( First Published in a CLAWS book titled "Bijoy with synergy: India-Pakistan war 1971)
The oft-repeated story of the historic attack off Karachi, by the Indian navy in December 1971, has broadly focused on the strategic and tactical brilliance of its concept and execution. The severe blow to the Pakistan Navy so early in the war had devastating ramifications on the morale and subsequent deployment of their naval assets. More importantly, logistic support from West Pakistan to East Pakistan was choked by the actions taken by the Western and Eastern Fleets of the Indian Navy.
A post facto analysis befits the occasion of the Golden jubilee activities currently in progress.
The cold war between the USA and the Soviet Union had reached a crescendo by 1960. Ironically Soviets and the Chinese had begun to escalate border skirmishes on the Sino- Soviet border just when India was desperately seeking assistance for up-gradation and modernization of the Indian Armed forces in the wake of the Chinese invasion. The Americans had rushed some hardware in response to our appeal to stall the Chinese. In our effort to remain non-aligned during the cold war, we had soured our relationship with the West. That we were seen to be leaning towards USSR, led to unforeseen consequences even before the Indo-Soviet Friendship treaty was signed. One such event was the sudden decision of the UK not to release the top-of-the-line submarine, the Oberon class to India. This, despite the training of the first few batches of selected Indian officers and sailors, had been completed.
Pakistan on the other hand was benefitting from the status she enjoyed as an active member of the SEATO and CENTO from 1954. Not only did she receive financial aid and grants periodically but was well supported by front-line Military platforms, sensors, and weapons from NATO allies too. The induction of the Daphne Class submarines from France was almost completed in the late 1960s much before the Indian Navy acquired its first submarine from the Soviet Union.
In the mid-1960s a series of acquisition agreements were signed by India with the Soviet Union which continued for the next 40 years and even after the disintegration of the Soviet Union.
What is often glossed over is that a predominantly Western-trained and equipped Navy of India had to grapple with tectonic changes related to manning, training, logistics, language, more importantly operations and tactics of the Soviet Block. The challenges were unprecedented.
This narration aims to exemplify those challenges faced by the Indian Navy and the ramifications that opened the door to a syncretic approach, much like eclecticism, that enriched the Navy in particular. Ergo, what follows is the author’s postulate necessarily drawn from a rear-view perspective.
The Soviet package negotiated for the Navy in the mid-1960s consisted of a wide array of surface ships, submarines, and aircraft. Eight Osa class Missile boats with four surface to surface missiles each formed a part of the modernization package on offer. For purposes of brevity, communications, and secrecy they were christened as AK Boats. AK was the initials of the then CNS, Admiral AK Chatterji. Given that the Navy was the smallest service, and that it had just completed the induction of an aircraft carrier from the British, in 1961, it is axiomatic that the manpower needs multiplied dramatically. The Navy chose to use the short service commission route of induction with reduced training and flexible employment, based purely on performance appraisals.
In the below officer category, to cater for possible technology updates the Artificer entry for mechanical and electrical personnel was beefed up.
The missile boat crew consisting of eight sets of personnel with a spare crew and the Squadron staff, and personnel of the missile preparation facility to be set up ashore, left for the Soviet Union in June 1969.
The author was the second in command of the boat to be named INS Veer later.
The entire crew was transferred from the Moscow international airport to Vladivostok via Khabarovsk, in a giant and noisy aircraft on a 14-hour sortie. That we had to transfer to smaller aircraft to our final destination was due to the confrontation on the Sino-Soviet border between the two communist states and the proximity of Vladivostok to the conflict zone.
At that point in history, we were unaware of the power struggle inextricably linked to the Cold war and which resulted in the USA cozying up with China. Hence, events that unfolded between 1969 and 1972 and are now available in the public domain, reveal a link that needs to be contextualized for the benefit of the reader.
Kissinger, in July1971, was able to make his first visit to China after Pakistan played a facilitator’s role. It would be reasonable to assume that the preparatory work kept under tight wraps commenced much earlier. The groundwork for Nixon to make history in 1972 quite clearly overshadowed the developing events in South Asia. Pakistan as a facilitator, held a trump card that could be used to get the fullest backing of the United States Govt should there be an Indo-Pak conflict. No less than the Secretary of State was in constant dialogue with the Pak leadership.
