Before we analyse the strategy and diplomacy of independent India we must have a perspective about what strategy and diplomacy means. It is only in the light of fundamental principles of strategy that we can comprehend the nature of successive wars India was forced to fight.

Clausewitz defined “strategy as the use of engagements for the object of the war, whereas tactics is the use of armed forces in engagements”. According to Clausewitz war is a continuation of politics, a form of political intercourse in which we fight battles instead of writing notes.1 In other words, strategy is the bridge that connects the threat and use of force with policy or politics. Strategy inherently requires understanding the terms of the two-way relationship between military power and political purpose. In addition, strategy requires understanding of how very different kinds of armed forces can generate the effectiveness that will yield politically useful consequences. It is ultimately the tactical and operational levels of war which implement strategy. The tactical and operational behavior has strategic effect, that is to say that strategic performance can only rest upon tactical performance.2 In fact, Clausewitz compared war with trade and saw in victorious battle as analogous to successful exchange.

Hence, the first strategic question which a statesman faces is to determine the nature of war - the form of war - which cannot be decided unless one has policy guidance. Policy is the Real, the object; whereas war or military actions are only manifestation or the appearance of the Real, the means by which we obtain the object, and the means must always keep the end in view.3 ‘Thus wars vary according to the nature of the end and the intensity of the desire to attain it. This is the cardinal principle of war.

The political theory of war provides us with two broad and well-marked classification of war. The first broad classification depends upon whether the political object of war is positive or negative. It is positive, if one’s aim is to wrest something from the enemy. In such cases wars in general will be offensive. If, on the other hand, one’s aim is negative, then one simply seeks to prevent the enemy wresting some advantage to one’s detriment. In this case the war in its general direction will be defensive. But nonetheless, defense is not a passive attitude, for that is the negation of war. Defense is a condition of restrained activity - not a mere condition of rest, but if unduly prolonged it tends to deaden the spirit of offense.4

A second classification of wars, Clausewitz makes, is that of ‘Limited’ and ‘Unlimited’ wars. A limited war’ is one in which the objective of belligerent is merely to assert one’s claim over the possession of a territory and in which the enemy’s stake is minimal. On the other hand, ‘unlimited war’ is the war of attrition, in which the main strategic offensive is directed against the armed forces of the enemy. To satisfy the full conception of a limited object, one of the two conditions is essential: firstly, it must not be merely limited in area, but of really limited political importance; and secondly, it must be so situated as to be strategically isolated or to be capable of being quarantined by strategical operations.5

Wars between contiguous continental states, in which the object is the conquest of territory’ on either of their frontiers, provide no real generic difference between limited and unlimited war. It becomes a difference of degree rather than of kind. On the contrary, if we extend our view to wars between worldwide empires, the distinction at once becomes organic. For a true limited object we must have not only the power of isolation but also the power by a secure home defense of barring an unlimited counter stroke.6 Limited war is made possible by command of the sea because the control of the sea enables one to select a theatre in effect truly limited. The beauty of limited war is that it can enable a weak military power to attain success against a stronger one by the quirk of fate.

To conclude, one can say that the relationship between the means and the ends is the domain of strategy. And holistic approach to strategy operates vertically and horizontally both. Vertically viewed, strategy encompasses all aspects of peace with security, from political vision down to tactical military performance. Horizontally considered, strategy includes land, sea, air, and space power, together with nuclear forces. Thus strategy is a dual-axes concept.7

Indian Diplomacy:

From 1945 onwards, as we have seen, it was the period of pure realism in politics among the nation-states and blocs which competed with each other for the maximization of power and pelf. The world was divided into two camps, capitalist and communists. India could not go with the capitalist world because it represented imperialism and it would have amounted to relapsing back to a colonial state of relations. Neither could India go with the communist world lock, stock and barrel, precisely because India emerged as the champion of freedom, whereas the communist world was “Orweilian”.

In the heyday of the cold war, when pure realist logic was the guiding principles of the big powers, Nehru, and hence India pursued a policy called non-alignment. Non-alignment basically meant not joining any alliance system NATO or WTO. By bringing all the Afro-Asian and Latin American countries under one banner of non-alignment, a new structure of world conflict was created, apart from East-West conflict. This new-structure of world conflict was called North-South conflict or conflict between the developed world and the developing world or soi-dissant third world. In order that one does not get embroiled in the ‘high politics’ of the two blocs, non-alignment became the ‘Grand Strategy’ of foreign policy for the whole of the underdeveloped, decolonized world.

Thus, diplomacy during the cold war was determined, channeled and constrained by the parameters of the conflict of the two blocs. ‘Third world’ endeavour to remain non-aligned remained a fata morgana in the face of concrete realities of an anarchical world. China, despite being communist, would have liked to become the leader of the third world, but its own ideological compulsions, strategic and economic interests led it into the lap of the Soviets. In such an anarchical world in which a power like China too had to join an alliance, Nehru wanted a ‘non-aligned’ India to align with the aligned China - China aligned to the leader of the WTO, Soviet Union. This was Nehruvian version of non-alignment before it could get formalized in Bandung (1955) and Belgrade (1961). De facto, non-alignment meant alignment with one power or the other, as an ally outside the formal alliance system. Having failed in its alignment with China, India directly entered into an alignment with the Soviet Union by 1971. Pakistan and many other countries remained satellite states of NATO under security umbrellas like CENTO, SEATO, and ANZUS and many others went to the WTO camp.

The policy of non-alignment was not based on secure and sound foundations which were evident from the very beginning itself. After all third world was not a homogeneous category and the regional interests of each player varied. In the event of a conflict within the non-aligned league, there was no method and mechanism to resolve the conflict. Moreover, by 1973, third world as such came to be dissolved by a solvent called oil producing and exporting countries (OPEC). OPEC emerged as capital surplus, and therefore ceased to be part of the ‘Third World’ which by definition is a capital deficient ouekomenie. Moreover, the graduation of Asian tigers - Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Thailand - in the rank of developed world further corroded the homogeneity of the third world. That is how, history kept delivering one verdict after another against the substantiality, materiality of the concept of ‘non-alignment’.

The voidness of Nehru’s non-alignment is evident from the fact that even after gaining political freedom, the umbilical cord with the British was not severed. India was totally dependent on UK, an ally of NATO, for not only the supply of armaments but also naval personals. The trajectory of Indian naval expansion plan was determined by the needs of British security rather than Indian; it was in pursuance of this policy that Britain refused to sell submarines and rather admonished to buy surface frigates for coastal vigilance and develop anti submarine warfare capabilities.8

Non-development of submarine arm of the navy till 1968 was in pursuance of British objectives in the Indian Ocean rather than India’s security needs. How could the purest form of non-alignment be pursued when one’s navy was more meant to serve the objectives of the British than India?

Next to follow is:

THE DEEP STRUCTURE OF INDIAN STRATEGY AND TACTICAL OPERATIONS

Reference

1. See, Corbett, Julian, S., ‘Some Principles of Maritime Strategy’, in Jablonsky, David (ed.): ‘Roots of Strategy’, Book Four, Stackpole Books, USA, 1999, p. 173.
2. Gray, Colins. ‘Explorations in Strategy’, Greenwood Press, Westport, USA, 1996, pp. 8-10. 6J.
3. Corbett, Some Principles ofMaritime Strategy’ p. 179.
4. Ibid, pp 182.-186
5. Ibid., pp. 202 - 203.
6. Ibid, p. 204.
7. Gray, “Explorations*, p: T.  .

Naidu, G. V. C, ‘The. Indian Navy smd South East Asia’, Knowledge. World: in. Association with Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, Delhi, 2000, p. 38. 69.