Will General Bipin Rawat go down as one of the greatest generals of Indian Army?

Adioz

शक्तिः दुर्दम्येच्छाशक्त्याः आगच्छति
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CDS and theater commands have been pricky issues for us for a while. Especially with the other forces not willing to reinforce IA dominance.

But in the past during wartimes IA cheif has acted as de facto CDS. For instance, FM Maneckshaw was effectively the CDS in 1971 war, with the supreme overall authority. I believe Gen. Malik enjoyed a similar position during Kargil, even as IN was involved in cowing down Napakis in the Arabain sea, far away from Kargil.

That said, the debate on instituting these reforms has been raging for a while. In fact as far back as Kargil when KR commission suggested a slew of defence reforms. It's just that much has not been open to public.

Here is Gen Malik with his views on the matter

Quite an apt point by Gen VP Malik.

But the de-facto head of tri services in 1971, etc and Ad-hoc approaches like Chairman Chiefs of Staff committee now are not nearly enough. CDS, etc are the first baby steps we need to make in order to be ready in the future. See this excerpt of Pravin's article:-
As part of the 2015 military reforms, all PLA think-tanks have been bought under the Academy of Military Sciences. These include those devoted to the science and art of warfare and futuristic warfare where Artificial Intelligence (robotics, autonomy and human-machine interface) is set to play a significant role in addition to simulations. The Academy’s strength has risen from 1,000 to more than 10,000 officers. Technology can only be exploited optimally in warfare with joint doctrines for peace and war.

This is how reforms happen, through deliberation and consultation over a period of time; not by cherry-picking ideas from all over the world and superimposing them on existing structures.
 

12arya

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But the de-facto head of tri services in 1971, etc and Ad-hoc approaches like Chairman Chiefs of Staff committee now are not nearly enough. CDS, etc are the first baby steps we need to make in order to be ready in the future. See this excerpt of Pravin's article:-
again, that's not something that bipin rawat alone can achieve.
there was an article by shiv aroor, i believe, who said, the main obstacle for combined command was the Air Force chief objecting to it; believe navy too agreed to the combined command. so the tri forces must sit together and discuss.
rawat clearly is trying to bring in much needed change in the army and the man's actions shows his sincerity as well. but other chiefs too need to put the nation first.
 

12arya

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Rawat’s Robust Response: How The Chief Is Leading The Army’s Campaign In Jammu And Kashmir
by Syed Ata Hasnain - Jul 01, 2018, 1:15 pm

Snapshot
  • A lasting solution to the conflict in Jammu and Kashmir has to come from the political community and the administrative machinery.

    Before any of that, though, it falls on the army to create a stable security situation.
This must start on a personal note because the current Indian Army Chief, General Bipin Rawat, is a former colleague and subordinate. He relieved me in the Military Secretary’s branch as the Colonel in charge of policy and management of the officer cadre. While I commanded Indian Army’s Dagger Division in Baramula, he commanded the Rashtriya Rifles 5 Sector (brigade) in the nearby volatile town of Sopore. Later, as I commanded the Chinar Corps, I also had the opportunity of asking for him by name, to command the Dagger Division, my old formation. He later dealt with the North East as a senior staff officer and commanded Indian Army’s largest formation, 3 Corps, which oversees a major part of anti-insurgency operations and the Line of Actual Control.

On 1 January 2017, when General Rawat was appointed Chief of the Indian Army, he brought to his appointment a wealth of experience of having dealt with hybrid conflict conditions in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) and the North East. He inherited a situation in J&K which was tenuous. Six months post the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani which had triggered unending turbulence on the streets; the army faced three major challenges. First, the Line of Control (LoC) was getting much more active with nearly everyday ceasefire violations by the Pakistan Army. The Hindu areas in the vicinity of the Jammu international boundary were under intense fire, which created communal tension with potential for more negative fallout; that was Pakistan’s intent.

