13 minute read
DEFENCE AND SECURITY
EMERGING SECURITY TRENDS
Charting the nation’s security environment is a veritable conundrum in today’s complex web of threats.
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SYNERGIA FOUNDATION
RESEARCH TEAM
This article is based on the 113th Forum on the ‘Future of Warfare’, organised in collaboration with the Ministry of Defence.
As a think tank, we consider it our primary duty to ideate on security-related issues and align our national leadership, the military leadership, the defence research community and the defence production sector to their respective strategies for the future. All decisions concerning procurement of strategic weapons and decisions that have a bearing on indigenising production must be anchored around what, where and how conflicts will be fought in the future. More importantly, companies that are at the forefront of 21st-century warfare must be helped to better understand the nature of conflicts in the region.
CATCHING THE TREND
The past is not a very good model to predict the future because the future turns out always in ways that we do not anticipate. No wonder militaries are always blamed for preparing for wars that have already been fought and then getting surprised in the next one! However, if security pundits look at current trends and extrapolate them for the future, they may be able to foretell future conflict outcomes with a degree of accuracy.
Future conflicts are unlikely to arise out of a clash of ideology, say like the Cold War when communism was pitched against capitalism. Even the so-called ‘clash of civilisations’ being propagated by those who predict radical Islam trying to overwhelm the so-called ‘civilised’ world is more of an idea that has been on the wane, once Al Qaeda and ISIS were decisively crushed. The conflict is more likely to be over regions that are stores of valuable resources. Water and clean air themselves may become a source of conflict if their scarcity threatens civilisation. Rising water levels or shrinking habitable and cultivable areas may also spark conflicts.
As global power dynamics change, friends and allies will shift loyalties. Pakistan, which was staunchly in the American camp during the Cold War, is today a close ally of China. Even if we look at India, from maintaining a strong strategic autonomy (with a perceptible tilt towards the USSR) for over four decades, it now looks at the U.S. to anchor a strategic partnership in the Indo-Pacific to counter the Chinese.
However, one sphere where conflict will rage across all regions and spectrums unabated will be the battle to win perceptions and minds of the global audience. Social me-
To overcome the domestic abhorrence for combat mortalities and returning body bags, western military powers are investing heavily in private military contractors. The Iraq war and Afghanistan witnessed the private military contractor business reaching record highs - with the ratio of regular military to private contractor crossing over 75 per cent.
Lt. Gen. PJS Pannu is the Former Deputy Chief of the Indian Integrated Defence Staff.
“Today, Industry 4.0 sets the benchmark on how future warfare will be fought. Very quickly, we have moved from analogous to autonomous applications through digital transformation. Many countries have shifted to autonomous applications through artificial intelligence. Over the past 20 years, the way countries have been thinking of, and preparing for warfare has largely revolved around digitalisation, remotisation, and hybridisation.”
dia will rule the wave of influence operations, creating perceptions of victory in an era of indecisive wars. The devastating power of modern arsenal, both conventional and nuclear, has made wars too expensive and destructive to be waged on a large scale between major combatants. War as a means to achieve political ends is getting far more difficult and complex. Of course, small states are fair game for bigger powers in a one-sided unequal contest of arms- the U.S. in Granada, Panama and even Iraq; Russia in Georgia, Crimea and now in Ukraine. Even the Gulf Wars and the Global War on Terrorism waged in Afghanistan, fought with the concurrence of the UN, saw the military might of the developed world being concentrated on a solitary lesser power. Even major countries would prefer to use multinational efforts to deal with evolving security situations rather than going it alone so as to spread the risk and the cost.
More importantly, public opinion, especially in democracies, needs to be turned in favour of war. This trend is very clearly visible in the ongoing confrontation in Ukraine between NATO and Russia, with both sides making aggressive manoeuvres but actually shying away from firing the first shot. Of course, miscalculations, especially on the part of authoritarian regimes, cannot be ruled out, which can result in the breakout of large-scale conventional fighting. President Saddam’s misreading of international signals to launch his ill-fated invasion of oil-rich Kuwait is not too far back in human memory.
To overcome the domestic abhorrence for combat mortalities and returning body bags, western military powers are investing heavily in private military contractors. The Iraq war and Afghanistan witnessed the private military contractor business reaching record highs - with the ratio of regular military to private contractor crossing over 75 per cent. Outsourcing combat is big business today, unlike what we saw in the Congo in the 1960s when unemployed troopers of Special Forces from South Africa, Belgium, Portugal, France and England were hired for a pittance to fight for African despots, skimming the mineral resource pile of their impoverished nations. Today companies like Black Water (reflagged as Academi since 2011) are run professionally as corporations. The Russians, too, have entered the market with their Wagner Group active in Syria and Libya.
