Lessons from the 1962 debacle

India’s younger generation can barely comprehend the humiliation, trauma, shame and anger that prevailed in the immediate aftermath of the diplomatic, military and strategic debacle in the 1962 border conflict with China. Responding to former President Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan’s admonition of his “credulity” and “negligence”, former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had acknowledged, “We were getting out of touch with reality in the modern world and living in an artificial atmosphere of our own making”.

Nehru had, in 1959, proclaimed that the Chinese were “unlikely” to invade India because they knew it would lead to a “world war”. He believed that China, faced with a growing rift with the Soviet Union and at odds with the US, would just not go to war with India.

Disastrous policy

What followed was a disastrous policy of deploying poorly-equipped troops in forward positions to contest Chinese claims, despite logistical and operational reservations expressed by former Army Chief Gen K. S. Thimmayya and other senior operational commanders. This policy sought to give credibility to a claim in Parliament that “not an inch of Indian territory” would be left undefended. Having raised expectations, the Prime Minister was unable to negotiate on suggestions by China’s former Prime Minister Chou en Lai. Taking suggestions on border claims at face value could, however, have been hazardous, as China’s claims continued to change repeatedly, as they do to this day.

Compounding the diplomatic bungling and the incredible naiveté in believing that China would never attack India was the behaviour of former Defence Minister V. K. Krishna Menon. He arbitrarily appointed Lt. Gen. B. M. Kaul, with no combat experience, as the Corps Commander of the newly-established IV Corps in Tezpur, tasked to “throw the Chinese out” in the eastern sector. India’s defence collapsed on November 19, with its elite 4th Infantry Division beating an ignominious retreat.

BORDER TENSIONS

As the eastern sector collapsed, a panic stricken Nehru wrote to former US President John Kennedy seeking American air support. India’s claims to non-alignment lay in tatters. A few months before the conflict commenced, the Chinese Ambassador had learnt in secret negotiations with the Americans that the US would not get involved in the event of border tensions escalating with India.

With the Sino-Indian conflict coinciding with the Cuban Missile crisis, China compelled the Soviet Union to initially remain neutral. Rather than assisting India, the Americans and the British demanded that India resolve differences with Pakistan over Jammu and Kashmir. It was the Soviet Union that moved meaningfully to help India bolster its Defences.

China has significantly bolstered its defences on Tibet’s borders with India since 1962. Apart from developing an impressive road and rail communication network, it has deployed 2.2 lakh troops in the Lanzhou military region bordering Ladakh, including airborne and motorised divisions. Another 1.8 lakh troops are deployed in the Chengdu military region facing India’s north-eastern States. Beijing has also been augmenting capabilities and training for high altitude warfare. The main lesson of 1962 is the need for Indian conventional capabilities along our borders with China to convince it that future conflicts will not remain confined to the Indian side.

Strategic containment

China today is the second largest economy in the world. It has made remarkable strides in areas ranging from space to cyber warfare. But it faces serious internal tensions arising from contradictions inherent in having a relatively open economy, on the one hand, and a closed and increasingly corrupt one-party political system on the other. China is continuing nuclear weapons, missile and defence collaboration with Pakistan. It is expanding its role in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. It has consistently sought to undermine India’s “Look East” Policies by trying to block India’s entry into the East Asia Summit, prevent the Nuclear Suppliers Group from giving India a waiver on nuclear cooperation, and being ambivalent on India’s quest for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council.

There is little awareness on the security implications of China’s growing role in key sectors of our economy such as power and communications, or of the dangers posed by the domination of these sectors by Chinese companies.

India has to, therefore, combine pro-active diplomacy and build up its offensive military capabilities along its borders with China, by formulating and implementing measures to achieve indigenisation in key sectors such as power and communications. Moreover, if present policies continue, our imports of electronic and communication equipment will exceed imports of oil and natural gas by 2020.

A serious effort has to be made to enable our public and private sectors to develop capabilities comparable to those developed by the Chinese in these strategic sectors.

(The author is a former High Commissioner to Pakistan. blfeedback@thehindu.co.in )

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