The infiltration of foreign terrorists, although under a fair degree of control, had witnessed attempts at targeting the army’s installations closer to the LoC. This was against the usual trends of deeper movement to safe houses and strikes in the hinterland. The suicide attack on the headquarters of the Uri Brigade on 18 September 2016 was part of this trend. Earlier, the army posts in the Jhelum Valley had also been subjected to such attempts and the brigade headquarters at Poonch and Tangdhar had successfully neutralised terrorist efforts to target them. Related to the LoC was also the fact that on 28 September 2016, the much-hyped surgical strikes had been launched against terrorist launchpads across the border. Although casualties inflicted were unconfirmed, the campaign itself became a celebrated event in India, leading to the expectation of such retribution in future too.

The second challenge was the continuing trend of terrorist strikes in the hinterland. From the high of 2011-12, when the army had established complete domination by effectively choking infiltration, the low was the proliferating local militancy, which required no foreign terrorists, to flourish. South Kashmir found its own moorings through the movement led by Burhan Wani, who succeeded in inspiring a segment of the youth through his image management on social media and networks spread by word of mouth. The surge in violence in 2016 was primarily in the southern districts of Anantnag, Pulwama, Kulgam and Shopian, sometimes moving up to Bandipora. The disturbing trend of flash mobs at encounter sites interfering in operations conducted by the security forces (SF) was leading to severe challenges for the SF, resulting in both SF and civilian casualties. The civilian casualties always triggered further disturbances and the potential of a cyclic chain of negative events always remained high.

The third challenge was a flow out of the second and not restricted to any single aspect. The political environment was vitiated and the local political class was being shunned. It did not have the ability of even visiting the rural areas to which the movement had shifted. The alienation against India and everything Indian was massive and no military civic action programmes such as ‘Sadbhavana’ could hope to overcome this. The new generation of Kashmiris, born after 1989, had only witnessed violence in everyday life and knew little about the happiness of a stress-free environment. It had produced a brooding and vengeful youth veering towards suicidal tendencies.

All the challenges which stood evident in early 2017 continued at different levels through the 18 months that General Rawat has been in office, underlining the fact that hybrid conflicts are long-drawn affairs. However, simultaneously, they were addressed with a new understanding of the ground.

General Rawat’s term as Army Chief, mid-way through his tenure, has been characterised by a robust response at the LoC without any horizontal proliferation. There was a choice to proliferate response to the LoC of the Kashmir sector and even to Kargil. This advice has been eschewed in favour of a stronger response in the areas where Pakistan attempted to escalate, with greater flexibility vested in frontline commanders. This was sane because LoC exchanges in the Kashmir Valley segment helps Pakistan divert the attention of our troops from the counter infiltration grid. The Neelam Valley domination that the Indian Army enjoys is a measure of last resort and must never be encashed too early. The subsidiary prong of this strategy has been the continuously strengthening counter infiltration grid. More prioritisation to sub-sectors and induction of additional units from the Pir Panjal South has afforded this.

It was done with an element of risk incurred both in the Jammu and Valley regions. In the Jammu region, militancy and terror have been largely wiped out, but the potential for resurgence always exists. Moving Rashtriya Rifles units from the grid there did weaken it to an extent. Communal violence and other political factors in Pir Panjal South can always contribute towards destabilisation and possible exploitation by Pakistan. Disturbing an existing but stabilising grid is never a good strategy, but the risk has been worth it because it energised the counter infiltration measures along the LoC in the Kashmir segment.

General Rawat’s knowledge of the ground in the Uri and Lipa sectors did ensure the practical deployment of additional troops. There have been strikes by border action teams of the Pakistan Army, but the demand for crossing the LoC has been silenced through effective neutralisation from our side, except in one case in the Poonch sector late in December 2017, when our troops had to do a shallow trans LoC operation.

Before venturing into reinvigorating the counter-terror operations, General Rawat drew the ire of a part of Indian intelligentsia by using some strong language against those who attempted to come in the way of the army’s operations at encounter sites. He termed them virtually as over-ground workers (OGWs) and promised action against them as anti-national elements, just the way other OGWs are dealt with. It was a strong message to the troops that they need not feel cowed down by the attempts to cause hindrance to their operations.

