China has already constructed and taken over possession of the Hambantota Port in Srilanka. This is merely further confirmation that while India was fully preoccupied with its casteist communalist politics to steal from the haves and the have-nots for the have lots of the Nouveau Kleptocracy and suppress its best talent and merit in favor of corruption and incompetence, China has taken over the Indian Ocean. Modi lost the Ocean by not acting on the Maldives when the opportunity presented itself just as Nehru lost Tibet and Kashmir.
India has never had an ocean strategy let alone a cogent military strategy because it has been ruled by smug imbeciles content with looting, raping and murdering the helpless under their control rather looking at what they cannot squeeze the next crore from. china china
The strategic positioning of the Navy and to a lesser extent the Air Force is not geared to threat perceptions and India is mired and wallowing about in the wet, slippery mud of it’s Constitution and Laws without clear security objectives other than behaving like a bison caught in the mud trying to push aside carnivores like Islam (Pakistan) and Communism (China) that are tearing at its flanks and underbelly.
Military strategy demands the ability of the adequate force to be present wherever threats emerge in quick time with minimal cost and investment.
As regards the Ocean, India must now fall back into defense position and leverage its own archipelagoes, the Lakshadweep, the Minicoy, the Nicobar and the Andaman islands into a formidable fortress of tiny bases among which compact assets can be moved and from which they can swarm to project power over the oceans.
I have maintained since the 1970s, for example, that India does not need Aircraft Carriers. It is a doctrine and expense entirely unsuited to India’s military requirements and is simply a “me too” method resulting from the absence of original and purpose made, fit for purpose strategic and tactical thinking on India’s part. What India needs is several nuclear-armed nuclear submarines for deterrence, and tiny bases all over the Lakshadweep, Minicoy, and Andamans among which attack submarines, helicopters, multi-role fighters, missiles, reconnaissance come depth charge/torpedo amphibian aircraft, long-range torpedo boats, and long-range light destroyers can be deployed, moved around and concentrated at will. Backed up with a strong Coast Guard and a distributed fast destroyer and attack submarine home fleet.
Here is something that I had written in the Diplomat (since removed at the request of the Indian Government) some fifteen years ago:
In modern warfare, the object is to be able to reach any point of threat with adequate high quality force in the shortest possible time while economizing on the quantity and cost of standing forces, India has been and continues absurdly lacking in engineering itself to these principles. There are hardly any force multipliers or mobilization of irregulars and reserves. Or even the strategic use of natural resources, environment, lie of the land and the oceans, the tides and the winds, the depth. The enormous expenditure on the National Cadet Corps has never been turned into an investment but is simply wasted away. china china
For just one example, India does not need Aircraft Carriers. It is a doctrine and expense entirely unsuited to India’s military requirements and is simply a “me too” method resulting from the absence of original and purpose made, fit for purpose strategic and tactical thinking on India’s part. India’s A/C tradition developed from having to make use of the HMS Hercules which Britain, having no use for it, sold to India to set off part of its debt. Every serious Navy knows that an A/C requires an accompanying flotilla, takes a long time to mobilize and get to the place of action. It can never be a riposte but only an aggressive, well-planned act, suited to support a seaborne invasion task force. India, even if it had such a policy would never be able to mount an aggressive action economically, technologically or politically. It is hardly suited for ought but fleet reviews. Real Navies do not posture like scarecrows or Indian Policemen but draw their weapons for serious business. Very expensive and risky business.
What India needed forty years ago is several nuclear-armed nuclear submarines for deterrence, and tiny bases all over the Lakshadweep, Minicoy, and Andamans among which attack submarines, helicopters, multi-role fighters, missiles, reconnaissance come depth charge/torpedo amphibian aircraft, long-range torpedo boats, and long-range light destroyers can be deployed, moved around and concentrated at will. Backed up with a distributed fast destroyer and attack submarine home fleet and a strong Coast Guard.
India would do well to derive principles underlying the lessons of Horatio Nelson’s victory against the Spanish Armada at Trafalgar, the sinking of the Bismark and Shivaji’s Admiral Angre’s strategies and tactics that brought the immensely more powerful and wealthy Mughals to their knees. The Battle of Colachel where Travancore decisively defeated the Dutch fleet and permanently ended Dutch ambitions for an Indian Empire (the only example in World History of a Native non Industrialized country defeating an Industrialized European Power. Or Giap’s conclusive destruction of the US (McNamara) fallacy that “spend is power” in Vietnam
– S.Suchindranath Aiyer, (Originally published on Quora)
