http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/nation/india-world-s-largest-importer-of-arms-military-equipment/54680.html
India world’s
largest importer _of arms, military equipment
Ajay Banerjee
Tribune News
Service
New Delhi, March
16
India has yet
again emerged as the world’s largest buyer of weapons and military equipment,
accounting for some 15% of all such international imports. Russia, despite
losing monopoly over the Indian defence market, continues to hold a dominant
position as the largest supplier for New Delhi. Saudi Arabia, China, the United
Arab Emirates (UAE) and Pakistan, are the next four biggest global importers.
These trends have
emerged from a report released on Monday by Sweden-based think-tank Stockholm
International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). The assessment was done for a
five-year period (2010-2014).
Titled ‘Trends in
international arms transfers’, it says India’s share in global imports
increased by 140% in previous 2005–2009 period, indicating that New Delhi’s
attempts to be self-reliant were not enough as sophisticated planes, warships
and radars were being procured from outside.
“India’s imports were three
times larger than those of either of its regional rivals China and Pakistan.
This contrasts with 2005–2009 when India’s imports were 23% below China’s and
just over double than those of Pakistan,” The SIPRI report said.
In the period 2010–14, which
is the basis of the latest report, Russia supplied 70% of India’s arms imports,
the USA 12% and Israel 7%. Acquisitions from the US are a break with the recent
past. During the period studied by SIPRI, India procured fighter jets and
Mi-17-V5 helicopters from Russia; specialised transport planes, the C-130-J
Super Hercules and the C-17 Globemaster from the US; UAV’s and radars from
Israel. The previous report that studied the period 2009-2013 had said Russia
supplied 75% of the equipment to India, while the US and Israel had 7% and 6%
sales, respectively. This means Russia’s share of 70% is a drop from earlier
year, while the US and Israel have grown.
The Chinese threat
India’s neighbour China is
helping Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar (Burma) in ramping up their military
prowess.
China is now the third largest
exporter of weapons ahead of traditional manufacturers Germany, France and UK.
Its biggest benefactors are Pakistan, Bangladesh and Burma — all having a
shared boundary with India and could potentially cause trouble for New Delhi.
The three countries accounted for 68% of Beijing’s exports.
India sees China’s exports to
countries around India as a part of its long-term strategy of having a ‘string
of pearls’ — a kind of military toe-hold in countries around India. Chinese
exports of major arms increased by 143% between 2005–2009 and during 2010-14.
Its share of global arms exports increased from 3% to 5%, the report said.
http://in.rbth.com/blogs/2015/03/16/how_indias_cold_start_is_making_the_world_a_safer_place_41995.html
How India’s Cold
Start is making the world a safer place
In the Russian
view, there is another serious threat that should be discussed: Pakistan.
Pakistan is a nation with nuclear weapons, various delivery systems and a
domestic situation that is highly unstable. Russia assesses that Islamists are
not only seeking power in Pakistan but are also trying to get their hands on
nuclear materials. – Wikileaks, November 2010.
The Russian
assessment of the Pakistani nuclear threat has to be seen in the backdrop of
Islamabad’s insecurity-fuelled weapons programme. The country has not only
cranked up its production of nuclear warheads, it is doing so primarily in the
area of battlefield nuclear weapons designed for use against the Indian Army’s
armour and troop concentrations. While Pakistan’s strategic arsenal is said to
be under constant scrutiny by US intelligence agencies, the tactical warheads
will be located in forward bases, presenting a tempting target for terrorist
groups.
The exact number
of nuclear warheads in any country’s armoury is a closely guarded secret, but
guesstimates are that by the end of the decade Pakistan will overtake France’s
tally of around 300 nuclear warheads.
Strange as it may
seem, many in the West blame India for Pakistan’s nuclear underground. They are
of the view that it is India’s new Cold War military doctrine that is
accelerating the production of nuclear weapons next door. The fact that it's
the Americans – along with China – who had actively helped Pakistan develop
nuclear weapons is conveniently forgotten.
To be sure,
Pakistan has embarked upon a wasteful militarisation programme that could wreck
its economy because of the fear of India. According to Wikileaks, more than the
al-Qaida, more than American plans to seize its nuclear stockpile, or even a
hostile Afghan government, what’s causing jitters among Pakistani generals is
Cold Start – a new version of blitzkrieg being perfected by the Indian Army.
