Not Just Arms Shopping

Context: India needs to rethink, widen and prioritises its defence budget and military expenditure to counter the security challenges posed by militarily aggressive China.

Factor Necessitating Shift in India’s Military Expenditure and Budget

• Import dependency: armed forces rely on high-cost wares to be bought off-the-shelf from foreign manufacturers.
• Bureaucratic reluctance: to sign off on big military expenditure that in turn lead to inordinate delays.
• Cost of Chinese security threat: China has deployments similar to the Line of Actual Control (LoAC) across Uttarakhand, Sikkim, Bhutan (Dokalam plateau) and other areas in the eastern sector.
  • ‘Siachenisation of LoAC’ implies longer high-altitude troop deployment with increased costs, and tug on India’s limited resources.
  • Southeast Asian countries (SAC) increased their 40% defence budget between 2010 and 2019 to counter Chinese threat as per SIPRI.
  • China’s increased expenditure amid Covid-19 pandemic has raised security concerns.
• Global dominance of high-end technology: future wars will be won on the coordinated, synchronised deployment of high-end technology, and not just on one or two weapon systems.
  • For e.g. Azerbaijan won over Armenia forces through dominance of drones and UAVs.

Way Forward: Defence budget must be seen as a wider security budget with a focus on following key areas: 

• Create strong defence-industry complex: it is a security statement in itself and is more effective from an economic and security point of view than equipping the military with imported weapons.
• Invest in civil-military technology fusion: like with drones and cyber capabilities as it would be impossible to defend the LoAC without offensive intent.
• Improve connectivity to border areas: by increasing expenditure on border infrastructure to start repopulating border areas along the LoAC and clear any grey areas over territorial control.
  • China’s border areas are connected by roads (through its Belt and Road Initiative and border villages and towns.

Conclusion: Defence budget is not just a ledger on military expenditure; hence higher military spending of India must not lead to more off-the-shelf weapons purchases.