance is better, thereby also proving a better deterrent too.  On the eastern side, the talks have had only partial success and the new normal is likely to stay. Therefore, the Ladakh stretch must devolve to the eastern theater, to be anchored either at Lucknow or Kolkata. Lucknow may perhaps be better placed to exercise an over-watch than the somewhat receded, location wise, Kolkata.  

With a single theater per front, the Delhi based headquarters IDS will be able to discharge its strategic role efficaciously and keep an eye on escalatory possibilities including the nuclear level, thereby fulfilling the promise of theaterisation. Delaying the switch over of NC area of responsibility to the other two commands may not prove the right decision since adversarial relations are set to persist with both China and Pakistan and a switch over, even if delayed, will have to contend with uncertainty even later. Consequently, India must get its theaterisation act together, even as it ensures that while it is doing so, it is able to tide over any challenge in the interim.

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 https://www.claws.in/options-for-the-northern-theater/

A consideration of options for the northern theater

The Northern Command (NC) appears to have been left intact in the latest structural rejigging of the army, the most consequential since Independence. The mandate for setting up joint commands reads: “Facilitation of restructuring of Military Commands for optimal utilisation of resources by bringing about jointness in operations, including through establishment of joint/theatre commands.”

Notably, if theaterisation was the directive, the forward slash need not have been there. However, the issue moot since reports have it that the theaterisation concept being implemented. The maritime theater is complemented by three landward theaters: western, eastern and the northern theater. The northern theater is the current-day NC area of responsibility, with its boundary duly adjusted to accommodate the two new neighbouring commands in the offing. NC therefore covers the adjacent territorial spread into Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh respectively of the two abutting theaters, western and eastern theaters.

The consideration in this article is whether the NC should be retained as the northern theater or should be split with the Pakistan and China facing stretches of its geography taken over by the respective neighbouring commands, western and eastern. Of the two options – retain NC as a northern theater or down the road split it between the two adversary-specific theaters – this article argues in favour of the latter.

As of now, since theaterisation is a work-in-progress, it is not fully known how the end state is envisaged. Along the two fronts, reportedly the operational functions of the current day commands are to be first taken over by designated command headquarters, followed over time by other functions as logistics. But the NC has been kept out of this makeover for now, favoured with its own theater as hitherto.

Presumably, since it is an operationally active command, with the counter-insurgency operations set to heighten after the Taliban victory in Afghanistan and the Ladakh intrusion by the Chinese not having reverted to status quo ante yet, the military – sensibly – has led to NC being a third theater for now. It would not do to generate structural instability at a time when the challenge is nigh. Doing so will reduce accountability, currently vested in one theater headquarters: the NC. 

In the first option, this arrangement is persisted with since the NC is where the much vaunted two-front threat is likely to be most incident. Geographical contiguity in the northern parts allows India’s two adversaries – Pakistan and China - to act in sync and manifest a threat. If the appreciation has it that such a threat is best met with an integrated response under one theater command, then the NC may be persisted with.

However, a drawback of retaining NC as a single theater is that its counter insurgency commitment is of the order that perhaps led to it being off-guard when confronted by the Chinese intrusion. Arguably, similar was the case with the Kargil intrusion. With the Pakistani proxy war apprehended to heighten in wake of the Taliban victory in Afghanistan and the Chinese refusing to revert to status quo ante in Ladakh, the NC may be faced with dissonance. It seems that the NC has a rather a lot on its plate, that can be better digested when shared. In other words, its area of operations should be split between the two fronts facing respectively India’s two adversaries, Pakistan and China.

If the NC is split, the theater command handling the Pakistan front can have a holistic view of the Kashmir situation, enabling it to modulate conventional deterrence as necessary and conduct integrated conventional operations across the whole front when warranted. It would have the two mechanised strike corps and elements of the new mountain strike corps (reportedly created out of the third mechanized strike crops) at its disposal. If the Pakistan front, in such as circumstance, is split into two theaters – western and NC – then the promise of theaterisation is defeated and its very concept negated. 

