In the last few months, there has been a growing disquiet among some serving and retired officers about increasing politicisation of the Indian armed forces. After being in denial for a long time, voices, especially on social media, are being expressed about this disturbing trend, with some courageous ones going to the extend of linking the process of politicisation to communalisation of the uniform.
Perhaps, this was the reason the video clip of western army commander Lt Gen. M.K. Katiyar enunciating the importance of being apolitical and secular for the armed forces went viral on social media. It was hailed as both out of ordinary and courageous. More recently, a photograph that would have been ordinary in normal circumstances—serving navy chief, who happens to be a Hindu, touching the feet of his old schoolteacher, who happens to be a Muslim, with his school director, who happens to be a Christian looking on—has been celebrated as extraordinary. Clearly, in extraordinary times, the ordinary becomes extraordinary.
With this backdrop, our cover story looks at why being apolitical is not a virtue for the Indian armed forces, but a critical necessity for professionalism. In a multicultural democracy, the armed forces have to be above politics, because any kind of political alignment—with this party or that—can only happen when the military conflates national interest with political interests. That military can no longer be the one in step with emerging technologies, new war-fighting concepts and the threats they pose. As the cover story points out, the Indian military, especially the army, has been trying to strike a balance between its pull towards party politics and its imperative to retains its professional edge, with poor results. Since it was forced to wake up to the challenge of technology-driven warfare only when the enemy was already on Indian soil, it has been trying to do some quick learning of the future, with one eye on the past, as desired by the political dispensation.
So, it is trying to understand how AI is shaping the battlespace, alongside learning how great Indian heroes fought in the ancient and medieval times using nothing but cunning—One reason why the modernisation plans of the three services are haphazard and independent of each other, as the overview the Indian Army, Air Force and Navy shows.
We also have a sobering piece on two years of Russia-Ukraine war, which is changing the global geopolitics faster than expected. In addition to that, are our regular features, books, news and tech update. Read on.