CDS Appointment & Command Restructuring: News & Discussions

[SBajwa]

[Rakesh]

Modi govt sets timeline for theaterisation, work being sped up
https://theprint.in/defence/modi-govt-s ... p/2084552/
14 May 2024

Modi dispensation wants it rolled out within one year of the new govt's swearing-in. Comes after armed forces held a conference to review progress of plan.

[Kanoji]

The plan entails a three-stage process that includes among other things self-reliance, adapting to technology and defining what is integration.

India’s Biggest Military Reforms: Final Shape Given To Contours Of Theatre Commands, Proposal To Be Sent To Government Soon
https://swarajyamag.com/news-brief/indi ... nment-soon
22 May 2024

[AkshaySG]

Has there been any info on the chain of command we finalized on?

Will it be PM - > RM - > Theatre Commanders or will the CDS role also be elevated with operational control.

[Rakesh]

CDS Calls For ‘Jointness 2.0’ For Integrated Theatre Commands
https://bharatshakti.in/cds-calls-for-j ... -commands/
21 May 2024

[VinodTK]

From: The WEEK

Brigadier-rank officers get posting orders for theatre commands

For sure, the theaterisation move is gathering traction even as Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Anil Chauhan, of late, has been travelling the length and breadth of the country meeting the men in uniform, asking them to prepare for what has been called the Indian military’s biggest transformation move.

“And wherever he cannot go due to paucity of time and logistics, he is meeting the officers online in video conferences,” an official familiar with the developments told THE WEEK.

The office of the CDS was created on September 30, 2022, with the core mandate of theaterisation, promoting jointness and integration of the Indian military.

“In the meantime, military officials in the rank of brigadiers in the army and commodores in the air force and the navy have been asked to report to their new integrated postings in a few days from now,” the official added.

The new postings are mainly for Jaipur (Pakistan-centric command), Lucknow (China centric command) and Visakhapatnam (navy centric command).

With theaterisation, a single commander in a designated zone will command all the assets and resources of all forces be it from the army, the navy or the air force stationed in that zone.

The challenges are not just about amalgamation and integration of men but also of weapons systems and platforms that is made more difficult because of the possibility of non-compatability among the systems.

Colonel and below-ranked officers in the army, group captain and below-ranked officers in the air force, captain and below-ranked officers in the navy had already started moving to these commands from about a year back.

The move towards theatre commands encountered its initial hiccups in the IAF’s ‘reservations’ on certain issues. Since then, the ‘reservations’ are understood to have been hammered out.

Last week, CDS Gen Chauhan had said during a speech in an event in New Delhi that “as there were no major differences, there is an impetus to move towards the next level of jointness” among the armed services.

“The creation of such (theatre) commands will separate the ‘operational’ functions from the Raise-Train-Sustain (RTS) and other administrative functions, and will allow greater focus of the operational commander to matters of security”.

Saying that theatre commands will not be an end state but the beginning of the next set of reforms, the CDS said it will lead to the next set of reforms like “single to multi domain operations, fusing space and cyber space into traditional domains, digitisation of battlefield information and visualisation, net centric to data centric among others”.

On May 10 and 11, the CDS presided over a two day ‘Parivartan Chintan’ (transformative discussion) in South Block that was attended by the heads of all Tri-services Institutes and was “aimed at generating novel reformative ideas & initiatives”.