This is especially relevant since India has been at pains to doctrinally link the two levels of war – subconventional and conventional – in order to deter Pakistan’s proxy war at the latter level. India is reforming its strike forces into integrated battle groups to make conventional military power credible. One operational level headquarters thinking up their simultaneous assaults is better than one handling those across the international border and the other across the line of control. This will keep the higher headquarters free to maintain a strategic view of the conflict and keep a wary eye on the other neighbour under the two-front rubric. 

A similar argument is valid for the other front too. Having Ladakh under one theater and the remainder of the line of actual control with China under another, would yet again embroil the strategic level headquarters at Delhi in calibrating the response across two theaters, rather than maintaining an eagle eye on both fronts. At the operational level, any future intrusions would require to be met with speedy counter grab actions, best mounted by one headquarters fully abreast with the strengths and vulnerabilities and the developing situation across the entire front. At the strategic level, the likelihood of a Pakistani hyena action is taken as more likely in a situation of a limited conflict on the other front. It would not do for the strategic level headquarters to be distracted by integrating the response of the two separate theaters on the China front.

The two-front situation is most pertinent at India’s northern extremity, where India has the vulnerability of Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO) on one side and the Siachen-Kargil area on the other, where India is on a surer footing. This may require to be innovatively handled if a split of NC places these two complexes respectively in the responsibility of two different theaters, with Siachen falling in the western front.

Even if the two adversaries join hands for a concerted effort here, the two theaters can respond by opening up other sectors along respective fronts. For instance, in case of a grab of DBO by China, the northern theater can counter with pressure points elsewhere and outside Ladakh, even as the western theater can ‘go for’ Gilgit-Hunza (specifically the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor) and/or elsewhere. Having the strategic level headquarters at Delhi oversee operational level details would distract it from its primary responsibility at such a juncture: paying attention to conventional escalation and nuclear thresholds. 

Admittedly, retaining NC for a better response is persuasive. It would keep the conflict limited geographically and make for a concerted response. But this would to play into the hands of the adversaries who would have catered for NC’s pushback. Escalation horizontally may be better in such a case, rather than have a repeat of Kargil. On balance, this argument in favour of a northern theater does not clinch the issue.

The argument for the northern theater being split into two putative theaters – western and eastern – is therefore plausible, but would require the current threat in the northern theater to stabilize before next steps are taken.

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 https://www.milligazette.com/news/Opinions/33915-no-terror-under-modi-a-reading-list-for-the-defence-minister/

A reading list for the defence minister

The defence minister, Rajnath Singh, speaking at a meeting of the state Bharatiya Janata Party in the shadow of the gigantic statue of the original Iron Man of India, said that ‘terrorists were afraid of the Narendra Modi government at the Center and there had been no major terrorist attack in the country since Mr Modi assumed office in 2014.’ The defence minister went on to say that by conducing surgical strikes (wrongly dated to 2018 in the news report, unless the defence minister faulted on the date), India had sent a message to terrorists that they were insecure even in their safe havens, in Pakistan.

Since the defence minister is the senior member of the cabinet and sits on the cabinet committee on security (CCS) and the national security council (NSC), what he says matters. This is even more so since we know his fellow members on any of the three forums are not particularly consequential. Therefore, Rajnath Singh’s utterances have some import.

In the same breath saying there have been no terror attacks, the minister also referred to surgical strikes. This appears a self-contradiction since the surgical strikes were presumably in response to terror attacks, at Uri and at Pulwama respectively. But then – as this columnist has earlier argued here and elsewhere – these were not incidents meriting the escalatory response of surgical strikes.

At Uri, in the skirmish with the intruding terrorists a tent in which our soldiers were sleeping burnt down, accidentally increasing the casualties. This is brought out in the then corps commander’s memoirs, thus: “During the firefight, a cookhouse also caught fire, which increased the death toll (Satish Dua, India’s Bravehearts) (emphasis added).” 

