NEW DELHI: In a significant development in India’s cybersecurity landscape, Lt Gen MU Nair has been appointed as the new National Cyber Security Coordinator (NCSC), taking over the reins from Lt Gen (retd.) Dr Rajesh Pant. The announcement was made on Monday, signifying a change in leadership and a renewed focus on bolstering the nation’s cyber defense capabilities.
With his appointment, Lt Gen Nair becomes the third individual to hold the prestigious position of India’s cyber security chief, following in the footsteps of Lt Gen (retd.) Dr Rajesh Pant and the first chief, Gulshan Rai. Lt Gen Nair brings a wealth of experience and expertise to the role, having previously served as the Signal-officer-in-Chief at the Army Headquarters.
The National Cyber Coordination Centre (NCCC), under the purview of the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS), plays a pivotal role in coordinating cybersecurity-related matters across various national agencies. Its primary objectives include generating crucial situational awareness regarding existing and potential cyber threats, promptly alerting relevant agencies during cyber attacks, and facilitating improved cyber intelligence sharing.
At the heart of its operations, the NCCC ensures comprehensive screening of all forms of metadata, fostering better coordination between different intelligence agencies, and streamlining intelligence gathering. Working in conjunction with the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), which oversees the government, public-private, and private sectors, the NCCC strengthens the nation’s cybersecurity landscape.
The department of defence (DOD) of the federal government of the United States has a budgetary allocation of $2.01 trillion for the fiscal 2023. (Representational Image:AFP)
The United States of America incurred 39 per cent of the World’s Military Expenditure in 2022. It was followed by China at 13 per cent. Russia, despite the Ukraine war, was just at 3.9 per cent and India was at 3.6 per cent followed by Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom at 3.3 per cent and 3.1 per cent, respectively.
The department of defence (DOD) of the federal government of the United States has a budgetary allocation of $2.01 trillion for the fiscal 2023. It broadly spends $829.89 billion in committed obligations and $192.23 billion contracts and financial assistance.
The People’s Republic of China (PRC) announced an annual defence budget of about $224.79 billion for fiscal year 2023. India, by comparison, has a defence budget of $72.6 billion in fiscal 2023–24. China spends more than the next 17 Indo-Pacific militaries combined. The US, by contrast, spends 10 times more on defence than what China does. There is, therefore, a very strong case for upping India’s defence spending or bringing down the threats and challenges to India’s national security.
China’s defence spending witnessed a 7.2 per cent increase over fiscal-22. It is the eighth consecutive single-digit enhancement in China’s defence spending, with the last double-digit increase of 10.1 per cent recorded in 2015.
Quixotically, the official budget released by the Chinese every year accounts for only a fraction of its actual defence spends. It does nor account for a whole range of military expenditure including and not limited to arms imports, expenses for the People’s Armed Police (PAP) and militia/reserve forces, state subsidies to China’s military-industrial complex, and earnings from PLA- run businesses. The department of defence of the United States has repeatedly underscored that China’s actual military expenditure is at least twice the officially stated figure. Presuming that is correct, it still is eight times less than what the United States spends on its defence needs.
China’s objective behind incessantly enhancing its military spending is threefold — meeting the centenary benchmark of ensuring the PLA is on track with its military modernisation programme. The benchmarks inter alia include that the PLA achieves strategic high-end deterrence by 2027 and fulfils the objective of PLA’s modernisation by 2035 that should finally culminate into the development of a world-class military by mid-century.
The reason for putting some of these numbers in perspective is to underline the fact that there is a huge gap between the defence numbers of the first four countries. This assertion, therefore, that the United States wants a closer defence relationship with India to only “muscle” into the Indian defence market may not entirely be correct.
The US military industrial complex is hardly able to service the needs of the department of defence. In the financial year 2023, it would award contracts and discharge other obligations worth $192.23 billion almost two-and-a-half times the total defence budget of India. Moreover, the US defence industry is now substantively engaged in defence of Europe once again.
