Backdrop: An Indian approach to LIC

In the post war period, the Indian Armed Forces are amongst the most combat tested forces in the world. They have a rich fund of experience both in Conventional wars and Low Intensity Conflict Operations. The Indian Army, in fact, prides itself on evolving a manpower centric approach to Low Intensity conflict. This manpower intensive approach stands in direct contrast to the Technology or equipment intensive approach of the Americans, the Russians and other European countries. Being a large Army, the Indian military has been able to ensure troop rotation for sustained CI /CT campaigns lasting two decades or more.

This article is published with the kind permission of "Defence and Security Alert (DSA) Magazine" New Delhi-India

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The essentials of this Indian approach are:

• Light Infantry predominant operations that are marked by significant restraint in terms of weapons usage. The Indian Army has consciously eschewed the use of offensive air support, tanks, artillery and other large calibre weapons.
• Its operations have been prolonged and sustained and have usually served to tire out the insurgents and psychologically exhaust the population that may support them.
• The operations have been discriminate, humane and people friendly. The people in fact have been the Centre of Gravity of our operations.
• Its basic operational feature is the establishment of an area grid to dominate the geographical space and the human terrain. Sustained operations are used to exhaust and wear down the insurgents.

However in recent years, the Indian state is showing distinct signs of retreating even from this minimalist model of force usage that relies primarily on straight legged Infantry and small arms alone. Civil society has been asserting itself in terms of a plethora of NGOs that draw inspiration from Europe and other Western countries. The irony is that the Europeans and Americans themselves have made uninhibited use of bombers, fighters, tanks, artillery and heavy calibre weapons in their Counter Insurgency operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Yet there has hardly been a whimper from human rights organisations in the West who are so strident in accusing the Indian Security Forces of human rights violations. There is a major element of hypocrisy and double standards in the Western discourse on Counter Terrorism and human rights issues. The hypocrisy is evident in the blind eye being turned to the very fire power intensive operations of the US / ISAF in Afghanistan and elsewhere and the rather strident and exclusive focus on the Indian Security Forces despite their very low level of weapons usage. In the last two years, this stridency has reached a level that is now hampering legitimate SF operations. If this trend continues, India will soon find itself to be incapable of responding coherently to armed violence by non-state actors. This phenomenon is most visible in the operations against Left Wing Extremism where the use of SPOs (Special Police Officers) recruited from the local ethnic groups is being vehemently opposed. Yet these were extensively and very successfully used in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir. They are indispensable for navigating the local human terrain and help to provide actionable intelligence and intimate knowledge of local terrain and village politics. The celebrity status given to Dr Binayak Sen by the Indian media means no action can be taken against Over Ground Workers (OGWs) - a very critical component of the support structures of insurgent organisations. All this is seriously hobbling SF operations against the Naxals. In Jammu and Kashmir, the military operations have successfully broken the back of the terrorist movement. However, Pakistan’s ISI is trying desperately to revive infiltration and stoke rioting and arson in the communally sensitive districts of the Valley. This could lead to a sudden deterioration in the situation. There are strident calls for withdrawal of the Army from a highly sensitive border state that faces a combined threat from Chinese and Pakistani forces. There are demands for revocation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act that provides the basic legal cover for military operations in that state. Overall, a climate is being created that will hobble the state’s response to armed insurgencies and vicious foreign instigated terrorist movements. The primary focus is on delegitimising the use of the most potent and effective instrument - the Army. The Indian state is turning soft beyond a basic level of prudence. It has now started retreating even from its minimalist model of response.


There are demands for revocation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act that provides the basic legal cover for military operations in that state. Overall, a climate is being created that will hobble the state’s response to armed insurgencies and vicious foreign instigated terrorist movements. The primary focus is on delegitimising the use of the most potent and effective instrument - the Army. The Indian state is turning soft beyond a basic level of prudence. It has now started retreating even from its minimalist model of response


Dealing with the fourth generation of war

Terrorism today is the primary tool of asymmetric warfare designed to destabilise large multi-ethnic nation states. It primarily targets civilians and non-combatants and aims to inflict mass casualties. It has eroded a significant level of moral restraint traditionally observed in conflict by not targeting non-combatants. 9/11 and 26/11 have unveiled a new and dangerous level of mass casualty actions. These could easily graduate to catastrophic acts of terrorism if Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) or crude Radiological Dispersal Devices (RDDs) are used. The way the Pakistani state is sliding towards chaos, the chances of such catastrophic acts of terrorism are increasing exponentially. Jihadi terrorism has become a new form of warfare that has to defend nothing and is totally offensive in nature. It stymies the normal processes of justice by terrorising the common people and witnesses. It has become a new and dangerous form of warfare in the 21st century that calls for a new order of responses.

Counter terrorism approaches: GWOT vs the criminal justice model

The rest of the world has enacted stringent new laws to deal with this form of war. The Americans have set up military courts to swiftly try and award stringent punishment to such terrorists. They have adopted a clear cut and ruthless “War against Terrorism approach” designed to protect their population. They relentlessly hunted down Osama bin Laden and meted justice to him in his ISI safe house in the Pakistani military cantonment of Abbottabad, after 10 years of painstaking pursuit. The simple fact is that this model has worked eminently so far. After 9/11 there has not been another successful strike on the soil of the continental United States.


Terrorism today is the primary tool of asymmetric warfare designed to destabilise large multi-ethnic nation states. It primarily targets civilian and non-combatants and aims to inflict mass casualties. It has eroded a significant level of moral restraint traditionally observed in conflict by not targeting non-combatants. 9/11 and 26/11 have unveiled a new and dangerous level of mass casualty actions. These could easily graduate to catastrophic acts of terrorism if Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) or crude Radiological Dispersal Devices (RDDs) are used. The way the Pakistani state is sliding towards chaos, the chances of such catastrophic acts of terrorism are increasing exponentially


India, in sharp contrast, is possibly one of the rare countries in the world that has insisted upon following a “Criminal Justice” model in its approach to Counter-Terrorism. It insists that this 21st century phenomenon of highly lethal terrorism must be dealt with under the archaic 19th century British enactment of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) designed for common criminals. The levels of violence in colonial India were dramatically lower than they are today. Our non-violent freedom struggle was characterised by a complete absence of violence and at best implied crowd control. Such an archaic approach fails to account for the highly lethal form of this new wave of terrorism. Even more unfortunate is the attempt to play communal politics with our Counter-Terrorism operations. This approach is reprehensible because it equates Jihadi terrorism with Islam and the Muslim Community. Nothing could be further from the truth. Islam is a stately world religion that does not condone the murder of innocents. Yet some politicians, by equating the two, unconsciously ask for a soft approach to terrorism, in the mistaken belief that this will make them popular with the community. It actually does great disservice to the beleaguered community.

Highly misplaced notions of liberalism have prevented the Indian state from executing convicted terrorists like Afzal Guru and Kasab. What kind of a signal does this send to the Jihadi Tanzeems? It sends a signal of pathetic weakness that invites more such attacks. The state seems more concerned about the human rights of the terrorists than their victims.