11-27-2007, 03:48 AM
Truth of â62 is locked away
Shishir GuptaPosted online: Monday, November 19, 2007 at 0000 hrs Print EmailTo set both history and policy straight, itâs crucial to make public the Brookes-Bhagat Report on that war.
Related Stories Manmohanâs long winter
Rangoon isn't Kathmandu
Forty five years ago to the day, the Zhou Enlai government offered the Indian charge dâ affairs in Beijing, P.K. Bannerjee, a humiliating ceasefire to end the month-long 1962 conflict across the 4,000 kilometre-long, mountainous border. Although the war officially ended two days later, the psychological scars it caused still remain rooted in the Indian mindset. Symbolic of this manifestation is the Henderson Brookes-P.S. Bhagat Report on the operational aspects of the 1962 conflagration, which lies buried in the vaults of South Block since it was submitted to the Nehru government in May 1963.
Prepared between December 1962 and May 1963, only one copy of this three-volume report exists today and the authors, as well as all the major players except the then director, Military Operations, D.K. Palit, have passed away. Yet successive governments at the Centre have adopted a âlet the past bury its deadâ attitude â the BJP-led NDA included. There has been no attempt to make public this three-volume report (one dealing with operations, the other two, with maps/annexures) in its fading yellow binding.
As if the Report symbolises the shame of the nation, it has been tucked away in a series of lockers inside the defence secretaryâs office, and can only be accessed through a series of keys and not-so-forthcoming permission. Even though the paper of this typed report is yellow and brittle with age, there has been no attempt to either keep a photocopy of it or make it public. Perhaps the political rulers and the military establishment want this report to self-destruct or simply fade out of the public mind. But it is crucial for India that its contents be made public. It could lead to a much-needed collective catharsis over the 1962 defeat. It is time the public knew exactly what happened when political leaders played Napolean with pliant generals as their subservient sidekicks.
The Brookes-Bhagat Report is, in fact, a scathing indictment of the then prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and his then defence minister, V.K. Krishna Menon, for a poorly strategised âforward policyâ towards Tibet and interference in the Indian armyâs operational affairs. The report is raw in its verbal expression. It minces no words in criticising then army chief, General P.N. Thapar, his then newly-created Tezpur Corps commander, B.M. Kaul, the then director, Military Operations, D.K. Palit, and a host of other army officers in the conduct of war operations. Laced with quotes from victorious generals from the west and quotes from leading war strategists, it is also harsh on then director, Intelligence Bureau, B.N. Mullick.
It is not for scoring points in a Parliament debate that this report must be made public, but for the Indian establishment to overcome its defensive mindset towards China which remains to this day. It is nobodyâs case that India should start flexing its muscles on the Line of Actual Control or be bitter about the past. Simply put, Indiaâs management of its relations with China should be firmly rooted on ground reality and not on illusions of Hindi-Chini bhai-bhai. But the facts are to the contrary. The Chinese ambassador to India, Sun Yuxi, recently patted the Indian government for sending written instructions to its Cabinet ministers not to attend any function of the Dalai Lama. While he has openly said that Tawang and Arunachal Pradesh are coveted by China, his consul-general in Mumbai took on the senior-most minister in the government last year over the latterâs interpretation of the 1962 war.
If this is the attitude of small-time career diplomats, one can well understand the mental framework of the Chinese leadership towards India. Despite this, the Manmohan Singh government still stands accused by the Left â some of whose leaders had sided openly and unapologetically with China over 1962 â of collaborating with Americans to encircle China. In fact, the political debate over the Indo-US nuclear deal is about how India is either being used by America or China or Russia, as if India is not confident enough to act independently in its own interest.
The overall trade China has with the SAARC nations stands at $9 billion; Indiaâs with SAARC countries comes second with $7 billion. China has an overall trade of $160 billion with ASEAN countries, as compared to Indiaâs $30 billion. Yet it is New Delhi that is seen to be building economic leverage in an effort to encircle Beijing and not the other way round.
