An Overview of the 1962 War begins...

India’s 1962 war with China was fatally flawed both in conception and

in execution. It was also totally unnecessary and avoidable. Once India

embarked upon what became an inevitable collision course with China,

the lack of a seriously thought-out system for the higher direction of

war hampered the manner and means of preparing for it.

A sycophancyemasculated higher command system then led to amazingly dangerous decisions at the military strategic and operational levels. Selection for pliability, as opposed to appointment on the grounds of military

professional competency, also proved disastrous in respect of staffing at

the Army Headquarters level, in the choice of Gen. P.N. Thapar as Chief of Army Staff (COAS). Selection for non-military criteria made Lt. Gen. B.M. Kaul the Chief of the General Staff (CGS). Finally, at

the business end when the chips were down, and the right operational￾level and tactical decisions were required to be taken at the right time,

then and there, India was badly let down. India was totally humiliated

by the poor decision-making and battlefield command of the 4 Corps

Commander.

He was no other than the ‘Army Chief-in-waiting’, the

Prime Minister’s military blue-eyed boy, who had been temporarily

given command at Corps level, while simultaneously holding the

appointment of CGS at Army Headquarters. Below him, to compound

the catastrophe, the critically affected Divisional Commander, a sudden

and unwise appointment, and one of his Brigade Commanders, also a

sudden appointee, let down their country, their Army, and the officers

and men they were supposed to be commanding, by their personal

cowardliness in a crisis. It is not surprising that India cannot forget the

drubbing it received at the hands of China’s methodically directed and

professionally led PLA.

To be continued...