Quoting the Latin saying “Si vis pacem, para bellum” (if you want peace, prepare for war), Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan set the tone for Ran Samwad 2025 as it began here on Tuesday.
Clearly outlining that India, though a peace-loving nation, was not a pacifist, the CDS, in his keynote address on the opening day of the two-day seminar, stated that “peace without power is utopian.”
Affirming that India has always stood on the side of peace, the CDS said, “We are a peace-loving nation, but don’t get mistaken, we cannot be pacifists. I think peace without power is utopian.”
Emphasizing on the four major trends that will reshape and become an integral part of the future conflicts, Chauhan, the brainchild behind the Ran Samwad, said that apart from technology, the seminar will also focus upon what kind of wars will happen in the future, the background for this.
“In my view, there are four essential trends that I foresee. First, there is an increased propensity amongst nations and governments to use force, and this is happening because political objectives today can be achieved by short-duration conflicts.
“The second trend which I see is a lack of distinction between war and peace, this particular era, which we knew in the past of declared wars, I think that’s all over. Contemporary warfare today is a kind of continuum of five C’s – competition, crisis, confrontation, conflict and combat, between wars,” the General said.
“The third important thing is the importance of people. In the past wars, because of territory and ideology, people and soldiers were sacrificed. The fourth important trend I think we can debate is the matrices of victory and how we perceive victory. In the past, matrices of victory were probably defined by losses inflicted in terms of men and equipment.
“In 1971, we had 95,000 Pakistanis captured. But in today’s warfare, probably the new matrices of warfare or victory are the speed and tempo of operations, effects of long-range precision strikes,” he added.
Stressing on the need of producing scholar warriors who are adept in the art of both Shastra (weapon) and Shaastra (knowledge), General Chauhan said, “As a Viksit Bharat, we also need to be ‘Shashastra’, ‘Suraksit’ and ‘Aatmanirbhar’. Not only in technology, but also in ideas and in practice. Hence, there is a need to increase awareness on all fragments of our society on doctrinal and conceptual aspects, that’s the academic pursuits of how war is fought and practical and actual war fighting techniques and tactics.” he said.
Stating that Operation Sindoor, launched to avenge the Pahalgam attack, was still ongoing, General Chauhan said that it was a modern conflict. “Operation Sindoor was a modern conflict from which we learned a number of lessons, and most of them are under implementation, some have been implemented. The operation is still on. We are not here to discuss Operation Sindoor. We are here to discuss something beyond Operation Sindoor.”
Citing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Independence Day address, General Chauhan discussed the development of the Sudarshan Chakra, an advanced defence system envisioned as a future counterpart to Israel’s Iron Dome.
“A second aspect for discussion in this seminar is the Sudarshan Chakra, India’s own Iron Dome or Golden Dome. The Prime Minister mentioned this on 15th August, stating that the Sudarshan Chakra will enhance India’s strategic defence and is expected to be rolled out by 2035. The aim is to develop a system to protect India’s strategic, civilian, and nationally important sites,” he said.
He emphasized that once developed, the system will function as both a defensive and offensive tool, integrating capabilities for detection, tracking, and elimination of threats. “It will require the development of robust infrastructure and processes, using both soft and hard skills, including kinetic and directed energy weapons,” General Chauhan added.