Journal of Defence Studies

Reorganisation of Defence Outlay for 2016–17: A Tepid Affair

Beginning 2016–17, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) will present four detailed demands for grant (DDGs)1 instead of eight that it had been presenting to the Lok Sabha2 in the past. It is not that its area of responsibility has shrunk. The reason why the number of demands has come down is that the budgetary outlays earlier spread over eight demands have now been compressed into four.

Galvanising ‘Make in India’ in Defence: The Experts’ Committee Chips In

In spite of spending close to Rs 500,000 crore on capital acquisitions between 2002–03 and 2014–15, the Indian Armed Forces continue to suffer from a chronic shortage of equipment and ammunition, low levels of serviceability of equipment already in service, and a heavy dependence on imports. The procurement programmes keep getting stalled or take inordinately long to fructify. There are several reasons for this morass; the primary ones being disjointed defence planning, limited budgetary support for modernisation of the armed forces, procedural complexities, and bureaucratic indolence.

India’s Afghan Muddle: A Lost Opportunity by Harsh V. Pant

The book provides a brief history of Afghanistan from ancient times to year 2014, and brings out the strategic interest of world powers in the country. It highlights that Afghanistan has seen considerable turmoil, upheavals and external forces battling for strategic control since the 1970s. In 2001, this culminated into an ‘international war against terror’ post the 9/11 attacks in the US by Al Qaeda, the leaders of which were then sheltered by the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

Geostrategic Imperative of the Indo-Pacific Region: Emerging Trends and Regional Responses

The global economic power shift from the West to East (Asia) and the increasing geostrategic significance of the Indo-Pacific region has resulted in cooperation and competition among the established and rising powers in the region. While the economic cooperation between them has significantly grown in recent past, the geostrategic and geopolitical frameworks remain very uncertain. In essence, the emerging trends and issues in the Indo-Pacific offer unique opportunities as well as daunting challenges to the nations.

Honour and Fidelity: India’s Military Contribution to the Great War 1914–1918 by Amarinder Singh

Three days after the ‘Great War’ was declared at midnight on the 4–5 August 1914, mobilisation orders were issued to marshal what would become the largest expeditionary force of that war and, arguably, of all wars till date. These instructions were issued by Lord Hardinge— the then Viceroy of India—resulting in Expeditionary Force ‘A’ that embarked for France within the month.

The South China Sea: The Struggle for Power in Asia by Bill Hayton

The South China Sea disputes have received considerable attention from international relations scholars, world leaders and policymakers in the recent decades. China’s aspirations in the region are challenged by the relatively smaller East Asian countries, including Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan. The territorial disputes, mixed with the concept of sovereignty and national pride, have led to the development of geopolitical rivalry in the region.

China’s Emergence as a Cyber Power

Cyberspace is increasingly becoming an area of contestation among nation states. Similar to the physical domains of land, sea, air and space, superiority in the cyber domain enables a nation state to exert its cyber power. In recent years, China has invested colossal amounts in building the requisite infrastructure and capabilities of its armed forces as well as governance practices to advance towards ‘informationalisation’. This article seeks to discern the motives, threats, objectives, strategy and intent that drive China to amass cyber power.

Arms and the Game: Accepting Competition and Encouraging Cooperation

The article approaches the issue of jointness through new lenses. It first describes how and why arms of the military, the ‘Services’, are different from each other. Airpower is shown to be the emerging technological paradigm, triggering paradigm competition. Next, it draws an analogy between anarchy in international relations (IR) and the existence of the services. It then looks at game theory as used in IR to understand both why inter-organisational competition occurs and how cooperation can evolve with a certain kind of behaviour—reciprocity.

Strategic Direction of the Chinese Navy: Capability and Intent Assessment by Kamlesh K. Agnihotri

Rarely do naval practitioners combine capability and strategy cogently. They are good at explaining technical terminology and its applicability, but insufficient in expounding strategy and analysis. They consider capability in terms of war-oriented applicability, rather than the intention, motivation and strategic outreach of such capability. But if a naval practitioner focuses on strategy and its commensurate capability, he can relatively predict the impact of such capability.

Addressing Maritime Challenges in the Indian Ocean Region: A Case for Synergising Naval Capacities towards Collective Benefits

The vastness and diversity of the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) and its littorals, and difference in the latters’ overall view of regional security, presents a broad spectrum of challenges therein. The maritime capacities of most littoral states are not strong enough to individually address these challenges. However, synergised response strategies, appropriately regulated by one or two collectively mandated apex bodies, would greatly help in managing regional maritime security.

