By Western standards, India possesses many of the components of an expeditionary force structure but is only now beginning to bring them together. Hitherto, India’s priorities have been elsewhere and its resources too limited, while profound dysfunctions still exist within the nation’s defense machinery.
Nevertheless, the country has rarely shied away from the employment of military force over the shore if the national interest has demanded it, and a number of successful operations have dealt with unexpected contingencies. In the past, such operations tended to be based on ad hoc organizations with little joint integration, but change may be on the way.
The Operational Record
The primary, sometimes the only, advocate in India for maritime power was long its navy. It consistently argued for a greater focus on the Indian Ocean but until recently to relatively little effect. Any priority the navy received after independence in 1947 over the demands of the army and air force or internal security concerns tended to be temporary and crisis-driven. It was frustrated by the government’s focus on the threat over land from Pakistan and China. In the words of Rahul Roy-Chaudhury, senior fellow for South Asia at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, up to the year 2000, “Indian security considerations over the past 50 years [were] dominated by developments on land, with maritime affairs being perceived merely as an extension of these activities.”1 Such national strategic priorities—as well as organizational weight—were consistently reflected in the funding the Indian navy received.
Despite its constraints on capability, the Indian navy nevertheless established a tradition of flexible response to crises in the Indian Ocean littoral and a readiness to improvise. On occasion, this could go badly wrong. One incident in particular, dating from the Indo-Pakistan War of 1971, is still held up as a warning to the unwary. An amphibious landing on a beach south of Cox’s Bazar on the coast of what is now Bangladesh on 15 December 1971 went seriously awry. It had been thrown together with little time for preparation and with very little expert advice. The selected beach had the wrong gradient, offshore sandbars, and extreme currents. The landing ship Gharial was nearly lost after broaching-to on a sandbank, and three Ghurka soldiers, untrained in amphibious work (and probably unable to swim) were drowned. As the Indian navy’s official history has observed of this “fiasco”: “Every mishap in this operation was attributed to the lack of detailed planning.”2
The approach to amphibious operations was much more conservative in the years after, but there were similar concerns with Operation Pawan, the Indian intervention in Sri Lanka between 1987 and 1990. Although India’s deployment was to support a peace accord and initially appeared to be a circuit breaker in a long-running civil war, the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) was soon deeply involved in operations against the Tamil separatists and the subject of increasing suspicion from the Sinhalese. It was eventually withdrawn with the Sri Lankan conflict unresolved.
There was also considerable dissatisfaction with the joint arrangements involved. Among other difficulties, the Indian navy admitted that its sea transportation capabilities were so primitive that “it often deposited the troops ashore in an unfit condition to fight,” while there were also concerns about the lack of ability to provide fire support and coordinate with operations on land.3
There were, however, also some achievements. In July 1989 the Sri Lankan government presented an ultimatum for the withdrawal of the IPKF. This created the potential need for a services-protected evacuation of Indian diplomatic staff, and the aircraft carrier Viraat was hastily adapted to her secondary role as a commando carrier for Operation Jupiter. Retaining four Sea Harriers for close air support, seven Sea Kings and four Cheetak helicopters were gathered from all over India, and the 7th Garhwal Rifles battalion embarked. Over the following fortnight, the Viraat worked up the capability to conduct company-strength lifts before the need for the operation ended.
The much briefer and lower-intensity Operation Cactus, the 1988 intervention to suppress a coup in the Maldives, was more successful. The embattled Maldives government sought assistance from India, which was immediately given. Newly acquired IL-76 transports landed a paratroop battalion group at the main island airport on the night of 3–4 November, which rapidly overcame resistance. A number of mercenaries then seized hostages and a merchant ship, the Progress Light, and attempted to escape toward Sri Lanka. The ship was stopped by Indian warships and the mercenaries captured.
