Defence Plans Must Be Both NBC – Ready And To Coordinate Disastour Management
By
Colonel Awadhesh Kumar, Veteran
All over the world presently a different breed of fighters are in action, — the health professionals who are putting their lives on the line daily and saving lives. These dedicated health workers are indeed the ‘ Corona Warriors’. However there should be no mistake of sidelining the traditional militaries in the bargain.
In most of the countries the regular military, reservists and Police are playing important roles. In India too Armed Forces are providing vital quarantine facilities and some much-wanted treatment facilities. The Central Police Forces like the BSF, CRPF and ITBP are all helping out. Indian Air Force aircraft have been employed to bring stranded Indians back from China, Italy and Iran and plans are afoot to evacuate our large diaspora (around 5 lakh) from the Middle East via Indian naval ships and IAF aircrafts.
This increased importance of HADR (Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief) would call for a force-structuring. That is even more important, given the fact that the Indian diaspora is spread across the globe and their physical and emotional well-being become priorities to build up national morale.
The relative dangers posed by a traditional enemy and an unseen virus as now, both have to be taken into account. The two-front war threat, along with terrorism/counter-insurgency in India’s context, would also continue into the foreseeable future.
Just like the Americans were engaged in military operations in Iraq while fighting the pandemic, and the NATO and US militaries were redeployed in the midst of the pandemic to stately counter drug cartels in the Pacific, even we Indians have been fighting Pakistani terrorists on Indian soil.
So, multi-tasking is inescapable for militaries such as ours, but the peculiar nature of the corona threat would, perhaps, call for some inescapable revamp of our force-structuring.
Firstly all the foolish half baked concept of Outsourcing must be vanquished at once. Armed Forces must be self contained in all respect. Then only they will be able to look after themselves and provide relief to the Civil population. Tail is as important as the teeth …..this should not be forgotten. Hopefully Corona has helped the Indian Military realize this.
Next as Indian Navy has now made nearly all its Ship fit to operate in a Nuclear Biological Chemical threat environment, so must be the case with Army and the IAF. Every brigade must have a first line of individual NBC kit to equip one infantry battalion and store it locally. Similarly all Military Hospitals should have such kits for 100 % of its staff and for the staff of ECHS operating under its jurisdiction.After all we have been talking of operating in NBC environment since 1980s.
Now coming to the next facet of HADR the following needs to be addressed on priority :
• Heavy lift aircrafts like C17 / IL76 needs build up to six squadrons ie 72 air crafts from the present 16 to 18.
• Heavy lift helicopters of MI26 / Chinook variety again needs build up to six squadrons from present 16 to 18.
• The Amphibious lift capability of the Indian Navy should be built up over the next ten years to ensure that we an Amphibious Squadron each with Southern Naval Command and the Andaman & Nicobar Command. Each Squadron must compromise 8x 1000 ton LCU, 4x 2500 ton LST, 2x 8000 ton LST and 1x 20000 ton LPD.
• Both Western and Eastern Naval commands must have 1x 20000 ton LPD, 3 x 45000 ton oil tankers, 4×15000 ton Replenishment Ships and 8x 5000 ton Replenishment Ships.
• Raising of an Auxiliary Air Force on lines of Territorial Army and also raisi g of few AAF Squadrons to make use of the vast national assets in form of all the Commercial airliners.
• Raising more units of Railway TA with capability to operate in NBC environment
When the lock down was announced our existing military rail system for war should have been given a kick start. All military personnel stranded away from their units on leave/courses/temporary duty should have been moved by rail/airlifted from designated places after duce screening and under protective gear.
Next a combination of Mil Rail and AAF could have transported a major part of the migrant interstate population.
Next if we had adequate heavy lift helicopters they could have played a major in neutralizing the migrant labour crisis. The heavy air lift alongwith AAF would have evacuated all our national from all over the world.
The above crisis no doubt a national shame, requires certain major organizational changes too. These are as under :
• The Vice Chairman of NDMA (National Disastour Management Authority must be a Service Chief who has just retired (PM is the Chairman).
• The Department of Military Affairs must have a Brigadier rank officer to manage a Disastour Management Coordination Cell.
• The Chief of Integrated Defence Staff and the three Vice Chiefs must form part of the National Crisis Management committee.
• The Reservists concept must be put on track in form of either activation of pure reservist units or reservist companies with TA battalions or reservist companies with regular battalions. This will enable full preparedness for both frontier war and corona type wars.
Along with the above, the cyber and space domains have to be strengthened. Large-scale cyber attacks against critical infrastructure could pose a direct threat impacting economy, healthcare and our basic way of life, perhaps even more than what Covid-19 has already done to us.
Likewise, food distribution supply chains, banking and telecommunication could be adversely impacted by a cyber attack. A fall back on reservists could be an option, especially in aid of civil power. Cutbacks in defence spending may become inevitable but key facilities will have to be strengthened.
The strategic goal of militaries is to defend the nation and its people. Hence all the unseen threats have to be planned for In our operational plans through software and standard operating procedures, such that the services can undertake their tasks unhampered.
