The future battlefield is defined by hypersonic missiles, swarm drones, electronic warfare and artificial intelligence.

Lt Gen (retd) Harwant Singh

INDIA’S security environment has never been more demanding. To the west, Pakistan, now armed with fifth-generation Chinese aircraft, cyber support and satellite intelligence, continues its policy of a thousand cuts. During Operation Sindoor, China provided Pakistan with real-time ground intelligence. Pakistan has also concluded a defence pact with Saudi Arabia and maintains strong ties with both the US

To the north, Indian and Chinese troops remain deployed along the Line of Actual Control (LAC). China occupies parts of Indian territory in Ladakh and covets the Karakoram Pass for a direct link with the Shaksgam valley above the Siachen Glacier. Opposite Arunachal Pradesh — which China continues to claim and is also giving Chinese names to Indian villages and towns — Beijing has constructed a large number of villages along the LAC.

Meanwhile, Nepal is increasingly coming under Chinese influence. China is building a railway line to Kathmandu as part of the Belt and Road Initiative and has pressured Nepal to claim Kalapani and parts of Uttarakhand in order to control the Lipulekh Pass — which overlooks the Chinese road in Tibet — despite the long-recognised border running along the Kali Ganga.

The neighbourhood picture is equally troubling. The Agnipath scheme has led to Nepalese Gorkhas no longer joining the Indian Army; they may soon be absorbed into the Chinese military. Bhutan is leaning towards China. So too are Bangladesh and Myanmar, both of which have long received Chinese military equipment. In Sri Lanka and the Maldives, China has established a firm foothold.

China has built a significant presence in the Indian Ocean through what is widely described as a ‘String of Pearls’ — a network of commercial and military ports designed to secure energy routes and expand Beijing’s geopolitical influence. These include Kyaukphyu in Myanmar, Hambantota in Sri Lanka, Gwadar in Pakistan and Djibouti at the Horn of Africa. China now commands the largest navy in the world.

A country’s strategic environment has a direct bearing on its security requirements; India is today surrounded by hostile or compromised neighbours.

India’s defence allocation for FY2025-26 stands at approximately Rs 7.85 lakh crore. While capital expenditure has grown and 75% of acquisition funds are now reserved for domestic procurement, the structural weight of pensions — at nearly 22% of the total — continues to constrain modernisation. It is worth noting that age and physical fitness eligibility thresholds for serving personnel have also risen; a corresponding increase in the retirement age for soldiers to 42/45, and for junior commissioned officers and officers by two years, would reduce the pension burden while retaining experienced manpower.

The Agnipath scheme, conceived as a solution to the rising pension burden, has instead damaged unit cohesion and regimental spirit. As many as 50% of the Agniveers who feel they cannot make it to the 25% to be retained lose all interest, while in the remaining 50%, there is cut-throat competition to be retained.

India’s efforts at indigenisation under the ‘Make-in-India’ initiative have made limited progress. The country still imports close to 75% of its defence equipment. The engine for its 4.5-generation fighter aircraft is imported. Even small arms continue to be sourced from Russia. This is particularly alarming given that China is already developing sixth-generation fighter aircraft.

Make-in-India cannot succeed unless significantly better talent is inducted into research and development and substantially greater funds are allocated to it. Several private companies have taken up government defence contracts without any genuine R&D capability — some are merely importing equipment from abroad and assembling it in India. This is not indigenisation; it is relabelling.

The lessons of recent conflicts demand urgent attention. Operation Sindoor, the Russia-Ukraine war and the evolving Israel-Iran confrontation share a common lesson: warfare has been transformed. The future battlefield is defined by hypersonic missiles, swarm drones, electronic warfare and artificial intelligence.

Instead of preparing for this kind of future, India risks equipping itself for the last war — seeking amphibious light tanks rather than elite precision-guided drones and hypersonic missiles.

Fighter aircraft and main battle tanks face existential threats from missiles and drones; their primacy on the modern battlefield is being fundamentally challenged.

India’s defence budget, while growing in absolute terms, remains structurally inadequate. The country’s strategic environment has never been more complex, nor the cost of complacency more consequential.

A credible, enduring military strategy demands three simultaneous commitments: first, a sustained increase in defence allocation to at least 3% of the GDP; second, a genuine investment in indigenous R&D — not assembly lines but design capability, with the DRDO funding doubled and deep linkages built between research institutions, private innovators and the armed forces; and third, a strategic diplomacy that arrests the drift of Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan and the Maldives into China’s orbit before it hardens into permanent encirclement.

Incremental allocations, short-tenure soldiers and imported weapons assembled under an Indian label are not a defence policy — they are a deferred catastrophe.