As for Pulwama, it is unthinkable that the perpetrator was in and out of police stations, after having been apprehended earlier in a firefight in which two of his fellow militants died, for some six times thereafter and did not catch anyone’s eye as a potential suicide bomber. Besides, the infamous Davinder
Singh – allegedly but credibly associated with the parliament attack - was posted in Pulwama till a couple of months prior to the attack. Today, Davinder Singh is being spared investigation on both counts in the name of national security, since to do so would see plenty skeletons spill out of the cupboard.

The upshot is that the minister is indeed right – there have been no terror attacks since the prime minister took office. But is the reason he gives accurate: that this owes to a policy of ‘zero tolerance towards terrorism’?  

Counter-intuitively, let’s begin with Kashmir. The police there required the media reporting on violent incidents to use the term ‘terrorism’ rather than their preferred term, ‘militancy’. This does not necessarily make the violence there terrorism. This author has argued that the term insurgency should instead be used since this is a phenomenon amenable to political resolution, whereas using the term terrorism makes political compromises intrinsic in negotiated settlement problematic. This advocacy is in keeping with the ground situation in which over 90 per cent of those killed these days are Kashmiri youth. The weapons recovered are at best a couple of pistols with an odd Kalashnikov thrown in. Not to forget, some of the terror attacks are liable to be black operations, such as possibly the one that won Davinder Singh a gallantry medal. The dividend is to help a safe landing by Pakistan on the Financial Action Task Force grey list.

That brings one to the terror attacks elsewhere that according to the minister stopped because terrorists - and Pakistan - went chicken. Terrorism is no child’s play. Perpetrators have pathological features and are hardened by ideologies of violent extremism. They often put their lives on line. Some are mercenaries whose families are amply materially compensated. Therefore, the minister’s reasoning is self-serving.

As for the anti-terrorism strategy itself, let’s revert to Kashmir. The recent burial of the political stalwart, SAS Geelani, was done under a considerable security blanket, testifying to the government knowing well that the place is poised on a brink. Kicking the can down road is never a good strategy. The belief that the political solution – invalidating of Article 370 – constituted a political solution shall face its severest test yet. Commentary on fallout from Afghanistan has it that Kashmir will likely be singed. A ‘wait and watch’ policy, arguably valid for Afghanistan, is hardly apt from a prevention point of view in Kashmir. 

As for the counter terrorism strategy of zero tolerance, elevating alleged terror participants - against whom the case is in court - to parliament on a ruling party ticket is not good strategy either. Assuming Muslim perpetrators were behind terror prior to 2014, it challenges reason that such radicalized individual have been rather inactive over the last seven years. During the period, the right wing has gone out of its way to not only lynch innocent Muslims victims periodically but upload the visuals from these beatings on to social media. The idea has been to provoke a Muslim backlash for polarization purposes. Such strategic patience on part of the Muslim terrorists begs the question why are they keeping their powder dry.

Mr. Rajnath Singh may like to have his speech writer peruse recent works on terrorism. Josy Joseph in his The Silent Coup shows how narco tests were abused to depict Muslims subjected to them as terrorists. Abdul Wahid Shaikh brings out voluminous testimony in his Innocent Prisoners on the torture he faced and his fellow Muslim prisoners to force false confessions for participation in terror acts out of them. He substantiates allegations former senior police man, Mushrif, makes in his Brahminists Bombed, Muslims Hanged. Even the flagship counter terrorism innovation of the regime, it’s cutting off of terror funding, has other impetus behind it – yet another instrument to throttle non-governmental organizations and whittle the civil society space.

