With Rajnath's call, Indian way of war takes shape

At RAN Samwad, a first-of-its-kind seminar on warfare, the 'third revolution in military affairs' was explored along with India's evolving defence needs. Bhaswar Kumar unpacks

- Bhaswar Kumar unpacks

"It would not be wrong to say that the age we live in has just one doctrine — that there is none. Circumstances and challenges are changing with such speed that every nation is compelled to keep its strategy flexible and responsive." In his plenary address last week, delivered at a first-of-its-kind tri-service seminar on war, warfare, and warfighting, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh offered the clearest distillation yet of the shifting nature of the battlefield — a landscape of uncertainty that India's armed forces continue to adapt to.

Addressing serving officers, veterans, and experts at the RAN Samwad seminar ("RAN" in Hindi means war) last Wednesday at the Army War College, Mhow, Rajnath's remarks on the event's second and final day were both a warning to adversaries and a reiteration of India's evolving military posture: "Our endeavour must be to define the battlefield and the rules of the game ourselves, compelling the adversary to fight there (on our terms)..." Citing Operation Sindoor as an example, he added, "The bravery and swiftness with which our forces carried out the action against terrorist shelters in Pakistan was something those terrorists could never have imagined."

The answer to the uncertainty outlined by him appears to lie in preparing for an Indian way of warfighting — a theme that ran through the seminar. Presentations and deliberations went beyond its overarching focus on technologies shaping warfare, extending to force generation — training, equipping, and preparing units — and force application — deployment, operational structures, and execution of objectives — amid what Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Anil Chauhan calls the third revolution in military affairs: Rapid advances in space-based, cyber, artificial intelligence, and autonomous capabilities.