Striking China – It is not Military alone, stupid!
India faces two hostile foes in Pakistan and China. The military problem is that the borders with both these countries are very different. Yet, responding to China, we need much more than military organization unit. We need a comprehensive set of creation of a strategic security doctrine including besides the military dimension – economic, political, technological, social, informational, industrial and international dimensions need to be integrated in a series of innovation that we may hope will evolve from the current disparate set of independent, uncorrelated, reactive, inefficient and insufficient responses that we are seeing. However, the remote possibility of such an evolution based on existing evidence, forces us to change our approach to redesign of the response in an integrated manner beyond the artificial demarcations of our government into defence, finance, home and foreign affairs on one hand and the military forces into army, navy, air force etc on the other hand. In the division of our government structures with limited one-dimensional views lies the key problem of designing a comprehensive response to rising China.
This article looks at some of the key military innovations that India should consider in order to create a strike capability against China. In subsequent, articles we will look at innovation in other dimensions that India should design. Of course, all these potential change areas need to be integrated into a comprehensive response such that the cunning and powerful foe that China has proven to be gets the message and the meaningful response that hits deeper into their estimation of India’s intent, impact and inventiveness.
Against China, India faces a very different terrain. The tank operations in mountains are extremely difficult and in fact likely to be useless as tanks may become sitting ducks when their mobility is either not possible or at best reduced considerably. The infantry becomes the key force for the army. The next dimension of warfare – that is the air is available to create a possible synergy for developing military capability and operations that are more potent and efficient. The nature of war against Pakistan and against China will be different – hence what will be an armor based war with Pak, will have to be infantry/mountain plus air war against China. India has proposed to create a Mountain Strike Corps – arguably, one of rare organizational innovation taken up by Indian Army since it created mechanized infantry in the form of RAPIDS (Reorganized Army Plains Infantry Divisions) in second half of 1980′s under General K Sundarji.
With the announcement of creation of a
Mountain Strike Corps (MSC), Indian Amy is in the process of creating a new organization structure. The employment and operationalizing this new structure requires comprehensive thinking to identify key problems, challenges and opportunities to be addressed. The new Mountain Strike Corps requires new thinking not only because of its rarity but the nature of Terrain, the cunningness and potential power of China as an opportunistic foe, the nuclear capability, background and doctrinal asymmetries, and very different politico-military doctrines of China and India.
Some initial questions, for example, are,
1.
Air-Mountain Battle Doctrine. Do we have a well-defined doctrine for Air-Mountain Battle – a unique requirement for the war against China? Just to illustrate the conceptual constructs of the Air-land battle doctrine employed in Iraq in 1991 by US/Allies were developed in 1980s. Where are conceptual constructs of India’s Air-Mountain battle doctrine? It is time to debate and create the conceptual constructs of such a uniquely Indian doctrine which our peculiar border, terrain and a cunning and powerful adversary demands? The current acquisition of C130s and C17s indicates some thoughts on Air mobility and theater switching of brigade size forces. However, following Sun Tzu, why we should fight the Chinese war, instead we should create the scenarios and reactions where we should be taking initiatives against China and Pakistan, not reacting to their strategic surprises. In summary, we need to create an integrated Air-Mountain Warfare doctrine. This then should also integrate Space dimension, Cyber dimension and Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) dimensions for the war against China.
2.
Mountain Strike Corps Capabilities. What are the key functions, objectives and capabilities that the Mountain Strike corps should have? What should be the organization structure of the Mountain Strike Corps? Should it be based on light armour? Should it be based on light infantry? Should it utilize heavy artillery/ light artillery? Should it have an integrated air-assault component? Will the UCAV/UAV based capabilities change the organization structure? Should it be a completely new organization structure with new operational concepts, new systems and new technology? India need to answer these questions looking at the specific needs of the future. The objective of our study will be to define key needs for the mountain strike corps based on its functions, doctrine, strategy and organizational structure. This should lead to development of key technologies, systems, combat systems, combat support systems, and identification of key challenges that should be met.
3.
Reactive versus Proactive postures. The key component of a strike force is surprise. India traditionally has never been advocating a surprise attack on any adversary. If a situation develops, where conflict is perceived to be imminent, will India take the initiative and launch the Mountain Strike? Or will India wait for conflict to start? In both postures and timing of the launch the role, capability and effectiveness of MSC will vary. How much, in what way, how long, and under what conditions, the MSC will play its role in these two fundamental postures by Indian Army is a question that we need answers or some indications of efficacy.