The difficult financial situation of the 1990s and a degree of reaction to the Sri Lankan intervention (although the Indian navy continued to be involved in patrol operations to suppress arms smuggling between India and Sri Lanka) limited India’s interest in projecting maritime power for a time, even close to its shores. Significantly, the navy did not directly assist the deployment of the Indian army to Somalia in 1991, but did eventually provide humanitarian aid there and conducted patrols along the coast from 1992–94. It also assisted with the extraction of Indian troops from the Somali port of Kismayu in December 1994.4
Recent Operations
With greater prosperity, the situation of the Indian Navy has substantially improved in recent years. Maritime intervention operations have become progressively more ambitious over the last decade as the navy’s capabilities have slowly increased. More recent operations have provided disaster relief and protected evacuations rather than armed intervention, but they have been significant not only for their success, but also their increasing scale and demonstration of the navy’s ability to move farther afield and operate for extended periods.
Four operations are particularly notable. In addition to providing relief in India’s own possessions in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands after the tsunami at the end of 2004, more than 30 of India’s ships, as many aircraft, and over 5,000 personnel were involved in assisting Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and the Maldives in a wide-ranging effort. In June 2006, an Indian task group deployed to the Mediterranean and evacuated South Asian nationals from Lebanon. More recently, Indian ships were among the first to bring disaster-relief stores to Myanmar after it was devastated by a cyclone, while a further deployment to the Mediterranean in 2011 brought out nationals caught in the Libyan civil war.5
The problem was that these operations were almost wholly conducted by the navy with little significant integration with the other services—the substantial air force and army activities in the Indian Ocean tsunami were largely carried out in parallel with the efforts of the navy. The absence of a capable amphibious land force effectively limited Indian participation ashore to benign operations or those in very low-intensity environments. This did not go entirely unnoticed in India. Although the capabilities required for a mission so far afield (and against such potential opposition) could not be within the national capacity for a very long time, there was considerable dissatisfaction over India’s lack of ability to influence events in Fiji in 2000, after a coup that was clearly aimed at protecting indigenous interests at the expense of the ethnic Indian population. The navy may well have been able to use the situation to garner support for improving India’s amphibious capabilities.6
Moves to Improve
There was certainly evidence at the time of increasing attention to amphibious warfare, but until very recently, this remained at very moderate levels. The army could and did occasionally train with the navy, but amphibious operations were not given much public priority. Even within the service, the amphibious capability had to compete for funds with the demands of the naval aviation and submarine forces. In times of fiscal restraint, amphibious forces tended to be the first to suffer. During the difficult 1990s, there was a ten-year delay between completion of the first (1987) and the second (1997) of the Magar-class large landing ships. Moreover, despite the navy’s improved situation in 2013, only three more have been completed since—the last some 22 years after the Magar.
The smaller Russian-built Polnochny-class ships are aging—four have already been removed from service—and have long suffered from a lack of spare parts and relatively little sea time.7 The eight Indian-built medium landing ships are now well into their third decade of service. The acquisition of a dock landing ship, the Jalashwa (the ex-USS Trenton), in 2007 was probably possible only because she was made available second-hand by the United States on favorable terms, together with a buy of a half-dozen Sea King UH-3H utility helicopters. A marine commando force of approximately 2,000 personnel has been in existence since 1987, but attempts to double it in size did not gain budgetary support.
The Jalashwa’s entry into service was also not without controversy. In March 2008 the Indian navy was criticized by the national comptroller and auditor general for a lack of due diligence in the acquisition, a judgment all the more telling because the ship had suffered a fatal toxic-hazard accident the previous month.8 These problems probably prevented the purchase of a second ship (the ex-USS Nashville) from the United States. Nevertheless, the capabilities of the Jalashwa were so much greater than the existing Magar-class tank landing ships that a project was soon in hand for a quartet of new, even larger amphibious ships. Most notably, the Indian navy was able to demonstrate the flexibility, through the use of smaller landing craft operating from the ship’s docking well, of not having to hazard a major unit by beaching it—or of having to find a beach with the right gradient.
