Analysis of India's Ability to Fight a 2-front War 2018

by Ravi Rikhye

  We could spend a pleasant chapter on explaining why the Germans did not have more divisions. Schlieffen, at least, saw a need for seven more corps, for a total of 96 divisions, for a single front.This was before Moltke had to adjust the plan to provide troops for the eastern front. The Kaiser, however, was very much in love with his Navy, and he built a formidable one. The problem is the navy contributed little to the war. It is difficult to simultaneous be a great power on land and at sea. Because they had the most efficient army in the world, the Germans likely figured it sufficed. They had handily defeated the French in 1870-71, inflicting five casualties for every one of theirs, the Belgians were not thought a factor, Russia would not attack for six weeks. This was an egregious error by the Germans because they had nothing in reserve and, perhaps, they were so overawed with their own efficiency they believed they would commit no errors. A mere 12 divisions more would have sufficed to win. With 4 extra in the East, Moltke might not have been prone to fears and not sent reinforcements by weakening the west. Similarly, he could have boosted his left wing, while leaving the right with 46 divisions instead of 34. Equally, however, we could argue that if Moltke was not a nervous leader, the 82 divisions would have sufficed.

  The reason to have more divisions is that things never go as planned. The idea is not, as GOI seems to think, of equality which means not enough troops on the line which must be compensated for by calling northern front forces, leaving nothing in reserve. Because the war deteriorated into a stalemate, and because the British and later the Americans kept building up, Germany had to mobilize 217 divisions and was still forced to capitulate. Half as many divisions at the start could have meant a short war and victory. On November 11, 1918, the Germans had 185 divisions of which only 49 were fresh. The Allies in March 18, 1918, had 64 British, 30 double-strength US, 108 French, and 11 other divisions, of which 70 were fresh.[64] US divisions had 28,000 troops, Germans and French had 14,000. This made 243 Allied to 185 German divisions. The British forces included its empire, with additional forces deployed in other theatres.

  I mention the number of divisions because in 1907 Germany had a population of 67-million, France, and Great Britain of 40-million each, US 87-million. And here is India, 1.3-billion, and GOI goes into cardiac arrest if anyone mentions going to 50, or 60, or 70 divisions. True, the above-mentioned countries had conscription, but surely, we can get a volunteer army of 2-million+. In World War II, on a population of perhaps 400-million, about 2.5-million men volunteered. Indians are blessed with an absurd government. In World War II, very approximately, US spent about 41% of GDP on defense, and during the Cold War, they spent 10%. In 1989, true Soviet defense spending was revealed at $128-billion[65], 4x official, and GDP was officially $2.5-trillion, so 5%. This figure makes no sense as it is far too low to sustain the size of the Soviet forces, but that is another story. Incidentally, the US has also taken to whining, so we are not alone. At Dulles International Airport the other day, an informational revealed that the US spends 1.9% of its GDP to treat obesity-related disease alone. But when it is suggested the US must spend more than 4% of GDP on defense, there is much wailing and weeping across the land.

  India is not constrained as were the Germans of 1914

  The Germans had to take enormous risks because they had only 82 divisions and their ally Austria-Hungary, while nominally contributing 55 divisions, was too weak to make a meaningful contribution. But why should India adopt a risky strategy when the country has the resources to fully man two fronts as well as a substantial AHQ Reserve? India spends 12% of its central government budget on defense or one dollar in eight. An interesting comparison is the US federal budget 2015:[66] 28% on health and human services, 25% on social security, 16% on defense and homeland security, and 31% on everything else. [67]

  Including Indian pensions brings spending to 16% of the Central budget.[68] The World Bank figure for defense spending for India is given as 2.5%, including pensions. But US veterans’ administration (4%) is not included in the US defense total, is unknown for China, and excluded in Pakistan’s defense budget. It should be excluded for India too.