Then why does the United States want a closer defence relationship with India. The reasons are purely strategic. As Donald Rumsfeld, the former US defence secretary, had famously remarked, “There are known knowns — there are things we know we know… We also know there are known unknowns — that is to say, we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns, the ones we don’t know we don’t know.”
The penultimate decade of the twentieth century and the first two decades of the 21st demonstrated to the United States that the only constant in the geo-strategic calculus is the unknown unknown and that is what it must prepare for.
The collapse of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 that heralded the end of the Cold War was such an unknown. 9/11 that defined the US defence posture for two decades was another. Russia’s unprovoked aggression against Ukraine was again such an unknown. It is the unknown that the US is trying to hedge against as it seeks to build alliances like the Quad, AUKUS in the Indo-Pacific and other like acronyms around the world.
Herein lies an opportunity for India to build an entirely new approach that can underpin both its defence frameworks and strategic relationships for the 21st century should it choose to do. That relationship and framework has to take into account the challenges, realities and imperatives of the 21st century and really jettison the shibboleths of a previous century that our “tanks — that supposedly think that they think” still pay lip service to. It comes under an overarching rubric called “strategic autonomy” — a term widely used but little understood by politicians, policymakers, defence planners and even the strategic elite.
How autonomous is India when today, according to data published by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) publication, the Military Balance, more than 90 per cent of the Indian Army’s armored vehicles, 69 per cent of combat aircraft operated by the Air Force and Navy, and 44 per cent of the Navy’s submarines and warships are of Russian origin? Also, 65 per cent of these vessels are armed with Russian missiles.
There might be valid reasons as to why this dependency came to manifest itself but does this rubric really fit the definition of strategic autonomy? In a situation whereby Russia itself is under tremendous stress with its war effort committed to supplying the Ukrainian front, how much would it be able to spare and supply if the push came to a shove for India? It is a question that neither has been seriously asked much less an answer attempted.
India’s defence indigenisation programme is still in infancy. A colleague, during a recent meeting of the parliamentary consultative committee of defence, rightly pointed out that the armed forces demand “state of the art” equipment to meet the two-front situation that we are confronted with. How much ever the push may be towards self-reliance there is a yawning gap between the expectations of the “users” and what the Indian defence manufacturing industry is able to offer.
It is, therefore, imperative that old paradigms need to be discarded and a fresh approach that really guarantees “strategic autonomy” in terms of defence preparedness be crafted with dispatch.
In continuation with the pursuance of developing remote areas, the Indian Navy has embarked on an outreach programme in Ladakh.
Navy Chief Admiral R Hari Kumar laid a wreath at the war memorial at Leh today.
The Motorcycle and Car Expeditions comprising 107 participants, including naval personnel of Ladakh domicile and 20 women, that commenced from Delhi and Visakhapatnam have engaged extensively with more than 3,000 students across various schools and colleges across the Ladakh region.
CHANGE and transformation are part of life. After 52 years, as we entered the portals of our alma mater, the Indian Military Academy (IMA), for the belated golden jubilee celebrations of our commissioning (June 1971), the metamorphosis in us and the academy was unbelievable. The Chetwode building stood as majestically as ever to welcome us; through its hallowed corridors, we had marched out, stepping on the ‘Antim Pag’ (Last Step) to graduate from gentleman cadets to young officers bursting with enthusiasm at the prospect of going to war.
Our course-mates had flown in from all over the world. Years had taken their toll. We had greyed, balding heads; some of us were pot-bellied, but our spirits were undaunted. As we exchanged expletives and retold old jokes, our exuberance grew and we were soulmates again. Health constraints didn’t keep anyone away. Jaggi and Jawahar braved many hours of air travel from North America; Gursey struggled his way with a stick everywhere; Mariyanna, despite a recent road accident, flew in to celebrate his 78th birthday amid his course-mates.