The India-China Special Representative dialogue on the boundary dispute is a work in progress, Chinese incursions into the Indian side of the LAC have become frequent and the exercise to exchange the western sector maps has been put on the back-burner. In the meantime, China has tripled its military deployment capability in Tibet through the new railroad to Lhasa and road infrastructure to the Indian border. The only positive out of this is that India-China trade now stands at over $20 billion. It is time that New Delhi got out of its defensive mindset and built up infrastructure and capability to deal with any situation that may possibly be thrown up by China. A step in this direction would be to identify the vital areas on the Indian side of the LAC, and build presence and capability through road infrastructure and revival of the advanced landing grounds that are lying in disuse since the border conflict.
Remember the idea is to be confident and not subservient or complacent towards our northern neighbour. But this can only happen if Indian strategists overcome the scars of 1962. This is illustrated by a meeting of the hush-hush China Study Group in 2004, when the Indian army opposed the plan of constructing 12 strategic roads in Arunchal Pradesh, saying that these would be used by Chinese Peoples Liberation Army to come into India. At this point, the then home secretary testily told the then director-general, Military Operations, that if the army was so afraid of meeting the PLA on the foothills, it should prepare to meet it in Delhi.
It is this need for clarity that demands the Brookes-Bhagat Report to be made public. It could ensure that the 1962 failure gets translated into some positive action. In the late eighties, then minister of state for defence, Arun Singh, tried unsuccessfully to ask the defence secretary, S.K. Bhatnagar, to lend the Report to the army chief, General K. Sundarji, so that he could read it, but to no avail. In 1997, Principal Secretary to Prime Minister I.K. Gujral, N.N. Vohra, was successful in accessing the Report, with a deputy secretary of the defence ministry waiting inside his office to ensure that there was no attempt made at photocopying it!
The consequences of this policy of denial is clear: the true history of 1962 war will remain buried. It will be the Chetan Anand film or some coloured war accounts of then serving generals which will serve as the public record of that war, unless the âHaqeeqatâ of the Brookes-Bhagat Report emerges.
Shishir GuptaPosted online: Monday, November 19, 2007 at 0000 hrs Print EmailTo set both history and policy straight, itâs crucial to make public the Brookes-Bhagat Report on that war.
Related Stories Manmohanâs long winter
Rangoon isn't Kathmandu
Forty five years ago to the day, the Zhou Enlai government offered the Indian charge dâ affairs in Beijing, P.K. Bannerjee, a humiliating ceasefire to end the month-long 1962 conflict across the 4,000 kilometre-long, mountainous border. Although the war officially ended two days later, the psychological scars it caused still remain rooted in the Indian mindset. Symbolic of this manifestation is the Henderson Brookes-P.S. Bhagat Report on the operational aspects of the 1962 conflagration, which lies buried in the vaults of South Block since it was submitted to the Nehru government in May 1963.
Prepared between December 1962 and May 1963, only one copy of this three-volume report exists today and the authors, as well as all the major players except the then director, Military Operations, D.K. Palit, have passed away. Yet successive governments at the Centre have adopted a âlet the past bury its deadâ attitude â the BJP-led NDA included. There has been no attempt to make public this three-volume report (one dealing with operations, the other two, with maps/annexures) in its fading yellow binding.
As if the Report symbolises the shame of the nation, it has been tucked away in a series of lockers inside the defence secretaryâs office, and can only be accessed through a series of keys and not-so-forthcoming permission. Even though the paper of this typed report is yellow and brittle with age, there has been no attempt to either keep a photocopy of it or make it public. Perhaps the political rulers and the military establishment want this report to self-destruct or simply fade out of the public mind. But it is crucial for India that its contents be made public. It could lead to a much-needed collective catharsis over the 1962 defeat. It is time the public knew exactly what happened when political leaders played Napolean with pliant generals as their subservient sidekicks.
