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COMMENTARY
India fast forgetting the
lessons of 1962
By B Raman
The Sino-Indian war of 1962 had the following
lessons for India: While we had a good capability for
the collection of tactical and topographical
intelligence about Tibet, we lacked a similar capability
relating to Yunnan.
Our threat perceptions were
largely, if not exclusively, focused northward towards
Tibet, and likely Chinese threats from Yunnan in the
east through north Myanmar (taking advantage of the lack
of control and presence of the Yangon government over
vast areas of the Kachin state of Myanmar), were not
adequately anticipated.
Consequently, a
disturbing increase in Chinese intelligence operations
directed at India's Northeast mounted from Yunnan and
clandestine intrusions and movements of Chinese troops
from Yunnan through Myanmar territory to the north of
Putao in Kachin state remained either unnoticed or
ill-assessed, if noticed at all.
After the war,
there were valid grounds for suspecting that some of the
Chinese troops, which took the Indian army by surprise
in the Northeast, had moved unnoticed by Indian
intelligence from Yunnan through unadministered Kachin
territory.
While we had a certain capability for
the collection of human intelligence (HUMINT) from
Tibet, our capability for the collection of technical
intelligence (TECHINT) was woefully inadequate. So was
our capability for the collection of strategic
intelligence indicating Chinese intentions, mindset,
perceptions, medium and long-term planning etc.
Our capability for the collection of strategic
intelligence was badly affected by the failure of the
intelligence community since India's independence in
1947 to build up a high level of knowledge of the
Chinese language and by the difficulties faced by all
countries in interacting with Chinese leaders and
officials at policymaking levels in Beijing.
The
rigorous restrictions imposed by Beijing on their
citizens, whether in the government or outside,
interacting with foreigners drastically reduced
opportunities for strategic intelligence collection.
While Chinese officials posted in New Delhi were freely
able to interact with Indian leaders, officials and
non-governmental analysts and collect strategic
intelligence by picking their brains and other means,
Indian officials found themselves denied similar
opportunities in Beijing.
Even though
arrangements for the sharing of China-related
intelligence between India and the US existed in a
rudimentary form even before October,1962, the US
intelligence chose not to share with India its knowledge
of the Chinese military build-up in Tibet and the
goings-on in Yunnan.
The John F Kennedy
administration in Washington, though well-disposed
towards India, had apparently calculated that an Indian
setback at the hands of the Chinese would make New Delhi
more amenable to US influence in strategic policymaking.
(A similar failure to alert New Delhi about the movement
of Pakistani troops to occupy the Kargil heights was
discernible before the Indo-Pakistan Kargil military
conflict of 1999. Again, the US calculation apparently
was that an Indian surprise at the hands of Pakistan,
even if temporary, would serve the US's long-term policy
interests).
Our capability for a meaningful
analysis and assessment of even the available
intelligence, open as well as secret, was very poor.
Consequently, policymaking was based more on wishful
thinking and personal hunches than on well-analyzed and
assessed likely scenarios.
We had failed to
foresee the likelihood of a military confrontation with
China resulting in the occupation of some of our
territory by the Chinese. As a result, we had not
developed a stay-behind capability for the continued
collection of intelligence and covert harassing
operations against the Chinese troops in our territory
occupied by them. Once the Chinese occupied portions of
our territory, we hardly knew what was happening there
and watched helplessly.
The painful experience
of 1962 led New Delhi, for the first time since 1947, to
have a comprehensive look at our intelligence
collection, analysis and assessment and stay-behind
operational capabilities with regard to China. Certain
long-neglected measures were taken such as:
Giving priority to the collection of
intelligence about north Myanmar and Yunnan.
Improving our HUMINT capability in
Tibet.
Strengthening our TECHINT capability.
Improving knowledge of the Chinese
language in the intelligence community as well as
outside.
Creating a stay-behind intelligence
collection and operational capability in our territory
claimed by the Chinese so that if the Chinese again
occupied it in future, we would not be as helpless as we
were in 1962.
Improving arrangements for intelligence
and assessment barter with countries sharing India's
concerns relating to China, while not developing a
dependence on them to meet our needs.
Improving our analysis and assessment
capability through the Joint Intelligence Community at
the governmental level (since converted into the
National Security Council Secretariat in 1998) and the
Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses (IDSA) at the
non-governmental level. The creation of the National
Security Advisory Board in 1998 was meant to further
strengthen the assessment capability at the
non-governmental level.
The benign face of the
post-1978 Chinese policymaking as illustrated by
Beijing's discontinuance of its assistance to insurgent
groups in India's Northeast since 1979 and its keenness
for the improvement of bilateral relations at various
levels without letting them become a hostage to the
long-pending border dispute have led to a certain
complacency in policymaking in matters relating to
National Security Management and China.
India
continues to have serious concerns over the
modernization of China's armed forces, its nuclear and
missile capability, its military assistance to Pakistan
in the nuclear as well as conventional fields, its
intentions in Myanmar, Bangladesh and Nepal etc. Despite
these concerns, the Indian attitude toward China seems
to be more relaxed and more trusting than in the past.
This is evident from the following:
The gradual erosion of our stay-behind
intelligence collection and operational
capabilities.
The almost exclusive focus of the Special Task Force
on the revamping of the intelligence apparatus set up by
the government in 2000 on strengthening our capabilities
vis-a-vis Pakistan without a similar exercise relating
to China.
This relaxed attitude was also evident
during the Asian Security Conference with a focus on
China organized by the IDSA at New Delhi from January 27
to 29 this year. Though well organized, with a large
participation from abroad, its focus was too dispersed
and too diffused to enable any meaningful assessment.
There was hardly any participation of Indian
experts with insights, knowledge and the painful
experience of dealing with China before and after 1962,
who have already started fading away and will do so
completely in another few years.
Foreign
perceptions - particularly American, Israeli and
Taiwanese - received greater prominence and attention
than Indian. One got the impression that the emphasis
was more on quantity (so many foreign participants, so
many papers, so many pages etc) than on quality.
This was reflective of the lack of attention to
details and the superficiality which have again come to
mark our China analysis and assessment. It is important
that we continue to move forward in improving our
relations with China, but our keenness to move forward
should not make us forget the painful lessons of the
past. We cannot afford another traumatic experience in
our relations with China.
B Raman is
Additional Secretary (ret), Cabinet Secretariat,
Government of India, and presently director, Institute
For Topical Studies, Chennai; former member of the
National Security Advisory Board of the Government of
India. E-Mail: corde@vsnl.com. He was also head of the
counter-terrorism division of the Research &
Analysis Wing, India's external intelligence agency,
from 1988 to August, 1994.
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