  Defense Spending Pakistan, India, China, US 2016

  Country

  % of GDP to government[69]

  % GDP on defense[70] 2016

  2017 GDP (US$ Trillion)

  Defense $Billion

  Pakistan

  19

  3.6

  0.3

  9

  India

  27

  1.6

  2.5

  43

  China

  31

  1.4

  13

  175

  US

  35

  3.3

  21

  700

  China may be spending more on internal security than on defense. While India’s percentage of tax to GDP, which shows how much of the GDP is mobilizing, is increasing, it is still lower than China’s. The latter is now a 2nd World nation. Pakistan also has a low percentage.

  What is ominous is that in 1960, India spent 1.9% of GDP on defense, which was the reason for the 1962 debacle. It would be of interest to know why GOI believes 1.6% is adequate today, especially since in 1962 China and India’s GDP were equal, but now China is 5x more.

  Previously, it was shown that India could resolve its numbers problem, though not the modernization problem, by spending 2% of GDP on defense, which would mean defense spending to 16 % of the central budget. Global defense spending as a percent of GDP has come down to 2.23% in 2016 versus 6.1% in 1960.[71]

  What could go wrong with India’s new 2-front plan

  Many things.

  We are not as efficient as the Germans of the 20th Century. No one was.

  We do not have interior lines of communications, mandatory for any plan that requires switching forces between fronts.

  Our road infrastructure in the north is miserable, and rail is non-existent.

  Our plan to defeat Pakistan in a short period, say 10-15 days, is a fantasy. We’ll discuss this in detail. For now, it suffices to say that after 15 days or even 21, Pakistan will have its forces intact, as soon as we start withdrawing troops for the return to the north, it will counterattack.

  When the above is pointed out to our strategic thinkers, the invariable answer is: foreign powers will intervene within 7-10 days and force an end to the war. This Indian line of thought is so overwhelming that normal folks would have to conclude we happily operate in an alternate reality.

  Who exactly are these powers that will intervene for us and stop the war? Only the US is left as a world power. When Pakistan was on its own, its plans against India were explicitly based on the western powers intervening. It aimed to strike rapidly, seize ground, and when the Indians were ready for their counteroffensive, the west would stop India. Then negotiations could begin, with Pakistan offering to return our territory in exchange for Kashmir. How well did these attempts work for Pakistan?

  In 1947-48, instead of forcing India out of Kashmir as Pakistan hoped, the UN ruled that Pakistan had to withdraw its regular army. Since Pakistan had not seized Indian territory outside Kashmir, there could be no bargaining for Kashmir.

  In 1965 Kutch, no one intervened to stop the fighting. The British suggested negotiations, particularly as the area in dispute was not demarcated. Had India refused, who was going to force us to stop? No one.

  In 1965 August, India not just pushed Pakistan out of Kashmir, it counterattacked across the international border. We agreed to a ceasefire because we were extremely nervous about Chinese intervention and because the Army Chief told GOI that we were about to run out of ammunition. Which was the opposite of the situation, Pakistan was running out; we had stocks for at least four weeks more. Regardless, Pakistan got nothing.

  In 1971, we took East Pakistan; no one intervened to stop us. The US threat, supported by the Soviet Union, to intervene if we continued the war in the west was a bluff that GOI fell for.


  In 1999, Pakistan attacked Kargil and threatened to use N-weapons if India retaliated elsewhere. This time the US did intervene – to force Pakistan to withdraw. Moreover, the US intervened after getting India’s promise Delhi would not escalate the war, thus preventing India from punishing Pakistan for its aggression.

  So why does India assume it can open offensive operations against Pakistan and stop the war when it wishes? If the US does intervene, as it did in Kargil, it will be to get India to withdraw. Two more cases represent the strangeness of India’s national security policy. In 2001-02, we planned to punish Pakistan for its terrorist actions, but partly because we had neither workable plan nor endgame and partly because the US pressured us not to attack, we gave up that option. In 2008, the US had to put no pressure on us to prevent retaliation: GOI itself decided not to attack before the US said a word.

