How Indian military can draw from ancient wisdom to devise future strategies. An extract
Brig. Ashok Pathak (retd)
The Arthashastra, Kautilya’s treatise derived from the Atharvaveda, also describes the duties (Raj dharma) of the King (the ruling class). The King’s dharma is to protect territorial integrity, civilisational values and ensure the well-being of the citizen. In essence, the political vision helps in answering five basic questions that relate to national security that are relevant for our study. What needs to be protected in terms of territory, people and civilizational values? Second, the threat indicators and modus operandi to neutralize the threats.
Our ancient wisdom on national security suggests that the threats need to be neutralised as soon as they emerge. Based on the type of threats, Kautilya described four types of war—the war of counsel (diplomacy), open warfare (this is where military is used at the time and place of their own choosing), concealed warfare, and psychological warfare. According to the wisdom of the Vedas and Upanishads, open warfare must be the last resort, it must be fought for a brief period of time with minimal damage to property and human lives (on both sides).
The third and most critical question is about major components or organs of the nation-state including their relative positions. Kautilya believed that the armed forces of the nation are positioned sixth after the treasury (economy). The king (elected political leader) occupied the top place followed by the council of ministers, next being the land and the people (territorial integrity and the well-being of citizens). At fourth place were the fortified towns and cities (due to their defence potential), fifth place in order of priority was the wealth of the nation (economy) followed by the armed forces at the sixth place and allies (international relations) at the seventh place.
The armed forces of the king were commanded by the Senapati who was part of the council of ministers but did not attend routine meeting of the council. He was called upon for advice related to war and aspects of national security that involved participation by the armed forces. Hence, though the armed forces were placed sixth in the order of priority with regard to the seven organs of the state, the chief of the armed forces retained a prominent position under the king. We will come back to this aspect while discussing the position of the CDS in the national security apparatus in the modern knowledge-driven information war environment.
If we adapt Kautilya’s theory to the modern knowledge era democratic ecosystem, then the seven layers can be, people and the leadership, knowledge and productivity, economy, internal security, armed forces, technostructure, and international relations. Consequently, the war forms will also be in accordance to these modern-day pillars of national security. The conflicts will occur at people (net war), political (political war), economic (economic warfare), internal threats (terrorism, proxy wars), conventional warfare involving physical destruction, electronic warfare, psychological warfare and so on.
While the CDS and theatre commanders will primarily be structured, equipped, sourced and tasked to meet external threats ranging from cyber to conventional and finally the nuclear, there will be organisations, infrastructure and policies to deal with and neutralise other threats. Since the threats will be overlapping with varying degrees in each domain, all the agencies involved in the business of national security will have to be inter-linked at some level through specific gateways for sharing information and synergising their respective actions with others. The military commanders at the highest level will be expected to visualise the military as well as non-military threats and prepare their forces accordingly/advise the cabinet according to their professional knowledge on the subject.
The higher direction of military affairs or war will always emanate from the political top. How is the political top organised and connected to the institutions that actually translate strategic intent into plans? According to the Indian representative democratic system, the Prime Minister is the Chief Executive who is advised by the cabinet committee on security. Since the cabinet committee on security in India comprises exclusively of civilians (generally devoid of military experience and without proper understanding of military affairs) they need to be informed and briefed on the situation at regular intervals. They may be advised, but theirs is the final call and rightly so. Small mistakes at these levels get magnified when these strategic decisions reach the operational levels.
In India, the office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) performs this task of advising the top political executives. The NSA is thus expected to grasp the entire gamut of security—geography, civilisational values and the citizens. Keeping this in mind, the NSA has been raised to the level of cabinet minister with minister of defence, home and external affairs reporting to him for briefing and advice. Where does the CDS fit in here? Earlier the secretary of defence reporting to the Defence Minister was made responsible for the defence of India (under the factor of geography). This arrangement will deprive the Defence Minister and the NSA of critical military advice as interpreted by a military professional. Hence, the institution of CDS must replace the Defence Secretary as an adviser on external security (related to the factor of geography).
It is for the top political leadership to visualize and monitor the national security environment in terms of threats and initiate timely and appropriate measures to neutralise these threats before they manifest themselves in harmful proportions. Since the ministers in the Cabinet Committee for Security (CCS) are without proper understanding of national security, the NSA with the help of specialised agencies makes the political leaders aware of the implications of various events that can lead to national security threats. The CDS provides the input for the external threats that pertain to our geographical location—establishment of military bases by an adversary, military movements, upgradation, training, alliances and so on. He is also responsible for apprising the CCS directly or through the NSA of the capabilities required by our own forces to meet the challenges. This would include the personnel, equipment, knowledge, education and skilling requirements. Similarly, the heads of other national security institutions keep the CCS apprised. Recently, there have been cases where the CDS and even the three service chiefs have met the Prime Minister together in a group and individually. This gives an indication that the highest level of national leadership is inclined to obtain inputs directly from the service chiefs.
Since the national security threats in the knowledge era emanate from a very large spectrum of activities, the environment scan needs to be that much wider. Besides, even the capability building for neutralising the threat goes beyond the conventional military systems. Non-military domains of the nation need to be involved in national security. Thus, cyber security, psychological warfare, perception management, narrative war, civilisational conflicts within and outside are all subjects that traditionally belong to the non-military domain. However, threat vectors are often carefully packaged in these external covers. This leads us to ‘all of the nation’ approach for securing the nation at all times.
The knowledge sector, industry, infrastructure and even the cultural sector needs to be watched to identify and neutralise any potential threats.
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