Mafia Ways

Poor handling of armour at and beyond brigade level in all Indo Pak Wars fought from 1947-48 till 1971 stands out as the principal cause of stagnation and lack of decisiveness in the final outcome of all three Indo Pak wars. On the face value this may appear to be an oversimplified view , however a dispassionate study of the British-Indian military tradition proves that this assertion is far more closer to truth than many military observers and analysts may have realised in actual on ground military analysis as far as military history writing in the Indo Pak scenario is concerned.

In this brief article, we will survey the entire canvas of British-Indo Pak military tradition from the eighteenth century till to date and endeavour to arrive at certain analytical conclusions which may help us in improving doctrine operational philosophy and handling of armour in a future war, or at least in military training.

Cavalry was the decisive arm of battle till at least the 1740s in India. It may be noted that the "superiority of the infantry-artillery team based European way of war, over the cavalry charge based Asiatic way of warfare"1, was,  for the first time  demonstrated at the Battle of Saint Thome in 1746,  where the French-Native troops of the French East India Company,  under the  Paradis, a Swiss soldier of fortune on the French East India Company's payroll,  brushed aside  the much larger and at least outwardly awesome cavalry heavy army of, Anwaruddin, the Nawab of Carnatic. Thus in words of the Cambridge historian  "Cavalry could make no impression on  troops that kept their ranks and reserved their fire" The terror of Asiatic armies had disappeared2! Cavalry, however, retained its own decisive role at the tactical level as a flank protection and limited attack role on the battlefield and as a protective element and strategic screen /raiding and harassing force at the strategic level. Since the Marathas and Mysore forces of Hyder Ali relied heavily on cavalry as a strategic screen and as a raiding force the British were also forced to raise regular native cavalry regiments. This process started from 1672 but was assumed a significant shape from once the Moghal Horse was raised at Patna in July 1760 under Sardars Mirza Shahbaz Khan and Mirza Tar Beg3. It may be noted that this unit was officered entirely by Indians. The British attitude at this time was that "cavalry was a rather flashy extravagance"4 and they preferred getting it on loan from native rulers rather than having their own Native cavalry units. Thus, in the south the Nawab of  Arcot and in the north the Nawab of Oudh were asked by the British to supply cavalry and raise cavalry units for war service with the English East India Company. The British discovered that cavalry taken on loan from the Nawab of Arcot and Nawab of Oudh was unreliable under fire and raised their own native cavalry units in Bengal and Madras officered by Europeans from the mid and late 1770s.5 Cavalry was first seriously recognised as an arm of decision once General Gerard Lake who was basically an infantryman arrived in India in  1801 as C in C Bengal Army . General Lake  for the first time organised  cavalry as brigades of two units 6. Lake decided to do so since he felt that Maratha cavalry was too efficient vis a vis the company's cavalry and there was a need for reorganisation and reform. Lake thus gave serious thought to cavalry training and the first major cavalry training manoeuvres in the Company's military history were held in 1802. Cavalry units were trained hard and the standard set was 45 miles in 24 hours. Lake also increased  cavalry's firepower by attaching two six pounder galloper horse artillery guns to each cavalry regiment.7 

The reader may note that while the Bengal Infantry from the beginning was Hindu dominated, cavalry at the outset was a wholly Muslim arm. Such was the Muslim dominance that even the British C in C of Bengal Army8 (also C in C India) Major John Carnac declared that "The Mughals ( Muslim of Central Asian/West of Khyber ancestry) .....are the only good horsemen in India"9. The Bengal infantry from the very beginning had no Bengalis since the English Company had the choice to recruit soldiers of fortune of "Jat" "Rohilla (Hindustani Pathan or anyone with a Pathan ancestry)" Buxarries (Hindu Bhumihar Brahmans from Buxar area in modern  Bihar province who had been recruited in Mughal Army also10) Jats (largely Hindustani Hindu but possibly some Muslims) Rajputs (mostly Hindustani Hindu from Oudh and Bihar) and Brahmans11. Even in Britain cavalry was seen as a feudal dominated arm and known as the "arm of fashion and wealth".12

