Tribune News Service
New Delhi, January 1

Army Chief General MM Naravane on Wednesday said the Army would lay equal focus on the country’s borders with China and Pakistan.

“We have been paying attention in the past to the western front, but the northern front requires equal attention. It is in that context we are doing capability development and enhancement on our northern borders, including the Northeast,” the Army chief said after inspecting a guard of honour outside South Block.

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On settling the boundary issue with China, he said: “We have a Line of Actual Control. The border question is yet to be settled. Progress has been made in maintaining peace and tranquility.”

On the border with Pakistan and threats from across the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir, General Naravane said, “Whatever threats we have, we keep analysing them. This is a continuous process. We analyse threats and act accordingly.”

The Army Chief termed modernisation of the force as one of the key priority areas. “We have a long-term perspective plan based on the analysis of likely threat. Threats keep changing and we change our plan.”

Speaking to mediapersons Wednesday after receiving his first guard of honour as the Army Chief, General Naravane said operational readiness and modernisation will be among the top priorities of the Army under his leadership.

Newly appointed Chief of Defence Staff Gen Bipin Rawat (third from left) with (from left) Army chief Gen M M Naravane, Navy chief Admiral Karambir Singh and IAF chief Air Chief Marshal R K S Bhadauria in New Delhi Wednesday. (Express photo by Prem Nath Pandey)

A day after he said India reserves the right to pre-emptively strike at sources of terror in Pakistan, new Army Chief General M M Naravane expressed confidence that maintaining peace and tranquility along India’s border with China will set the stage for an “eventual solution” to the boundary dispute.

Speaking to mediapersons Wednesday after receiving his first guard of honour as the Army Chief, General Naravane said operational readiness and modernisation will be among the top priorities of the Army under his leadership.

“While we have been paying attention in the past to the Western front, Northern front also requires equal attention. It is in that context we are going for capability development and enhancement of our capacitors in our Northern borders including the North-East part of the country,” he said.

“The border question is yet to be settled. We have been able to maintain peace and tranquility along borders and I am sure that situation will prevail. By maintaining this, we will be able to set the stage for the eventual solution,” he said.

Highlighting the priorities of the Army under him, General Naravane said: “The priorities will always remain to be ever ready to meet any challenge and to be operationally prepared at all times. This will happen as a result of modernisation. We will continue to build up capabilities especially in the North and North-Eastern region of the country. We will also lay emphasis on raising the security awareness amongst rank and file.”

“India can progress (in the next decade) only if our borders are secure… then only will be able to do our work and then only will there be development in the country. I want to assure my fellow citizens that all three defence services — Army, Navy and Air Force — are fully ready and will keep our country secure,” he said.

“The soldiers of the Army deployed on the border are ready and alert 24x7x52. In the coming days, in the future as well, we will continue preparing to take on the future challenges. Our Army is battle-hardened and, in the future as well, is capable of repelling any danger,” he said.

Explained: What are role, powers of CDS?

General Naravane took over as Chief of Army Staff Tuesday from General Bipin Rawat who became the country’s first Chief of Defence Staff (CDS).
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in Twitter posts, said: “I am delighted that as we begin the new year and new decade, India gets its first Chief of Defence Staff in General Bipin Rawat. I congratulate him and wish him the very best for this responsibility. He is an outstanding officer who has served India with great zeal.”

The past decade has seen India shifting away from its largely Russian dependence for weapons and equipment. The US emerged as a key supplier, especially planes for the IAF and the Navy, besides specialised helicopters for the Air Force. The first US-made planes, the C-130J, started arriving in 2011. New Delhi has, so far, balanced its strategic ties between the US and Russia, warding off threats of sanctions for its military ties with Moscow.

Border standoffs with China in 2013, 2014 and 2015 marked sporadic tensions that peaked during the 73-day standoff at Doklam in 2017. A new Border Defence Cooperation Agreement signed in 2013 ironed out some wrinkles, but the settlement of the boundary question remains.

The announcement of the charter of the Chief of Defence staff is a major reform for the services.

The Army inducted the latest artillery guns like the imported M777 and also the locally-made Dhanush. Nuclear submarine INS Arihant made its sea debut and a new sea-borne aircraft carrier, INS Vikramaditya, was added to the fleet. The Agni series of missiles progressed rapidly and Hindustan Aeronautics Limited emerged a major helicopter maker with its Advanced Light Helicopter powered by Safran-made engines.