Elias Davidsson in his Revisiting the 26/11 Evidence pokes holes in the Mumbai terror attack evidence. While the terror attack was Pakistan conceived and originated, it appears India profited by exploiting the terror attack to its purposes. Irrespective of supercop Rakesh Maria’s version to the contrary, in the drawing room Muslim narrative, saffronite extremists took advantage of the chaos to eliminate policemen investigating them for prior bomb blasts elsewhere. India’s inept security response – perhaps kept deliberately so to corner Pakistan - led to heightening the toll. The showing of the National Security Guard (NSG) was intriguing in this, with the NSG taking 48 hours to clean out the hotel near Gateway of India, especially when the naval Marcos and an infantry battalion’s ghatak platoon were on hand but denied a shot on the very first night itself.

The clinching evidence is from the courageous RB Shreekumar. A senior cop, Shreekumar in his Gujarat: Behind the Curtain depicts how the cover up was deployed post Godhra. The Gujarat model in which fake encounters were used to build up the image of a political worthy as Hindu Hriday Samrat thereafter went national in the false narrative of Muslim terrorism. A case to point is of the bombs being fortuitously found and defused in Surat after the serial blasts in Ahmedabad in 2008 when the current Delhi Police commissioner was in charge there.

This is no doubt a counter narrative, but deserves to be mainstreamed. Else the narrative sought to be propagated in courses on terrorism as in the new course introduced in Jawaharlal Nehru University, that terrorism is exclusively jihadi perpetrated will gain validity. While no doubt there was a Muslim backlash to events as Babri masjid demolition, Mumbai carnage and Gujarat pogrom, this pales in comparison in its temporality and impact to the terrorism attributed to Muslims by appropriation of the backlash by the right wing by covert means and its media hyperinflation. No wonder the defence lawyer of Umar Khalid described the police charge sheet as spill over from right wing trolls’ script. Revisionism as here will help strategic thinkers and the attentive public to evaluate the actual state of security and how a questionable security narrative is being employed to further political party goals at the cost of national security.

 https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/opinion/911-anniversary-the-global-war-on-terror-has-done-little-to-help-india-tide-over-its-security-issues-7449541.html/amp?__twitter_impression=true

9/11 Anniversary | The global war on terror has done little to help India tide over its security issues

Periodisation of the recent past customarily ends the post-Cold War unipolar moment of United States’ hegemony at 9/11. Though the US response to 9/11 epitomised its power at its zenith, its strategic overreach has turned its strategic trajectory indubitably downwards, not so much in aggregate power but in relative terms to its peer competitors, as also the suitability of its power to the issues of the day. Nothing illustrates this better than the manner of its exit from Kabul last month.

The observance of the 20th anniversary of the terror attacks in the US on September 11 is an appropriate moment to likewise appraise as to where India’s power is poised.

The anniversary finds India hemmed into its regional space, with the two-front challenge feared for more than a decade now a manifest reality. An economy under strain from missteps even prior to the onset of COVID-19 is stretched to find the necessary resources for the corresponding defence outlay.

India is coping by movement doctrinally (integrated battle groups) and structurally (integrated theatre commands), though its efforts to return to equable relations with China continue as a work in progress ever since the Chinese intrusion in Ladakh. Its strained equations with Pakistan are likely to heighten in wake of Pakistan seemingly stealing a march over India with the movement it backed, the Taliban, taking over Kabul in one fell swoop from the India-supported Ashraf Ghani government. The apprehended fallout has India gearing up for instability in Kashmir.

The clock appears to have rewound some 20 years.

Immediately prior to 9/11, India was stocking up for giving Pakistan a sock in the nose for its being unheeding of India’s outreach at the Agra summit and upping of its proxy war in Kashmir, then raging at a higher note since the Kargil War. The plan was called Operation Kabaddi and involved taking a few posts along infiltration prone routes on the Line of Control (LoC). In the event, 9/11 intruded and so rudely did the US into the region with the operation hastily renamed Operation Enduring Freedom from its earlier hubristic moniker Infinite Justice.