  What are some scenarios that could trigger a 2-front war? Some possibilities are listed below. The probable estimates are based on my study of Indian military operations 1947-2017 and are subjective. In real life, everything depends on the decision-making team, which may act rationally or irrationally, depending on hundreds of circumstances and evaluations of information received.

  For example, in 1962 India knew perfectly well China had an overwhelming force superiority, even if it did not know exactly how many divisions it faced and their exact locations. But for reasons beyond the purview of this analysis, the civilian decision-makers, the Intelligence Bureau, and the Army convinced themselves China would not fight. Similarly, it was understood that Indian 7th Brigade positions were not defensible. But GOC IV Corps had no combat experience. He was appointed because Nehru was tired of the generals correctly saying India was in no position to start a war, and he assured Nehru he would get the job done. When this august officer went, for the first time, to inspect the front-line, the Chinese had already swept away Indian forward positions on the Thagla ridge. The GOC told the brigade commander “it’s your war now,” and pushed off. He did not give an order for the brigade to withdraw, neither did GOC Eastern Command, nor Army HQ, because no one wanted Nehru’s wrath. The one officer who earlier had said the situation was impossible, GOC XXXIII Corps, was relieved of his position, sent to Delhi, retired, and made to beg for his pension. I’ve told the story in a little detail to show this is how decision-making works in fact as opposed to theory. Anything resembling accurate prediction of how and what decisions will be made when crisis hits is near impossible.

  Pakistan creates a provocation of such scale that we are forced to retaliate, but China steps in on Pakistan’s side. We refuse to stop. Probability: high.

  China decides we need another “lesson.” starts a limited war; Pakistan decides to take advantage of our preoccupation to go for Kashmir, with approval/cooperation from China. Probability: medium.

  China stages a provocation; India refuses to back down; China stages a “lesson”: Pakistan decides to take advantage of the situation by attacking Kashmir; i.e., Doklam 2017 Probability: medium.

  A hardline Indian government decides to retake Pakistan Occupied Kashmir; China intervenes on Pakistan’s side. Probability: low.

  Due to mistakes, misunderstandings, and national pride, a situation arises in which all parties refuse to back down, leading to war; i.e. a repeat of 1962. Probability low.

  A hardline Indian government decides to retake POK and the Aksai Chin; Pakistan and China join against India. Probability: very low.

  The Law of Unintended Consequences creates a war begun in error. Probability: unknown.

  The last two require more discussion. It is a human conceit that we can foresee the consequences of each move we make, and a lesser conceit that we can always control events. Let us go back to World War I. No belligerent wanted war. But the European system’s balance of power stability, created after Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo, no longer worked because of the rise of Germany, which by 1900 had overtaken Great Britain in industrial power and wanted its own place in the sun. For that to happen peacefully meant Great Britain, France, and Russia would have to accept diminished power. This they would not do. So, while Germany also didn’t want war, its resentment increased because of what it saw as a lack of respect. The increasing tension was palpable. War then became inevitable to create a new equilibrium. (Rising China today makes a good paralell to Germany 120-years ago. Had the war to rebalance Europe not come in 1914, it would have come soon enough. Indeed, some marvel that it took as long as 1914 for war to erupt. Then the 1918 peace settlement left Germany intact, within a mere 20-years it rebuilt its military, vowed its power would not be denied, and a second world war began. In 1945, a new equilibrium was established because the two powers challenging it, Japan, and Germany, were destroyed as completely as if the Mongol Horde had passed through. Again, however, there was no peace: a rising Soviet Union wanted its place in the sun, including supremacy in Europe and Asia. The Soviet Union collapsed under the pressure of the Cold War, which was fought on the peripheries because a war in Europe risked nuclear annihilation. Also, the communist economic system could no longer cater to the hopes of its citizens for a better life while simultaneously feeding the always-hungry military beast. About the time the Soviet Union was cracking up, China began its rise, so rapidly that by 1980-2017 its GDP, previously on par with India, became two-thirds that of the United States, and by 2018, triple that of Japan, the third largest world economic power. As its power increases, China is determined to obtain its due respect, not as a great power, but as a super-power, with the objective to become the world power. For those who need an American to validate something before they believe an Indian, please read Graham Allison’s Destined for War: Can American and China escape Thucydides’s Trap?[72] which says exactly the same thing. Should you not have time for the book, read the New York Times review of it and of Howard French’s book, Everything under the heavens. The review’s title is “China has arrived”[73]. Not will but has. In my opinion, China has started moving too fast, jettisoning its previous cautious moves, and is starting to make mistakes which could end in war.

