Eating Humble Pie

Two years back, around January 2024, excerpts of General Naravane’s memoirs, that are now making waves, had first come into the public domain. I had then written on the issue in The Pioneer. A piece, that incidentally, is no longer accessible (https://www.dailypioneer.com/2024/columnists/will-we-ever-confront-china--call-its-bluff-.html), for whatever reasons, along with the rest of my published articles in that paper.

Nevertheless, I had then made the point, based on the titbits that had come out, which bear repeating, that it had shed fresh light on both, the much-touted Agnipath Scheme, and the confrontation with China in Eastern Ladakh, which persists to this day. More importantly, it also confirmed that our government’s response to Chinese belligerence has been excessively passive, timid and restrained. Not that this was in any doubt given the EAM’s public statement that we were dealing with a larger economy and would never cause trouble.

With regard to the deeply flawed Agnipath Scheme, whose consequences have been far more debilitating and momentous for our military than any other government initiative till date, arguably leaving aside Krishna Menon’s attempts at reform that left us reeling during the 1962 conflict with China. The General admits he was taken aback when his similar, but extremely limited proposal, “The Tour of Duty” Scheme, was enlarged and pushed through by the PMO for universal application, without either consultations or acquiescence of the Service Chiefs.

What does that say about the state of our civil-military relations and the standing of our Service Chiefs in the eyes of the political leadership? Even more importantly, what does it say about the military’s chain of command, that despite being fully aware of its flaws, refused to stand up and be counted, when it mattered most? Instead, we witnessed not just total acquiescence, but even praise being heaped on an initiative that has irrevocably changed the character of our military for the worse.

As regards the confrontation in Eastern Ladakh, the General was, as he points out, “handed a hot potato. With this carte blanche, the onus was now totally on me.” As events transpired, it is quite clear that the General preferred to tread with caution and was unwilling to take any robust measures to avoid provoking Chinese escalation, though fortunately for all of us, his actions paid off in the end and our troops forced the Chinese tanks to withdraw. It was undoubtedly a moral victory for our forces in the circumstances. One should however point out, and history is quite clear on this, the Chinese do as they please, regardless of whatever agreements they may have signed to the contrary. In the circumstances, if escalation was in their interest, they would have done so regardless of whether we provoked them or not.

Despite seven decades of Independence, it is fairly clear that our political and bureaucratic establishments remain utter novices when it comes to matters military. This is exactly what we have witnessed in the discussions in parliament , where the issue of the Government’s response, as elucidated by General Naravane, has been reduced to a binary zero-sum game of who was to blame and as to whether the government had abdicated its responsibility. The more serious issues that should concern us, of systemic failure, has been glossed over. It is quite apparent our politicians are blissfully unaware of the dictum that “wars are too important to be left to generals”, which is the very reason that we have institutions and processes in place for the higher direction of war.

In a functional system, all this falls in the purview of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS). Which begs the question, shouldn’t it have been convened when the Chinese first ingressed into our territory? If indeed it had been convened, would it not have taken formal cognisance of the prevailing situation, obtained inputs and assessments from various stakeholders, discussed contingencies and options and given clearcut directions to the military?

Obviously, the system did not do its job, and the good General found himself in a position where he needed to look over his shoulder for directions, if not support. Evidently, even in matters of national security, we have learned little from our past errors and our civil-military functioning continues to be dysfunctional and held hostage to personalities. Sadly, the impression given is that as events took a turn for the worse, everyone who mattered was intent on passing the buck or hiding behind a wall of secrecy. Despite all our aggressive posturing and chest thumping, humble pie seems to be our favourite dish, at least when it comes to China.

Mark Twain once wrote “An uneasy conscience is a hair in the mouth.” It seems post- retirement General Naravane was extremely keen to get that hair out of his mouth, by penning his version of events. The Government, for fairly apparent reasons, did not want to be seen lacking and thus held up its publication for the last two years. That, for all practical purposes with the memoirs now allegedly available online, seems moot. The actions of the Government to prevent a discussion on the issue in Parliament and talk of expelling the Leader of the Opposition only further highlights the government’s missteps and further adds to its woes.