Is it arms vs food for India?

Arming without aiming

Stephen P Cohen and Sunil Dasgupta
Penguin Viking
2010, pp 240,
Rs. 499

Some among India’s strategic community argue that the wealth generated by a spectacular economic growth can provide the wherewithal to realise the vision. In the past, India’s military modernisation got bogged down by resource crunch.

Though we are a nation with the largest number of poverty-stricken people, the hawks would like the scarce resources to be diverted for military modernisation.

India is now the biggest importer of arms with New Delhi being the most favoured haunt of global arms suppliers. The armed forces’ wish-list is worth a whopping $100 billion.

Bulk of it has to come from western sources. This provides immense ‘opportunities’ for our policy makers. In Arming Without Aiming, Stephen P Cohen and Sunil Dasgupta trace the evolution of India’s defence policy and management, analyse the challenges facing military modernisation and its implication on Indo-US ties. The refrain of the authors is that a traditional policy of strategic restraint has come in the way of India playing a pro-active role. Modernisation of armed forces with Western technology can provide India with new instruments of strategic assertion, they argue.

Quoting extensively from media reports and strategic studies, the book reflects the typical American view. A lot is devoted on the endemic failure of indigenous defence industry and faults DRDO on several fronts. The heavy investment in weapons research and development is yet to produce anything substantial. Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) remains a ‘paper plane’ 25 years after DRDO set out to build it. So is the case with some weapons systems and Arjun tank. “We would not cross any border with these tanks,” a brigadier is quoted as saying. Though India has embarked on an unprecedented modernisation of its armed forces, the strategic purpose in purchasing weapons remains unclear.

While the US seeks strategic co-operation and profit, India seeks access to technology. Washington has not been a trustworthy supplier of advanced military technology. The US desire to use India as a counterweight against fast growing China is well known. Hence, magnifying the threat from China serves the arms lobby well. The cost of a nuclear-powered missile submarine is $2.9 billion and an aircraft carrier costs $1.5 billion. The authors say India is a potential strategic asset to US.

The book dwells at length on India’s nuclear capability and concludes that the nation has failed to convert it into political or military advantage. India could not ensure Pak adherence to a no-first-use agreement. Pak nuclear ability has inhibited India from adopting a ‘hot pursuit policy’. The problem of nuclear terrorism and the possibility of rogue nuclear operations from Pakistan are also discussed. The US-based authors also highlight the need for overhauling intelligence set-up in the backdrop of failures, better co-ordination among the three services, improved civil-military relations and transparent procedures for procuring new weapons to tackle corruption. One of the basic problems is that, very few Indian politicians have shown interest in defence and security issues, leading to muddled decisions.

Strategic thinkers, in their obsession with the balance of power, often forget the alternative to armament. Arming Without Aiming also suffers on this count. Whether we should spend billions to buy dreaded weapons that may never be used or for fighting hunger is the moot point.