4.
Creating Military Innovation. India has a situation today, because of the way the Pak-China Combine threat is increasing, to innovate in a comprehensive manner – by creating new military form combining technology, organization and doctrine. The new revolution in military affairs, by definition and design, has to be uniquely Indian.
a.
Armor in Mountains. The key message of mountain strike corps, however, is in stark contrast to the possibility of innovation. In the nomenclature, the syntax and semantics of Indian Army, naming the new formation as Mountain Strike Corps indicates to an existing connotation of the concept of strike corps. Indian army’s existing three strike corps, all deployed and to be used against Pakistan are based on traditional armored/Tank warfare. Each strike corps has an armored division or bloated Independent armored brigades (although the tanks are old T-72s and new T-90s) and mechanized infantry (Russian BMP IIs) to be used as a mobile high momentum firepower going deeper in the open spaces of plains of Punjab and desert of Rajasthan sectors. If the word “strike” map to tank/armored warfare in the Indian Army mind, as is evident, the mountain strike corps will map to mountain tank warfare. Tanks in cluttered mountainous terrain reduce almost to the level of heavy artillery; although with less firepower than the heavy artillery of say 155mm caliber guns. The key capability of the Tanks – their mobility is nullified in the mountain terrain. The war in mountains is excruciatingly slow, compared to war in say desert. The rule of thumb – a heuristic used by armies based on historical data, is to have 3:1 ratio of attackers to defenders for a victory in plains and deserts. This ratio increases to 6:1, 8:1 or 9:1, in mountains, giving 2-3 times an advantage to defenders with prepared positions in mountains compared to same in plains. The heavy armor in mountains is actually a silly option – whether tracked or wheeled. The key combat value of tanks – the mobility is considerably reduced. However, the tanks slow down the infantry troops that potentially can move relatively faster in the valleys, passes, tunnels and narrow ridges and unannounced protrusions that one encounters in the mountainous terrains. The key traditional doctrinal construct is to use light infantry and occupy the hill tops – the higher you are, the better you are against enemy. The strike through the mountains using armor doesn’t make sense. In that sense, mountain strike corps based on tanks is an oxymoron. Hopefully, it is just the nomenclature and Indian Army has thought about an organization or orbat for its new MSC which is not predominantly based on raising new armored divisions or even armored brigades.
Indian Army and Chinese PLA troops during joint training Exercise 2013
b.
The Mountain Strike – has to be air-mobile? Since “strike” as a function requires rapid mobility of forces deep inside the enemy territory, one need to consider different means to accomplish the “strike”. The mobility of firepower deep inside enemy territory, need to be accomplished with comprehensive protection. The Tank/armor gave such a capability to move deep inside enemy territory. The artillery was not accurate to stop tanks and infantry didn’t have sufficient firepower to penetrate 670 mm of heavy steel layers of a main battle tank. The anti-tank missiles and guns have comprehensively increased in their capability to stop tanks, yet a brigade of tanks (about 3 x regiments of 45 tanks each ~ 135 Tanks) is a very difficult proposition to stop by sheer infantry and indirect firepower of artillery. In the mountains, however, the protected mobility of comprehensive firepower has to be accomplished by taking the aerial route. The air route changes the game comprehensively for defenders who might have taken prepared positions on the hilltops. Suddenly they can become easy targets in the absence of their airpower. The Kargil war, in 1999, showed the value of airpower, although Indian Air Force (IAF) realized after the loss of its Mig 27 and helicopters that the solution lays in using precise standoff weapons. The Mirage 2000 of IAF, when they were modified to release laser guided bombs (LGBs) at safe distance from the enemy shoulder fired SAMs, were able to destroy the enemy positions on hill tops with relative ease. The skills required and learned on the job to release LGBs at higher distance by the IAF, needs to be appreciated. However, the Kargil war was a peculiar conflict. The enemy had occupied Indian side of the hills. There was no Pakistan Air Force (PAF). Had they intruded inside Indian Territory, the war would have spiraled into a full scale war, with Indian forces given free hand to strike deep inside Pakistan. So, the mountain strike corps essentially has to create its “strike” component using air assets. Predominantly it has to accomplish the protected movement of firepower deep inside enemy through the air route, bypassing the prepared hill top positions of the enemy troops. This requires a comprehensive air-mobile capability. The USA can operate air assault divisions with a comprehensive set of equipment and aircraft dedicated for achieving protected mobility of firepower which unleashes deep inside enemy the destructive power. However, a comprehensive air-superiority is the basic requirement. Hence an integrated or joint doctrine with air force has to be developed
c.