The forces did face the brunt of the digital era. Leading the men to conflict in times of Facebook, Twitter and ‘fake’ information on WhatsApp is getting tough. Veterans have opinions critical of the service headquarters, matters once mentioned in hushed tones and without names are now discussed on Twitter or TV studios.

The decade saw acrimony as Army Chief Gen VK Singh went to court against the government, only to withdraw the case later. Accusations were levelled against seniormost officers, including a few retired Chiefs, who got flats allotted in the Adarsh housing society in upscale Colaba, south Mumbai. Land for the society was reserved for war widows; the CBI is probing it.

A case of alleged corruption in the purchase of helicopters saw former IAF Chief SP Tyagi facing a CBI case as an accused.

— Ajay Banerjee

New Delhi, December 31

In a stern warning to Pakistan, new Army Chief Gen Manoj Mukund Naravane on Tuesday said, “India reserves the right to preemptively strike at sources of terror, asserting that a new normal in the country’s response mechanism to acts of cross-border terrorism has already been emphatically displayed.”

Gen Naravane also said the Army would enhance combat capabilities along the border with China so that it was fully prepared to deal with any security challenge.

“The threat remains from both northern and western sides. Over the last many years, we have been concentrating on our western borders while our northern border was at a little lower in priority. There was a need to rebalance and reprioritise,” he said.

Giving a detailed brief on India’s security challenges, including combating cross-border terrorism, Gen Naravane said a strategy of “resolute punitive response” was put in place to deal with Pakistan-sponsored terrorism, noting that the policy of “zero tolerance” would continue to drive counter-terror measures.

“If Pakistan does not stop its policy of state-sponsored terrorism, we reserve the right to preemptively strike at sources of terror threat,” he said. — PTI

Defence acquisition is a mission for committed professionals and not for administrative generalists or indeed for uniformed specialists working on rotating assignments, burdened with other chores and pressures. In the US and elsewhere, it is a profession where people train, specialise and work full-time. The US even has a Defence Acquisition University.

Air Marshal BD Jayal (retd)

Mmilitary Commentator

Arecent panel discussion on ‘Make in India and the nation’s security’ featured General VP Malik, who was the Army Chief during the Kargil war. Few will forget his promise to the nation, when faced with a herculean challenge, of ‘we will fight with what we have’, also discreetly conveying the message to the civil leadership that the defence management, procurement and production systems had failed to deliver, leaving the Army to fend for itself. Not surprisingly, during the panel discussion, he again cautioned the people that unless India becomes self-reliant in defence, its security forces would continue to be vulnerable.

Another panellist, who had been a senior member in the defence acquisition system, suggested a dedicated and overarching organisation to deliver on defence needs and the panel moderator reflected on the irony that the country has launched ballistic missiles but is unable to make the INSAS rifle. If these are the sentiments of those who have been practitioners, then clearly the self-reliance in defence production, that has been an avowed objective of governments since independence, continues to evade us.

It is worth revisiting recent history to fathom why indigenising defence production is proving to be so challenging to successive defence ministers, all of whom mean well, and of late, appear to have taken positive steps towards this end. In 2015, the government appointed the Kelkar Committee to study the public-private partnership concept and make recommendations. This was followed by the Dhirendra Singh Committee which looked at the Make in India concept in the field of defence manufacturing and recommended a strategic partnership model wherein the government would select Indian private enterprises to exclusively make designated military platforms.

Consequently, the ninth version of the Defence Procurement Procedure or DPP-2016 devoted a chapter to strategic partnership, which followed soon after. Whilst the idea evokes optimism amongst most stakeholders because of the dynamism that the private sector will bring, as subsequent events including the drawing of the Rafale controversy into the political arena showed, any attempt to involve the private sector in the defence procurement and production domain will continue to be a challenge.

This is borne out by a recent media report highlighting how in six years, no major Make in India defence project has taken off because of bureaucratic bottlenecks, commercial and technical wrangling and a lack of requisite political push. These shortcomings have a historical reason, some going back decades and unless we attempt to understand and address these, our Make in India vision will continue to stagnate. That the Defence Minister has formed yet another committee to review the DPP-2016, indicates that formulating newer and more complex procedures appears to have become an end in itself rather than merely a means to an end.

