Given the border dispute with China and President Xi Jinping’s declaration that not an inch of Chinese territory would be forsaken, India has a major problem at hand. To be sure, India’s major threat is not terrorism or Pakistan. It is the PLA — whose capabilities are not adequately understood — and interoperability (ability to fight together against common enemy) between the PLA and Pakistan military

Pravin Sawhney
Strategic Affairs Expert

For all the hype around the elevation of General Bipin Rawat as India’s first Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), the bitter truth is, it will not help in war preparedness. The CDS is likely to prepare the military to fight the wrong enemy, the wrong war, with wrong procurements, training and mindset. While it might help the Modi government politically, it would make India weak militarily.

As CDS, Gen Rawat would head the newly-created Department of Military Affairs (DMA), the fifth department in the Ministry of Defence (MoD). The other four are the departments of Defence, Research and Development, Production and Supplies, and Finance. The Defence Secretary will coordinate the activities of all five. Moreover, under the Government of India Rules of Business 1961, he will continue to be responsible for the defence of India.

By making a four-star and not a five-star CDS (as was recommended by the 2002 Group of Ministers’ report headed by Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani), the Modi government has (a) ensured civilian control of defence ministry; (b) obviated (unfounded) fear of a military coup by a powerful CDS; (c) fulfilled the longstanding demand of CDS; and (d) retained Gen Rawat.

The twin-hatter CDS — as head of the Integrated Defence Headquarters (IDHQs) and permanent Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee (COSC) — will have four jobs. One, he will be answerable to the Defence Minister, like other secretaries in the MoD, along with the Defence Secretary. Two, on the military side, as head of the COSC, he would be the first among equals whose advice would be binding on the Services Chiefs. Three, he would do all that IDHQs had been doing — raised in 2001, the IDHQs have come a long way, performing a range of tasks, including procurements — better with his raised status and authority.

General Rawat’s fourth and most important task would be ‘facilitation of reconstructing of military or integrated theatre commands in three years. This is a problem area with deep implications. Given the uninspiring indigenous defence industrial base, frugal defence allocations, heavy dependence on imports and military lines to protect, tying down of limited military assets— especially belonging to the Air Force — in integrated theatre commands without proper assessment that it meets real threats and future warfare needs, would be disastrous.

Focussed on Pakistan, General Rawat believes the Indian military should prepare for hybrid warfare comprising the entire spectrum of war from sub-conventional (counter-terror) to conventional to nuclear level, to cyber war to psychological war to information (perception management) war, and so on. Speaking at the ‘Army Technology Seminar’ on December 23, he said: “While non-contact war will help give advantage, the man on the ground (soldier) will remain relevant.” He added, “Quantum, space, cyber and artificial intelligence (AI) need to be leveraged in defence ecosystem.” He is certainty not talking about the war that PLA — our main adversary — is furtively preparing itself for and giving sleepless nights to the powerful US military.

The PLA is preparing for conventional war which is transforming from real battlefields to virtual battlespace. There would be AI-backed intelligent computers (capable of learning, reacting and problem-solving in fog of war better than humans) embedded in unmanned systems on land, air and sea. These intelligent and autonomous systems will communicate with one another in real time through networks which will be hugely vulnerable to cyber and electronic warfare. Given this, small networks supported by cloud architecture (with advanced computing powers) and data would be preferred to large networks in theatre commands. Jointness will give way to diverse small unmanned missions.

PLA’s Strategic Support Force (SSF), created in 2015 and comprising cyber, electronic warfare, space and psychological warfare, will have the capability to end war before it starts. The SSF will destroy network nodes making communication on battlefields unsustainable. PLA’s humongous cyber-attack capabilities could start war instantly, without warning, involving whole of the nation by shutting down all computer and telecommunication-connected commercial enterprises, creating havoc. So, cyber and space are not force multipliers, as Gen Rawat believes, but a potent force in new warfare.

There will be fewer humans and more machines fighting war. The intelligent cruise, ballistic and hypersonic missiles will be capable of reasoning on their own such that they would be able to change mission mid-course to hit a more dangerous target. At a panel discussion on ‘AI in future warfare’ at the 9th Xiangshan Forum in Beijing recently, the consensus was that the character of warfare would alter dramatically. In the next decade or so, by the time India’s integrated theatre (military) commands fructify and all Integrated Battle Groups (brainchild of General Rawat) become operational, the war would have changed: from information to intelligent warfare. It would be both a non-contact and software-driven invisible war, with few or no soldiers, all by 2035.

The word ‘quantum’ that General Rawat used casually is a different ballgame. It would propel warfare to the next level — from intelligent to quantum warfare where China has invested more finances and effort in quantum sciences (including computers) than the US. In quantum warfare, things will be superimposed — one thing will exist at two places at the same time. Sounds unbelievable, that is what it would be by 2040.

Indian military is oblivious to all this because it has been fighting terrorism since 1990, a war it cannot win. Given the border dispute with China and President Xi Jinping’s declaration that not an inch of Chinese territory would be forsaken, India has a major problem at hand. To be sure, India’s major threat is not terrorism or Pakistan. It is the PLA — whose capabilities are not adequately understood — and interoperability (ability to fight together against common enemy) between the PLA and Pakistan military.

The PLA — focussed on the US military — started conceptualising its military reforms from 2010, and finally announced them in 2015. In India, without a clear understanding of threats and future warfare, work to raise integrated theatre commands has begun with General Rawat as the CDS. Everything else, from joint procurements, training, logistics and operations will not amount to future war preparedness, which is what the CDS is meant to deliver. In any case, General Rawat’s focus — since he is a counter-terror expert — will be on sub-conventional war. This will help the government which has declared terrorism as a threat to India. But it will not make India militarily strong.