Cavalry was decisively employed by General Lake in the Second Maratha War, notably at Fatehgarh which was an all cavalry battle.13  Lake brilliantly used cavalry as a lightning leading force to reconnoitre otherwise impregnable Maratha defensive oppositions so that infantry and artillery were used with maximum effect at the decisive moment. Lake often used cavalry to the point of rashness. At the Battle of Delhi he brilliantly employed his cavalry in a feint withdrawal tempting the French trained and led Marathas to leave an otherwise impregnable defensive position to attack the supposedly withdrawing cavalry, while Lake brought up his infantry to counterattack the overconfident Marathas! The Maratha War was a lesson for the British in cavalry's capabilities as well as limitations. At Laswari  where Lake finally decisively defeated the Maratha main army under the Hindustani Pathan Sarwar Khan14, he advanced single-handed with his cavalry against a Maratha army which Lake thought was retreating . His cavalry initially achieved a breakthrough, but was then held up by Maratha artillery fire and Lake was able to finally defeat the Marathas only after his infantry joined him at midday.15 Laswari once again proved that cavalry was not as much of an arm of decision as infantry, for it was the British Indian infantry that finally saved the day at Laswari.

Cavalry was again significantly  employed in the Third Maratha/Pindari War. This was essentially a cleanup operation covering thousands of miles and was essentially a war of movement suiting the cavalry. Cavalry was used to locate the Pindaris while infantry was later used to attack and  destroy them. The most notable cavalry action of this war took place at Sitabaldi where the 6th Bengal Native Cavalry defeated a much larger combined Maratha-Arab Muslim force singlehandedly.16

Cavalry's importance started declining from 1817 onwards . Although it performed important reconnaissance and protection duties in the First Afghan War the mountainous terrain and poor logistics limited its role severely. The Sikh Wars were also wholly infantry dominated wars in which Sikhs dug themselves up into entrenchments which were stormed by the British at great human cost. The Second Sikh  War was particularly unfortunate for Indian cavalry because of flight of a cavalry brigade of two British and two native units at Chillianwalla which led to a serious British reverse. Cavalry's role by 1857 was reduced to escorting artillery siege trains, supply convoys and flank protection. Since most of the battles of the Sepoy Rebellion were fought in built up areas cavalry had a limited role.

The most decisive change in Indian Cavalry which started from 1858 was the mixing up of the class composition by the British with a view to reducing chances of any further rebellion. This was done because the Sepoy Rebellion was largely led and sparked by the Hindustani Pathan/Ranghar Muslim units of the Bengal Army. Most notable of all being the seizure of Delhi in the early hours of 11th May 1857, by the 3rd Bengal Native Light Cavalry (raised in 1776) after reducing into shock and inertia a British garrison of one Royal British Army infantry and one cavalry regiment at Meerut on 10th May  1857. The British adopted a firm policy not to have a Muslim dominated cavalry. Thus Cavalry was made a mixed  arm after 1857 with almost equal proportions of Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs in each unit The only exception to this rule being  two  one class units of Muslims and one of  Hindus.17

Cavalry remained an arm dominated by rich men more interested in polo and pig sticking from the 1860s till the First World War. Two Indian  cavalry divisions were sent to France as part of the allied cavalry corps, but remained largely unemployed with few exceptions like the Hodson's Horse which was used in mounted infantry role18. One controversial albeit tangible way of gauging Cavalry's contribution in WW One and Two may be the  fact that the lone Victoria Cross won by an Indian cavalry man/Tankman in both world wars out of the total 35 won by Indians was won in France by a Hindu Rajputana Rajput in WW One while performing the duties of a despatch rider19! Indian Cavalry was relatively more decisively used in the Mesopotamian and Palestine Campaigns notably in the final allied offensive in 1918 when General Allenby successfully used cavalry with great effect in the battles of Gaza, Beersheeba etc along with eight British manned tanks20. The Turks were heavily outnumbered in the Palestine Campaign of 1917-18 and there was far more freedom of manoeuvre for cavalry to be employed for carrying out raids and outflanking marches21. The main fighting was, however, done by the infantry and cavalry remained an important but essentially second important arm.

