It must be around the same time that the RIN mutiny, which the British refused to call a strike, would have been rechristened as the Naval Uprising. As far as the felicitation of the mutineers goes, Madan Singh and B.C. Dutt have each had ships named after them by the Indian Navy, nearly 52 years after the incident. In 2002, Indian Navy also unveiled a memorial in the honour of these mutineers, which stands in the busy Colaba area of Central Mumbai.
A pointer towards solving officer shortages in the Indian armed forces.
Malcolm Gladwell in the New Yorker:
Social scientists distinguish between what are known as treatment effects and selection effects. The Marine Corps, for instance, is largely a treatment-effect institution. It doesn’t have an enormous admissions office grading applicants along four separate dimensions of toughness and intelligence. [...]
Indian defence services can emulate this innovative idea.
The problems of recruiting and retention are a challange for the armed forces the world over. Due to the current economic downturn, these challenges seem to have lost their urgency, at least in the Indian context. But the US Navy has used this opportunity to try out an [...]
Two quotes.
From Seize the Fire: Heroism, Duty, and the Battle of Trafalgar by Adam Nicolson
Rather than order, the prevention of disorder was the essence of naval life. Written Admiralty instructions required the boatswain and his mates on each ship “to be diligent . . . and see . . . that the working of the [...]
…that afflicts the Indian defence services.
Decisions without Actions are Pointless. Actions without Decisions are Reckless. ~Colonel John Boyd
Harsh Pant had hinted about the dissonance between the Indian strategic aims, military doctrine and the need for acquiring modern military hardware. Now former Navy Chief, Admiral Arun Prakash, while absolving his own service of any such mistakes, [...]
…will put an end to the doubts raised about the efficacy of Indian naval operations in the Gulf of Aden.
It wasn’t perfect the first time around. When the INS Tabar claimed to have sunk a pirate mother vessel in Indian Ocean off the Somalian coast, it later turned out to be a Thai fishing trawler [...]
The Southern Army Commander inspected the Taj hotel during the operations with his wife, before shooting his mouth off in front of the media. Should the General be treated differently to the politician who took his family and friends for a similar round of disaster tourism?
The shenanigans of the Navy Chief with the media after [...]
…that send negative signals about the armed forces.
Tom Peters had explained the signalling value of small mistakes with the example of coffee stains on the tray table of an aircraft, which raises doubts in a passenger’s mind about the reliability of the engine and safety of the aircraft itself.
Leaving aside the only positive story that [...]
…and strengthens the case for reforming the Indian armed forces.
First it was the Army Welfare Housing Organisation [AWHO], which the army conveniently declared as a private body outside the ambit of the RTI. The next in line was Army Welfare Education Society [AWES], which met the same fate. Now comes the real big one — [...]
Between the intention and the effect falls the shadow. ~Eliot
While the Indian Navy destroyed a pirate mother ship off the Somalian coast, the Australian Navy is getting two months paid holiday during Christmas. It is one of the innovative ways to improve recruitment and retention rates in the Australian Navy.
What next? A no-war pact with [...]
Rajeev Shukla, the Congress MP, would better stick to cricket, bollywood and petty politics.
Rajeev Shukla, Congress Rajya Sabha MP with pretensions of being a serious journalist, had attended the 63rd session of UN General Assembly in New York late last month. In a piece in the Indian Express, he puts his foot in the mouth [...]
…is a clear declaration of the Indian intent to be the preeminent power between the Persian Gulf and the Malacca Strait.
During the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Qatar earlier this week, India and Qatar signed a defence cooperation pact. One of the top Indian officials there labelled the agreement on — Joint training exercises, [...]
No one wants to learn by mistakes, but we cannot learn enough from success to go beyond the state of the art. [...]
…vis-à-vis the Chinese “string of pearls”.
During Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Japan, India and Japan signed the Joint declaration on Security Cooperation between India and Japan. The declaration — recognising their common commitment to democracy, open society, human rights and the rule of law — with specified elements and mechanisms of military cooperation, is [...]
…is deceitful and designed to hide uncomfortable facts.
The directive issued by the Parliamentary Committee on Defence to stop the use of professional soldiers as personal sahayaks to army officers has taken the limelight away from another pressing issue raised by the Committee in its report on Stress Management in the Armed Forces. In Part-II of [...]
Earlier post on the subject :A potboiler… off the Somalian coast
Somalia is a failed state with no central government and over 3,000 miles of coastline. NATO reports that there have been seven new piracy-related incidents including two hijacks during the past week itself and nine vessels are now being held by Somali pirates for ransom. [...]
Even the best of Hollywood scriptwriters will fail to match the plot and sub-plots in the drama playing in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Somalia. If this NYT report [HT: Nitin]is something to go by, the plot includes:
Somali pirates… Ukrainian arms… originally a load of cars for Syria… Weapons destined for southern Sudan [...]
Those who seek absolute power, even though they seek it to do what they regard as good, are simply demanding the right to enforce their own version of heaven on earth. And let me remind you, they are the very ones who always create the most hellish tyrannies. Absolute power does corrupt, and those who [...]
In a series of articles and columns last week, The Telegraph (UK) has covered the delicate relationship existing between India and China. It also pushes the much echoed theory that the US is courting India to counter China’s rising influence in the region.
Meanwhile, future administrations will seek to advance Washington’s burgeoning partnership [...]
The contest for ages has been to rescue liberty from the grasp of executive power. ~Daniel Webster
A new book by Bill Murphy, In a Time of War: The Proud and Perilous Journey of West Point’s Class of 2002, recounts how life changed for him and his classmates at the US Military Academy at West Point [...]
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