Analysis of India's Ability to Fight a 2-front War 2018

by Ravi Rikhye

The analysis asks one question and has one answer: Can India fight a two-front war against China and Pakistan? The answer is it cannot. Because of the China-Pakistan alliance, we cannot fight even a one-front war: engaging in a war with either adversary runs the risk of weakening the other front, leaving it open to exploitation. The solution, fortunately, is straightforward: build a 2-front war capability. The next problem is equally straightforward: The Government of India is determined not to spend money on defense. Today spending is down to 1.56% of GDP, lower even than in 1962. And we know how that ended. It takes little imagination to foresee what would have happened if 1962 had become 2-front: Pakistan would have walked over Punjab, perhaps all the way to Delhi, and we would have lost Kashmir too. If we chose to defend Punjab, we would have lost the North East Frontier Agency, now called Arunachal. If we tried to defend both fronts, we would have lost both. For a strong defensive posture, we need to spend the 3

457 pages, Paperback

Published September 21, 2018