Conceived in 2007 the Indian unmanned strike air vehicle (USAV)-an attack version of the reconnaissance and surveillance and strike type of unmanned aerial vehicle that has had an impressive record of precision drone attacks against Islamist terrorists in the tribal belt in Pakistan’s Waziristan – should come out of the project definition stage by 2015. It is projected to be ready for squadron service by 2020. One will have to say “god willing” given the… Read More »Requirement of UCAV

For long, the cry was heard that the Indian Army was largely “night blind” or unable to fight a war in the dark. This was hardly an admission that any modern, self-respecting, fighting force should make. Yet, through well-placed leaks and frequent innuendos the impression was created that the Indian Army was deficit in at least one of the capabilities that a modern-day war requires. The implication was that most of the tank and mechanized… Read More »Night fighting capabilities

With the advent of nanotechnology in military warfare, it is no more a dream or a just science fiction where aliens invade Earth and return without getting injured despite heavy exchange of ground fire from best equipped soldiers having ultra decimated guns at their hands. The aliens could escape because they had nano-particles inside the body of their soldiers which had given them extra speed, extra mobility and extra lethality to deal with fire from… Read More »Nanotechnology for soldiers

There has been talk of improvement of infrastructure-helipads, airstrips for heavy-lift aircraft, roads, bridges and everything else that allows for easy passage and maintenance of a large body of fighting men all along the Line of Actual Control opposite that of the Chinese positions-since the middle of the last decade. The Government of India at that point of time abandoned its policy of deliberate benign neglect of the landscape adjoining the LAC in Arunachal Pradesh… Read More »Infrastructure along LAC

Difficult terrain in the early years of warfare (World War I and World War II) was that landscape that was serrated with trenches and cratered by the fall of heavy ball-type artillery which tended to obstruct passage of motor vehicles and towed and self-propelled guns thereby obstructing the momentum of the battlefield charge. Trench warfare was the norm rather than the exception in these two conflicts and the kind of obstruction they created to mass… Read More »Terrain warfare

The Indian Army is considered as among the best trained army in the world when it comes to mountain or high altitude warfare. India, due to the instability in the region, hostile neighbors with the need for permanent deployments in the mountainous regions, has come a long way since 1962. India’s mountain warfare units were vastly expanded after the 1962 war, with the creation of 6 Mountain Divisions. But it was the shortcomings and observations… Read More »Winter warfare

India is in the process of creating the Future Infantry Soldier As a System (F-INSAS). The conceptual framework of the project is to impart increased protection (survivability), lethality with a range of higher caliber infantry weapons, mobility and the ability to fight at night. It is, thus, an amalgamation of each of these capabilities on each soldier of the Indian Army from 2020 onwards. Of special interest is ‘protection’ given that lethality has increased in… Read More »Body armor

The efficacy of an attack helicopter or a helicopter gunship is best understood in pugilistic terminology. Where it enjoys the advantage of reach (the range of its onboard weaponry be it the gun or missiles/rockets) it is king but where the enemy has the greater reach the helicopter can become a coffin. As India learned to its dismay in Kargil where a helicopter and an aircraft were lost to shoulder-fired Stinger surface-to-air missiles after which… Read More »Chopper needs

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s brainwave to allow a transplantation of population in Arunachal Pradesh is a strategy that appears to have been only partially thought through. It appears to be moulded to the concept enunciated during border talks with China that populated areas would not be disturbed in any future border demarcation. In Arunachal Pradesh, Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself has spoken of populating the many open spaces that lie in that border State largely… Read More »Border settlement

In April 2010, Chinese Rear Admiral Zhang Huachen, then-deputy commander of the East Sea Fleet of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN), declared: “We are going from coastal defence to far sea defence. With the expansion of the country’s naval strategy of the country’s economic interests, the navy wants to better protect the country’s transportation routes and the safety of our major seal lane.” This statement symbolized China’s departure from Deng Xiaoping’s dictum “Hide brightness,… Read More »Maritime challenges