So deeply does it
dread Cold Start that the Pakistani military has increased its output to an
all-time high of over 20 nuclear bombs annually. To understand why Pakistan is
now upping the ante with battlefield nuclear weapons, we need to understand the
dynamics unleashed by Cold Start.
India Army: Need
for speed
India and Pakistan
have fought wars in 1948, 1965, 1971 and 1999. Each of these conflicts was
launched by the Pakistani military with the knowledge that if its military
thrusts failed, its patrons – the US and China – could be relied upon to work
the diplomatic back channels, get the world media to raise the alarm, and issue
veiled threats, thereby bringing pressure upon India’s political leadership to
call off its attack.
India’s military
strategy was different. After the defending corps along the border soften
Pakistan’s frontal positions, the mechanised columns of India’s elite strike
corps roll across the border, destroy the core of the Pakistan Army and slice
the country in two, giving the political leadership a huge bargaining
advantage.
Sounds like a
bullet-proof strategy. But because India’s strike corps were based in central
India, a significant distance from the international border, it took up to
three weeks for these three armies – comprising hundreds of thousands of troops
– to reach the front.
Because of the
long mobilisation period, the intervention by Western nations and the
truce-happy nature of its political leadership, India’s military brass could
not use its strike forces to their full potential.
Quick strikes
Cold Start was
designed to run around this logistical Maginot Line. The doctrine reorganises
the Indian Army’s offensive power away from the three large strike corps into
eight smaller division-sized battle groups that combine mechanised infantry,
artillery, and armour in a manner reminiscent of the Soviet Union’s operational
maneuver groups. According to Dr Subhash Kapila, an international relations and
strategic affairs analyst at the New Delhi-based South Asia Analysis Group,
Cold Start aims to seize the initiative and finish the war before India’s
political leadership loses its nerve.
“The long mobilisation time
gives the political leadership time to waver under pressure, and in the process
deny the Indian Army its due military victories,” says Kapila. “The new war
doctrine would compel the political leadership to give political approval
‘ab-initio’ and thereby free the armed forces to generate their full combat
potential from the outset.”
The crux of Cold Start is:
Pakistan must not enjoy the luxury of time.
Cold Start aims for eight “Battle Groups”, comprising independent armoured and
mechanised brigades that would launch counterattacks within hours.
These Battle Groups will be fully
integrated with the Indian Air Force and naval aviation, and launch multiple
strikes round the clock into Pakistan.
Each Battle Group will be the size of a
division (30,000-50,000 troops) and highly mobile unlike the strike corps.
Ominously for Pakistan, the Battle Groups
will be well forward from existing garrisons. India’s elite strike forces will
no longer sit idle waiting for the opportune moment, which never came in the
last wars.
Calculus of war
In a Harvard paper on Cold
Start, Walter C. Ladwig writes, “As the Indian military enhances its ability to
implement Cold Start, it is simultaneously degrading the chance that diplomacy
could diffuse a crisis on the subcontinent. In a future emergency, the
international community may find the Battle Groups on the road to Lahore before
anyone in Washington, Brussels or Beijing has the chance to act.”
пустым не оставлять!!
1971 War: How Russia sank
Nixon’s gunboat diplomacy
Cold Start is also aimed at
paralysing Pakistani response. Although its operational details remain
classified, it appears that the goal would be to have three to five Battle
Groups entering Pakistani territory within 72 to 96 hours from the time the
order to mobilise is issued.
“Only such simultaneity of
operations will unhinge the enemy, break his cohesion, and paralyse him into
making mistakes from which he will not be able to recover,” writes Gurmeet
Kanwal, director, Centre for Land Warfare Studies, New Delhi.
Agrees Ladwig: “Multiple
divisions operating independently have the potential to disrupt or incapacitate
the Pakistani leadership's decision making cycle, as happened to the French
high command in the face of the German blitzkrieg of 1940.”
Also, rather than seek to
deliver a catastrophic blow to Pakistan (i.e., cutting the country in two), the
goal of Indian military operations would be to make shallow territorial gains,
50-80 km deep, that could be used in post-conflict negotiations to extract
concessions from Islamabad.
Where the strike corps had the
power to deliver a knockout blow, the Battle Groups can only “bite and hold”
territory. This denies Pakistan the “regime survival” justification for
employing nuclear weapons in response to India's conventional attack.
