Land warfare will remain ‘extremely important’ in India’s case, says Army chief

NEW DELHI: The ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict reaffirmed the significance of land warfare and the domain will remain “extremely important” in India’s case as well as for countries having contested borders, Army Chief Gen Manoj Pande said on Thursday.

In an interactive session at an event, referring to the situation along the Line of Actual Control with China, he said the border situation remains stable and that his force is focusing on boosting its overall combat capabilities to effectively deal with any future security challenges.

Delving into global geopolitical upheavals, the Chief of Army Staff said the key lesson that the Army has learnt from the Russia-Ukraine conflict is that it can’t rely on import of military hardware and achieving self-reliance in defence is very important.

He described the Indo-Pacific as a key region and noted that India has an important role to play. The Army chief was speaking to Lt Gen Raj Shukla (retd) at the curtain-raiser for the first Chanakya Dialogue. He said the first batch of 40,000 Agniveers have joined the units and the feedback on them from the field units has been encouraging. To a question on increasing global focus on the maritime domain while both Russia-Ukraine war and Hamas-Israel conflict have the dimension of land, Gen Pande said land warfare will remain crucial in the Indian context. Though he chose not to make specific reference, it was clear the Army Chief was indicating the border issue with China.

Talking about India’s rising global profile, Gen Pande said India will continue to play a key role in the Indo-Pacific region.

“With the enhanced stature, we will have additional responsibilities and with this we will have certain challenges to encounter,” he said.

In his remarks, Gen Pande also spoke about how national security is emerging as a crucial aspect in the geo-political competition. “What we are seeing is the centrality of national interest in this global flux...The salience of national security is growing in the entire international system,” he said.

Highlighting the changing character of war, Gen Pande said “by this I am alluding to what we are witnessing in the context of Russia-Ukraine conflict.”