Essays

Though India is strategically located between China and Pakistan, the Himalayas were considered to serve as natural defenders against external aggression, in the past. So, after India gained independence, it was involved in building good friendly relations with its neighbours. In 1947, Pakistan declared a clan-destine war against India and was able to occupy 35 per cent of Jammu and Kashmir because of shortsightedness of our leaders. The war came to an end in 1949 with the United Nations sponsored Ceasefire Agreement which recognized the ceasefire line, beyond which lay the Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK). Pt. Nehru formulated the PnnclisJn'i'1, the five principles of peaceful co-existence with the neighbours, but in 1962, to his utter dismay, China attacked India. It seized 20 per cent of Kashmir consisting of around 38,000 sq. km of Ladakh's Aksai Chin region. Another 4,000 sq. km of land, located to the west of the Karakoram Pass, was illegally ceded to China by Pakistan. In 1965, the defence of the country, though lacked infrastructure and expertise, was able to repulse the Pakistan's aggression. In 1971 again, despite its past humiliation, Pakistan attacked India but was forced to retreat. India had woken up to the fact that because of its location, the country is vulnerable to the invasions of our neighbours.

India's defence policy aims at promoting and sustaining durable peace in the Asian subcontinent and equipping the defence forces adequately to counter external aggression. The Supreme Command of the armed forces is vested in the President of India, though the responsibility for the defence rests with the Union Cabinet. The Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs, presided over by the Prime Minister, decides all important matters having a bearing on defence. The Defence Minister is responsible to the Parliament on all matters pertaining to the defence of the country. The administrative and the operational control of the armed forces is exercised by the Ministry of Defence and the three services headquarters of the Army, the Navy and the Air Force. The three services function through their respective service headquarters headed by their respective Chiefs of Staff. The Army is led by the Chief of the Army Staff at the Army Headquarters in New Delhi.

The Army is organized into five operational commands, namely. Southern, Northern, Eastern, Western and Central Commands and one Training Command. The NavaJ Force is responsible for the defence and security of India's maritime interests and assets, both in times of war and peace. The Indian Navy is led by the Chief of the Naval Staff at the naval lead quarters in New Delhi. To protect the Indian Peninsula, the Navy has established three commands - Western, Eastern and Southern - with their headquarters in Mumbai, Vishakhapatnam and Kochi respectively. The Indian Air Force is organized on functional and geographical basis. There are five operational commands -Western Air Command, South- western Air Command, Central Air Command, Eastern Air Command and Southern Air Command. Maintenance Command and Training Command are two functional commands of the Air Force. This force is led by the Chief of Air Staff with its headquarters in New Delhi.

The Indian armed forces symbolize the unity of the country and propagate the ideals of national integration. The recruitment to the armed forces is open to all Indian nationals, irrespective of their caste, creed, community, religion and region. The aim of the armed forces is to provide equal opportunities to all sections of the society to join the forces and to render service which would promote the ideals of secularism, democracy and social justice. Recruitment to the .limed forces is entirely voluntary. The aura of a challenging career in the armed forces beckons the youth from different parts of the country. However, the competition for entry into the service is tough because there is a growing number of educated youth taking part in the competition. Recruitment to the armed forces gives them the opportunity to serve the nation and command awe and respect from the civilians. Section 12 of the Army Act provided that women would not normally be eligible for enrolment in the Army. Similar provisions also existed with the other two services. With the changing times, the Government has approved of the women joining select non-combatant branches in the three forces.

The Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) was set up in 1958. A separate Department of De- fence Research was formed in 1980 which is engaged in de- veloping indigenous technologies of relevance to national security, required by the armed forces. The successful projects undertaken by the department are the development of the surface-to-surface missile PntJivi; state-of-the-art battle tan Arjun, pilotless target aircraft Lakshyn; flight simulators for aircraft; parallel supercompuicr pace plus and small arms and ammunition. The DRDO also possesses skill in the area of Guided Missiles, Supercomputer, UAV, armaments and ammunition including illuminating ammunition, night vision devices, fire detection and suppression systems and military bridging systems. The organization has also developed Indian field gun, INSAS rifle, charge line mine-clearing to safeguard against land mines, cluster weapon system for fighter aircraft and naval mines. The organization has developed the marine acoustic research ship sagadhwani and the submarine sonar and weapon control system panchendriya for the navy.