Tactical nukes: Pakistan’s
back-up
Pakistan has declared it will
launch nuclear strikes against India when a significant portion of its
territory has been captured or is likely to be captured, or the Pakistani
military suffers heavy losses.
At the same time the Pakistani
military is taking out another insurance policy – through battlefield nuclear
weapons. The message is that Islamabad is prepared to use these compact
warheads, which can be launched on purpose-built short range rockets, such as
the much hyped Nasr, in the early days of war.
This can be interpreted in two
ways. One, Pakistan has come round to the thinking that it can never defeat the
Indian Army. Two, the Pakistani generals believe Cold Start cannot be allowed
to stymie their plan to bleed India “with a thousand cuts”. In their view,
achieving nuclear deterrence is not a victory but to stop their proxy war
against India would be a defeat. This is not something to be taken lightly as
it shows that the Pakistani elites want perpetual conflict with India in order
to control Pakistani resources for their own benefit.
пустым не оставлять!!
Weakest part of Russia’s
relations with India
Calling the bluff
What if Pakistan uses tactical
nuclear bombs against the Indian Army’s Battle Groups the moment Cold Start is
initiated? In Kapila’s view, Pakistan’s low nuclear threshold is a myth –
perpetuated and planted by Western academia and think tanks. This suits the
needs of the conservative American establishment in whose eyes India is a
long-term rival and Pakistan a useful, if unreliable, ally. Unfortunately,
India’s political leadership and its uncritical media have been brainwashed
into believing that Cold Start has apocalyptic consequences.
“Nuclear warfare is not a
commando raid or commando operation with which Pakistan is more familiar,"
says Kapila. “Crossing the nuclear threshold is so fateful a decision that even
strong American Presidents in the past have baulked at exercising it or the
prospects of exercising it.” Pakistan cannot expect India would sit idle and
suffer a Pakistani nuclear strike without a massive nuclear retaliation.
Broken arrows: Threat for the
West, not India
The spectre of battlefield
nuclear weapons under the direct control of commanders who sympathise with
Islamic terrorists no doubt scares a lot of people. According to Wikileaks, in
the Russian view, “extremist organisations have more opportunities to recruit
people working in (Pakistan’s) nuclear and missile programmes”.
Although Pakistan’s strategic
nukes are stored in well guarded depots, the miniaturised tactical nukes are
harder to supervise 24/7. To ensure battlefield nuclear weapons are used at the
opportune time, field commanders need independent charge and prior clearance.
This is why German Army commanders have independent control of American nuclear
warheads kept at NATO bases in Germany.
There is no need for New Delhi
to feel alarmed. If, say, the al-Qaeda or the Islamic State manages to get hold
of a battlefield nuke, the biggest threat is not to India but to Pakistan and
the West. It is the West that made a Faustian bargain with Pakistan in order to
target Russia. And like all Faustian bargains there comes a time to pay up. A
broken arrow (code for a lost nuclear bomb) from Pakistan’s arsenal is more
likely to explode in New York or London than New Delhi.
пустым не оставлять!!
New Russia-Pakistan energy
deal will not spoil relations with Delhi - Indian Foreign Ministry
However, if these terrorists
brandish nukes against India, it is Pakistan that will have to deal with the
consequences. American strategic analyst, Ralph Peters, the author of Looking
for Trouble, says: “Let India deal with Pakistan. Pakistan would have to behave
responsibly at last. Or face nuclear-armed India. And Pakistan's leaders know
full well that a nuclear exchange would leave their country a wasteland. India
would dust itself off and move on.”
Islamabad is thus faced with
the cold reality that India is prepared to undertake offensive operations
without giving it time to bring diplomatic leverages into play. Since India has
declared it will not resort to a nuclear first strike, the onus is on Pakistan and
its patrons – the US and China. A South Asian nuclear exchange has the
potential to spiral out of control, sucking in China, the US, the Islamic world
and Russia. That would drive the global economy right over the cliff.
Therefore, argues Kapila, “A nuclear conflict will take place in South Asia
only if the United States wants it and lets Pakistan permissively cross the
nuclear threshold.”
Without firing a shot
The beauty of Cold Start is it
may never have to be used. It screws with the Pakistani military’s mind and
forces the generals to spend time and scarce resources on finding ways to stop
an Indian blitzkrieg.
