INDIA IS AT WAR
INDIA’S GRAVEST THREAT IS NOT INSURGENCY!
IN THIS WAR, THE LINE BETWEEN WAR & PEACE IS LESS CLEARLY DEFINED THAN AT ANY POINT IN THE HISTORY OF OUR NATION
INTRODUCTION:
Yes, we are at war and we don't even know it! And it's not Pakistan that's attacking us.
This “new war” is not new. It’s just that it did not dawn upon us as a nation. We saw different parts of a grand design and we called them by different names - Asymmetric War, Terrorism, Naxalism, Secessionism etc. Our approach therefore has been piecemeal. It is only in the last few years that a concerted effort has been made to recognize the dimensions of this multi faceted war.
We know ever since Zulfiqar Bhutto declared a 1000 year war & General Zia‘s desire to bleed India by a 1000 cuts. But it did not dawn on the collective leadership and national consciousness of the extent of this campaign.
The humiliation of 1971 loss and subsequent turmoil in Pakistan, promoted its leaders to unleash a new type of war. This war was, to a large extent, influenced by a theory first pioneered by Polish PM Josef Pilsudski - “Prometheism”. After decades of this new war, Pakistan too was facing the consequences, it was then that a new/old enemy stepped in and took over this war. No one realized it, not India nor Pakistan. This new enemy was growing into an economic powerhouse and had its sights set on regaining its position as a great civilization & power. Only India stood in the way - not knowingly or deliberately, yet geography & history, had put India in it's path towards global domination. This enemy was fed, strengthened and helped along the way by the great, deluded Jawahar Lal Nehru. Either through incompetence or through sheer madness, he saw a friend instead of an foe & handed them the means to irrevocably harm India. We are even today paying the price of his idiocy.
I am sure you would have by now guessed the name of this enemy - CHINA.
HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE:
Now before proceeding further let me put a historical context to this narrative.
Since the dawn of nation states, India has consistently faced threats from across our borders These threats have varied in intensity and goals but we have always managed to turn these threats away. That is until the arrival of Islamic invaders from across the Hindukush & the English from across the sea. Like so many threats we faced, we managed to turn these away too… But at grave human, economic and geographical costs. Yet like the unfathomable timeless sea, we absorbed all who came here, changed them irrevocably and made them ours.
India has and always been a source of great intelligence and wealth. It is this that has attracted the invaders time and again… In the process of attacks and assimilation, India grew into a diverse beautiful nation that's a smaller version of this very earth. However with advent of mid eastern religions with their version of absolutist religiosity that lacked spirituality, India faced a graver threat. These religious zealots sought to destroy India’s soul - a soul that still believes in वसुधैव कुटुम्बकम.
Why???
Because India was a living proof of fallacy of their beliefs. India showed that diversity CAN exist and prosper within a geographic boundary. Religion fueled zeal drove many to their deaths and India was overrun. But 1000 years of constant attacks and rule by despots could not break the spirit of the nation.
India, once again, faces grave threats to its existence as nation state. These threats are often seen as separate entities originating from different sources. Herein lies the biggest error on part of our national consciousness.
We are at war & it's a new type of war - A Hybrid War.
Concept of a hybrid war is not new. Over centuries, it has been practiced in different forms, by some of the greatest military strategists. But these strategies never coalesced into a single Grand Strategy. Years of strategic planning coupled with new technologies and newer players adept at war has eased the coalescing of these disparate strategies into one single grand strategy. This grand strategy is now called Hybrid War.
Before examining its threat, I would, with the reader's indulgence, like to explain the genesis and theories that led to the formulation of the theory of Hybrid War.
The first block of this theory is PROMETHEISM - this strategy was named after the Greek Titan Prometheus. A Polish strategist (and Prime Minister) Josef Pilsudski formulated this theory.
Sandwiched between Russia & Germany, Poland was vulnerable to both these great powers. Pilsudski advocated a subversive strategy to counter these potential threats. Prometheism was directed towards Russia, who at that time occupied significant Polish territories. Edmund Charaszkiewicz chronicled the Promethean Project. It stated that creating unrest in the peripheral territories of an enemy using local population, will ultimately destabilize the power center of the bigger power. In this case the bigger power was Russia and the weaker and smaller power was Poland.