India’s Military Modernization: Strategic Technologies and Weapons Systems, edited by Rajesh Basrur and Bharath Gopalaswamy

The Oxford University Press could not have timed it better with its second part of the two-part project on Indian military modernisation in the field of advanced technologies like cruise missiles, nuclear weapons, anti-satellite weapons, missile defence, and information warfare. The adjoining regional countries of the Indian peninsula are flooded with new research vis-à-vis modern weapons and in utilising technology to develop even more advanced weaponry. It is, therefore, prudent for India to step up and be recognised for the power that it professes to be.

Coalition Warfare, edited by N.B. Poulsen, K.H. Galster and S. Nørby

The book contains 10 articles from presentations made by Western scholars (including officers from the defence forces) at the Royal Danish Defence College, in 2011, and has been edited by N.B. Paulsen, K.H. Galster and S. Nørby. Their historical research brings out that coalition warfare is not a new phenomenon, and has been practised by nations for different reasons. While, in most cases, countries came together when they faced a common threat and did not have the strength (manpower, finances or military power) to counter it, often it was to regain their pride and prestige in the world.

An Indian Maritime Strategy for an Era of Geopolitical Uncertainty

The fractious nature of maritime relations in the Asia-Pacific region is a recognisable feature of international geopolitics today. Following China’s massive reclamation and ‘island-building’ project in the South China Sea recently, many Pacific states have moved to bolster their maritime postures. While Japan has sought legislative amendments to liberate its maritime posture from post-war passivism, Vietnam and the Philippines have been building stronger navies aimed at countering China’s hostile moves in the South China Sea.

China Borders: Settlement and Conflicts—Selected Papers, by Neville Maxwell

This book is a compilation of papers written by journalist Neville Maxwell over a career span of five decades. Those who look at China–India relations closely, notably the border dispute, will know that Neville Maxwell is not new to the India–China border discourse. Accredited to The Times, he was their South Asia correspondent in New Delhi during the tumultuous years from 1959–62, when he extensively covered the Indo-China War of 1962.

‘Arriving in the Nick of Time’: The Indian Corps in France, 1914–15

Today, military historians as well as those dealing with colonial South Asian history tend to overlook the fact that during the First World War, the Indian Army was Britain’s strategic reserve. It vitally despatched over 150,000 troops to the Western Front to shore-up the British sector in the critical period of 1914-1915. To the Indian sepoys who crossed the kala pani to fight, die or be wounded in the trenches there, it was a jarring initiation into modern industrialised warfare.

Asymmetrical Threat Perceptions in India–China Relations, by Tien-sze Fang

Tien-sze Fang’s Asymmetrical Threat Perceptions in India–China Relations makes a comparative study of the threat perceptions of the two countries vis-à-vis each other. The book endorses the view that although both the countries have security concerns from each other, the threat perception in India is far more acute than in China. This asymmetry defines the relations between the two countries.

Indian Defence Offset Policy: An Impact Analysis

The article assesses the impact of defence offset policy on the Indian defence industry, by taking into account two key parameters—foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows and exports. It observes that the offset policy has a mixed impact. On the positive side, the offset policy seems to have an impact on certain types of exports. On the negative side, the policy has not been a catalyst in bringing in foreign investment and technology inflows into the Indian defence industry, nor has it been successful in promoting its high-end manufacturing.

Birth of UNLFWSEA: Internal Dynamics and Implications for India’s North-East

A distinctive feature of insurgency in India’s North-East and neighbouring Myanmar has been the tendency among rebel groups to form alliances. Cooperation is deemed advantageous in a hostile terrain, against a powerful and better organised enemy. Several coalitions were formed in Myanmar by the separatist insurgent outfits with well-defined objectives which, however, failed to produce any significant impact on the campaign for independence of the region.

Military Education in India: Missing the Forest for the Trees

India’s Professional Military Education (PME) system is weighted towards the tactical level in all stages of professional development. This results in inadequate exposure of its senior leadership to strategic studies, thus inhibiting the provision of qualitative advice at the strategic level. While combat as an instrument of warfare is focused on at all levels, it fails to relate to war as an instrument of politics. It underlines the absence of an effort to build a broader vision that incorporates the entire constellation of forces.

An Assessment of Organisational Change in the Indian Army

The article analyses military change in the context of the Indian Army, with specific focus on organisational innovation and change. In doing so, it analyses two case studies: restructuring of the army after the Sino-Indian War of 1962; and mechanisation based on the 1975 expert committee recommendations. On the basis of these case studies, the article assesses the drivers and desirables for organisational change in the Indian Army, with the further aim of deriving policy recommendations which are especially apt in light of the ongoing transformation of the army.