Military expeditionary forces are expensive to maintain for a sustained period of time. The Americans, whose entire force structure is based on fighting overseas, are finding it difficult to foot the bill for their overseas commitments. At a conservative estimate, Afghanistan has cost more than $14 trillion to the American taxpayer! With the costs rising, it is unlikely that big powers are going to directly get involved in open wars in other countries, especially if you are already carrying a burden of a huge national debt.
Nuclear arms remain attractive as it convinces smaller powers that it gives them immunity from an all-out invasion from stronger enemies. North Korea clearly gives strength to this perception, and perhaps it is this protection that Iran is striving for. However, nuclear arms will mean more frequent nuclear sabre rattling, something which occurs very frequently in India’s neighbourhood with Pakistan. Even some undeclared nuclear powers like Israel can convey an unsaid threat to its potential aggressors to keep them at bay. So while major nuclear powers, including new entrants like India and Pakistan, have established a sort of nuclear equilibrium/ stability, it is these rogue powers and those that have nuclear devices in their closet that pose the gravest threat to global peace.
The rules-based international order is under siege. The UNCLOS has been totally ignored by China in its maritime disputes with the Philippines, which had international law on its side. With weakening international structures, weaker
countries will have greater diffi culty in safeguarding their rights, especially in erstwhile global commons like deep sea and outer space.
REGIONAL THREAT ENVELOPE
Since its independence, India’s security concerns have been guided largely by two of its militarily strong neighbours, with both having a formidable strategic capability at their disposal. The fact that India has fought a number of wars with both and continues to have at best an adversarial relationship sums up the nature of India’s security dilemma when it has to count the cost of a conventional and nuclear deterrent to keep its sovereignty intact.
Apart from the conventional and nuclear threat, there is an actual hybrid confl ict also being waged in India’s periphery as also in its hinterland - proxy war, terrorism, drug and counterfeit currency operations at a vast scale, infl uence ops through social media and cyber-attacks on Indian institutions. There is a blurring between combat along the LoC and the hybrid/grey zone war being waged in the hinterland. In fact, the confl ict is in a continuum, in perpetuity. The threat thresholds are being lowered, and many an adversary that may pop up may not even be our security risk management matrix.
The last two years of the pandemic and the vast destruction caused globally both in terms of life and treasure have opened fresh fears of bioweapons. Such a weapon can cause devastation beyond imagination amongst India’s teeming millions.
While all combatants showed exemplary restraint from indulging in chemical warfare after the First World War, the threat has not disappeared. Saddam had used it against his own citizens, and so has President Assad of Syria. In fact, any country which has a basic pharmaceutical industry can develop chemical weapons, which like bioweapons, also have a disclaimer attached because you do not know from where they are delivered.
The next frontier for global contestation will be the deep oceans whose untold riches lie untapped in their dark depths. However, every day, we are getting closer to new technology that can ensure their commercial exploitation. Once this stage is reached, the fi ght for EEZs and the right to secure the mineral resources on the sea bed will become a bone of contention between competing corporations backed by powerful nations. Confl ict will be the logical conclusion. India, with its 2.37 million sq miles of EEZ, will be hard-pressed to protect its ocean wealth.
In our frenzy to digitise all aspects of our lives, we have lost track of the vulnerabilities that we are creating for ourselves. Propped up by electric power, which itself is generated, transmitted, distributed and accounted for through digital processors, our digital world is thoroughly enslaved to the vagaries of power outages. Our critical infrastructures are prone to cyber-attacks from distant shores with little or zero attributes. Even in those rare cases where attribution is possible, there is no set of formal laws to act on them.
THE SPACE DOMAIN
Space is no longer a neutral, global commons as stipulated by various UN treaties. The recent Chinese test of a spacebased hypersonic missile is indicative of how destructive technologies are exploiting space for military superiority. Says Lt Gen PJS Pannu (Retired), former Deputy Chief of Integrated Staff Operations, “The Chinese have invested hugely on space. In fact, 40 per cent of the orbital space over India is being occupied collectively between the U.S. and China. 15 per cent of the orbital spaces over India is with China.”
“Space is a new domain, and defence budgets in Asia particularly are giving it more credence through enlarged allocations,” says Mr Craig McGilvray, the Regional Director of Lockheed Martin Space. “You see a tremendous amount of future spend in Korea. You see increasing budgets in Thailand as well as in Japan, all focusing on space resiliency.”