The impact of the global war on terror (GWOT) swirling in the close vicinity led to Pakistan’s deft footwork in reacquiring strategic capital from its location as a frontline state a second time round. This enabled it to wiggle out of a tight spot after the coincident terror attack on India’s Parliament. India’s military reaction — slow off the blocks — allowed Pakistan to rely on the US to bail it, then and in the next peak of the twin-peak crisis.

The upshot of the crisis was benign in the two countries able to work their earlier plan of engaging each other on issues of discord. Meetings followed, marked by ceasefire on the LoC and quietude in Kashmir. However, internal politics playing spoil sport, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf was deposed and then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s latitude eclipsed in the aftermath of Mumbai 26/11. In retrospect it is easy to espy a lost opportunity.

Having shot its bolt on peace initiatives, Pakistan turned its attention to its northern neighbour, nursing the Taliban back to insurgent good health while encouraging US President Barack Obama’s peace surge. It withstood US President Donald Trump’s fulminations by delivering the Taliban to the table at Doha. Strategic patience through some 10 rounds of talks since 2018 enabled it to finally see the US pack up and leave Afghanistan last month. A small price to pay for this strategic gamble was in playing down India’s surgical strikes, refraining from proxy war and its reluctant inaction on India’s dilution of Article 370 in Jammu & Kashmir.

For its part, India snuggled up with the US, starting with the nuclear deal and participating in Obama’s pivot to Asia, that has lately culminated in its co-option into the Quad. It hopes to balance against growing Chinese power, but the effect has arguably spurred China to through its intrusion caution India against proximity with the US, despite personal ministrations of the ties by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in successive summits with China’s Xi Jinping. The Ladakh intrusions, prompted in part by the changed political map of J&K, signify India’s current day strategic predicament.

The US having departed Afghanistan and poised by year end to leave Iraq, the GWOT has run its course. The GWOT in the backdrop did little to help India tide over its security issues that predated 9/11. The lesson is that India must be Atmanirbhar Bharat, a term popularly associated with economic regeneration, but also relevant for strategic autonomy. Self-reliance, interpreted as a return to non-alignment rather than external balancing, must be leitmotif of strategy hereon

 Publications in 2020-21 - 35

Eschewing and not manipulating escalation	Economic and Political Weekly (EPW) 12 May 20
Why India Did Not Go to War with China	EPW Vol. 55, Issue No. 35, 29 Aug, 2020
The India-Pak escalation dynamic	Economic and Political Weekly Vol. 55, Issue No. 9, 29 Feb, 2020
Why India Did Not Go to War with China	EPW Vol. 55, Issue No. 35, 29 Aug, 2020

  30 August 21 - India’s Afghanistan policy explained in regime security terms, thecitizen.in

2.      24 August 21 - Afghanistan Crisis | India must deploy its economic soft power, moneycontrol.com

3.      16 August 21 - Reform intelligence agencies in the national interest, milligazette.com

4.      11 August 21 – Afghanistan Civil War fallout on Kashmir – thecitizen.in

5.      11 August 21 - What a civil war next door means for us, Kashmir Times

6.      6 August 21 - The Escalatory Risks of India’s Integrated Battle Groups, South Asian Voices, Stimson Center

7.      11 July 21 - A peace strategy for Afghanistan

8.      18 June 21 - Counter insurgency is not a policeman’s job, Kashmir Times

9.      16 June 21 - Cohesion in the army: The battle winning factor, Center for Land Warfare Studies

10.  8 June 21 - An assessment of new ‘strategies’ for Pakistan and China, Kashmir Times

11.  6 July 21 – A case for ceasefire in Kashmir, Kashmir Walla

12.  18 May 21 - Try UN peacekeeping in Afghanistan, Kashmir Times

13.  28 Feb 21 - Securitisation of cultural nationalism, Kashmir Times

14.  7 July 21 - In Kashmir, the GD Bakshi way, Kashmir Walla

15.  5 Jan 21 – A fake encounter yet again?, Kashmir Times

16. 17 August 2020 - Why the déjà vu over the Shopian killings, Kashmir Times

17.  5 Oct 2020- The long-term implications of India’s do-nothing response in Ladakh, Newsclick

18.  19 February 2020https://www.thecitizen.in/index.php/en/NewsDetail/index/4/18337/Whose-Army-is-it-AnywayWhose army is it anyway?

