Navy officer blames IAF for ‘trust deficit’

NEW DELHI: The Indian Air Force has harmed itself by opposing ‘theaterisation’ and this has resulted in weakening of trust between it and the army and the navy, a top navy officer wrote in a new paper published by defence think-tank Centre for Joint Warfare Studies (Cenjows) on Friday in a rare criticism of one service by a serving senior officer in another.

The paper, titled ‘The IAF and Theaterisation — Misplaced Apprehensions,’ is a deep dive into the military’s approach towards enhancing so-called jointmanship and its progression toward theaterisation. Jointmanship refers to a degree of co-ordination and integration in terms of both strategy and execution across the three services. Theaterisation refers to placing under a Theatre Commander, specific units of the army, the navy, and the air force.

There is stiff resistance from the IAF to theaterisation, or setting up of integrated commands where the assets of all three defence arms would come under the operational control of a threestar officer from any of the three services, depending on the function assigned to that command.

“By continuing to stress on a ‘do it alone’ command structure, the IAF has only harmed itself. It has resulted in a weakening of trust with the other two services who have attempted to resolve the issue by investing into integral air power,” rear admiral Monty Khanna wrote.