The dominance over land will remain the currency of victory in the Indian context, Army chief Gen Upendra Dwivedi said at an event on Tuesday.
Addressing industry leaders at All India Management Association’s 52nd National Management Convention, Gen Dwivedi highlighted the criticality of land forces in wars, while citing the example of the Alaska summit talks last month between US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin on the Ukraine conflict.
“When you go back to the Alaska conference… they just discussed how much land has to exchange hands… In India, since we have two-and-a-half-front threats, land will remain the currency of victory,” he said.
Gen Dwivedi’s comments come nearly two weeks after Air Chief Marshal A P Singh had said Operation Sindoor established the primacy of air power.
Gen Dwivedi further highlighted the Army’s transformative changes, including the inducting of new and emerging technologies in line with the changing nature of warfare.
He said when Russia went into war (with Ukraine), it was thought that it would last only 10 days. He said the Iran-Iraq war lasted for approximately 10 years. But when it came to the Operation Sindoor, there was no surety on the number of days it would last, he added.
“War is always unpredictable. We are unsure of the psychological impact a particular issue would have. The force visualisation, which was done in the Russia-Ukraine war, …maybe there was a miscalculation,” he said.
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He said there is a need to understand what technology is available on the other side to sustain the war for a longer period.
“We should be able to make sure that we have enough to last for a longer war. In all these wars, we have seen that what is impacting the David and Goliath system is low-cost, high-technology. If you have low-cost, high-technology, you will be able to beat a superior adversary,” he said.
Stating that the Army would use whatever the industry can initially provide and increase its purchases as the industry scales up supplies, he said the goalposts will, however, keep changing.
“If I wanted something to fire at 100 kilometres, tomorrow it has to go to 300 kilometres. Because it is not only me, it is the adversary that is also enhancing its technology,” he said, adding that ‘atmanirbharta’ becomes important here.
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He also mentioned that the Army used its indigenously developed secure mobile ecosystem Sambhav (Secure Army Mobile Bharat Version) in Op Sindoor, adding that the Army is now preparing for an upgrade.
“We are ready to accept the spiral development of equipment. Sambhav phone was used in Operation Sindoor for command and communication. We were not using WhatsApp and others. We are now upgrading it to a higher level,” he said.
He also said in Operation Sindoor, soldiers, commanders, scientists, industrialists… all contributed, making it a whole-of-nation approach.