(Do we not see Prometheism in action in Kashmir??)
Pilsudski used immigrants and refugees from Russia & it’s occupied territories to create unrest in Russia occupied border areas of Poland, Crimea etc. Just as Pakistan uses dissatisfied Kashmiri muslims to agitate against their nation.
Theories & strategies of German Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck & Prussian General & Military Theorist Carl Von Clausewitz helped formulate various aspects of the Hybrid War. As brilliant as they were, they too did not see what their strategies will transform into. Clausewitz once famously said
“Der Krieg ist eine bloße Fortsetzung der Politik mit anderen Mitteln”
[“War Is a Mere Continuation of Policy with Other Means.”]
Modern day strategists expanded on theories of these geniuses create a new more devastating method of waging war. People like F. William Engdahl wrote in his 2009 book -
“...main priority is to acquire full dominance over the spheres of the conventional military, nuclear weapons, human rights rhetoric and other norms, geopolitics, space, and communications”
It can thus be said that a hybrid war aims at everything and anything that can be weaponized or have some kind of significance on the battlefield or the consciousness of its actors towards achievement of total decimation of the enemy.
Sun Zu (Art of War) has, in his famous work stated -
“至高无上，包括打破敌人的抵抗而不战”
“Supreme excellence consists of breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting”
These words are in perfect sync with the concept of hybrid wars. Such wars use various overt and covert means to attack different pillars of an enemy's strength and weaken them. This process utilizes internal dissidents, enemy's news media, social media, NGOs, political opponents, financial markets, social organisations...all aspects that have any bearing on the social, financial, military, political, judicial and theological aspects of a nation
When one sees at the full spectrum of acts underway in our nation, a picture begins to emerge.
It's a worrisome picture of a grand design for destruction of our nation without actually engaging in an overt military action. The symmetry of this both terrifyingly beautiful and amazingly simple as well. Since the mid 60’s India has been increasingly buffeted by class, religious divides, regionalism and language apartheid. Political ineptitude, complicated by a faulty worldview further hobbled India's growth. Nehru's romance with China, Congress's continued love affair with Porkistan have bled India for decades. The biggest display of using incompetent indian netas to push Chinese agenda is the 1950 Sino-Indo-Tibet treaty. Nehru's delusions of being a world leader were, masterfully played by China. Nehru was given the royal treatment,by China. His already inflated ego was further inflated as China sang songs of eternal friendship “Hindi - Chini Bhai Bhai”. All this while China used the Sun Zu principles of art of war, to deceive and attack India. So befooled was the Nehru govt that they did not give army orders to retaliate till it was too late
After India successfully broke Pakistan & created Bangladesh….Paki generals and politicians embarked on a 1000 year war and to bleed India by a thousand cuts.
This strategy was put in place by using local dissidents in Kashmir and Punjab to cause unrest in India's peripheral areas and subsequent unraveling the of the core of India's nationhood. Here again the willing or unwitting complicity or incompetence (the reader is free to choose) of politicians played a significant role. Usurping the Kashmir elections, creation of the frankenstein of Punjab separatism laid open the fertile field for Pakistan to plant the seeds of its “Promethean Agenda” for decades Pakistan used our indigenous dissidents as militants to wage war against the indian state. But this war took a toll on Pakistan..
They ruined their economy, religious fanaticism took roots and Pakistan sped down the slippery road to ruination. It was this moment in history that China stepped in. They bankrolled the generals of Pakistan & took over the Paki agenda. Pakistan eagerly became a Chinese patsy. Where, Pakistan was an open enemy - China was an ambiguous enemy. using its soft power China created a sliver of goodwill in the Indian psyche. Its fast growing economy allowed it to wield all tools of war. Its military strength created just enough doubt & fear in minds of Indian policy makers to overlook & bow down to some of Chinese intransigence. China built on the Promethean agenda and irefined it further through seminal works like Theory of Unrestricted Warfare (1999) published by generals Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui. The basic premise is simple and this makes it all the more dangerous.