Under the Integrated Guided Missile Development Programme (IGMDP), five missile systems have been developed - Pritlivi, surface-to-surface tactical battier field missile; Akash, medium-range surface-to-air missile; Tiisinil, short-range surface-to-air missile; Nag, third generation anti- tank missile; and Agni-11, Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile (IRBM) with a strike range of 2,500 km. India's missile programme has been developed to counter the threats arising from the nuclear proliferation in the neighbouring China. China is also assisting Pakistan in developing its nuclear progmmme. The USA and Korea are also known to support Pakistan in developing its nuclear arsenal. The Indian missile programme caters to the requirements of the armed forces and hence have to conform to various specifications based on the performance, cost and time schedules. India's missile programme dates back to 1983, when research experts of the Defence Research and Development Laboratory in Hyderabad came up with the proposal of making five types of missiles under the IGMDP.

The missile programme was developed on the guidelines that the missiles had to be contemporary and based on state- of-the-art technologies; development and production would be carried out simultaneously; and should involve the participation of the Services in the programme. Six years after the missile programme was launched, Prillivi, Nagand Agni were developed and successfully tested. India's success at developing the missile technol-ogy indigenously came as a surprise to many countries like the USA, the UK, Canada, France, Italy, Japan and West Germany. They unanimously announced the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) which denied India access to critical technologies required in the realization of the programme India is not only successful in building its missile indigenously but is able to successful lest fire them on the Indian soil. Earlier, India had to cap the test-firing of Agni-11 due to pressure from the USA and China but in April 1999, India became a nuclear missile power by successfully test-firing the missile.

The test-firing of Agni-11 came exactly 11 months after the nuclear tests at Pokhran in May 1998. The nuclear tests were conducted because India perceived a threat to its sovereignty. Defence experts claimed that Pakistan had developed its nuclear programme with the assistance of China. North Korea and other countries. China has recently been accused of having developed its nuclear arsenal through espionage on the US. According to the Cox report on the issue, China is said to have acquired all the latest data related to the US weapon designs. Though the accusation came to light recently, China was considered a nuclear weapon power with around 45 nuclear tests to its credit. India had learnt the hard way, after falling prey to evil designs of China and Pakistan. The international reaction to India's nuclear tests was hostile because it was felt that India required to build its infrastructure than nuclear bombs. Leading defence experts felt that the nuclear proliferation in the Asian sub-continent had left India with no other option. Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, reiterated India's stand that the nuclear tests were not meant to mount threats on any country. He said that the weapons needed to be developed to retaliate in case of an external aggression by a nuclear weapon power and committed himself to the doctrine of no-first-use. He further added that these tests were conducted to pose as a deterrent to India's potential aggressors.

India's defence preparedness was a subject of debate among the top level defence personnel. There were reports of having inadequate staff in the army and many of the projects meant for the upgradation of the defence forces were being delayed. Primary among these were the Light Commercial Aircraft (LCA) and the Main Battle Tank (MBT), ArJini. Our defence forces also suffer from budget constraints. All this and intelligence failure led to the expensive military campaign to recapture the heights above Kargil from Pakistan's army and the infiltrators.

The infiltrated positions in Kargil were not in remote glaciated areas as was previously supposed. It took some thousand men, equipped with heavy artillery and supplies around three months, to position themselves on our side of the Line of Control (LoC). This lapse on India's part has exposed the extent of incompetence and the intelligence failure of our defence experts. The Kargil operation is similar to the Pakistani attempts in 1947 and 1965 to push in tribesmen and other irregular forces, before following up with regular troops. The third attempt by Pakistan, to cruss the LoC has exposed the lack of foresight and negligence shown by the defence forces in exposing our frontiers to our enemies. Kargil is the latest example of the Indian story of repeated blunders and unending naiueh/ which has led to India's susceptibility.

The need of the hour is to review India's defence strategy. There has to be a national perspective on security threats. India has been constantly under threat of clandestine wars, so our borders should be adequately manned and equipped with sophisticated devices of telecommunication as well as ammunition. Pakistan has, since its formation, tried to create insurgency in Kashmir. Along with China, Pakistan has control over 55 per cent of Kashmir. Sino-Pak link-up could make India yield Kashmir to their aggression. India's nuclear deterrent has not saved us from an indirect aggression. The defence strategy should be upgraded to equip the forces with better intelligence sources. As various countries are increasing their defence expenditure, India should also scrutinize its defence budget. A strong defence force would provide confidence and security to the citizens and help in the progress of the country.