To build a comprehensive space catalogue, data integrity
OVERVIEW OF ELECTRONIC WARFARE
ELECTRONIC ATTACK Use of electromagnetic energy, directed Use of electromagnetic energy, directed energy, or antiradiation weapons to attack personnel, facilities, or equipment attack personnel, facilities, or equipment with the intent of degrading, neutralizing, with the intent of degrading, neutralizing, or destroying enemy combat capability and is considered a form of fi res.
l Electromagnetic Jamming (e.g., CounterRCIE, standoff jamming) l Electromagnetic Deception l Antiradiation Missile l Directed Energy l Expendables (e.g., Flares and active decoys)
ELECTRONIC PROTECTION Actions taken to protect personnel, facilities, and equipment from any efforts of friendly or eney use of electromagnetic spectrum that degrade, neutralize, or destroy friendly combat capability.
l Spectrum Management l EM Hardening l Emission Control
ELECTRONIC WARFARE SUPPORT
Actions tasked by, or under direct control of, an operational commander to search for, intercept, identify, and locate or localize sources of intentional and unintentional radiated electromagnetic energy for the purpose of immediate threat recognition, targeting, planning, and conduct of future operations.
l Threat Warning l Collection Supporting EW l Direction Finding
is key for facilitating sharing of geospatial intelligence. The space domain gives rise to many questions – the applicability of the OODA loop principle to decision making in space, around cognitive warfare, manoeuvre detection, threat detection and space object identification. The key question is one of interoperability in space between partner countries. Therefore, it is important that like-minded countries collaborate through existing initiatives like the Quad. Together, space and cyber will become combined technology enablers for future warfare, as a huge amount of cyber applications will be going through space than through terrestrial media.
GROOMING FUTURE LEADERS
Future operational leadership will have to be up to speed to keep up with all the developments and disruptions taking place across all domains, the constantly changing rules of engagements, especially in the space domain. “What is now required is a 360 degree rounded personality in terms of leadership construct,” says Col KPM Das (Retd), National Cyber Security Officer at Cisco.
Irrespective of the physical result of tactical engagements on the ground, in space or in the depths of the ocean, the outcome is decided by the perception and the narrative around that tactical engagement. India has a great deal to catch up in relation to its Northern neighbour on this account.
A major responsibility that military leaders have to bear is the need to prepare their million-strong soldiers to be prepared for the next war, and not the one which was fought a decade back. The future operational construct must be translated down through doctrine, training and evolving tactical and operational philosophies.
ROAD TO SELF-RELIANCE
With this security environment, it is obvious that India’s defence expenditure has been climbing over the years. Sadly, despite a significant manufacturing base and a large government-financed R& D infrastructure, India continues to have the dubious distinction of being one of the largest arms importers in the world. For a nation aspiring to great power status, such a situation wherein you are dependent upon an external supply of high-tech weapons is no longer acceptable or affordable.
The Indian industry, especially those related to defence production, must quickly advance to Industry 4.0 standards and move rapidly from analogous through digital transformation to autonomous. Many leading militaries are already on the cusp of shifting to autonomous applications through artificial intelligence (AI). It may be recollected that China is today accepted as one of the leaders in AI.
Imported technology is never cutting edge; it is like paying a premium for an expensive insurance policy which turns out to be a dud when things start collapsing. In the field of defence, you may spend billions in importing arms which may turn out to be second best in a war. However, if the technology is homegrown and is world-class, potential adversaries will think twice before applying kinetic measures against us. The secret of American power lies in its ability to stay far ahead of the pack in the technology curve; it is only now that it fears that this edge is slowly being nibbled at by China.
Around 40- 50 per cent of a nation’s comprehensive national power will go into science and technology, research and development and ensuring that its industry is empowered with the latest technology. Col KPM Das (Retd) has a word of caution on the rapidity with which technology gets obsolete these days. “The technology cycles are so fast that procurement cycles of the services just cannot keep up. The budgets have to be so modelled that they can sustain technology which can last for at least 15 to 20 years,” he says.
Therefore, there is clearly a solid rationale for the government to seriously consider the civilian sector industry as an equal partner in taking defence programs forward. This will require an injection of people from the private sector, who are willing to lead some of these missions for the battlefield.
Craig McGilvray is the Regional Director & Asia Business Leader at Lockheed Martin Australia.
“The more we invest in space in Asia, greater will be the quality of data obtained. Better precision and data sharing will also become possible. But in order to do so, we need technology transfer. Sharing in geospatial intelligence is also key. ”
