Indian Special Forces

[tusharfoxtrot]

Once I read on Twitter that boko haram has taken same Indians as hostages. Does anyone know about it?

 

[Fire and groove]

How important is restructuring our sf actually? Can it be done slowly over time, and what will we use sf for?

We may get pretty depressed at times but it is happening with consistency. 10 years ago our situation was hopeless, now we're on our way to establish a special operations command (SOC) which'll make a huge difference for the Indian SOF community provided they have sufficient power and resources attributed to them. Expect to see the most changes and standardized modernization under the SOC. Equipment aside major changes needed are:

1. Tiers: We need a two-Tiered system to expand roles and capability for the SOF units in India. A two tiered unit will allow optimum utilization of our SOF assets and units, with Tier 1 units designated for the more high risk, high importance missions and around covert/clandestine operations with plausible deniability. The Tier 2 units can be used for less complex operations which still require SOF units.

2. Garud SOF's role definition - For some reason one of their roles involve airbase security, which is a waste of SOF resources outright. They instead need to be honed and focused into combat search and rescue as well as TACP with some progressing into JTAC and embedded into other SOF.

3. Dedicated intelligence element - an SOF unit is mostly useless if it doesn't acquire actionable intelligence to carry out it's job. We need a well fleshed out and centralized intelligence unit dedicated for SOF information gathering with liaisons attached from all intelligence agencies (military and civilian) for relevant and efficient intelligence gathering.

4. Dedicated air assets - Unlike today where all air assets have to be requested for when it comes to the SOF, we need a dedicated SOF aviation unit within the SOC which is trained and designed for the sole purpose of transporting SOF units even under enemy radars. We also need assets to be tiered along with SOF units, Tier 1 should have access to specialized transportation like the V22 osprey while Tier 2 units can work with Dhruvs and the bigger air assets.

5. Para SF needs to be detached completely from the parachute regiment - The Para SF suffers from being saddled by the parachute regiment which is hell bent in exploiting and consuming them to gain access to SOF equipment and training. This has led to dilution of manpower (although the SF has made sure those converted go through a more rigorous selection process) and loss of manpower for regular airborne operations. The requisite numbers should be separated and sent into the new unit, the rest remain in the parachute regiment.

 

[Aspirant847]

thoughts?

 

[Aspirant847]

Not anything you'd define as a "Commando" Job
Close protection and low level hits would be my guess

does nsg even do hits?

 

[Tactical Doge]

does nsg even do hits?

It would be apt to term it as a social experiment
Close protection- yes they do that

 

[vampyrbladez]

thoughts?

Please post in the appropriate thread. DON'T DERAIL THE THREAD.

https://defenceforumindia.com/threa...-716-assault-rifle.81277/page-60#post-1878072

 

[Phantom sierra]

What do they even do?

Provide close security to female VIPs I guess... I don't think they are trained for room intervention though.

 

[vampyrbladez]

Not anything you'd define as a "Commando" Job
Close protection and low level hits would be my guess

VIP Protection

Perimeter Defence (Public Events)

May also be used when interacting with a local population. When women are present for 'PR' , female suspects are more cooperative as they believe they will not be raped/ harmed.

 

[Fire and groove]

We may get pretty depressed at times but it is happening with consistency. 10 years ago our situation was hopeless, now we're on our way to establish a special operations command (SOC) which'll make a huge difference for the Indian SOF community provided they have sufficient power and resources attributed to them. Expect to see the most changes and standardized modernization under the SOC. Equipment aside major changes needed are:

1. Tiers: We need a two-Tiered system to expand roles and capability for the SOF units in India. A two tiered unit will allow optimum utilization of our SOF assets and units, with Tier 1 units designated for the more high risk, high importance missions and around covert/clandestine operations with plausible deniability. The Tier 2 units can be used for less complex operations which still require SOF units.

2. Garud SOF's role definition - For some reason one of their roles involve airbase security, which is a waste of SOF resources outright. They instead need to be honed and focused into combat search and rescue as well as TACP with some progressing into JTAC and embedded into other SOF.

3. Dedicated intelligence element - an SOF unit is mostly useless if it doesn't acquire actionable intelligence to carry out it's job. We need a well fleshed out and centralized intelligence unit dedicated for SOF information gathering with liaisons attached from all intelligence agencies (military and civilian) for relevant and efficient intelligence gathering.

4. Dedicated air assets - Unlike today where all air assets have to be requested for when it comes to the SOF, we need a dedicated SOF aviation unit within the SOC which is trained and designed for the sole purpose of transporting SOF units even under enemy radars. We also need assets to be tiered along with SOF units, Tier 1 should have access to specialized transportation like the V22 osprey while Tier 2 units can work with Dhruvs and the bigger air assets.

5. Para SF needs to be detached completely from the parachute regiment - The Para SF suffers from being saddled by the parachute regiment which is hell bent in exploiting and consuming them to gain access to SOF equipment and training. This has led to dilution of manpower (although the SF has made sure those converted go through a more rigorous selection process) and loss of manpower for regular airborne operations. The requisite numbers should be separated and sent into the new unit, the rest remain in the parachute regiment.