  4.4 The Law of Unintended Consequences

  The Law of Unintended Consequences is so widespread, so much of an everyday affair, that it scarcely needs elaboration. Some examples from US history.

  No European empire wanted war. And yet it happened, for the most trivial of reasons.

  After World War I, in which Britain and Japan were allies, the US pressured the British into ending the alliance because Japan’s rise bothered Washington. Consequently, Japan had no allies and was isolated, a major consideration in its decision to invade China. Meanwhile, Britain was left without protection against the Japanese, now an enemy.[74]

  In 1941, the US imposed an oil and steel embargo on Japan because of the latter’s fantastically brutal occupation of China. The US was horrified and morally repulsed at Japan’s behavior. The embargo was to back an ultimatum: evacuate Manchuria or be squeezed to death by lack of oil and steel – Japan relied on recycling steel scrap. US experts on Japan were not required to predict what road the Japanese, with their extreme pride, cultural arrogance, and desirous of their place in the sun, would choose. Inadvertently, despite the best intentions, the Americans backed Japan into a corner and caused Pearl Harbor. And incidentally, the Japanese knew they would lose the war, but honor required them to stand their ground. Again, an existential conflict was inevitable. The US was, in 1941, already the most economically powerful nation. It did not see why it should accommodate rising Japan.

  An intriguing question: might Japan been better off attacking Siberia to gain its unrivalled resources?

  It planned just that, under the Northern Plan favored by the Japanese Army. The 1939 Battle of Khalkin Gol, however, saw the Japanese defeated by Marshal Zhukov, who used his mechanized forces to great advantage against the badly underequipped and outnumbered adversary. This strengthened the Japanese Navy and its Southern Plan because Tokyo decided it could not compete with the Soviet i
ndustrial might. Now, why did the Japanese get into a war with the Americans, who had three times Soviet GDP in 1941 and five times in 1945? [75] The answer: hopeful thinking. With the US 10,000-km away via Hawaii, the Japanese figured that by sinking the US Pacific Fleet, they would somehow muddle through. But by attacking the US and not the Soviet Union, Japan likely cost Germany success in World War II. Stalin could withdraw 45 Siberian divisions for deployment at Moscow and Stalingrad, saving his country.[76] Again, the Law of Unintended Consequences took charge.

  In 1944, the US, refusing to understand Stalin’s expansionist intent, agreed to a partition of Europe. To the Americans of the day, sworn word was sacred. Many warned that as Germany slid to defeat, the Soviets would become a greater tyranny, but Roosevelt and his successor Truman refused to listen. By 1945 itself the US formulated a plan to pre-emptively atom-bomb the Soviet Union.[77] This is not the same as the much-discussed Operation Dropshot, which came later and assumed the USSR began a war by seeking to overrun Western Europe. with the Soviets having snuffed out multiple European democracies, and pushing hard to impose communism on western Europe, it became clear the US had erred. A plan was proposed: before the Soviets could become a N-weapons power, the US should use 300 A-bombs against 200 Soviet cities and industrial centers, returning the country to 1910.[78] This was just the start of a massive conventional war ending up with the west occupying the US. But again, the US could not morally justify this to itself and remained unconvinced the USSR would give up. )