“无限制战争的第一条规则是没有任何规则，没有禁止的。”
"The first rule of unrestricted warfare is that there are NO rules, with nothing forbidden."
Let’s take a look at the pan India scenario -
NAXALISM in central to southern India, Terrorism in Jammu Kashmir & North Eastern States Like Manipur etc - Form the basis militant action against the Indian state. This is aimed at engaging the security apparatus in a quagmire where the army is focused on fighting its own people and security systems are turned inwards, instead of outwards to the enemy.
NGO’S & HUMAN RIGHTS LOBBIES - They are the second arm of Hybrid War. They selectively highlight every encounter between army & naxals/militants as abuse of rights of tribals, poor and backwards etc. NGO’s aid in festering the wounds sustained in fighting militants. They use money to brainwash susceptible and vulnerable populations of the area. This in turn provides a steady stream of recruits to fight against the nation.
THE MEDIA - They form the third arm of Hybrid War Strategy. Many in media can be & are possibly brought through cash or sex or blackmail etc. They use their words to paint every act of the state in negative light, highlight every atrocity at the wrong forums (international etc where nation's image is sullied)
THE ACTIVIST - This group of people are exemplified by what can be described as “Jhola Chappal brigade”. This band comes from well to do, influential families. They are usually well educated and love to pontificate on any and all issues. Sadly this scotch guzzling, sermonizing group never, ever advocates or offers any advise or suggestions. They use their contacts to paint an ugly picture of the nation they belong to. The female version of this group is popularly called the bindi brigade - a big bindi on the forehead, overly made up or the other extreme, totally dressed like a maid.
THE NETA - Usually corrupt and opportunist to the core. They divide the electorate into small captive vote banks that ensures they get elected back to power.
THE DISGRUNTLED CITIZEN - usually deprived of some of the benefit, poorly educated and more often than not - betrayed by the government and their elected netas.
THE JIHADI - religiously indoctrinated to kill all non believers. They are most dispensable of the above groups. They are easily brainwashed and radicalised, poor and disenfranchised. This group along with the naxal, form the cannon fodder of the Hybrid War.
THE CRONY CAPITALIST - He is the moneybags of the operation. Living and growing like a fungus on the fecal matter of a rotting socio economic system, he grows rich at the expense of his nation. He is the financer and the subversor of the national fabric.
All the above groups are either financed or supported by this group.
Now as aware citizens we all, can very well, put faces to the above examples.
These wings or arms are wielded by the enemy, in this case China, to successfully weaken the foundation of our nation. As Sun Zu said….. Win without fighting, destroy enemy state's foundations and weaken it so that it loses it’s will to fight….. All of this was seen very clearly till now.
With advent of a strong leader like Modi, India has started fighting back. The Naxal menace is being tackled, the NGO nexus is being monitored and the media, activists nexus is being exposed.
CONCLUSION -
As India started its climb back to its rightful place as Vishwa Guru, the intensity of the Hybrid War has been ratcheted up. The Award Wapsi, Intolerance brigade and the nursery of this group that celebrated murder of our soldiers are being increasingly exposed and countered both on the street and on the intellectual levels. Modi government is at the moment engaged in the “Bismarkesque” model, striking alliances, signing treaties & agreements. The intelligence wings are working to bridge operational gaps that congress governments had allowed to creep in
But this is not enough… We need to do more!!!
RECOMMENDATION -
It may not be my place to recommend any action but as a citizen of this great nation, I can certainly suggest -
We as a nation need to recognize the grand design that's being implemented against India - This Hybrid War.
We as citizens, need to break the stranglehold of Armchair Intellectuals, Saleable Media, Activists and NGO’s over our national psyche. We need to start thinking for ourselves and not rely on this unholy nexus to tell us what to think.
The government needs to revamp the security doctrine of our nation. Though we have been quite successful in countering terrorism & militancy but our security protocols still rely on decades old theories. These have helped us till now but it has also failed to address the need for a countering grand design to the enemy’s grand plan - a hybrid war.
Jai Hind
Writer
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