In February 1999, Pakistani Army personnel, disguised as jihadi militants, infiltrated into mountainous Kargil and occupied key vantage points. Their intrusion triggered a limited war between the world's newest nuclear states. It was a bitter battle, and one that threw up important lessons for India's defence preparedness, as also its responses to conflicts such as this. This incisive book by General V.P. Malik, former Chief of the Army Staff, analyses the reasoning behind the Pakistani Ar...

Operation Cactus was a unique mission for the Indian Army. Within hours of receiving an appeal for assistance from the Government of Maldives, Indian troops rescued President Abdul Gayoom and foiled a coup detat attempt by rebel forces led by Abdullah Luthufi and assisted by the Tamil secessionist group from Sri Lanka, the People's Liberation Organization of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE). On the notice of a few hours, the Indian military put together a strong task force that flew non-stop over 3,000...

A book on India's defence and military diplomacy from a Chief of the Indian Army General V.P. Malik, Chief of the Indian Army from 1 October 1997 to 30 September 2000, writes about his experiences in the field and important strategic events in which he was involved during his service. He has focused on decision-making processes that were followed at the political and military strategic levels as well as at the operational level. In India, such important decisions are seldom recorded in det...

""General Malik's book...stands out as perhaps the most valuablecontribution to our military literature since Independence.""-The Tribune""Malik deserves credit for a frank and refreshing analysis of thefirst limited war fought by two nuclear powered states. His theoryabout the possibilities of further conflict would go a long way inshaping India's military strategy.""...

Jews who have made India their home have flourished without adverse discrimination. Of this, the Baghdadi Sephardic community is very small in number but has produced one of India's greatest contemporary soldiers, Lt Gen. Jack Jacob. This is his fascinating story. As a small boy, Jacob, who was from a business family, was sent to a residential public school in Darjeeling along with his two brothers. When the Second World War broke out, Jacob without informing his family joined the army in ...

Ask anyone from India about Jammu and Kashmir, and he or she will tell you it is the home of spirituality. Its a beautiful place blessed by the gods with beautiful rivers, calm lakes, picturesque waterfalls, and cypress trees. Its famous for its ancient Mughal heritage and Hindu shrines. But toady these places are in news for something else: Islamic extremistsespecially those operating from Pakistancontinue to terrorize residents, visitors and spreading militancy in region. Azad Singh Rath...

The end of the Cold War introduced an altered global dynamic. The old bond of East/West patronage in Africa was broken, weakening the first crop of independent revolutionary leadership on the continent who no longer had the support of one or other of the superpowers. With collapse of the Soviet Union, all this changed. The question of global/strategic security devolved into regional peacekeeping and peace enforcement, characterized primarily by the Balkans War, but also many other minor re...

Fifty years in a nation's life is a small period of time. However, it is quite likely that collective memory will have faded about several events…and so it is with the 1965 war that India was dragged into by Pakistan's chronic insecurities and territorial ambitions. This time in the form of a forcible attempt to annex Kashmir. Today, the details of the war that came between the tragedy of 1962 and the triumph of 1971 are hazy in the memory of the country.But it is a story that needs...

India’s armed forces play a key role in protecting the country and occupy a special place in the Indian people’s hearts, yet standard accounts of contemporary Indian history rarely have a military dimension. In India’s Wars, serving Air Vice Marshal Arjun Subramaniam seeks to rectify that oversight by giving India’s military exploits their rightful place in history. Subramaniam begins India’s Wars with a frank call to reinvigorate the study of military history as part of ...

Things are never what they seem, especially in the world of international politics. Janet Chang appears to be an attractive, successful scientist, but shes really a Chinese spy, sent to degrade United States nuclear submarine capability. If she succeeds, Americas potential ally, India, will dismantle and fall apart. Of course, China isnt the only country out to get India on the ropes.Syed Ali is a former member of Pakistans Inter Services Intelligence who served as a long term ment...

For the first time, the Ministry of Defence, Government of India, has made public the official records of the 1965 war with Pakistan. This book provides the detailed military history as per military records maintained by the History Division of the MoD.

In 2009, the Sri Lankan government forces literally eradicated the Tamil Tiger insurgency after 26 years of civil war. This was the first time that a government had defeated an indigenous insurgency by force of arms. It was as if the British army killed thousands of IRA cadres to end the war in Northern Ireland. The story of this war is fascinating in itself, besides the international repercussions for terrorism and insurgency worldwide. Many countries involved themselves in the war to arm...