The build-up of military power takes time and cannot be created in an emergency. The process has to be medium to long term. As the official historian of the 1962 India-China border war, one is reminded of an incident.
The Indian Army the Chinese in 1962 with First World War vintage Lee Enfield bolt action rifles, the kind our policemen continue to carry to date! The army's request for automatic rifles was stuck in the red tape and government apathy.
Nobody told the babus and the netas that the induction of a new weapon takes at least a year or two to train the men in handling it. All that we ended up doing was to gift brand new rifles to the Chinese.
If we do not anticipate and prepare before the threat manifests, we may well end up like in 1962. Many political commentators have been hailing Dr Manmohan Singh only the second prime minister after Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru to have got re-elected after a full term like Nehru in 1962. But come October 1962, and the Chinese attacked us. Nehru was never the same again.
While the prime minister basks in glory of being only second after Nehru, this is a useful reminder of the pitfalls of neglecting security.