The First World War marked a turning point in warfare. Infantry failed to achieve a breakthrough on the Western Front and its place as the arm of decision was challenged seriously for the first time since the Battle of Crecy (1346). Introduction of tanks in 1916 broke the stalemate despite faulty employment doctrine. However, tanks despite their relatively significant role in the German defeat in World War One failed to achieve a major victory because of mechanical failures and poor employment doctrine.22 The British Army was an infantry/cavalry  dominated army and till the end of WW One tanks were still viewed as an important but not as decisive an arm as infantry23. Tanks found an antidote soon. It was at Battle of Cambrai where tanks for the first time, at one of the five points of breakthrough, were effectively engaged and destroyed by a single German Field Artillery Battery which destroyed many tanks by direct fire.24 Tanks played a crucial role at Battle of Amiens in 1918 which was termed by military analysts as turning point of the war and as the "Black Day" of the German Army by General Ludendorff. The true worth of tanks, however, was still not appreciated, since the Germans were able to stabilise their front, thanks to conservative British doctrine of exploiting breakthroughs.25 Although the Royal Tank Corps was created from 28 July 1917, 26  Tanks as an entity did not have any Godfather in the British military hierarchy and this ensured that their true significance was not appreciated at least in the British and Indian Army. Once the allied armies were demobilised the tank was forgotten and the old generals once again elevated infantry to the role of arm of decision.

First World War brought very few changes in the Indian Army and the Indian Army remained an infantry cavalry army retaining twenty one Horse Cavalry regiments27 after the 1920-21 reorganisation. Indians thus had nothing to do with tanks till 1937-3828 when, keeping in view the growing German military threat and relative backwardness of the Indian Army it was decided to mechanise two Indian cavalry units i.e 13 Lancers and 14 Scinde Horse29. Both were given a squadron each of Vickers Light Tanks and Crossley Armoured Cars, phased out from British units 30 . The reader may note that the main problem in mechanisation of Indian cavalry in the interwar years was not essentially conservatism but lack of funds. Three of the five Indian Army chiefs in the inter war years were from cavalry31 and  wanted to mechanise the Indian Cavalry. Their efforts to do so failed because of lack of funds and economic depression of the inter war years.32 Thus on the eve of WW Two in 1939 just two Indian cavalry units were mechanised. The outbreak of World War Two forced the British to speed up mechanisation but initially mechanisation for Indians meant only trucks or armoured cars. There was one important measure which the British undertook and which most probably attracted the best available manpower to try to enrol in the Indian Armoured Corps.This was an almost  doubling of the pay of the Armoured Corps soldiers from around 18 rupees  to 33 rupees per month.33 This was done in October 1942, once General Martel who was visiting India in order to reorganise the Indian Armoured Corps was told that "India had a mercenary army" and that the best men in India would not join he Indian Armoured Corps if they were paid Rs 18 per month which was the average monthly pay of an Indian soldier.

It was Burma where the Indians for the first time thanks to US military aid to Britain were given the latest tanks of World War Two. Both the Indian tank brigades i.e.  254 (which led 33 Corps advance) and 255 (which led 4 Corps advance) were equipped with Grant and Sherman tanks.These brigades however had a limited infantry support role. It cannot be said that the Indians who fought as tankmen learnt anything really worthwhile about modern armoured warfare. The tank warfare conducted in Burma was a one sided show with the British Indian Army having 300 most modern Grant and Sherman tanks34   against  just one Japanese Tank Regiment35 consisting  of tanks which could not have the firepower or  capability to destroy the Grants and Shermans of the Indian tank brigades!36 Mostly they were in support of infantry and the Japanese in front of them had hardly any tanks to match the heavy Shermans etc with which the Indian cavalry regiments were equipped. Thus there were hardly any tank to tank fights  since the Japanese hardly possessed anything to oppose the latest Sherman and Grant tanks. The only resistance that these tanks encountered was from Japanese anti tank guns and artillery at very close ranges and these were relatively rare since the British always enjoyed numerical superiority in the later stages of the Burmese campaign and the British Indian infantry was always in close support of their tanks. In war once the enemy is vastly undergunned and underequipped to oppose you, little can be learned in terms of tactical or operational lessons. Brigadier Riaz ul Karim whose unit 5 Horse was equipped with Shermans in Burma has claimed that he was the only Indian who commanded a tank squadron in actual action in Burma and also won an MC. If this is true then the only Pakistani officer who actually commanded a tank squadron (not armoured car or tracked carrier) in WW Two was a sidelined man in the Ayubian era before 1965 war broke out!37 In any case Indian or Pakistani officers could have learnt little about armour tactics in Burma  which was essentially an infantry man's war and in which the enemy was vastly outnumbered both qualitatively as well as quantitatively as far as the tanks were concerned.