The infrastructural transformation at the IMA was amazing. The living barracks of the 1940s were replaced by triple-storeyed buildings having individual rooms with attached toilets! We were housed in these rooms, which reminded us of the alarm clocks of yore — ‘Every morning… when rips through the air the most terrible beeping….’Instead, a surprise awaited us as we woke up to strains of soothing bagpipes! Modern buildings were everywhere, some named after Param Vir Chakra recipients — Arun Khetarpal Auditorium, Hoshiar Singh Gymnasium, Vikram Batra Mess — besides an all-weather swimming pool, glass-fronted squash courts and much more.
Early morning, we paid obeisance at the war memorial. Emotions ran high as we escorted nine Veer Naris to pay floral tributes at this monument to the brave. We proudly remembered the comrades who were posthumously honoured with the highest wartime and peacetime gallantry awards: 2/Lt Arun Khetarpal and Col NJ Nair, the latter being an Ashoka Chakra awardee. Both were valiant soldiers with ‘a golden heart (that) stopped beating early….God broke our hearts to prove to us, He only takes the best first!’
In the evening, the mood changed as the Madeira flowed. The crooner belted out numbers of yore: ‘Strawberries Cherries’, ‘Lemon Tree’ and ‘Knock Three Times’, mixed with catchy Hindi and Punjabi songs. We got our dancing shoes on, the magic of a reunion worked and hearts turned young. The two-and-a-half days flew by as we, of the ‘Born to Battle’ course, stepped homewards. The saxophonist sounded the haunting Auld Lang Syne, ‘And there’s a hand, my trusty fere! We’ll take a cup o’ kindness yet, for auld lang syne.’ Yes, for old times’ sake, we left with a spring in our feet, a desire in our hearts and a determined mind to return to our alma mater for the diamond jubilee.
MANIPUR has been on the boil for the past two months, but the volcano seems to be still spewing fire and venom. I stayed there for quite some time (2008-13) and the beautiful valley, hills and forests are still fresh in my mind. I still feel the presence of its flora and fauna and picture the Loktak lake in the mind’s eye. More than everything else, I remember its people, a virtual kaleidoscope of different tribes, with different lifestyles, customs and religions, each complete in itself and yet more complete together. All stuck in the groove of time and leading simple lives, as did their forefathers. The small towns and Imphal city showed some signs of the advances of modernity; otherwise, life was a still landscape.
What defies all logic is the fact that police stations and police armouries have been attacked across the state.
In Manipur, you could get lost in the haze of time and forget the hectic pace of life elsewhere. A society in slow transition from the old ways to the new, where the Indian State’s presence has been felt more in the spectre of the armed forces rather than in education and healthcare. Left largely to its own devices, rural Manipur has still kept its traditions alive, whether they be in the arts and crafts, their ancient herbal lore, temples and tribal divide. What happened to its peaceful people, whom I still see in their lovely traditional dresses proceeding to the temples and churches to worship their gods? It has been a volcanic eruption that swept all before it. However, the primal instincts were always visible, the tribal antagonism always lay below the surface, the tribal territories had been marked out and adhered to but some cross-migration had taken place. These were the fault lines which became the targets of violence first of all.
I do not propose to indulge in finger-pointing nor in a blame game. I am too far from the scene of activity and know only what the media chooses to reveal. However, there was some trigger which set off this chain of action and reaction. One does not know whether it was an action or a reaction, whether it was intentional or unintentional. Whether it was the failure of the executive or overreach of the judiciary? Whatever it was, it let loose ‘the dogs of war’; mayhem followed, and it still continues. Although again I have no access to factual data, but going by the media reports, over a hundred lives have been lost, hundreds injured, thousands of houses and villages burnt and properties destroyed. Much of the livestock, which is a crucial source of livelihood, must also have been lost. It appears that government property has also been targeted. What defies all logic is the fact that police stations and police armouries have been attacked across the state and thousands of firearms and huge quantities of ammunition looted. This did not happen in the worst of times in J&K, Punjab, Delhi, Gujarat, etc. This is beyond the comprehension of anyone who has donned the uniform or is a civilian, for that matter. I’m sure these arms must have come in very handy for the mischief-mongers. It seems that in spite of appeals by the government, not many of the looted arms have been returned. They will continue to pose a challenge to the security forces in the state.