Declassified documents of the Nixon-Indira Gandhi meeting clearly prove the antagonism that existed between the two leaders. Kissinger duly supported the sentiments of his President, as India was seen to be firmly in the Soviet camp. In retrospect, the British Govt’s decision to deny us the top-end submarine and the French resolve to equip Pakistan with Daphne Class submarines are but some connected examples of the Geo-Politics of the era.
Another fact that bears scrutiny is the deployment of Task Force 74 led by the USS Enterprise in the Bay of Bengal in Dec 1971 in support of Pakistan. The Soviet Union reportedly neutralized the intent of the Task Force by deploying both surface ships and nuclear submarines in the vicinity.
In our context, these were remarkable events born out of the raging cold war and its impact on Indian Maritime operations.
Going back to 1969, In all the calculus and imponderables associated with shifting to the Soviet philosophy of training from purely Western-oriented methodologies, it would now appear that we underestimated some of its consequences.
When the need to lean on the Soviet union arose in the mid-1960s, the Military in India had the least knowledge of what lay behind the Iron curtain. Until then most nations that proceeded to the Soviet Union for acquisition and training were either from the Warsaw pact or from autocratic/military Govts opposed to the Western- NATO-led alliance. Briefly, none in our chain of Command could have foreseen the challenges and conflicts that could euphemistically be termed a “clash of civilization”.
A smaller version of the Osa class, the Komar, acquired by Egypt had sunk an Israeli Frigate in 1967. However, in a blue-water environment, the boat was meant to be a defensive asset, as its endurance had to be necessarily linked to its fuel carrying capacity. Equipped with high-speed diesel engines adapted from an aircraft engine the boat could speedily ingress and egress in a limited theatre of war. They could be manufactured in large numbers to enable them to carry out divisional attacks from multi directions to saturate the defenses of the enemy Aircraft Carrier, should it venture closer to the coast. This was a quantum jump in technology for the Indian navy.
The Indian Submariners and Petya class crew were already being trained on an Island off Vladivostok when the Missile boat crew landed in the summer of 1969. On arrival, the first challenge was the language. There were no interpreters to assist in basic communication needs. Desperation and necessity for routine needs drove the crew to acquire proficiency in record time. Most Indians spoke multiple languages. That in particular aided correct pronunciation and learning difficult syntax and phonetics/phonology. Within a few months, some officers were able to recite Russian poetry and dwell in serious literature. A level of comfort that takes years of study. Clearly, the Russians had not encountered professional competence and ability to absorb technical content in comparison to others who had trained with them.
On the flip side, their routine activity of subtly introducing Communism as an ideology to our sailors, often without our officers being present, met with little success. Many factors thwarted their subtle efforts. The Indian officers and sailors bonded as never before due to the extraordinary environment. Winter hit -32c, we were both limited in our ability to communicate with the Soviets, the accommodation and food continued to be irritants, we were all denied the opportunity to visit the city except on weekends as the boats from the island were controlled. Interaction with the locals was discouraged as Vladivostok being on the fringes of the East was always short of resources and was akin to a secret city where their nuclear submarines were based. All in all, these very conditions aided our ability to bond with our men. Also, the lack of freedom to travel provided the rare opportunity to focus on our training and master the subject of surface- to- surface missiles.
The training facilities were more than adequate and the instructors were experts on their subject.
The post-training evaluation process and crew efficiency on all aspects of the boat ensured grading of the crew as a whole for combat efficiency. For the Squadron Commander, this was an invaluable input.
The invisible dividends of being exposed to both Western and Eastern philosophies did result in some turbulence too, in structuring the training for Soviet origin platforms, and later the Indian built warships that began to populate our asset holding. It was not seamless particularly when the Soviet Union collapsed. The long chain of training facilities along with the supply chain of logistics collapsed when the Union broke into smaller states.
Although we had increased our dependency on USSR in all three dimensions, we maintained our connections with the West for courses and procurement of selected sensors and armament. Moreover, systems from the west and their integration with Indian platforms were ensured through setting up organizations specifically to marry eastern and western systems onboard Indian platforms.
In summary, the Indian Military saga of the Cold war era and after, is a captivating chapter with valuable lessons for the future. When India begins to speed up arms export to friendly countries, our experience of the cold war, if documented, would be of value.
