CHACHA KAHINI
A STRONG
ARMED FORCES WASTED.
A medallion too far.
SARASIJ MAJUMDER
The funniest
thing is--- Chacha was not to do much! Only Prioritize.
Our
bad luck that we didn’t get BOSE as P.M., who understood the importance of a
strong ARMED FORCE, required for a budding nation, surrounded by small countries, and to
face CHINA, and Pakistan. GEO-POLITICALLY, and from MILITERY INTELLIGENCE point
of view— Nehru was just pretty ordinary, and NAIVE( and that is what Stalin also
thought of him) but politically he was an air bag with very high ambition.
When the British left the country, India inherited the most
powerful army in the continent. A battle hardened force that had tested its
blade successfully against the best in the world,.
Strength of the Indian Army in August 1947 was 4,00,000 men along
with 6 GORKHA REGIMENTS. But the political leadership was keen to reduce the
strength to save defence expenditure and hence it was decided to bring down the strength of the Army to 2,00,000 men after
the Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) Operations which would involve the disbandment
of many units. What a foolish idea!
India inherited an air force, which, small European nations, including FRANCE, and
ITALY would give an arm to possess in 1947. The principal components of the
RIAF after partition were Nos. 3,4,7,8 and 10 Squadrons with Tempests, No. 2
Squadron with Spitfires and No. 12 Squadron with C-47s, plus No. 1 Air
Observation Flight, the establishment of which with AOP Auster 4s, 5s, and 6s,
coincided with independence, and about 15,000 + Officers, Pilots, and other
personnel. Despite
the skepticism on the part of the US and British advisers concerning the
feasibility of the scheme, the first half-dozen HAL-reconditioned B-24s were
ready by November 1948 and, on the 17th of that month, No. 5 Squadron was
formed with these heavy bombers. Later, in early 1950, No. 6 Squadron was to
reform at Poona also with B-24s, while No.16 Squadron was to be established to
provide back-up training on the type. To supplement the Tiger Moths, Prentice
basic trainers were delivered to the RIAF during the course of 1948, eventually
to see service at Jodhpur, Tambaram and Ambala. But truly epoch-making in so
far as the Service was concerned, was the arrival in India of three Vampire
F.Mk.3 jet fighters on 4 November 1948. These were the precursors of more than
400 Vampires of various types that were procured by the Service over the
following years. The
achievement of operational status on the Vampire FBMk.52 by No. 7 Squadron in
the following year was to give the RIAF the distinction of becoming the first
Asian air arm to operate jets. There were some more to this went on
getting added —but we stop here on IAF, which left “R” prefix after 26/01/
1950.
The NAVY, perhaps was a bit lagging. On
India attaining Independence, the Royal Indian Navy consisted of 32 vessels suitable for coastal patrol, along with 11,000
officers and men. The senior officers were drawn from the Royal Navy, with R.
Adm. ITS Hall, CIE, being the first Post-independence Commander-in-Chief. The
prefix 'Royal' was dropped on 26 January 1950 with India being constituted as a
Republic. The first Commander-in-Chief of the Indian Navy was Adm. Sir Edward
Parry, KCB, who handed over to Adm. Sir Mark Pizzey, KBE, CB, DSO in 1951. Adm.
Pizzey also became the first Chief of
the Naval Staff in 1955, and was succeeded by V. Adm. SH Carlill, CB, DSO.
We, however, got 70% of the TOTAL FLEET of RIN, 30% only going to Pakistan with
same, or lower, and smaller class of Vessels..
On 22 April 1958 V. Adm. RD Katari assumed office as the
first Indian Chief of the Naval Staff.
The best in the
sub-continent, JAPAN’s NAVY was disseminated by USA in 2nd World War. Considering that, we were well
off. And we have 3 Integrated steel plants, and 5 shipyards to build Naval
Vessels of our need, and CHOICE.
The above was the scenario, at the time of Independence—kept
hidden from People of India by Congress. We could beat Pakistan, and China
Pants Down, in 49-, and 62.
But, by
the time Nehru was 10 years down the line of his PREMEARSHIP, he reduced the
INDIAN ARMY to a bunch of Boy Scouts, being commanded by a few JOKERS!.
And he dreamed, and he had
a very solid reason for that DREAM, with Mr. Gandhi out of the way. He was SCHEAMING of being the first Indian,
nay Asian- to win the Nobel for peace. He thought a strong army would be
detrimental to realize this dream. So he proceeded to reduce it into a group of
parade marchers, starving them from
arms, equipment, and to even proper uniforms. And if this wasn't enough, he
decided to remove army heads capable of fighting and replaced them with cry
babies like BIZZY KAUL.
When forced into the FIRST WAR with Pakistan, he ensured
that there wasn't a decisive victory. He never wanted to be perceived as an
“AGGRESOR”. When the Pakis were
abandoning everything and retreating, a ceasefire was declared, leaving a large
part of Kashmir to Pakistan, and taking the case for negotiation at UN security
council. While Chinese were making a mincemeat of our soldiers, he ensured that
our Airforce (which was still the most potent Air Force in Asia and could decimate the Chinese
misadventure in a day, or two) remained in the hangars.
In POK,
we lost 72,935sq. km. In Aksai Chin—we lost 38,000sq. km. Our total loss of
land area is more than area of BIHAR (94,163km2)
All for
THE MEDALLION which never became his…. and
he died a broken man However, he was nominated 11 times, but not awarded..
The irony is--Hitler, Mussolini, (Both,1939) and Stalin (1945, 1948) were all nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, at some time or other. None Got it.
HISTORY
OF INDEPENDENT INDIA WILL NEVER PARDON HIM FOR THIS LOSS.
Sources:-
1.0 https://www.spslandforces.com/story/?id=433
2.0 https://indianairforce.nic.in/history/
3.0 https://www.indiannavy.nic.in/content/genesis-indian-navy
4.0 I have researched lot more. Shared above list only for
reference. There could be some minor conflict on data at various sources, in the net; which
you should ignore.
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