I was wondering though, how much of a budget would an Indian special operations command need to be optimum and very well equipped?

 

[Tactical Doge]

I was wondering though, how much of a budget would an Indian special operations command need to be optimum and very well equipped?

We already have the money

Misplaced priorities
Slowly but surely things are changing though
Armasen is a prime example of that

 

[Fire and groove]

We already have the money

Misplaced priorities
Slowly but surely things are changing though
Armasen is a prime example of that

I'm not talking about whether we have it or not, I'm talking about how much would it take to have a fully functional SOC.

 

[FalconSlayers]

It would be apt to term it as a social experiment
Close protection- yes they do that

Close protection of women VIPs.

 

[Tactical Doge]

I'm not talking about whether we have it or not, I'm talking about how much would it take to have a fully functional SOC.

Not talking about SOC
There are around 10,000 members in Para
Let's say it costs around 20 grands per soldier (US spends 17500 on a single soldier)
I would say around 0.2B USD
It's a rudimentary take of mine.....That too on an individual level
Obviously you need to spend on ISR elements and transport & logistics much more and that is something I cannot comment on or rather Don't know to comment on

 

[Killbot]

I'm not talking about whether we have it or not, I'm talking about how much would it take to have a fully functional SOC.

Maybe $50M a year for starters. For the SOC in initial years, it should be enough. But setting it up and buying equipment like helos, ISR assets, comms equipment, and individual equipment would cost another maybe $200M. But that is to set up the command.

This is assuming that there will be no more than about 5000 soldiers, techs, pilots, assaulters, etc included.

 

[Fire and groove]

Maybe $50M a year for starters. For the SOC in initial years, it should be enough. But setting it up and buying equipment like helos, ISR assets, comms equipment, and individual equipment would cost another maybe $200M. But that is to set up the command.

This is assuming that there will be no more than about 5000 soldiers, techs, pilots, assaulters, etc included.

...I don't like it, let's spend a billion instead

 

[ManhattanProject]

...I don't like it, let's spend a billion instead

bol toh diye bhaisahab, ab ye karega kaun?

 

[Fire and groove]

bol toh diye bhaisahab, ab ye karega kaun?

There's plenty of ways to do it. Only question is whether someone's willing to do it or not at the expense of their extravagant and very much unnecessary spending. Is the MHA willing to cut down on it's bloated paramilitary manpower and transfer most of those units into the regular police and establish SWAT units instead? Is it willing to open up recruitment of police personnel from former military servicemen? Is it willing to cut down on some of it's astonishing 24 billion dollar budget? Is it willing to stop itself from raising nine battalions based on a whim?

Is the MoD willing to cut down on the salaries and manpower of it's civilian defense personnel? Is the MoD willing to gradually liquidate most of the unnecessary DPSUs that eat up funds yet don't produce because there's no accountability among them and their very existence is unnecessary?

We're willing to spend around 700 million dollars on the most over priced rifle I've ever seen, but we can't spend a billion for a far more relevant, effective and necessary system? Our unconventional war in Kashmir doesn't need conventional forces, it's exactly the kind of war an SOF would thrive in. Those 7 billion dollars worth of planes and 4 billion dollars worth of AA/AD systems only become actually useful in a conventional war, which is realistically not happening anytime within the next decade or two. We'll see provocative actions time and time again, but China isn't throwing away it's desire to surpass the US just for a dick-measuring contest with us, especially considering how short their window is right now to achieve that goal.

With a fully operational SOF unit, we'll be able to shape the geo-politics of (at the very least) our immediate neighbourhood, develop a very useful tool in a conventional war, AND provide ourselves with the best weapon to fight in the unconventional ones (as far as the military aspect is concerned) all at the same time. We need to optimize our intelligence agencies and we need to flesh out and fully develop our SOF capabilities and make them proactively fight/gather intel on the insurgency in PoK itself. It'll provide the most immediate results and wreak havoc in Pakistan's ability to project cross-border insurgencies here. We'll have plausible deniability and create a net of sorts. Those that filter through that net have to contend with a highly militarized border, high tech surveillance and limited routes where they get clapped by the border security, and those who manage their way through THAT net hunted down in Kashmir. Simultaneously we need the political side of the country to wake up and do it's job. You cannot end an insurgency militarily, you can only set the conditions for the political side to exploit.

 

[Tactical Doge]

So people ....I found out the scarf that our operatives are obsessed with nowadays

It's Called a SHEMAG scarf

Planning to buy one myself

 

[Spindrift]

So people ....I found out the scarf that our operatives are obsessed with nowadays

It's Called a SHEMAG scarf

Planning to buy one myself

You can get that on oliveplanet.in I bought a few from them

 

[rkhanna]

So people ....I found out the scarf that our operatives are obsessed with nowadays

It's Called a SHEMAG scarf

Planning to buy one myself

A shemagh (pronounced 'schmog') or keffiyeh, is an Arabic headscarf.

It's as old as Lawrence of Arabia in pop culture