The first challenge is to understand that defence manufacturing is in a special category and needs to be treated as such. This is best exemplified by what Jacques S. Gansler, who steered such consolidation in the US, had to say in their context: “In order to understand the economic operations of the US defence industry, it is first absolutely essential to recognise that there is no free market at work in this area and that there cannot be one because of the dominant role played by the federal government. The combination of a single buyer, a few large firms in each segment of the industry, and a small number of extremely expensive weapon programmes, constitutes a unique structure for doing business.” Drawing from this experience and applying our own conditions both in the public and private sector, we first need to arrive at our own ‘unique structure’ of doing business in the field of defence production which must have unanimity across the political system for it to succeed.

The second challenge dates back to the Bofors scandal of 1987 and the attendant political controversy that resulted in a defence procurement eco-system where procrastination has become the mantra. The Services have termed this as the Bofors syndrome, a mindset where few in the decision-making chain would venture to take decisions for fear of falling prey to the shenanigans of others in the complex chain of decision-making.

The unique feature of this syndrome is that it works smoothly where government-to-government procurement contracts are concerned, but goes into deep freeze when faced with an open tender purchase. But with the recent political controversy surrounding the government-to-government agreement for the purchase of Rafale aircraft, this avenue may also become a victim to the Bofors Syndrome.

The next challenge is to recognise that defence acquisition is a complex process involving multiple stakeholders and involves diverse resources and decision-making systems and should aim to provide on-performance, on-time and on-cost capabilities to the armed forces. This is a mission for committed professionals and not for administrative generalists or, indeed, for uniformed specialists working on rotating assignments, burdened with other chores and pressures. In the US and elsewhere, defence acquisition is considered a full-time profession where people train, specialise and work full-time. The US even has a Defence Acquisition University committed to creating acquisition professionals.

In the foreword to the DPP-2016, Manohar Parrikar said, “The DPP is not merely a procurement procedure, it is also an opportunity to improve the efficiency of the procurement process, usher in change in the mindset of the stakeholders and promote growth of the domestic defence industry.’ The biggest challenge to the Make in India aspect in defence production, hence, remains the outdated mindset.

Whatever the official claims, to impartial observers, the underlying spirit of successive DPPs is no longer ‘delivering and sustaining effective and affordable war-fighting capabilities to users within a specified time frame’. Instead, each successive version is being driven by a procedural, legal and defensive mindset where following the book appears to be an end in itself, leaving the armed forces bereft of modernisation and left to ‘fight with what they have.’

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Ajay Banerjee

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, January 1

Newly-appointed Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat on Wednesday said the armed forces stayed away from politics and worked as per the directives of the government, amid allegations that the forces were being politicised.

Laying down his tasks, General Rawat said they had to find ways of doing theatre commands without copying the Western models and strive for completing the jointness and integration of the services as mandated within the three-year timeline set by the government.

He inspected a tri-services guard of honour outside the South Block where the three service chiefs were present. The CDS will be the head of the newly created Department of Military Affairs (DMA). The three services will be under the DMA for matters of military like procurement, logistics, training, transport and maintenance.

On being asked as to how will he complete the mandate of having theatre commands as the IAF, in the past, opposed it, General Rawat told the media, “There are methods of doing theatres, we need not copy the western system. We will work out a system of our own.”

When asked if India would retain its current 19 commands or merge them, the CDS said, “That is something we have to study. We will surely come up with a mechanism that suits the Indian system.”

On the government setting a three-year timeline for integration, is it possible to do it in three years or more time was needed, General Rawat said, “I will say it is possible. I cannot say we give up. The government has said three years, so we will strive to achieve it in three years.”

On the role of the CDS, he said, “I can assure that the Army, the IAF and the Navy will work as a team. The CDS will only keep control; it is not that the CDS will want to run a force on his own.”

On how he felt as CDS, the General pointed towards his new military cap saying, “I am wearing a peaked cap after 42 years. The last I wore this was when I passed out of the IMA. The Gorkha tilted hat is gone. This shows the CDS will remain neutral within the service and to all three services.”

The General said all three services could not work on the formula that the sum total of three energies translated into “only three”.  The total of energies had to be much more, maybe five or seven, meaning multiplication, he added.

The forces, he said, had to have best economical use of resources as they focused on integration. “We can do training jointly. Procurement procedure can be made uniform.”