Quarrelling over Kargil

Antiquated decision-making system must go

by Lieut-Gen Harwant Singh (retd)

THE controversy and quarrel over Kargil has been one of the most futile and unproductive inter-service exercises. However, Kargil does throw sufficient light on the prevailing set-up to take note of the discord and delay in the decision-making process that could seriously jeopardise national security. The Air Chief’s ruminations and the issue of helicopters versus air power, lack of lateral flow of information do bring out, in stark reality, the unsavoury fact that the Air Force and the Army have been operating in water- tight compartments. These episodes do throw up important lessons, which require unbiased and objective assessment and need to be assimilated for better understanding and future inter-service working.


The Kargil sector had been free from jihadi and terrorist activity essentially because the local population is Shia, Buddhist and Droks, with only a sprinkling of Sunnis. Intelligence reports of the period pointed to some concentration of jihadi elements opposite this sector. At that point of time, the Indian Army was heavily committed in counter-insurgency operations in other parts of J and K. The requirement of reinforcing the Kargil sector was neither necessary nor were there troops to spare for this task. No one need be apologetic about this ground reality.

The Kargil sector has no strategic importance and the terrain does not favour offensive operations from either side of the Line of Actual Control (LAC). With the opening of an alternate route to Leh, from Manali, the importance of the Srinagar-Leh road had considerably reduced. Moreover, the LAC in this sector is clearly delineated and well recognised by both sides. Further, it has been India’s avowed position that any attack by Pakistan across the LAC in J and K will be taken as an attack on India and that India will respond accordingly. Given these circumstances and ground realities, no large-scale mischief by Pakistan could be expected. According to the circumstances then prevailing, Pakistan was neither spoiling for nor was it in a position to risk a war with India.

In view of this and the slip-ups in the collation and analysis of the limited intelligence reports then being made available, the Kargil sector required no special attention. Large gaps between the posts along 164 km of the front from Chor Batla to the Mushko Valley, across very difficult terrain, susceptible to heavy snowfall and consequent frequent avalanches, could not be regularly patrolled during the winter months. During the previous years the Army had lost entire patrols under snow avalanches. As such, infiltration and occupation of gaps between the posts by jihadi elements was not immediately detected. Determining the full scale and extent of ingression was a time-consuming process.

Since they were initially reported to be only the jihadis who had infiltrated, there was nothing wrong in the deployment of attack helicopters to engage them. These helicopters could engage targets from a distance of four kilometres or so, keeping well away from the enemy’s small arms fire. They are required to engage enemy tanks, staying outside the range of the tank’s heavy machine guns. Therefore, tasking them to engage jihadi elements with cannons and missiles was not a very inappropriate commitment for them.

These helicopters do have some limited capability to evade a heat-seeking missile. In any case, jihadis were not expected to be equipped with shoulder- fired anti-aircraft missiles (Stinger-type missiles). Therefore, Air Headquarters’ sustained reluctance to deploy these and that “we know better” attitude cannot be justified. In the end, even a fighter aircraft was brought down by these alleged jihadis, negating Air Headquarters’ objection against using attack helicopters. An attack helicopter is entirely a ground support weapon system and considered the world over as integral to the Army’s fire support assets. To contend that the Indian Army is unaware of the capability and employment of this weapon speaks volumes of the chasm that exists between these two services, the exchange of polite letters between the two chiefs after the Kargil conflict notwithstanding.

If Air Headquarters felt so strongly against the deployment of armed helicopters, it could have instead offered the use of fighter aircraft and in which case both the Army and the Air Force together could have approached the government on this issue. Where was the question of escalation in the event of employment of air power over own territory (air space) against the enemy, which had infiltrated deep inside India. In any case, Pakistan had denied any involvement. After all, the Army’s heavy artillery was already relentlessly engaging the intruders.
On arriving at a consensus within the Chiefs of Staff Committee, the government could have been apprised and advised on the issue of deployment of air power. Further, it was necessary to have pointed out to the government that deploying the Air Force within Indian airspace against jihadis (or even if Pakistani troops were there) who had penetrated inside Indian territory, could not possibly provoke Pakistan to start hostilities against superior conventional forces (both ground and air) nor would it have started a nuclear conflagration just because we were engaging jihadis well within Indian territory. Therefore, this bogey of escalation and consequent inordinate delay in the decision to deploy the Air Force cannot be employed to dither and defer vital decisions. Nor can the obfuscation of the self-generated confusion created in the use of air power and not armed helicopters find justification in this dithering. No one has ever considered helicopters as an extension of artillery. Though they are, in reality, an extension of armour. They carry direct firing weapons (missiles and cannons) and, employing appropriate techniques, can operate even in the face of enemy anti-aircraft capability.

Fortunately, the enemy merely occupied the gaps between our posts and had no intention or the capability to progress operations any deeper into India. Consequently, it posed no threat to any vital areas in depth. Were the enemy to have the capability and the intention of driving deeper towards some vital objective, the semantics, mistrust and petty fogging within the Chiefs of Staff Committee, and the attendant delay, could have had grave consequences.

Time and again this discord and differing perceptions have surfaced. Be it the 1962 war against China or the wars against Pakistan, the Services have failed to function as a well-oiled machine and proof of this, if any, lies in the continuing spat between the two Service chiefs even seven years after the event. The existing arrangement of the Chiefs of Staff Committee with its conflicting views, “turf tending” and differing recommendations can merely confuse the political executive and result in delays and dithering which would prove disastrous in the event of grave national emergencies demanding quick responses.

The imperatives of single- point advise to the government, on defence matters, needs no further emphasis. A nuclear and emerging economic power with ambitions to exercise a sobering influence in the region, for its stability and security, cannot have an antiquated and potentially dysfunctional decision-making system within its defence apparatus.


http://www.tribuneindia.com/2006/20061018/edit.htm#4