Hopping Capability. Indian mountain strike corps per-se need to have strong hopping capability – the helicopter definitely, is one option. However, it requires local air superiority to be achieved and an ability to escape enemy’s SAMs and anti-air artillery. Given the constraints and the need, the Mountain strike corps is predominantly infantry, 80,000 new troops indicate anyway to the infantry based thinking. These troops need to be backed up by heavy helicopter support, attack helicopters, alternative mountain mobility options, supported by unmanned aerial vehicles and potentially unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UAV/UCAV). The para-commandos and dedicated aircraft for para dropping need to be included in the orbat of the MSC.
d.
Strategic strike and airlift. With the induction of C-17 Globemaster III strategic airlift aircraft and C-130 transport aircraft, IAF will have a capability to lift a brigade equivalent across theaters and potentially para-drop inside enemy territory. Combining with dedicated Brahmos 290 km missile regiment, MSC should be able carry considerable firepower.
e.
Orbat of a mountain strike corps platoon/company. One of the proposed platoon level change (a platoon is part of a company and has 30+ troops – composed of 3 sections of 10 soldiers each- typically a homogeneous orbat). The section of 10 soldiers is the basic fighting unit of infantry. The proposal was to change the orbat of platoons into three heterogeneous sections. The rationale behind it is given below. The small, independent, information warfare capable units should be linked together through a series of multi-purpose, redundant, reliable, fault tolerant and intelligent communications links, Command and control (C2) nodes, logistics support links and Space and Electronic Warfare (SEW) links. These links should be secured and should pervade over whole battle space, where the battle space is defined as the whole extent of enemy forces including theater combat forces, strategic links, logistics dumps and command centers. Therefore the capabilities needed for are not only to observe our own space and terrain, but also the space and terrain of the potential enemies with an aim to rapidly move a large number of our highly mobile units capable of information combat and physical destruction of the enemy. These units will be called PICK (Platoons Information Combat and Killer) platoons. The PICK will be organized into three sections – Arms Section, Information Warfare section and C4ISR section.
f.
Integrated Logistics Support System (ILSS). Any organization that continues to operate with a logistics system designed for one environment, but operating in another, is bound to incur economic inefficiencies and operational ineffectiveness. Most of today’s military organizations face just such a situation. The Future warfare will have two fundamental impacts upon logistics system. Firstly, mobility of field forces has been a keystone. But mobility is greatly limited to the extent that the logistics system constrains it, particularly with the requirement of co-location. Mobile forces require flexible logistics systems. Secondly, the monetary value of field equipment, resulting from the introduction of electronics and advanced weaponry has risen rapidly.
Overstocking rifles and ammunition may not have been relatively expensive, but overstocking electronic direction finding equipment is. Hence, two prime requisites of future logistics support are that it must enhance rather than detract from mobility and it must be accurate in its knowledge of what material is where. The complexity of modern day support suggests that the needs of the user will be best served by an integration of the functional specialists within a single support organization that has direct access to the most vital logistic information. This indicates that the creation of an ILSS could provide visibility of assets including: quantity, condition, authorized stock levels, location and items in transit. An ILSS specialist, provided with a single command structure, should be able, upon direction, to redistribute assets anywhere within his command on a priority basis within a very short time frame.
5.
Chinese Doctrine and Strategy. What are the Chinese doctrine, strategy, and thinking against India? This requires a comprehensive construction of future actions and scenarios that China may construct and construe, or perhaps emerge in the dynamic geo-political situations when a global power, such as China, that is rapidly rising confronts the existing superpower across various global resources. An example of China’s thinking, (although not their official views, but then, China is such a centralized governance system, that so called individual views cannot be attributed to a lone researcher sitting somewhere and armchair these futures), is given in a recent report from China. The article gives details of future wars China will be fighting till 2050. On war against India to be fought around 2035, the article states, “… best strategy for China is to incite the disintegration of India. By dividing into several countries, India will have no power to cope with China.”
Striking China – It is not Military alone, stupid!
