By Neil John
EDITOR'S NOTE - This piece by Neil John was triggered by an article from Lt Gen Bhopinder Singh, titled 'The art of leading from the front ' published by ' The Pioneer' on 22 Sep 23
I intend to disagree a bit on the leading from the front concept. The kind of leadership that rides into the battle cavalier style is of course the worst form of leadership. What I disagree with is as a leader getting into an operation and drawing fatalities. And if the fatalities are due to bad planning, operational ignorance and lack of tactical knowledge then, it’s poor leadership. You might not be able to gauge an unpredictable sudden development and then you go to ground, due to the intangible factors of decision making involved, there you buy casualty, even after due precautions, that’s acceptable. Cause leadership called for you to take on the role of ensuring a foreseeable bad outcome is negated pro actively and you took that risk of being present on site.
It is good to lead from the front, when you have a clear picture of the battlefield and achievable objectives. Or objectives that need grit and valour, which without a follow me out … kind of boost would be unachievable. The time of leading from the front charging on to the enemy is over. Leading from the front doesn’t mean dhawa of an enemy position. It means accomplishing a mission, through planning, mission type orders, catering for contingencies, deriving usable intelligence and manifesting own strengths on enemies vulnerabilities, aimed at achievement of the planned end state. To do this we don’t need to lose lives. We need to follow the principles of contact battles. Dekho, samjho, pahechano, plan banao, phir bhido.
With the transparency in battle fields, it is but imminent that the leader is going to get hit first. Indian army casualties atleast 75% of them are due to failure to see the thin line indicating a contact, or due to callous attitude, or failure to gain credible intelligence. Mixed with this is false bravado and wanting to do well. The biggest problem is the awards, they substantiate your next rank and give you a jumping chance over your Coursemate’s. Having been there and done that, living through it. Valour and gallantry are but opportunities provided to you in time and space. In our younger years the adrenalin and the adventure gave you a high. Killing a terrorist was the self proclamation, that I have been blooded. But today it’s not so. While our junior officers are good, forthright and most of them willing to take calculated risks. No one is ready to lose a life. It’s just not worth the price. Not for a terrorist, who if not today will be brought down another day.
The clamour for merit based courses and further promotions, with the incentives that go with awards is the bane. I don’t want to sound negative, valour needs to be appreciated and given it’s due. But foolish valour, where you risked the lives of the men you command and expose yourself in the garb of forward leadership is a moot factor. Lots of times we find senior leadership at the point of contact. Why? Don’t you trust your junior leadership to do the job well? If not, then you have failed to be a good commander, failed to make the body of troops you command understand the ground requirement and realities and then practice and validate drills to achieve success in contact ops. I am in no way saying that in CI drills and procedures will see us through and prevent casualties. All that I am saying is that you better train knowing your ground, the terrorists modus operandi, the way they react during contact, study habits, look through case studies to gain important lessons. Toughen yourself mentally, have the mental mobility to take care of contingencies.
The issue is of leadership and the position of the leadership. We are sequenced in our applications. A section first, conforming to the company objective and the company to the battalion and so forth. The application is as per a cycle that is preached and practiced. Every leader in his little bubble has a role to play and only he plays it best. The issue is casualties happen when you burst his bubble and become the external influencer. Where you presume you are in a leadership module only because you know the bigger picture. More often then not, we forget that we grew from the same crop of leadership. It’s okay to plan and give orders for conduct of an operation and let the leadership at that level, prosecute the nitigrities in a manner he knows best. Only he can establish, the capabilities of his men, the environment of operations and formulate the best ways of achieving the same. Every leader will get his time to play the role he is been training for. But atleast let that time come. When you jump the gun, you put yourself in a mantle of authority. In the military this authority comes at a price. You start giving orders and dictating terms. Also the ACR factor, when the young leader knows he will be gauged for his act, as the boss is on ground. In his fervour to perform exponentially he commits mistakes. Mistakes cost lives and that is unacceptable. My leadership as a battalion commander is to ensure peace and security. Towards that goal, I am proactive through domination and an dynamic intelligence gathering network. Also I arm my officers with adequate amount of confidence and motivation. They know that they are the best and they have to make sure to keep that perception constant. He doesn’t need to get into monkey tricks. Just needs to do what he is trained for and do it at his best.
CI operations can never be black and white. The shades of grey will prevail, luck and karma too have a major role to play. What we need is the leadership that can understand the need. Be mature and patient to follow leads, pick up the signs from the environment, collate practices and past histories.
Sadly the superficiality has set in. Most of us already due to article 370 in J & K feel that we are in a comfort zone of relative safety. The imminent rot of peace time soldiering will set in slowly in due time.
The adage is simple … “YOU WANT TO BE A GOOD LEADER, ENSURE CREDIBILITY WITHOUT LOSSES”.
Remember you are trained to kill, not to die. But if in action death has come to you, let it be in glory, to be written and talked about.
If you still want to perform acts of valour. Do it with perfect planning and be ready to take ownership of events as they pan out. But for gods sake … don’t go and start dictating to a company commander or a CO how to fight tactical and sub tactical battles at the place of occurance. Leave that radio set alone, you don’t need a update minute to minute about what’s happening. Trust your command, they will deliver. Our junior leadership has never failed us … what has failed us at times is too much micro management and a few ambitious wannabes.
Comments