Government fumbling on defence issues?

Are the 26-month blanket ban on recruitment and rethinking over the charter of the CDS (Chief of Defence Staff) casting a shadow on our operational capabilities?

A nationalist government that treats national security as a sacred patriotic duty has surprisingly put the brakes and taken a laid-back position on two critical defence matters : Recruitment of Personnel Below Officer Rank (PBOR) and the appointment of the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS).

After milking the armed forces through cross-border strikes - the Uri surgical raids, Balakot airstrikes or hot pursuit in Myanmar against dissident Naga groups, that yielded enormous electoral dividends - the government has gone kind of numb and begun fumbling on key issues.

Late CDS Gen Rawat would not have let recruitment stop for so long at a time when the Chinese PLA is breathing down our neck of our troops across multiple un-vacated intrusion points. Nothing explains the suspension of soldier recruitment in combat  and combat-support arms.

The current mess in Defence is partly due to the absence of the CDS. But the cat is out of the bag. After six months of suspense, MoD officials are leaking information to justify delay in naming the CDS that some of us in the strategic community had predicted - that the government is rethinking the charter of CDS, in particular, remit of the Department of Military Affairs (DMA) which has deprived the Defence Secretary and his bureaucrats of the control they exercised over the military. 

By transferring several sections/departments that the Defence Secretary controlled to the DMA, the civilian officials were marginalised.

- Excerpts from an article by Lt Gen Ashok K Mehta (Retd) in The Pioneer.

My take

The Modi government had taken a historic step in drawing up and later, appointing the CDS. The tragic and untimely end of the General in a helicopter crash at Wellington, Ooty has brought about a void that should have been filled soon after. The continuing delay will definitely embolden the bureaucrats to hanker for the 'status quo ante' so that they can have control over the defence establishment as before, which will be very, very unfortunate!   

Tailpiece.

Got up late around a half past 6, the chores and was ready by 10.

The forenoon saw heavy rain which subsided by mid-afternoon.

Ranjoo, the service rep of the Pest Control of India (PCI), had come by to carry out the quarterly routine as per the annual maintenance contract that I've with it.