In the North African theatre the Indian armour experience was also quite limited. The Indian 3rd Motor Brigade that reached North Africa in early 1941 was equipped with soft skinned wheeled vehicles and did little except evading getting captured by the tanks of Rommel's Afrika Korps!38 Even their British masters were so inept in handling of tanks that the Germans inflicted various major defeats on them despite the fact that the British were numerically as well as qualitatively superior to the Germans! In such an environment Indians could have learnt little about armoured warfare. The British tanks in North Africa were famous for doing one of the two things. Either they would recklessly charge a well prepared German or Italian position, without any deliberate support from the despicable artillery, and return with a bloody nose or would exercise extreme caution once restrained by "Take no Risk, do nothing till you enjoy overwhelming numerical superiority" policy of commanders like Ritchie or Montgommery as happened in various operational situations throughout the North African campaign from 1941 to 1943, thus allowing the enemy to counter attack decisively and turn the scales or to disengage and occupy another sound defensive position. In any case the Indians were organised as infantry divisions or as Light Recce elements in motorised brigades and did not have tanks in this sector, which ensured that their experiences were limited as far as true armoured warfare was concerned. The Indian whose battle performance was most distinguished in this sector in tangible terms was Major Rajendarsinhji then a squadron commander of 2nd Gardner's Horse who was awarded a Distinguished Service Order  in 1941 for breaking out and capturing 300 enemy troops as prisoners.39  The South African official historian correctly observed that ".....the armoured car regiments were employed almost exclusively in observation which they performed with commendable efficiency, but there was little else in the desert campaigns that they were equipped to do. The armour of their cars was inadequate, being vulnerable to everything save rifle fire, and their armament a machine gun at best was useless save for shooting up thin skinned and defenceless transport". 40

Indian armour was deployed in other theatres like Italy, Sudan Malaya etc but here too their role was scouting and observation rather than anything more significant and the few armour officers who served in these theatres could have learnt very little about real tank battles even at squadron and unit level. The operations in these areas were infantry dominated in any case and in Italy warfare had degenerated to the positional battles of WW One.

Pakistan Army, as a result of the division of the pre 1947 British Indian Army on a communal basis, inherited six armoured regiments at the time of transfer of power and partition of India. These six units were constituted from Muslim manpower of units transferred to Pakistan and those transferred to India as the following two tables indicate 41:—

The deficiency of 10 Muslim Squadrons was made up by inter unit transfers from the following units allotted to India:—

The above thus made the class composition of the Pakistan Armoured Corps as following :—

Although 3rd Armoured Brigade was equipped with Shermans, Pakistani General Headquarters did not employ any Pakistani tanks in the 1947-48 Kashmir War. Mr Jinnah the Governor General wanted to conduct the war aggressively,and had the vision but not the energy . He was a dying man and had too many things to do. Unfortunately he was  not supported by his ethnically divided as well highly incompetent and irresolute cabinet of weak men who had neither the vision nor the resolution to function as a war cabinet! The Pakistan Army on the other hand was commanded by a non interested Britisher.

The 11 Cavalry equipped with armoured cars were the only unit employed in the war. The GHQ assigned the unit an essentially defensive and passive role but the indomitable Colonel Tommy Masud commanding the unit was too resolute a man to be restrained 44. The unit thus took a prominent part in operations in Bhimbhar-Mirpur area under Tommy Masud, but its role remained limited since it was not allowed to conduct any major offensive operation to support the militia by an over cautious general headquarters.