The Joint Problem
What remains an issue is that India has yet to develop coherent permanent joint-command systems, although it is moving slowly toward greater integration. There are a number of special organizations, such as the joint command of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, that rotates at three-star level between the three services and operates within an inherently maritime and amphibious context, with assigned amphibious craft and a brigade of troops. The Integrated Defence Staff organization created in 2001 is slowly gaining influence, although it remains limited by the fact that there is no designated Chief of the Armed Services with accompanying command authority, but a rotating Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee (COSC) to whom the Chief of the Indian Defence Services (IDS) reports. Although a separate Joint Chiefs position has been recommended repeatedly to successive governments, political and bureaucratic sensitivities, notably in relation to the potential concentration of military power in a single individual, have combined to prevent its enactment. The navy and air force have also had some concerns about the potential for domination of the position by the much larger army, but the need for further jointness was emphasized by Admiral Nirmal Verma, the outgoing Chairman of the COSC and Chief of Naval Staff, in his final press conference in August 2012.9
A watershed in 2006 was the publication of Joint Doctrine—Indian Armed Forces, which was accompanied by other significant steps, many coordinated by the Doctrine, Organisation and Training authority within the IDS, part of which forms the Directorate of Amphibious and Special Forces. The navy made its ambitions clear in its 2007 publication of Freedom to use the Seas: India’s Maritime Military Strategy. This stated the navy’s priority to be a “stabilising professional force in the region” and that the augmentation of capability is for “humanitarian assistance.”10 But it also declared that the ability to influence events on land was now one of the navy’s primary roles—which was not the case before.11 The other services began to move into line with these ideas, with the Indian army publicly recognizing the need for “an amphibious formation suitably grouped with other elements for out of area operations” as part of its future vision.12
In June 2008, building began at Kakinda of an Advanced Amphibious Warfare School. While a navy initiative, laying the foundation stone was followed by an amphibious demonstration by the Jalashwa, and the brand-new landing ship Kesari, in concert with troops and vehicles from the army’s 18 Madras Regiment.13 The navy stated that the “creation of a Joint Rapid Deployment Force (RDF) along with a Joint HQ would considerably enhance our ability to conduct expeditionary operations.”14
Doctrine
A Joint Doctrine for Amphibious Operations had been in preparation from 2004 and was publicly released in September 2008 by the Chairman of the COSC. While this officer was also then-Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Sureesh Mehta, the release was in the presence of the heads of the army and air force, as well as the most senior officers holding joint appointments within the Integrated Defence Headquarters.15 The amphibious doctrine had also been subject to considerable development, including major exercises in 2005 and 2007, before its approval.16 A Joint Doctrine for Special Forces Operations was launched later the same month.17
The Indian army then announced the conversion of 91 Infantry Brigade into a much-strengthened unit specializing in amphibious warfare. The brigade was planned to expand from 3,000 to 5,000 personnel by the end of 2009, and was to be based at Thiruvanthapuram near the very southwestern tip of the Indian mainland.18 In January 2009, the Chief of Army Staff confirmed the need for a strong “India-tailored” amphibious capability following a two-day amphibious-warfare seminar.19 Exercise TROPEX in February 2009 saw the deployment of a battalion of the brigade ashore at Madhavpur Beach in Gujurat on the northwestern coast, with the support of Jalashwa and an LST, following a work-up landing at Lakshadweep in the islands the previous month.20 TROPEX 2011 saw a similar emphasis on amphibious warfare—significantly, with increased air force involvement.21
The amphibious-training cycle has developed substantially over the last half-decade, to the point where major exercises are now at least annual.22 The difficulty is that the nearest major naval base for amphibious units (Karwar near Goa) is nearly 400 miles away from 91 Brigade, while the new Amphibious Warfare School is on the east coast, and the inherently amphibious Andaman and Nicobar command is farther away still. This will present significant challenges in developing expertise across the services. Nevertheless, more facilities have been promised for the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, including an amphibious-warfare training range.23 The army’s increasing recognition of the importance of the capability was signaled in 2011 by the designation of 54 Infantry Division (Hyderabad) as the command element for the amphibious units on the Indian mainland. The significance of this step was that it would substantially improve the army’s capacity for both deliberate and immediate planning for operations and exercises.
