Yet an other the degradation of the military by the 6 Pay Commission and subsequent farce enacted by the Committee of Secretaries, “Is a deliberate act”. Actually it appears to be ‘Conspiracy’ to weaken our military.

Before WW II, when Hitler had decided to attack Russia, the Germans launched a massive intelligence operation to convince Stalin, the Russian dictator , about the unreliability of the Russian military and a military coup against him. So successful was the German ploy that Stalin thoroughly purged his military and executed about 40,000 (forty thousand ) officers in the process. When the Germans eventually attacked Russia , the Russian military was virtually leaderless, resulting in stunning German victories which brought them at the very gates of Moscow.

Similar game is being played against our military by our (potential) enemies for quite some time. When Nehru died in 1964, wiser from the massive problems of crowd control which were faced during Mahatma Gandhi’s funeral and handed over to army at last moment , the then Army Chief, Gen JN Chaudhary, ordered move of brigade to Delhi for that purpose . Pakistan intelligence reportedly alerted our govt. Though it was too late and perhaps too risky to countermand the Chief’s order at that stage, the clever ‘Babus’ reportedly came with a plan to appoint the three military chiefs as “Chief Mourners” to keep vigil over Nehru’s body, pending his funeral, so that they could not launch any coup. No wonder later the govt passed orders that no formation could be moved to Delhi without its permission. That’s why when other Prime Ministers died the Chiefs were no longer put as ‘Chief Mourners’, (for there was no need to thus ‘confine’ them). Later the ‘Vested Interest’ convinced an insecure and suspicious Mrs India Gandhi the then Prime Minister , to raise a parallel army complete with artillery and other supporting weapons in the form of BSF. This increased ‘Establishment’ for the IAS and opened flood gates of promotions for the IPS officers.

During the Indo-Pak ‘stand- off’ in 1986-87, in the form of Exercise ‘Brass Tacks’ and ‘Operation Trident’, Pakistani Gen Arif confirmed in a book that the Pak ISI, spread canard of military take over in India . Unfortunately Mr Rajiv Gandhi, the then Prime Minister swallowed the bait and Pakistan killed two birds with one stone. Not only any possibility, how so remote it might have been, of any Indian attack, was removed, but a strong suspicion was sown in the mind of the Prime Minister against the Army Chief. When the mutual relations between him and Gen Sunderji deteriorated as a sequel to the on going Boffors (Gun) controversy , Gen Sunderji , after his retirement in an interview to ‘India Today’ in July 1989 remarked, “What could they have done to me? Get me killed through RAW?”. The very fact that a thought of RAW killing him crossed his mind speaks volumes in itself. No wonder, the Indian Defence Services suffered massive degradation at the hands of 4th and 5th Pay Commissions.

Now, through the mechanism of the 6th Pay Commission, the process of massive degradation and humiliation of our Defence Services has almost been completed. It appears to be aimed at total breakdown of their self-confidence and working relationship with the Para Military Forces. In the light of ‘Red Corridor’ spanning about one third of India covering in almost 160 districts, where hardly any ‘governance’ exists; frequent pan India serial blasts by the terrorists at will ; dangerous spread of regionalism and religious hatred; very strong centrifugal forces are at play. These centrifugal forces have a strong potential to balkanize India ( which is the ‘stated aim’ of Pakistan and may of China too). If, the only centripetal force, the military, can be rendered dysfunctional due to low self-esteem, poor morale and perpetual bickering between it and others, our enemies would have delightfully achieved their aim.

In view of the foregoing, is it far fetched to theorise that a conspiracy is on against India to break it and the 6th Pay Commission is just one of its tools? After all, our bureaucracy is notorious for its all pervasive corruption. With just a few thousand crores per head slashed in foreign banks, perhaps some of the bureaucrats have been occasionally bought by our enemies to play ‘fifth columnists’ to weaken our Defence Services . Otherwise how can one explain non implementation of Subrahamanyam Report after ‘Kargil’ fiasco. Every one agrees that ‘Kargil’ was a massive intelligence failure, interestingly the RAW chief who should have been held accountable for it, was sent as Governor of Arunanchal Pradesh perhaps, as a reward.

We have a strong tradition of Raj Ambhis, Jai Chands and Mir Jaffars, just to name a few. It is not beyond the pale of imagination that they are again active in their modern avtars in the form of our ‘Review Committees’ and others bent upon destroying the morale and motivation of the Indian military. When the final moment of reckoning comes, perhaps history would repeat it self as it has been doing from Alexander the Great onwards ; over a span of about 2300 years, with just one exception of 1971 AD, victory in Bangladesh.
My countrymen, stand warned against this apparently ongoing conspiracy to destabilize India by weakening its military.

(In July 2009, In a seminar held at Delhi on police reforms recently, Director IDSA Mr. N.S. Sisodia an IAS Officer said that if Defence Forces are given more powers, they will cease power like Pakistan and Bangladesh.)

By-
Brig Harwant Singh (Rtd)