Cold Start also works to
undermine the much smaller Pakistani economy. According to the Pakistani media,
the threat of the Indian Cold Start doctrine and increase in India’s defence
budget has prompted the Pakistan government to sharply increase its defence
budget, further increasing the strain on that country’s fragile economy.
However, if at all Pakistan
uses tactical nuclear warheads on Indian armoured columns thundering towards
its cities, it would end up devastating its own Punjabi heartland. Most Pakistani
cities are close to the border and would become uninhabitable while India would
lose only a small part of its army.
Cold Start was devised by
India’s brightest military minds to end the standoff in the subcontinent. In
their view, no country can be allowed to export terror and brandish nuclear
weapons at India, without a fitting response.
As Chanakya wrote in the
Arthashastra, the Indian treatise on statecraft, 2300 years ago: “The antidote
of poison is poison, not nectar.”
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/no-clarity-on-army-promotions-policy-after-tribunal-judgment/
No clarity on Army
promotions policy after Tribunal judgment –
Two weeks after
the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT) struck down the Army’s 2009 promotion policy
for Colonels as violative of Article 14 of the Constitution, Army Headquarters
is yet to come out with a plan to implement the judgment.
As reported by The
Indian Express on Saturday, the Army has cancelled its ongoing boards for
promotions from Lt Colonel to Colonel rank. It has been decided that no boards
would be held until a “concrete” policy decision is taken in the matter.
Defence Minister
Manohar Parrikar is learnt to have “seen” the AFT’s judgment and “given a
thought” to its likely implications.
On March 2, the
AFT upheld a petition filed by 30 Army officers against the 2009 policy based
on the Command Exit Model, which gave infantry and artillery more Colonels than
other arms and services.
The AFT had asked
Army Headquarters to consider afresh the cases of all officers affected by the
2009 policy, and ordered the Army to distribute vacancies of Colonels in a pro
rata manner, i.e., the number of Colonels in each arm and service should be
proportional to the strength of Lt Colonels in each arm and service, the way it
was done before 2009.
The AFT judgment
necessitates the holding of fresh promotion boards for all officers who have
been impacted by the 2009 policy. Army Headquarters will have to issue a fresh
distribution of vacancies in various arms and services, and a fresh schedule of
promotion boards to implement the AFT order.
The judgment has
far-reaching consequences, as the number of Brigadiers, Major Generals and Lt
Generals among various arms are decided on a pro rata basis from the number of
Colonels held by each arm. Implementation of the AFT order, which will reduce
the number of Colonels from the Infantry and Artillery, can subsequently reduce
the number of Brigadiers, Major Generals and Lt Generals from these arms.
The AFT order also
affects the current schedule of promotion boards where the number of Colonels
to be promoted in each arm is decided by the 2009 Command Exit Policy.
As reported by The
Indian Express, the promotion board for Air Defence, Engineers, Signals, EME
and ASC was scheduled to be held from March 10-14, but has not been held. No
intimation of its postponement or cancellation has been received by the
officers from the Military Secretary (MS) branch of Army Headquarters, which
deals with the promotions and postings of Army officers.
The lack of
clarity has given rise to concerns among the affected officers that the MS
branch might be planning to approach the Supreme Court with a Special Leave
Petition (SLP) against the AFT judgment.
That is the only
option available to the Army after the AFT turned down the application of the
union government for leave to appeal before the Supreme Court against the
order. Meenakshi Lekhi, counsel for petitioners, has filed a caveat in the
Supreme Court on March 9 to ensure that the petitioners are heard if the
government files an SLP.
Meanwhile, another
group of Army officers affected by the 2009 policy, who were not part of the
original group of petitioners, is planning to file a case in the Supreme Court
on March 22. Following the AFT judgment, these officers feel it is important to
become a party to the case in the Supreme Court.
The AFT judgment
has led to a lot of discussion among officers of various arms and services over
email and social media.
Even on the
veterans’ groups on the Internet, one section has argued for better promotion
avenues for the infantry and artillery by implementing the 2009 policy, while
the other section has argued that this cannot be done at the cost of creating a
demotivated and fractured Army.
Lt General (retd)
Syed Ata Hasnain, former Military Secretary, has said on Facebook that the
Command Exit Model policy of 2009 was never needed, and backed a return to the
pro rata model for promotions.
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