The navy also continued to pursue improved capabilities. In September 2010, the Defence Procurement Committee approved $3.5 billion for four big new amphibious ships.24 Shortly afterward, the Cabinet Committee on Security endorsed the decision. The navy then issued a request for proposals, on the basis that two could be built overseas and two in India.25 The specifications were ambitious, including the capacity for 800 troops, 4 main battle tanks, and 85 other vehicles, as well as sufficient helicopter spots (6) to achieve a simultaneous company-size lift, and a large docking well.26 With such requirements, either the Spanish Strategic Projection Ship or the French Mistral, both of which had achieved export success, appeared the most likely contenders. Furthermore, the need for a new generation of smaller vessels was acknowledged in 2011 by an order for eight 800-ton landing craft from Garden Reach shipbuilders.27
India and the Future
The shape of the Indian amphibious force is likely to mature into one of a single worked-up on-call force, consisting of two large LHDs and an LST, with a second task group in maintenance and training. The landing force itself will probably comprise a reinforced infantry battalion from 91 Brigade, together with some logistic support. As a package, this force will represent a quantum jump in India’s amphibious capabilities, particularly for non-permissive environments. It would also leave the remaining pair of LSTs and the smaller landing craft available for sea lift and local operations, such as those regularly conducted in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in cooperation with the brigade based there.28
The future for Indian expeditionary capabilities in the longer term will depend on the interplay of budget, internal defense rivalries, and the extent to which strategic developments around the Indian Ocean littoral create challenges for India’s security environment. The problems of the country’s land borders will probably always mean that seaborne expeditionary capabilities will only be developed as a secondary priority. The navy itself also will not give up either its carriers or its nuclear-submarine ambitions. Indeed, it argues strongly that the carrier capability is inherent to any serious expeditionary capability in relation to the air cover and close air support that the carrier air groups can provide.
The key issues are the extent to which the priority for maritime expeditionary operations will be sufficiently high to justify continuing expenditure on force structure and training. To make the capability both significant and credible depends on whether joint arrangements can render it effective and flexible enough to do more than provide disaster relief and sea transport. These are not simple problems, particularly as the continental focus of many in India’s defense machinery is now intermixed with increasing concerns over internal security and the requirement to protect against acts of terrorism, both of which have significant maritime dimensions. They are major tasks for the small, albeit highly professional, Marine Commando Force. In a more constrained financial environment, it may be that these factors will combine to limit India’s maritime expeditionary ambitions.
Nevertheless, the potential for Indian operations in the Indian Ocean littoral must not be underestimated, however severe the constraints under which its forces operate. The Indian tradition of improvisation and “can do” in achieving an operational goal is a long one that has produced some good results in the past. This may well continue to be a theme of the future. The Indian navy in particular has always understood that it is sometimes better to be able to do something badly than not to be able to do it at all.29 But the evidence suggests that a serious attempt to do much more is in progress. As the newly developed 12th Defence Plan declared in 2012, the Indian Armed Forces are determined to “build adequate stand off capability for sea lift and expeditionary operations to achieve desired power projection force levels, influence events ashore and undertake military operations other than war.”30 The next decade will see whether that goal is achieved.
1. Rahul Roy-Chaudhury, India’s Maritime Security (New Delhi: Knowledge World, 2000), xx.
2. VADM G. M. Hiranandani Transition to Triumph: The Indian Navy 1965–1975 (New Delhi: Lancer, 2000), 181.
3. Headquarters, Ministry of Defence (Navy), Freedom to use the Seas: India’s Maritime Military Strategy, May 2007, 22. LGEN Depinder Singh, The IPKF in Sri Lanka (Noida: Trishul Publications), has extensive material on the problems of command and operations for the IPKF.
4. Roy-Chaudhury India’s Maritime Security, 181.
5. The Times of India, “Naval ships to bail out Indians stranded in Libya,” 27 February 2011. http://articles.timesofindia.com/2011-02-27/mumbai/28637902_1_indian-navy-naval-ships-ins-jalashwa.html.
