“Our defence forces require the timely and cost-effective acquisition of defence equipment to enable them to meet any challenge to the country’s security. If they have to effectively meet these challenges, we must adopt a holistic approach towards defence acquisition right from the planning to the final disposal of the weapon system, without compromising on transparency, fairness and probity at any level.”
—Shri A. K. Antony, Defence Minister (26 October 2009)
To start, let us first try to answer the question: What does Defence Acquisition mean?
Defence acquisition or military acquisition, as it is also referred to, typically implies the bureaucratic management and procurement process dealing with a nation’s investments in the technologies, programs and product support necessary to achieve its national security targets and support its armed forces. Now, maintaining a military that is prepared to face uncertain future security challenges often requires the acquisition and procurement of new and technologically advanced equipment, which is a major expense for any nation. With the rising cost per unit of military hardware, it has become almost inevitable for nations to cooperate for defence procurement.
The procurement of new weaponry and equipment is a long, arduous and time-consuming process for all countries. This is because multiple agencies have to perform vital functions and a large number of inter-dependent variables have to be factored in to provide the required equipment to the armed forces. A few major imperatives also have to be taken care of like the expeditious procurement of approved requirements, optimal utilisation of allocated funds etc. which define these defence acquisitions.
INDIA’S POSITION
In India, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has been responsible for many reforms in this field. For instance, the “Defence Procurement Procedure” sets out the contours as well as detailed rules for capital acquisition. India’s Defence Acquisition Policies are mainly centralised and are not carried down to different sectors.
In 2006, the MoD adopted the “make” ideal for the development of indigenous research and design of weapon systems to increase the participation of the Indian industry in defence. The category of ‘Buy and Make Indian’ has also been introduced to facilitate the Indian private sector who can now enter into ventures with foreign companies to make advanced weapon systems. These two policies have given India an edge in innovation and research in the field of weapons technology.
In 2017, the MoD laid out the Strategic Partnership Model intended to engage the Indian private sector in the manufacture of hi-tech defence equipment. Under this, Indian industry majors would partner with global original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to seek a transfer of technological know-how to set up the domestic manufacturing industry and supply chain. However, one potential drawback of this policy might be the inclusion of the public sector. The policy is expected to be implemented in a few selected segments to begin with, namely, fighter aircraft, submarines and armoured vehicles.
Apart from this, in its Defence Acquisition Procedure (DAP) 2020, the compendium guiding the SOP policies and basing the terms for Defence Acquisition, India has put an embargo on 101 Defence Items. This might prove to be a turning point and encourage the indigenisation of weapon systems in India.
USA’S PRIVATISATION
Most Western nations with modern armies rely on the private sector to a great extent to meet their needs for military equipment and ammunition. For example, about two-thirds of the United States’ Army's ammunition dollars go to purely commercial plants.
USA’s privatisation in the defence production industry has been largely monopolistic, mainly due to the consolidation of European as well as the USA’s defence manufacturing companies. This consolidation period came into existence due to the decrease in defence expenditures around the globe, the need for technology shifts necessitating the need for indigenous research, and the opening up of European collaborative policies as a result of the Cold War. This allowed dominant defence companies to benefit with investment into indigenous defence systems and weapon engineering.
With aerospace engineering companies like Lockheed Martin, in the USA, expanding towards defence manufacturing, the United States Air Force aircrafts have observed state of the art technologies accruing to the advancement of national security and self-sufficiency in weapons and arms. This can be backed up by the example of the Cold War American Spy plane Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird which was one of the most invulnerable aeroplanes in history.
United States’ observed efficiency in Defence Acquisition can be attributed to its policies and its organisational structure for its Defence Acquisition workforce. This sufficiency and leadership have allowed the US to become the biggest weapons exporter in the world by international sale, which, further supplemented by its policy of Foreign Military Sale (FMS), has led to significant profits and economic development.
CHINA'S LEAP TOWARDS DEFENCE SUPREMACY
China has set its sails to become one of the nations with advanced defence industries. A shift towards a market based and research-driven paradigm to inculcate competition in this field has been ongoing since the late 1990s, leading to more advanced and capable weapons. This shift is, in fact, an outcome of the lessons from the failure of the central planning era, which focused less on defence and more on economic development.
With the increase in the felt need for defence in China, the industrial reforms have also led to an increase in R&D investment. China, which continues its pursuit of civilian-military integration (CMI) and focuses on mastering both the art and science of innovation as applied to the defence sector, is shifting to a system-of-systems development model, more conducive to the information age. With this, we are likely to see significant changes in China’s approach and potential advances towards defence innovation.
A major step towards the advancement envisioned by China is the civil-military integration, forging linkages between civil and defence economies. This initiative is yet to be significant, and requires major organisation structural change, with transparency, adaptability and market-oriented structure, which opposes the general policy of China’s Socialist secrecy and insularity.
PROBLEM WITH INDIA
India has the dubious distinction of being one of the world’s biggest arms importers. This is not to say that it is bad for our country to indulge in international defence deals since, after all, we live in an open economy. Even famed defence superpowers like China had once followed the practice of importing weapons. But unlike China, the fact that India has a share of 9.5% in the world's total arms imports even after 75 years of independence cannot be defended on any ground.
Have you ever thought, why can’t India do the same for its domestic economy? Why can we not spend at home and create more jobs domestically?
The heart of the matter is India’s apparent inability to develop military systems that could run off assembly lines that employ thousands like the USA and China (referred to above). As a first step, one needs to explore, analyse and scrutinize various aspects of research followed by initialising real manufacturing. Researching and developing new military systems, primarily, is the job of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). DRDO, due to its inherent problems and contradictions, seems to be unable to lead the creation of India’s very own Military Industry Corporation (MIC). Hence, if the foremost step is out of order, it becomes difficult for India to be able to stand on her own feet in the area of defence production.
CONCLUSION
India’s Defence Acquisition is a very dire need and requires involvement which is not merely centralised to the higher military and political positions but is also of the workforce from different parts of the job stratum. This requires the setting up of workforce planning and training, supplemented by research and an institutional push from universities and organisations across India and the globe. The establishment of an autonomous institution to guide students and make visionaries for Defence Acquisition is crucial. This can be considered as the most efficient step towards the betterment of defence planning and policy-making.
While India allows the private sector to delve into defence manufacturing, stringent policies and entry barriers are not uncommon. This leads to delays in defence contracting and acquisition. This can be manoeuvred with open competition, brought down to the level of even small-scale industries for systems development. FDI in the defence sector can be affiliated to indigenous research, to provide for limited dependency. The Union Budget emphasises a lot on defence acquisition, but most of it is biased towards revenue and not capital formation. While India’s capable aerospace engineering companies and industrial manufacturing companies are endowed with the capacity to produce and venture, their momentum in the sector can also be utilized in weapons development and research.
All in all, India seems to be in a position to procure and not produce. This presently necessitates developing a future generation of leaders through education. In such a situation, where the country’s self-reliance depends on its indigenous thought-centre capability, there is an urgent need for better manpower and policy planning.
This piece has been authored by Yugam Sharma, Advait Prasanna and Eshanya Sethi of Sri Guru Gobind Singh College of Commerce, University of Delhi. The article has been edited for brevity and clarity. The views and opinions expressed in this article are entirely those of the authors and do not reflect the official position of The Civil Services Forum.
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