Arun Sahgal

Why is the Pakistan military pushing for Military Courts when the country already has a fairly robust Anti Terrorism Act together with designated Anti Terrorism Courts set up specifically to try terrorism related offences?

• Published: January 14, 2015
• IDSA Comments

The recent heavy firing by the Pakistani army is to gain public sympathy and providing it greater flexibility in the flawed civil-military relations. It is an orchestrated plan to provoke India believing that it can take such a risk of escalation in the back drop of its effective nuclear capability.

• Published: October 10, 2014
• IDSA Comments

In the short-term India needs to let the internal situation within Pakistan play itself out and see what emerges from the standoff. There is no doubt that Pakistan will have to be engaged but terms and manner will be dictated by the prevailing political and economic scenario in India, Afghanistan and the region including India-China relations.

• Published: August 22, 2014
• IDSA Comments

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Defence’s figures reveals that the army's equipment modernisation is steadily falling. In 2008-09, the army spent 27 paisa of every rupee on capital expenditure. This fell to 24 paisa in 2009-10; 23 paisa in 2010-11; 20 paisa in 2012-13 and just 18 paisa in the last two years. Resultantly the army’s ambitious plans to transform from a ‘threat-based to a capability force’ by 2020 are being consistently thwarted.

• Published: July 31, 2014
• IDSA Comments

Islamabad remains sanguine that as long as it can leverage both cross border terrorism as well as conventional asymmetry by playing the nuclear card, it can easily manage relations with India.

• Published: August 12, 2013
• IDSA Comments

In the light of the US rebalancing strategy in the Asia-Pacific, the Indian dilemma is how to boost its relationship with the US that can provide an impetus to its economy and defence capability building without antagonising China.

• Published: July 09, 2012
• IDSA Comments

The asymmetric military balance prevailing between India and China is likely to get accentuated overtime if effective political and military steps are not taken by to address the same. The paper looks upon the need to develop an asymmetric strategy by India to prevent domination by inimical or hostile adversaries. This paper attempts to examine the principles of the Chinese Anti Access Strategy and use that as a model to develop the contours of an Indian ‘Grand Strategy that entails developing military capabilities capable of inflicting damage and raising the cost of intervention.

• Published: July 2011
• Journal of Defence Studies

The philosophy of approach toward military technology is based on purpose, vision, relevance, efficiency and performance. Being Indian in content is what needs to be added to the above! Sixty four years down the line, four battle engagements later, our defence technology story is one of unexpected miracles and unacceptable failures. It is in above context that a holistic understanding of the foundation on which the edifice of the defence industrial base of India needs to be progressively pillared becomes imperative?

• Published: April 2011
• Journal of Defence Studies

Militaries of major states in the international system have been responding to the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) debate, mainly to the technological and operational concepts propounded by the US, even though most of them particularly in Asia continue to grapple with its full import. First off the blocks in Asia has been China. Given the salience of the American threat perspective in any Taiwan-centric conflict scenario, it has identified rapid development in high technology with Informaion Technology(IT) at its core as the means to bring about revolutionary changes in the military field as a strategic and operational necessity to meet the challenge.

• Published: August 2007
• Journal of Defence Studies

The deeply troubling situation in Nepal is marked by three discernible trends. First, is the collapse of the ceasefire and commencement of violent activities, including strikes, blockades and attacks by the Maoists. This has led to the revival of counter-insurgency operations by the Royal Nepalese Army (RNA), reinforced by a fresh supply of arms and ammunition, and other military hardware from China.

• Published: January 2006
• Strategic Analysis