The Indians on the other hand employed their armour much more aggressively and imaginatively in Kashmir. Armoured cars of the 7th Light Cavalry saved Srinagar in November 194745. The Indians also employed tanks decisively in recapture of strategic towns like Jhangar and Rajauri of which the latter was captured single-handedly by a tank squadron of Central India Horse46. The greatest Indian strategic success by employment of tanks was the recapture of the otherwise impregnable 11,578 feet high Zojila Pass on 1st November 194847   which enabled them to relieve Leh and recapture the vast bulk of Ladakh. These areas without Zojila Pass were  for all purposes lost to the Indians. Today the Pakistan Army is still paying the price for loss of Zojila with approximately three infantry brigades committed in Pakistan held Kashmir opposite Indian held Ladakh.

The rule of the thumb of the 1947-48  War was the fact that all Indian successes had a deep connection with presence of tanks or armoured cars while all Pakistani failures were attributable to the absence of tanks or armoured cars! Indians stopped only where either the gradient became too steep for their tanks or where there were bottlenecks like the Indus or the Jhelum valley and tank or armoured cars could not make an impression.

The Pakistani GHQ finally moved the 3rd Armoured Brigade near Bhimbhar, for a projected counterstroke at Indian communications to Poonch, but was glad and relieved, at not employing it, when the Indians made a unilateral offer of ceasefire on 30 December 1947.48

The Pakistan Armoured Corps was equipped almost wholly with  US tanks. These tanks as earlier discussed were supplied by the US in WW Two for the defence of Burma. The armoured cars were mostly of British origin but had proved obsolete even in WW Two and were slowly phased out in the period 1950-58 as US aid enabled the armoured corps to wholly switch to tanks from 1954 onwards. It appears that the policy makers in the Pakistan Army in 1954 did not really appreciate the importance of tanks. The first US military team, which came to Pakistan and surveyed the Pakistani military requirement ments after liaison and discussions with Pakistani officers thus, reported to the US Joint Chiefs Committee that the Pakistan Army needed equipment for one armoured brigade and four infantry divisions. The US Joint Chiefs added another armoured division to this estimate making the proposed four and half division plan the famous "Five and Half Divisions Plan"49.

The developments and changes that took place in Pakistani armour can be gauged from the following table:—

We have seen that the Pakistani armoured division was a gift of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff since the US Military advisory group had recommended a four and half division plan, which included, only  one armoured brigade. There is little doubt that in the hearts of their hearts the senior Pakistani lot, with men like Musa, described by Gul as selected for "dependability rather than merit "50 feared employing this division, in actual operations, more than the Indians! The problem with the army of that time, was not as Gul suggests, that it was infantry dominated. This as a matter of fact is the case with  all armies, since infantry is the largest arm and thus has the maximum number of officers. The problem was that historically, by virtue of conservative British traditions and the colonial legacy, there were very few officers, armour or non armour, who really understood tank warfare beyond squadron level. Whatever the reason, the only major armoured divisional training manoeuvre with troops, as per General Gul,  held before the 1965 war was  one in 196151 (Gul has probably got the year wrong since both Musa and A.R Siddiqi  cite 1960) as to test the 1 Armoured Division  and this as per Gul's description was a Quixotic episode.52  The exercise was nicknamed "Tezgam" and according to both Gul and A.R Siddiqi was an utter fiasco,53 in the sense that despite ample, warning time the armoured division being exercised did no reconnaissance and tanks were launched in boggy country as  a result of which  a very large part of the armoured division got bogged down.54  The reader may note that "Exercise Tezgam"  was no haphazard affair, having been planned in advance and mentioned by Fazal Muqeem as one which "will be held"55  at the time of writing his book on the army.

The only positive aspect of this exercise not mentioned by Gul was reduction of the size of an armoured regiment from 75 to 44 Tanks56.  This was a positive improvement since an armoured regiment with 75 Tank was an administrative nightmare and difficult to tactically control. The tanks rendered surplus were used to raise four more armoured regiments which were allotted to the infantry divisions and certainly improved their battle potential. As a result four more armoured regiments (22,23,24 & 25 Cavalry) were raised in 1962.57

During the period 1954-65 various Pakistani armour officers were sent to attend courses at the US Armour School Fort Knox . These courses however played limited role in the development of the Pakistanis since the US way of warfare was lavish and totally different from that of the Indo Pak scenario in terms of terrain, comparative level of infantry mobility etc. However, some officers who were assigned to revise tank manuals did employ US manuals apart from British tank manuals to good use as this scribe discovered while serving in the Tactical Wing of the School of Armour in the period 1990-91! 58 

