PM Modi, Our Special Forces are Good But Not as Good as Israelis

A nation haunted by IC-814 hijack shouldn’t liken itself to efficient Israeli operations, writes Chandan Nandy.

Killing a man is murder unless you do it to the sound of trumpets.

Voltaire

Slightly less than a year before Narendra Modi became prime minister — he was still Gujarat chief minister — his publicity machinery, powered by an American company called Apco Worldwide, headed, among others, by a couple of former Mossad officers, claimed that he rescued 15,000 Gujaratis stranded in flood-ravaged Uttarakhand.

Cut to 18 October, 2016. Speaking at a public rally in hilly Mandi in Himachal Pradesh, Modi proclaimed proudly that the surgical strikes against Pakistani terrorists by Indian special forces well across the Line of Control was nothing short of the mythical intelligence and counter-terror operations that the Israeli Mossad is known for. It is another matter that Mossad also has had its share of abysmal failures.

Also Read: Modi Likens Indian Army’s Surgical Strikes to Israel’s Expoilts

Comparing Apples with Oranges

We know nothing to suggest whether Modi is familiar with some of the no-holds-barred counter-terror operations of the Mossad — the abduction of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann from Argentina (1960), the revenge assassination (1972) of the killers of Israeli Olympians in Munich, scores of other assassinations across a quarter of the globe and, of course, Entebbe (1976). Till the 90s, the Mossad, or HaMossad leModi’in ule Tafkidim Meyuhadim (Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations), was described as the world’s most “efficient killing machine”.

What we do know, however, is that Modi has as National Security Advisor Ajit Doval who as an Intelligence Bureau officer is said to have undertaken a few operations that supposedly matched the guile and ruthlessness of the Mossad. And what we do know a little more about Doval is that he did have friends in the Mossad when he served in the IB.

Let us be clear about India’s September 2016 surgical strikes against terrorists and some of their infrastructure in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir and the Mossad’s derring-do. It would be comparing apples and oranges. While Mossad does carry out highly covert intelligence operations worldwide, it does not undertake military missions, which is the job of the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) and the Aman (military intelligence), in neighbouring, hostile Arab countries.

The Mossad, as Meir Amit, one of its former chiefs, has said, “is like the official hangman or the doctor on death row who administers the lethal injection. Our actions are all endorsed by the State of Israel. When Mossad kills, it is not breaking the law. It is fulfilling a sentence sanctioned by the prime minister of the day.”

Mossad Operations Known for their Finesse

The Indian special forces’ surgical strikes were certainly sanctioned by Modi and executed by army commandos, not for the first time and neither was it the last, though it will be tough, if not impossible, to replicate such action in the future.

The point is that while Israel has almost always gotten away with its black operations, India doesn’t enjoy either that stature or the quiet support of the country that matters the most — the United States. Hitting terrorists and their staging grounds across the LoC was a one-off, a counter-attack that took the militants and their Pakistani army minders by surprise. The Pakistanis are no push-overs and they will certainly be on their guard in the future.

What Modi must acknowledge is reality. Even if we were to consider for a moment his tenuous comparison, what comes to mind is IDF commandos and Mossad’s audacious Entebbe operation and the wishy-washy way in which Indian intelligence handled the December 1999 Kandahar hijack when the first NDA regime under AB Vajpayee was at the helm.

What marked out Entebbe, in Uganda, was the boldness of the operation (codenamed Thunderbolt) that rescued 248 passengers from an Air France flight hijacked by a joint team of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the German Revolutionary Cells. Backed by a Mossad plan and intelligence, the Israeli commandos travelled 4,000 kms to accomplish their mission.

Haunted by the Ignominy of Kandahar Hijack

But of course, in Kandahar, India earned the freedom of 176 passengers and crew members of Indian Airlines flight IC-814 by meekly handing over three hardened terrorists, including Maulana Masood Azhar, who now heads Jaish-e-Mohammad, besides a trunk-load of dollars. There was no question of an Entebbe-like operation because we had (and still don’t have) neither the competence nor the clinical precision/efficiency of the Israelis.

The best that was done was to dispatch a team of IB and RAW officers to negotiate with the Taliban to secure the release of the passengers. On the team was Doval who was then an IB special director, waiting in the wings to take over as director, a position he assumed for just six months between July 2004 and January 2005.

Also Read: 16 Years On, Mystery of RAW Officer on Hijacked IC-814 Remains

Israel Has Well-Defined Security Doctrine

Throughout its history, Israel has faced acute challenges to its national security since its birth in 1948. Despite this condition, Israel, which in the eyes of many countries practices its own form of terror, has never officially articulated all the elements of its national security doctrine. Israel’s national security concerns, however, have extended — and still do — far beyond the conventional battlefield.

At the low end of the unconventional warfare spectrum, Israel has been subjected to almost continuous violence in the form of terrorism and guerrilla warfare (mainly Palestinian and Lebanese, but often sponsored by Arab states and Iran), insurrection (primarily Palestinian), and border skirmishing (along its frontiers with Egypt, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon).

Modi might crow about the success across the LoC, but mere chest-thumping calls to greatness alone will not win him the tough battle against Pakistan-sponsored terrorism. What Modi needs foremost is a national security doctrine, not woolly-headed utterances of Home Minister Rajnath Singh, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and sundry RSS men who are used to wielding only lathis.