Defence Notes
New Delhi, 13 November 2006
Towards Growing
Might At Sea
TASK AHEAD OF NEW
NAVY CHIEF
By B.K. Mathur
Indian Navy has now a new Chief in Suresh Mehta and,
importantly, he will remain at the helm for nearly three years, till August
2009. He is equal to the task, like any
of his predecessors; otherwise he
would not have got to the top of the ladder, to the Admiral’s rank. Name any of
the challenging assignment in the
sea force and he has held it satisfactorily after having been commissioned into the force in July 1967: Chief of Personnel
at the headquarters, Director-General Coast Guards and Flag Officer
Commanding-in-Chief Western and Eastern Naval Commands. His task as the Chief
is all the more challenging at the time when India’s Navy is no more a “silent
force”. It is moving towards India’s growing
might at sea.
How well and fast the Navy grows under Mehta would depend
upon the way the Admiral handles the system which has its limitations under the
defence policy makers and babudom. The sea force, like the army and the air
force, had its ups and downs. It
remained a small and silent force until December 1971. But its exploits in the
war against Pakistan
that year gave it a new dimension. It
thrilled the country with the Naval exploits and punch off Karachi
and then Visakhapatnam where Pakistan’s
lethal submarine was sunk. That
operation prompted the Navy to traditionally celebrate its day on December 4.
The neglected service began to get the Government’s greater attention, and its
modernization and upgradation plans began to be taken up in earnest.
Plans after plans have been made for updating and
modernizing the Navy since 1971, raising two important questions: Has the Navy
become a super-power? And, has the resource crunch all these years affected the
force’s long-term development, keeping in view the fact that the gestation
period in the sea force is quite long.
To the first question, the Navy Chief Jayant Nadkarni had reacted as the
Chief of the Naval Staff some 16 years ago.
The Western media’s description of the Indian Navy as the “Super Navy”
was nothing but a “crescendo of chorus” by vested interests”. What had actually
happened was that the expansion was confined to replacement of fighting ships
and systems earlier phased out.
Actually, the Navy has suffered all these years for lack of
understanding of two realities. One, the
growth should be directly proportionate to the country’s maritime interests. India’s sea force is undoubtedly eighth largest
in the world, but don’t forget that India has the fifth largest
coastline in the world---7,650 kms and an area of over two million sq. km. of Exclusive
Economic Zone. Secondly, it needs to be
understood that in a full-fledged sea warfare, the operation could spread to
thousands of kilometers throughout the length and breadth of the sea where a
battle might take place. In the Indian
Ocean and the seas around India,
there are a number of powers operating with highly sophisticated machinery and
lethal weapon systems.
For this kind of a challenging task at sea, “the Navy has
not been doing enough open ocean work”, as Admiral Madhavendra Singh had stated
as the CNS three years ago. The force has yet to be made a real blue-water
Navy, which it really is not so, notwithstanding the implementation of several
modernization plans. The Navy has to be built around three aircraft-carriers,
at least 30 destroyers and frigates and replenishment ships. But where do we stand now? The strength of the naval force is not even
what it used to be in the 1980s and 90s, where we had two aircraft-carriers and
were preparing for a big underwater Navy and missile
boats. One of the carriers Vikrant has
retired. The other one, Viraaat has, no doubt, been renovated at high cost but
has a limited life. Another second-hand carrier has been negotiated with Russia,
but God only knows when it will deck into the Indian coast, duly refitted and
upgraded.
Successive Naval Chiefs
have talked of big plans for the force’s development. But none had much to show
when he relinquished his charge. Admiral
Arun Prakash, who handed the Navy to Mehta on October 31 last too was not very
happy about the strength of the force. He had admitted in an interview to the Indian
Defence Review that the Navy’s force level will keep on reducing till 2012. He
had disclosed in 2004 that while the Government had approved maintenance of
the, then, existing force levels, the de-commissioning
of warship would outnumber new inductions. He had blamed the situation on
inadequate augmentation of the force between 1985 and 1996.
Another very significant point he made repeatedly in that
interview was that the Navy suffered a force imbalance because a large
proportion of the Fleet comprises “brown water” or smaller ships. This needs to be rectified with the addition
of more “blue water” capability. In this
context, almost all Naval Chiefs in recent years have regretted that the
Government was not willing to give the Navy a long-term assurance
of funds. Remember, the Naval planning
requires at least a 15-year plan which the late Jagjiwan Ram and former
President Venkataraman had envisaged as Defence Ministers.
But that has not happened so far, year after year, decade
after decade. It takes a lot of time to
negotiate expensive purchases of military machines and systems from abroad. So
also is the case with indigenous production.
This really is the reason why considerable amount of annual defence
budget has lapsed during the last few years.
Plans are made at the budget time, but are not implemented during the
budget year. More about this development another time. At the moment, let us see what Admiral Mehta
is required to pursue for the force development and what priorities of
acquisitions are needed to be drawn up. His predecessor
had done enough in this direction; now those plans need to be followed up
faithfully.
Admiral Mehta’s priority is clear: Consolidation of the
Navy’s rapidly transforming role from being just a silent service to a potent
maritime power in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) to further the country’s
geostrategic objectives. He will have to
ensure that the force levels do not fall below the present 130 warships and 16
submarines. These levels are to be kept up, given the fact that over 70
existing warships would have to be gradually replaced in the next 10-15 years.
The replacement process could start
satisfactorily for the sea force only when the present plans for acquisition or
indigenous production of warships get started right now. At present the Navy
has under production or order as many as 33 warships from foreign or indigenous
sources. In addition to this, the
requirement would be for another 30 ships in the next 10-15 years.
The spadework to meet the requirements 10-15 years later
should start right now. And for that handling
of the file-pushers in the Defence Ministry would be required. In addition to the need for keeping up the
force level, Mehta’s Naval headquarters must also keep chasing the already
kicked-off Rs.18,798 crore project to build Scorpine submarines at the Mazagon
Docks between 2012 and 2017. The project for the indigenous production of the
air defence ships is to be speeded up, since the two more of these would be
required even after the induction of the refurbished Admiral Gorshkov carrier
from Russia. A challenging task indeed, Admiral.---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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