 6 February 2020http://www.kashmirtimes.com/newsdet.aspx?q=98998 Modi must sack those misadvising him on national security

  5 February 2020http://www.milligazette.com/news/16872-what-should-shaheen-bagh-stalwarts-do-now What should Shaheen Bagh stalwarts do now

  27 January 2020http://www.milligazette.com/news/16869-india-the-coming-anarchy India — The coming anarchy

22.  Jan 2020 https://www.indianewsstream.com/a-suggestion-for-india-on-the-afghanistan-peace-talks/ A suggestion for India on the Afghanistan peace talks

 16 January 2020https://www.thecitizen.in/index.php/en/NewsDetail/index/4/18172/The-Crisis-in-the-Indian-Deep-State; http://kashmirtimes.com/newsdet.aspx?q=98483 20 Jan 2020; The crisis in the Indian deep state

 15 January 2020http://kashmirtimes.com/newsdet.aspx?q=98358 An Army Day resolution for the new chief

  13 January 2020https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/politics/politics-the-iran-us-spat-has-resonance-for-the-region-4810501.html/amp The Iran-US spat has resonance for the region

26.  8 January 2020https://www.newsclick.in/Many-Chink-India-Nuclear-Chain-Command Many a Chink in India’s Nuclear Chain of Command

27.  7 January 2020https://countercurrents.org/2020/01/gujaratification-as-the-foremost-national-security-threatGujaratification as the foremost national security threat

bBook Reviews 

1.      The Book Review India Volume Xlv Number 6 June 2021 Military Musings: 150 Years Of Indian Military Thought From The Journal Of The United Service Institution Of India Edited by Sqn. Ldr. Rana T.S. Chhina, MBE

2.      Shiraz Sheikh, Democracy and authoritarianism in Pakistan, The Book Review, Dec 2020

3.      TP Sreenivasan, Modiplomacy: Through a Shakespearean Prism, New Delhi: Konark Publishers, 2020; pp. 242; Rs. 800; ISBN 978-8193555446.

4.      HS Panag, The Indian Army, New Delhi: Westland, The Book Review, September 2020

B

UNPUBLISHED, REVISED VERSION OF THE PRECEDING POST

India’s Afghanistan policy in regime security terms

Foreign minister Jaishankar informed the recent all-party meeting on the Afghanistan situation that India’s policy is one of ‘wait and watch’. Whereas a policy-in-the-works is justified, a regional power should instead be pushing for an outcome it prefers in Afghanistan.

Diplomatically, it has at the two Security Council meetings joined the international chorus calling for moderation on part of the Taliban and to ensure a broad representativeness in the new government. As incentive, the mid August reference to Taliban among the armed groups has been removed in the late August Council resolution. Sticks to extract good behavior of the Taliban in power remain in the form of diplomatic recognition and sanctions’ lists procedures, on which India will likely fall in line with the Western powers. On the ground, having pulled out its diplomatic staff, it has limited possibilities of influencing the situation. This action willy-nilly acknowledges the preexisting deficit in India’s Afghan policy that resulted in India being kept out of the plethora of forums – the troika plus and quadrilaterals - that have come up as the peace process wound its way over the past two years.

While India’s intelligence moves are not known, these can be expected to include an outreach to the Afghan resistance shaping up at Panjshir holdout. By reassuring the resistance leadership of India’s continuing support, India can strengthen their hand. At the table currently with the Talban, they have the confidence to wrest their due in terms of representation in the new Taliban-led dispensation. If the Taliban’s ongoing tactics of coercion-with-talks fail to persuade their challengers at Panjshir, it provides India a leverage it could exploit depending on how the situation pans out.

