CDS General Anil Chauhan said that India will have to be prepared for short-term high intensity and long-term conflicts due to terrorism and land disputes involving neighboring countries. Multi-domain warfare will be essential in the future.
New Delhi. Chief of Defense Staff General Anil Chauhan said at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay that India must be prepared for both short-term high intensity conflicts and long-term conflicts to prevent terrorism and territorial disputes with its neighbours. However, General Chauhan, without naming countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh or China, hinted that India has land disputes with its neighbours. In such a situation, we should be prepared for all kinds of dangers and challenges coming from there.
What kind of challenges does India need to be prepared for?
“What kind of threats and challenges should India be prepared for? Speaking on this, CDS General Anil Chauhan said, it should be based on two things. Both our enemies – one is a nuclear weapon country and the other is a nuclear armed country, so we should not allow that level of deterrence to be breached.” CDS General Anil Chauhan further said, “We must be prepared to fight short-term, high-intensity conflicts, such as Operation Sindoor, to stop terrorism. We must be prepared for ground-based, long-term conflicts because of our land disputes. Yet, we should try to avoid this.”
What did General Chauhan say about modern war?
Talking about modern warfare, General Chauhan said that it is at the juncture of the third revolution in military affairs and described it as convergence warfare. He said that this is because now many different technologies like Artificial Intelligence, Quantum, Edge Computing, Hypersonic, Advanced Materials, Robotics have an impact on the nature and character of war, whereas earlier the technologies were less.
The need for multi-domain operations in the future
He further said that in future, multi-domain operations will become a necessity rather than an option, as one domain will have an impact on the other, as was clearly visible during Operation Sindoor. This war lasted only for 4 days in which India got a decisive victory. All domains of warfare were used simultaneously very rapidly. Multi-domain operations will require multi-domain capabilities and extensive co-ordination and control between different wings of the military – Army, Navy and Air Force. Besides, there will also be a need for cyber force, space force and forces working in cognitive domain.