NEW DELHI: A “belligerent” China will continue to assert itself by seeking to establish dominance in countries surrounding India along land borders as well as the Indian Ocean Region (IOR), said chief of defence staff General Bipin Rawat on Thursday.
With India facing a complex and challenging security environment, the armed forces need to be prepared for military threats from both China and Pakistan by transforming themselves into an integrated war-fighting machinery through the setting up of unified theatre commands and other such measures, said Gen Rawat.
Addressing a webinar organized by the College of Defence Management (CDM) in Secunderabad, the top military officer said, “2020 has been an interesting year. The world had to grapple with a corona pandemic…losing millions of lives…We (India) also stood up to our belligerent neighbour (China) on the northern borders and thwarted their nefarious design.”
“Now more than any other time, military transformation is vital for us. Threats for which our military must be organized primarily comes from China and Pakistan. In future, China will continue to assert itself, seeking to establish dominance in states surrounding India and in the IOR,” he added.
Stressing that the Indian armed forces will “increasingly need to achieve more with less” due to budgetary constraints, despite facing greater challenges probably than any other military in the world, the CDS said the Army, Navy and IAF need to “relook” at existing force structures, doctrines, concepts and technology.
“Some important steps that we need to take include — defining the national security strategy, higher defence strategic guidance, structural reforms in higher defence and operational organizations,” he added.
The webinar was held just ahead of the combined commanders’ conference (CCC) that began at Kevadia in Gujarat and will be addressed by defence minister Rajnath Singh on Friday and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday.
The CCC will be held in the backdrop of no de-escalation with China in the Depsang Plains, Gogra, Hot Springs and Demchok areas of eastern Ladakh, though the two armies disengaged on both sides of the Pangong Tso last month.
Gen Rawat, at the webinar, said the Indian military since Independence has grown from a small force with limited warfare capabilities into a large and modern fighting machine.
“The organizational structures for conventional wars or limited conflicts under the nuclear overhang already exist, but they need to be re-modelled, re-equipped and re-oriented to conduct joint battles in digitized battlespace to have necessary flexibility for other types of operations,” he said.
“We must effectively also leverage the opportunity provided by our Island territories which enables us to extend our reach, orchestrate our defence strategy and also provide depth to the mainland,” he added.