Now let us come to the thousands who have lost not only members of their families but also their homes, their livestock and means of livelihood. Thousands have fled their homes and villages in the valley and the hills and found refuge in neighbouring states or in refugee camps set up temporarily. Some might have also gone across the border to Myanmar. Whatever little that might have survived the first onslaught of violence must now have been destroyed. The conditions in the hastily established refugee camps must be abominable. A state which cannot defend its most fundamental symbol of security — the police station — can hardly be expected to be providing quality shelters. I do not know how far the writ of the state administration has been restored and if it is able to monitor the activities at these camps. It has to be done on a war footing — providing food, shelter, sanitation, medicines, doctors, etc. It is a huge task and I hope and pray that those running the state government prove equal to the task. It is their state, their people, their sworn duty to do so. Looking beyond the present and the refugee camps and emergency measures, there looms the larger task of rehabilitation of these uprooted people. The valley and the hills, especially the latter, afforded their people a very low level of sustenance. We cannot keep them locked up in refugee camps forever; they cannot stay with their relatives in neighbouring states forever; they have to go back to their habitat from which they have been uprooted by force of circumstance. It is this task of rehabilitation which would test our country and the state of Manipur.
Earlier, whenever and wherever such tragedies have taken place, resulting in uprooting of people, we have not succeeded in restoring them to their original habitat. In larger states and cities, people manage to find alternative places of livelihood, although never similar to what they had lost. But Manipur is a small state; its people are used to living in their valley and hills. Where will they go and from where will they obtain the means to start new lives? The answer lies only with the Central and state governments. Fortunately, they belong to the same political party. They have to urgently draw up a rehabilitation plan which takes into consideration all aspects. It is important that the people be helped to resettle in their original habitat. This would also help in psychologically reducing the collective and individual pain. The fault lines exposed in Manipuri society are deep and primeval; they have now been renewed and deepened in the ill wind that has swept the land. Let us all help to heal and rehabilitate, to unite and build, not to divide and destroy.
India should be wary of China’s territorial designs
INDIA’s stand that its dispute with China ‘isn’t a matter of territory but forward deployment by both’ goes against New Delhi’s core interests. The entire bilateral issue originated from the October 1950 invasion and occupation of independent/sovereign Tibet by the Mao Zedong-led Communist Party of China (CPC).
India’s prescient Home Minister Vallabhbhai Patel had precisely dubbed the Dragon’s invasion as an act of ‘malevolence and perfidy’. The then Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, came up with a bold statement in the Lok Sabha on November 20, 1950: “Our maps show that the McMahon Line is our boundary and that’s our boundary, map or no map. That fact remains and we stand by that boundary.” This demonstrated that both Patel and Nehru had the courage of their convictions.
Thus, territory was a primary and fundamental issue between New Delhi’s democratic rule of law and Beijing’s rule by ‘fight, fright and might’, to be spread in all possible directions by the ‘forward deployment’ of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to create a firewall of ‘defence-in-depth’ for vast stretches of Central Asia.
Barring India, China’s land-border neighbours today face the prospect of occupation or conquest through the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which is nothing but ‘forward deployment’ and quick mobilisation of CPC-PLA brigades, penetrating resource-rich, sparsely populated terrain. The situation is so bad that small, poor and weak nations are succumbing to the BRI lure. The biggest hurdle for China is India, notwithstanding the latter’s democratic tradition of policymaking. In the New Delhi declaration issued at the end of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit held earlier this week, India refused to extend support to the BRI, unlike other member states.
The CPC has taken a cue from the truism that land has been the name of the game since the dawn of human history, being a permanent feature of war as well as peace. Territorial acquisition, possession and conquest constitute a core human ambition, which China itself faced during the invading Mongols’ Han-crushing forays in the 13th century. Hence, the central goal of CPC leaders, right from Mao Zedong to his 21st-century reincarnate Xi Jinping, is gobbling up territory through all means — aggression, invasion, conquest, subjugation of territories extending towards the Himalayas, with special reference to India from 1962 onwards. The bedrock of the Communist state policy became evident 73 years ago in Tibet.
