Lavoy and Indian Tanks in Afghanistan?

Posted on May 24, 2012 by Bharat Karnad

Heard the other day from Rahul Bedi of Janes’s and, following up on my blogging re: Lavoy, said he had heard from his MoD army sources that Lavoy, during his trip here last week, had urged India to dispatch Indian army’s T-72s and T-90s to Afghanistan!! Lavoy, I know, did suggest that India quickly up its stake and occupy at least part of the space being vacated by ISAF. But tanks? I am doubtful he pitched this, in the main, because, well, how would you get these monstrous things from here to there? Have the Indian armoured columns take the Grand Trunk Road to Peshawar and across the Khyber, or detour via Quetta past Bolan? And how would this armored formation be logistically supplied — through Pakistan? Or, the round about route presently used by NATO the so-called Northern Distribution Network via Latvia, Russia, Kasazkstan, Uzbekistan or up through the Caspian entrepot? Simply isn’t feasible. But if Lavoy did ask for this, he must be loco. Then again, the US comes with some damn fool ideas.

About Bharat Karnad

Senior Fellow in National Security Studies at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, he was Member of the (1st) National Security Advisory Board and the Nuclear Doctrine-drafting Group, and author, among other books of, 'Nuclear Weapons and Indian Security: The Realist Foundations of Strategy', 'India's Nuclear Policy' and most recently, 'Why India is Not a Great Power (Yet)'. Educated at the University of California (undergrad and grad), he was Visiting Scholar at Princeton University, University of Pennsylvania, the Shanghai Institutes of International Studies, and Henry L. Stimson Center, Washington, DC.

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This entry was posted in Afghanistan, Asian geopolitics, Geopolitics, Great Power imperatives, India's Pakistan Policy, India's strategic thinking and policy, Indian Army and tagged Afghanistan. Bookmark the permalink.

11 Responses to Lavoy and Indian Tanks in Afghanistan?

Ravi says:

May 26, 2012 at 6:04 pm

Whether Lavoy urged India to dispatch Indian army’s T-72s and T-90s to Afghanistan is immaterial. What matters is the fact that the present Afghan government will not last too terribly long once the ISAF leave. Instead, it would be wiser if India started planning for the not too distant future, and be in constant touch with the leaders of the former Northern Alliance (which has been a long standing ally of India’s) to chalk out ways and means to supply them with weapons and other assistance when (and not if) the Karzai regime collapses.

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Bharat Karnad says:

May 27, 2012 at 9:12 am

Quite right. The problem, however, is that India has put down big stakes in Karzai’s Afghanistan, and these simply cannot be thrown overboard. We have always had a our hand in with the Northern Alliance and that’ll stay.

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Joydeep Ghosh says:

May 28, 2012 at 1:31 pm

Bharat sir

sorry for raising different topic, but whatever the below links depicts is that good for India? http://www.defensenews.com/article/20120526/DEFREG03/305260001/Experts-Wary-Pakistan-Nuke-Claims?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE

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Bharat Karnad says:

May 29, 2012 at 9:52 am

Anything that makes the Pakistani SPD feel better, comfortable, more secure is good as far as India’s concerned. Because any actual use, accidental or planned, of nukes will mean the certain and definite extinction of Pakistan.

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Satyaki says:

May 29, 2012 at 6:56 pm

Even without a proven TN warhead, is what we have now adequate for the certain extinction of Pakistan (in the event of a use of nukes from that side) ?

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- Bharat Karnad says:
  
  May 30, 2012 at 9:59 am
  
  Pakistan’s industrial, population, and military concentrations are all in a narrow north-south corridor that a series of 20 KT explosions can destroy. Spatially not as constricted, India is not faced with the same level of risk.
  
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  - Satyaki says:
    
    May 30, 2012 at 11:22 am
    
    By “destroy” I resume you mean causing enough physical damage that Pakistan stops functioning as a coherent national entity (rather than the destruction of most of its population). Is this correct ?
    
    Also, you say that we are close to having 200 nuclear warheads. What is your estimate of the number of warheads with Pakistan ?
  - Bharat Karnad says:
    
    June 1, 2012 at 6:50 am
    
    It means Pakistan, to use the great geostrategist Halford Mackinder’s phrase, ceases to exist as a social organism.
  - Ravi says:
    
    May 30, 2012 at 1:04 pm
    
    @Satyaki-Pakistan stopped functioning as a coherent national entity quite a while ago;-).
Satyaki says:

May 30, 2012 at 1:12 pm

I disagree: the core of the Pakistani state (the army) is very much intact.

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- Ravi says:
  
  May 30, 2012 at 10:54 pm
  
  Does the Pakistani army collect taxes, build infrastructure, take care of education (I don’t mean Madrassas here), maintain law and order on the streets for the common people, manage the economy,….? These are all the signs of a functioning and coherent national entity. Further, have you factored in the jehadi elements who have been consistently infiltrating and/or finding support in both the junior-middle and even at times the top echelon ranking of the officer corps, and the rank and file (notably NCO’s and JCO’) of the Pakistani army since Zia’s time?
  
  Reply