Again during the same period professionalism in tank regiments varied from unit to unit. There was the case of a unit that painted the muzzle ends of the barrel of its main gun where cuttings are made to bore sight the guns and, would have been not very effective, had it been employed  in the 1965 war! There were cases of newly raised units led by some excellent officers like the 25 Cavalry. Thus on one side there were units who were as as non professional as British cavalry who were notoriously incompetent in fame for lopping off their own horses heads59 instead of the enemy's,  because of poor cavalry swordmanship standards. On the other hand  there were units where professional efficiency was higher due to force of tradition or by virtue of having excellent commanding officers. In this regard the British system of each tank regiment having its own idiosyncrasies worked mostly in a negative manner! As I discovered much later that each tank regiment was as distinct from another as one Hindu caste from another and this was even in terms of training, operating procedures etc! The point is that the transformation from cavalry to mechanisation was thus not fully incorporated neither in the British Army nor in the British Indian Army, and the Indian tank experience against the hopelessly undergunned and ill equipped Japanese tanks in Burma in WW Two also was not helpful in developing levels of professional competence necessary in mechanised units.

The period 1951-1965 i.e the Ayubian era, was a period when one man dominated the army and as history has proved, dictators prefer working with men they know, and can trust. This was not helpful for the tank corps since the ruling clique was infantry dominated. I am not hinting that armour as an arm suffered Vis a Vis infantry as Gul's memoirs imply. Nor I am suggesting that there were no potential Guderians or Von Thomas. The point that is being driven home is,  that the emphasis was on thrusting men on the armoured division who were not very imaginative or professional, but were essentially , loyal and dependable men. The same was true for infantry too, but armour despite being a highly specialised arm was treated as no different from infantry. In the process some relatively gifted armour officers without good family connections and without having the advantage of belonging to the ruling cliques regimental groups were sidelined. War record for promotion to higher ranks was no criteria at that time as has remained the case till to date, since its Godfather had the most dubious war record in the Indian Army of WW Two!

The Pakistan Armoured Corps thus remained a ceremonial but much neglected arm during the period 1951-65. No serious thought was given to developing a special Indo Pak doctrine of employment of the armoured division in the framework of a corps. The emphasis in the Ayubian army was on the "New Concept of Defence" which revolved around the infantry division and as per one general officer of that time "did not last even for the first day of 1965 War"!60  The ideas of the senior officers of that time about armour were vague but it was generally thought that Pakistani armour would perform roles similar to those of the German armour of 1940! The concept of friction and the independent will of the enemy was not really understood by these men who were of the firm conviction that by virtue of having martial races and better US tanks, it would not be very difficult to teach the Indians a good lesson in case of war! It was fashionable to read or pose to read "Rommel Papers"61 and Liddell Hart's "Strategy the Indirect Approach" 62   but no serious attempt was made in the armoured corps ,as the tank manuals and journals of that time amply prove,  to understand the real mechanics of tank warfare or the essence of Blitzkrieg.

Even at the armoured brigade level no credible doctrine/tactics of the armoured battle at brigade level was developed . Each unit jealously guarded its traditions and remained a closed entity for other armoured units even within the same brigade. The armoured brigade commanders developed a similar to infantry brigade commanders with fixed field headquarters with reliance on despatch riders and liaison officers whereas mobile operations demanded that the armoured brigade commander stayed close to the leading regiment while his staff looked after the brigade headquarters.

The emphasis thus remained on the thinking that each unit must increase its battle honours while training at brigade and divisional level was neglected. Gul states that many of the armour commanders who performed miserably in 1965 were never tested in peacetime training. Thus while commenting on the pathetic handling of armour in Khem Karan in 1965 Gul said "It seems (commenting on Khem Karan operations) that the two Headquarters  (11 Division and 1st Armoured Division) were paralysed by the very dimension of their undertaking........Had they physically handled their commands on manoeuvres in more normal times,they would have been either found out, and should have been sacked, or the enormity of the task that  confronted them later in the war would not have benumbed them".63

On the eve of 1965 war the Pakistan Armoured Corps was organised as following64:—