Open Forum
New Delhi, 15
September 2016
India’s Air Power
NEHRU
THWARTS 2 WINNABLE WARS
By Proloy
Bagchi
Aroop Raha, the Indian Air Force
chief recently articulated his disappointment that the country’s air power was
not fully utilized during the first war with Pakistan in 1948. Likewise, he said,
the airpower was not used during the 1962 war with China.
Raha said that while the Indian Air
Force (IAF) was used as a “bridge” to transport troops to Kashmir for several
months, but when a military solution was in sight India went to the United
Nations taking the “the moral high ground”. The statement is largely true. The
Air Force was used when the situation became desperate with the Pakistani
regulars and tribal raiders came as close as sniffing distance of the Srinagar airfield
threatening to overrun it. Even at that crucial juncture the Prime Minister was
hesitant. The books and documents that have now come out clearly show the
ambivalence of Prime Minister Nehru.
According to the various documents
of the period, it seems a meeting of the Indian Cabinet had been called after
the Kashmir Maharaja Hari Singh signed the Instrument of Accession. Among those
present were the Prime Minister, Home Minister, Vallabhbhai Patel, and Defence
Minister Sardar Baldev Singh. Late Field Marshal Manekshaw, then a junior
officer, was also present presumably to assist his Defence Minister.
Towards the end of the meeting
Manekshaw was asked to give his assessment of the situation in Kashmir, which he did with precision. On hearing him, the
consensus was India
should intervene as soon as possible but Nehru was still in two minds and was
wondering whether to refer the matter to the United Nations. That is when the
Home Minister Vallbhbhai Patel reportedly snapped at him asking whether Nehru
wanted to keep Kashmir in India
or let go of it.
Nehru is reported to have said, “Of
course, I would like Kashmir to stay in India”. The moment he answered in
the affirmative Sardar Patel asked his assistants to fly the Indian army to Kashmir. Because of the delay in taking this decision
most men in first few sorties were reportedly, gunned down on landing.
It is indeed surprising that
throughout the campaign the IAF remained largely under-utilised. It took quite
an effort for the Indian Army to slowly push back the invaders out of the Kashmir Valley though the Air Force did a
commendable job of breaking the backbone of the invaders by strafing them when
they were gathered in strength near the airfield. The Air Force did play its
role in making the invaders run for their lives.
But, that was about all for an
offensive role of the IAF as it was mostly used for logistics – transporting
troops and supplies. In doing so, too, it did some remarkable jobs like those
of landing on an untested airfield built by 40000 refugees in a week’s time in Poonch
and landing Dakotas on an airstrip along the Indus River
in Leh at a height of 11000ft, a height where these planes were not supposed to
fly.
Hundreds of sorties were flown with
troops and arms and ammunitions and in the return journey, especially from
Poonch, they brought back thousands of refugees. Even the then Governor General
Earl Mountbatten had remarked that in his view it was one of the biggest
airlift operations till then anywhere in the world
Meanwhile, Delhi was getting impatient. Jawaharlal Nehru
is reported to have once said that India could not be fighting this
war for months or even years. Besides, the brutally cold winter was approaching
and the shortage of arms and ammunitions was also telling on the operation.
What is more, he was being advised by the Governor General to refer the matter
to the UN. It seems the Prime Minister had expectations that a reference to the
UN would settle the issue speedily.
Unfortunately, that did not happen
and it took the United Nations half a century to treat it as an unresolved
dispute. On reference to it the Kashmir issue became a victim of the then
prevailing Cold War rivalries between the Western Powers and the Soviet Union. The former had a stake in the State as it
could provide a location from which they could keep an eye on the latter. The
West, therefore, was never inclined that Jammu & Kashmir should merge with India. For
them, for various reasons, Pakistan
was a better option being tactically better located. At the UN they, therefore,
weighed in for Pakistan
and some very biased debates had taken place.
What was most unfortunate, however,
was that Nehru’s reference was made to the UN just as the Indian Army acquired
the capability to throw out the Pakistani raiders from the State. Perhaps,
under the influence of the Governor General the Army Headquarters issued an
order not to initiate further operations without its orders. Some reports say
that it was not Mountbatten but the US
intervened and did not want India
to recapture the lost J&K territories. Nonetheless, Mountbatten played a
dubious (double) role. This was, therefore, not as much a matter of occupying
“high moral ground” as of probably succumbing to pressure from a Big Power.
It seems Nehru’s incapacity to take
independent decisions at crunch situations did quite a lot of damage to India. While in
the Kashmir war of 1948 Earl Mountbatten led him up the ‘garden path’, during
the 1962 war with China it
was the US
Ambassador John Kenneth Galbraith who was his advisor. It was largely because
of Galbraith that the Indian air power, much improved after the 1948 Kashmir
Operations, was not allowed to carry our combat operations.
This apart, there was a total
absence of intelligence from the other side about the enemy’s capabilities in
air warfare. Intelligence Bureau chief BN Mullik did not have any intelligence
about Chinese Air Force establishments in Tibet. In fact, information was
circulated about two Chinese air bases in Tibet which never existed and,
probably, do not exist even today.
There was thus an ‘intelligence
vacuum’. For fear of an imagined retaliation by China, while the IAF planes were
made to sit on their bases, Nehru wrote, surprisingly without consulting the
IAF, to Kennedy for air cover for the cities in the plains. This, the US was not able
to provide because of several reasons including the then ongoing Cuban Missiles
Crisis.
The result was IAF’s own Toofanies,
Mysteres, Gnats, Hunters and Canberras remained virtually mothballed in their
Eastern bases while the Army was deprived of much needed air support. The
denial to the air force of an offensive role was such an implausible negative
action that it is being researched and debated till today.
Raha, therefore, is not the only Air
Chief to have highlighted this act of omission. Earlier, ex IAF chief Air
Marshal AY Tipnis too, blamed Nehru for not using the country’s airpower and
the consequential debacle in the 1962 war. Likewise, Chief of the Air Staff,
Air Marshal (Retd) NAK Browne later had to say that the outcome of the 1962 war
would have been different had IAF been allowed an offensive role. But such
messy situations tend to occur when, instead of defence chiefs, politicians
fight wars. ---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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