An intelligence dominant Afghanistan policy

It is likely that the intelligence prong of strategy, even if invisible, is more active than its diplomatic one, since India’s Afghanistan policy has been intelligence-led. There have been multiple exchanges between the intelligence establishments of India and the former regime, especially since mid 2017, when President Trump decided to wind down the American commitment in Afghanistan. India’s Afghanistan policy is entwined with its Pakistan and Kashmir policies, making it a subset of its national security policy and therefore, the domain of the national security adviser.

However, despite this privileging of the intelligence prong of strategy - and perhaps because of this - not unlike most other states, India was unable to gauge the rapidity of collapse of the Ghani regime. Limiting its outreach to the Taliban eventuated in India being marginalized. Consequently, India surveys uncertain national security prospects in case the Taliban return to power. The threat is not so much from the Taliban, as much as from the unreformed and triumphalist Pakistan, that would be able to return its attention to its traditional preoccupation, Kashmir.

Kashmir returns as a conflict trigger

In Kashmir, it appears to be lull before the storm. There is enough tinder in Kashmir only waiting for the proverbial match stick. The recent outreach of the prime minister to the mainstream parties has not resulted in a breakthrough. Absent a promise of return to statehood prior to the elections, this remains unlikely. Such as reversion to statehood, albeit minus the earlier autonomy, would likely only be in case the elections are won by the ruling party at the Center. Consequently, the developments in the neighbourhood have potential for instability for national security, if and when the Pakistani state and non-state elements currently absorbed in returning the Taliban to power in Afghanistan, turn their attention to Kashmir.

In case unrest revives in Kashmir and presence of battle hardened Pakistani mercenaries resets the insurgency back to terrorism, India is liable to take harsh actions in Kashmir, besides being militarily firm with Pakistan. The current hiatus of relative stability, such as the Line of Control ceasefire reiteration in February, will likely unravel.

Prospects of wider insecurity

The fallout may not be limited to Kashmir. From the overdrive of the pro-right wing media on contrived linkages between Indian Muslims, Pakistan and Taliban is evident that already-frayed social harmony is set to suffer. Resulting polarization can be taken political advantage of by the right wing. ‘False flag’ terror operations implicating Muslims as perpetrators- as was the case in several terror incidents in the 2000s - shall heighten the political dividend from insecurity for the right wing.

It is by now well known that electoral advantage is sought by the ruling dispensation from India’s security showing. This remains true for how India will view its Afghanistan policy.

Since Kashmir remains delicate and a potential site for resumption of proxy war, India would perhaps prefer a like handle on the other side of Pakistan, not only to deter it but to get back at Pakistan in case of proxy war revival. Therefore, India may not be averse to instability continuing in Afghanistan. This explains lack of energy and dexterity in its diplomacy – exemplified by the term ‘wait and watch’ - in working for the presumed preferable outcome of returning stability and security to Afghanistan over the uncertainty of civil war.

The regime security calculus

In other words, not only has an intelligence-led Afghanistan policy failed India already, but is set to fail India once again in an impending unraveling of its Kashmir policy. That this has domestic political advantage for its political masters makes for ambiguity as to whether this is at all seen as a failure. On the contrary the powers-that-be may see an intelligence success through their parochial-political lens. Contending externally with the Taliban and its supposed sponsors, Pakistan, has internal political dividend in keeping up polarization. With the crucial Uttar Pradesh elections due soon, and their outcome’s implications for national elections in 2024, they primary prism for gauging national security policy is how any such policies influence political fortunes.

When national interest is defined as perpetuation of the right wing electoral majority for sustaining the Hindutva project in the unmaking of India as we know it, national interest articulation in traditional and conventional terms is futile. India is thus poised to move from being a free-rider to a spoiler for regime security and at the cost of national security.

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