The Brookes-Bhagat Report is, in fact, a scathing indictment of the then prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and his then defence minister, V.K. Krishna Menon, for a poorly strategised âforward policyâ towards Tibet and interference in the Indian armyâs operational affairs. The report is raw in its verbal expression. It minces no words in criticising then army chief, General P.N. Thapar, his then newly-created Tezpur Corps commander, B.M. Kaul, the then director, Military Operations, D.K. Palit, and a host of other army officers in the conduct of war operations. Laced with quotes from victorious generals from the west and quotes from leading war strategists, it is also harsh on then director, Intelligence Bureau, B.N. Mullick.
It is not for scoring points in a Parliament debate that this report must be made public, but for the Indian establishment to overcome its defensive mindset towards China which remains to this day. It is nobodyâs case that India should start flexing its muscles on the Line of Actual Control or be bitter about the past. Simply put, Indiaâs management of its relations with China should be firmly rooted on ground reality and not on illusions of Hindi-Chini bhai-bhai. But the facts are to the contrary. The Chinese ambassador to India, Sun Yuxi, recently patted the Indian government for sending written instructions to its Cabinet ministers not to attend any function of the Dalai Lama. While he has openly said that Tawang and Arunachal Pradesh are coveted by China, his consul-general in Mumbai took on the senior-most minister in the government last year over the latterâs interpretation of the 1962 war.
If this is the attitude of small-time career diplomats, one can well understand the mental framework of the Chinese leadership towards India. Despite this, the Manmohan Singh government still stands accused by the Left â some of whose leaders had sided openly and unapologetically with China over 1962 â of collaborating with Americans to encircle China. In fact, the political debate over the Indo-US nuclear deal is about how India is either being used by America or China or Russia, as if India is not confident enough to act independently in its own interest.
The overall trade China has with the SAARC nations stands at $9 billion; Indiaâs with SAARC countries comes second with $7 billion. China has an overall trade of $160 billion with ASEAN countries, as compared to Indiaâs $30 billion. Yet it is New Delhi that is seen to be building economic leverage in an effort to encircle Beijing and not the other way round.
The India-China Special Representative dialogue on the boundary dispute is a work in progress, Chinese incursions into the Indian side of the LAC have become frequent and the exercise to exchange the western sector maps has been put on the back-burner. In the meantime, China has tripled its military deployment capability in Tibet through the new railroad to Lhasa and road infrastructure to the Indian border. The only positive out of this is that India-China trade now stands at over $20 billion. It is time that New Delhi got out of its defensive mindset and built up infrastructure and capability to deal with any situation that may possibly be thrown up by China. A step in this direction would be to identify the vital areas on the Indian side of the LAC, and build presence and capability through road infrastructure and revival of the advanced landing grounds that are lying in disuse since the border conflict.
Remember the idea is to be confident and not subservient or complacent towards our northern neighbour. But this can only happen if Indian strategists overcome the scars of 1962. This is illustrated by a meeting of the hush-hush China Study Group in 2004, when the Indian army opposed the plan of constructing 12 strategic roads in Arunchal Pradesh, saying that these would be used by Chinese Peoples Liberation Army to come into India. At this point, the then home secretary testily told the then director-general, Military Operations, that if the army was so afraid of meeting the PLA on the foothills, it should prepare to meet it in Delhi.
It is this need for clarity that demands the Brookes-Bhagat Report to be made public. It could ensure that the 1962 failure gets translated into some positive action. In the late eighties, then minister of state for defence, Arun Singh, tried unsuccessfully to ask the defence secretary, S.K. Bhatnagar, to lend the Report to the army chief, General K. Sundarji, so that he could read it, but to no avail. In 1997, Principal Secretary to Prime Minister I.K. Gujral, N.N. Vohra, was successful in accessing the Report, with a deputy secretary of the defence ministry waiting inside his office to ensure that there was no attempt made at photocopying it!
The consequences of this policy of denial is clear: the true history of 1962 war will remain buried. It will be the Chetan Anand film or some coloured war accounts of then serving generals which will serve as the public record of that war, unless the âHaqeeqatâ of the Brookes-Bhagat Report emerges.