Operation ‘All Out’ was the generic name given for all counter-terror operations as the SF prepared for the 2017 summer campaign season. While cooperation between the SF constituents has always been good, the need for further refinement of cooperation was a necessity due to the changing nature of conflict. The necessity of being on the same page was never felt more as vigilante flash mobs attempted to intervene and prevent the effectiveness of execution of operations. A couple of decisions added weight to the effectiveness. First among them was on reintroduction of cordon and search operations (CASO). Generic CASO is executed when intelligence is not specific but exists in bits and pieces. It involves a larger number of troops and creates alienation among the populace, which has to suffer the ignominy of search of houses over a longer duration. This was the challenge in South Kashmir and the return to CASO ensured better domination, and in some cases, actual contact with terrorists. CASO was progressively reduced through later months of 2017 as greater domination was achieved.

Operation ‘All Out’ remained dynamic in concept as it switched to focus on terrorist leaders, who through social media were attempting to create personality cults and larger-than-life images of themselves. This strategy, which the army adopted to curb terrorist initiatives and break their command, control and planning, again proved invaluable as close to 20 militants were eliminated. The infamous photograph of the team of young terrorists with Burhan Wani saw all the members on display being neutralised. Hard operations convey the right message that life as a terrorist may not exceed more than three months.

It is in the third domain, the socio political one that the SF initiatives have yet to bear fruit to the degree desired. This is work in progress. It needs to be appreciated that soft power initiatives to take effect require the rebuilding of trust and creation of hope through restoration of the dignity and self-esteem of the people, and 2018 is the right year for that. To its credit, the army continued with almost all its soft power measures, but the ability to dilute alienation could enhance only marginally because of powerful narratives, which the separatists had been able to ingrain once again in the minds. General Rawat made it clear in a recent media interaction that the contribution, which infiltration made towards sustenance of levels of violence, has been curbed and controlled.

However, the terrorist strength today is being maintained through the phenomenon of local recruitment of youth driven by the passion generated on the streets and funerals of young terrorists, who were many cases their friends. This means that a virtually interminable chain of induction and availability of local terrorists will make the attainment of peace a non-starter. For this, the assistance of the political community, clergy and academics, and of parents, is a must. They have to be empowered to speak, travel and address through multiple means of communication. The army is never afraid to extend a helping hand well beyond its responsibilities as the attainment of peace remains its ultimate aim. If by its own presence or redeployment, it can assist in this effort, it will ensure that, and even provide necessary feedback for the efforts. The political community has to be urged to engage with the people but shorn of political rhetoric. This assurance has been given time and again by the Chief.

The political and social outreach is enabled by the domination achieved in the security situation. The continuity of that domination is as essential, because such strategies cannot work in fits and starts or remain driven by personalities. They have to be institutionalised. The army under its current Chief understands this better than almost all, and has, therefore, worked towards putting together its best practices for continuity. A major achievement in the internal dynamics of the army has been the careful succession procedure to ensure optimum talent in the field is maintained without trying to question the validity of specialisation needed for India’s most enduring military challenge.

Anyone who knows the profession of soldiering would appreciate that the most important battle-winning factor for warriors remains the entire notion of trust. What the current leadership like many of those in the past has achieved is to maintain and build on the concept of trust. Commanders down the chain have been empowered and backed up many times even in the event of mistakes, which in such conditions will occur. It is important to allow the army to do its work and back it with equal degree of trust from the political leadership. The situation in J&K is as worrisome or stable as one may wish to read it. The most important thing is to back the political community and the administrative machinery and encourage them to provide quality governance and positive narratives even as the army holds the periphery and prevents any breach.

The writer is a former GOC of India’s Srinagar based 15 Corps, now associated with Vivekanand International Foundation and the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies.
 