6. See “India, Navy,” Jane’s Sentinel Security Assessment—South Asia, 30 October 2008, www.janes.com/.
7. The Ghorpad decommissioned in January 2008 after 24 years’ service with barely 166,000 nautical miles steamed—little more than 5,000 a year on average. “Polnochny Class,” Bharat Rakshak www.bharat-rakshak.com/NAVY/Ships/Active/164-Polnochny-Class.html.
8. Asia Times, South Asia, “India all at sea over defense ties,” 27 March 2008. www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JC27Dfo1.html.
9. Neelam Mathews, “CNS Admiral Nirmal Verma Retires,” 11 August 2012. http://aerospacediary.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/cns-admiral-nirmal-verma-retires.html.
10. ADM Sureesh Mehta, Foreword, Freedom to use the Seas: India’s Maritime Military Strategy, v.
11. Ibid., 119.
12. GEN S. Padmanabhan, “Indian Army: 2020,” Indian Defence Review, vol. 20, No. 4, 19 January 2008, www.indiandefencereview.com.
13. Indian Navy Media Release, 24 Jun 2008, “RAM inaugurates Naval Enclave at Kakinad.” See Indian navy website: http://indiannavy.nic.in.
14. Roy-Chaudhury, India’s Maritime Military Strategy, 119.
15. Thaindian News, “Joint Doctrine for Amphibious Operations Released Today,” 9 September 2008.
16. The Times of India, “Forces Ready with Joint Amphibious Warfare Doctrine,” 7 September 2008.
17. Thaindian News, “Navy Chief announces Joint Doctrine for Special Forces Operations,” 20 September 2008.
18. Global Security, “91 Infantry Brigade,” www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/India/91-bde.html.
19. The Indian Express, “Strong amphibious capability needed: Army chief,” 20 January 2009, www.indianexpress.com/news/strong-amphibious-capability-needed-army-chief/412837/.
20. India Today, “Army and navy plan to set up a marine brigade.” 9 June 2010. http://indiatoday.indiatoday.in/story/army-and-navy-plan-to-set-up-a-marine-brigade/1/100770.html.
21. It appears as though every second annual TROPEX has an amphibious focus. India Defence, “TROPEX 2011—Indian Navy to Exercise Amphibious Capabilities in Tri-Service Wargames,” 18 February 2011, www.india-defence-com/reports-5033.
22. Express News, “Embarkation Begins for Annual Exercise,” 25 December 2008.
23. ZecNews-India, “Andaman & Nicobar to be major amphibious warfare base,” 9 February 2010, http://zecnews-india-com/news/nation/andaman-and-nicobar-to-be-major-amphibious-warfare-base_602570.html.
24. Global Military, “India dock landing ships will be China’s nine times,” 23 October 2010. www.global-military-com/india-dock-landing-ships-wil-be-China’s-nine-times.html
25. India Defence, “Indian Navy launches Request for Proposal for 4 amphibious vessels (LHD type),” www.india-defence.com/forums/indian-navy/12972.
26. Stephen Saunders, Jane’s Fighting Ships 2011–2012 (Coulsdon, Surrey: HIS Jane’s, 2011), 345.
27. Deccan Herald, “Indian Navy orders new amphibious fighters,” 30 September 2011. www.deccanherald.com/content/194896/indian-navy-orders-amphibious-fighters.html.
28. The Magar at least is likely to decommission before all the LHDs are in service, being now 25 years old.
29. For a history of the first five decades of the Indian navy after independence, see the author’s No Easy Answers: The Development of the Navies of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka 1945–1996 (New Delhi: Lancer, 1997).
30. The Indian Express, “12th Defence Plan: Focus on Navy’s ‘expeditionary’ operations,” 4 May 2012, www.indianexpress.com/news/12th-defence-plan-focus-on-navy’s-expeditionary-operations/945283/.