One, therefore, just has to look at the fundamentals of two important subjects — economics and political science — under which falls the ‘land of the nation-state’. In both cases, the supreme, sole and lowest common denominator is territory. Thus, four factors shape the economics of production — territory, labour, capital and organisation — whereas the four key factors for a nation-state are territory, people, government and sovereignty.
Hence, the history of international relations or diplomatic exchanges and the future of humans will always be focused on land, no matter which extraneous factors influence bilateral ties.
As things unfold, the CPC’s seven-decade-old aggression has grown to acquire its nastiest form by targeting Indian territory through several means — military, economic, the charm offensive, trade, BRI, CPEC, BRICS, etc.
Indians, therefore, need to draw rudimentary lessons from world history of land conquest, which is deeply embedded in the psyche of those aspiring to be mighty and powerful and also those who already are a ‘great power’.
India has to note that the essential and fundamental dispute with China pertains to the latter’s territorial ambitions. China knows well that once it captures parts of Indian territory, the field will be wide open to enter deep into the hinterland and take over whatever comes along the way. The East India Company came here for doing business, but soon realised the potential to capture land to enable it to rule, plunder and ruin India.
Virtually the whole continent of Africa succumbed to the European powers based in London, Berlin, Paris, Rome, Brussels, Lisbon and Madrid in the 19th century. Till 1875, less than one-tenth of Africa had been colonised by European powers; by 1895, only one-tenth remained unappropriated. It’s because each of the seven European nations was hungry for land, without which none of its aspirations of ‘greatness’ could have been fulfilled, just like China in the 21st century.
Indeed, the expansion to capture territory was always the pivot of the West — capture, control aliens’ trade, settlements, and export people, capital, finished goods. Territory denoted a profitable market. Thus, 20th-century Germans resorted to an eastward drive (Drang nach Osten) towards Russia for ‘Lebensraum’ — done in the 19th century by Napoleon in Europe and by European settlers across mainland US, expanding into the vast West by suppressing or eliminating the indigenous population.
At every stage and in every age, the prime motive and aim has been territorial expansion, occupation and conquest for prosperity through any means without caring for the adverse consequences for the conquered or the vanquished. China has been aping the West in a big way. For India, territorial loss appears endless, along with the loss of trade and a humiliating diplomatic defeat at the UN owing to China’s brazen terrorist-supporting moves. Wake up, India. Follow the Bhagavad Gita to face a brutal neighbour.
INDIA, the host of Tuesday’s virtual summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), refused to endorse China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), even as fellow SCO members Pakistan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan reaffirmed their support to the multi-billion-dollar Chinese project. The declaration issued at the end of the summit stated that these nations had taken note of the ‘ongoing work to jointly implement this project, including efforts to link the construction of the Eurasian Economic Union and the BRI’. India has maintained a consistently firm stand on the BRI, which includes the under-construction China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that passes through Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). New Delhi rightly sees the CPEC’s progress in that region as a blatant violation of India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
China’s double standards are plainly visible. In May this year, Beijing had boycotted the G20 Tourism Working Group meeting in Srinagar on the grounds that Jammu & Kashmir is a ‘disputed territory’. In stark contrast, it’s business as usual for China in PoK, which rightfully belongs to India.
During the SCO summit, India also managed to corner Pakistan and China on cross-border terrorism. In his address, PM Narendra Modi called on member states not to hesitate from condemning countries that sheltered terrorists and used terrorism as a policy instrument. Even though Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the ‘hydra-headed monster’ of terrorism and extremism must be fought with ‘full vigour and conviction’, he added a rider that the issue should not be used as a cudgel for diplomatic point-scoring. Beijing has been Islamabad’s close ally on this front too. China has repeatedly blocked proposals by India and the US at the United Nations to proscribe Pakistan-based terrorists. It’s laudable that India, the current SCO chair, has effectively used this platform to lay bare Pakistan-China complicity.