HariPrasad-1

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Greatness of any person can be proved if circumstances allow him to prove his worth. Bipin Rawat got some limited opportunities to prove himself on which he proved his stuff. Had he got some more opportunity like Field Marshal Manekshwa , we would have known his potential better but certainly he proved himself on every occasions. He is among few Dabang generals like Padmanabhan, General Krishna Swamy Sunderji and general V K Singh.
 

Bhadra

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Everything is good about this guy except if he has any women in combat BS.That is a deal breaker for a rationalist-militarist-nationalist like me. Sir, if you can find this message, DON'T DO IT!
Sir, It is largely the services and supporting arms where lady officers are commissioned.

Indian Commissioned officers are largely drawn from National Defence Academy where they are trained for three years and then one year further at IMA. Some of them are from institutions like RIMC, Military Schools and Sainik Schools. So largely one can say that they are hardened and well trained core officers.

Since Indian Army does not have a seperate stream of commissioned officers for Service and supporting arms, some of that hardened well trained officer per force has to go into Services and logistics while the main fighting Arm like Infantry is short of officers. To my mind that is a waste. If Indian Army fills up some Logistic Services and some of the technical supporting arms with lady officers, it will mean so many more officers available to be sent to cutting edge arms - Infantry, artillery and armoured units.

There is a virtue in this too besides socio economic gender justice. I am glad a four year trained officer is not offered into supplying atta dal and chawal. A lady can do that with chips on her shoulders, or she is sitting on a table manipulating a radar or building a bridge on a river.
 

vampyrbladez

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Sir, It is largely the services and supporting arms where lady officers are commissioned.

Indian Commissioned officers are largely drawn from National Defence Academy where they are trained for three years and then one year further at IMA. Some of them are from institutions like RIMC, Military Schools and Sainik Schools. So largely one can say that they are hardened and well trained core officers.

Since Indian Army does not have a seperate stream of commissioned officers for Service and supporting arms, some of that hardened well trained officer per force has to go into Services and logistics while the main fighting Arm like Infantry is short of officers. To my mind that is a waste. If Indian Army fills up some Logistic Services and some of the technical supporting arms with lady officers, it will mean so many more officers available to be sent to cutting edge arms - Infantry, artillery and armoured units.

There is a virtue in this too besides socio economic gender justice. I am glad a four year trained officer is not offered into supplying atta dal and chawal. A lady can do that with chips on her shoulders, or she is sitting on a table manipulating a radar or building a bridge on a river.
There is massive evidence why Women in Combat is an extremely bad idea!

USMC Study

https://www.npr.org/2015/09/10/4392...ase-results-of-study-on-women-in-combat-units

upload_2019-4-11_15-10-52.png

upload_2019-4-11_15-11-16.png

upload_2019-4-11_15-12-9.png


https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4151859/

https://forward.com/schmooze/141221/female-idf-soldiers-suffer-more-stress-fractures/

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/220939

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/198853

https://watermark.silverchair.com/m...RIA6WfHhoAV2yTMerPLJ3Dw74CztVMWusvqOmEZgiEf5v

https://assets.publishing.service.g.../27403/Report_review_excl_woman_combat_pr.pdf

https://www.cmrlink.org/issues/women-in-combat

Putting women into technical arms is a creeping maneuver by radical feminists who after 5-7 years will file court cases and keep moving the ball forward until you end up with women in combat.

Then the LGBTQRST+++ bullshit flows and combat effectiveness and lethality will go for a toss. As a military professional, do you want your army to look like this?





Recently WCO Abhinandan got captured and whole country was shitting bricks! Imagine if one of the female MiG 21 pilots were captured! Do we want a clip on LiveLeak of something nasty happening to her (Late Capt. Saurabh Kalia type incident) circulating in WA groups? Imagine our war effort going for a toss!

This image made sure hippie dumbfucks during 1960s, burnt draft cards and lose the US the Vietnam War!


End of the day war is an extension of politics. We need to make sure we are on the winning side at any and all costs!
 
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ezsasa

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Gen. Bipin Rawat’s House, Epitome of Simplicity | The Chanakya Dialogues With Major Gaurav Arya

 

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